Tomorrow's business leaders are today's marketers

Prof Roger Sinclair, managing director of BrandMetrics, believes marketers are following the accountants and not leading businesses as they ought to be doing: "All of the income in an organization is generated by what marketers do - they market the brand, and keep or acquire new customers based on this. If customers like the brand, they buy more of its products.

"Analysts recognized this long ago and a good example is Tiger Brands. Their share price went up by 8% last year when the company decided to release an annual report that concentrated on its various brands."

Sinclair's point is that in less than one in four cases is there a marketer on the board of SA listed companies.

"That's a shocking statistic and it's a reality because we don't talk the financial language of the board. Even engineers are being accepted onto boards and getting the budgets they want because they've learnt to talk the right language.

"We ask for R4 million to buy TV ads and that's simply not a good explanation of what we're really doing in the organization."

Sinclair says one thing is for certain - a consequence of the new accounting standards is that it will bring the finance and marketing functions closer together: "Once brands are on the balance sheet, management will show an elevated interest in what the marketing people are doing to enhance and accelerate the income that these assets generate."

Marketer and author Richard Coombes says 80% of marketing is the product itself, yet this is often outside the control of the marketers: "We are trained to look outwards at markets, environment and competition, but if 80% is delivery of the product, then we are looking in the wrong direction.

"We need to apply our marketing skills internally and shift to a leadership role."

Coombes also echoed yesterday's speakers when he emphasized the importance of the role of good research again and again.

"You have to know where you are starting from in order to build on your plans. Often companies think they are in one place when the reality is far different."

He cites the example of a trucking company which rated (internally) its parts department as the very best in the market because of a new process, yet external research revealed it was second to last in the market in this department because of its slow turn-around time.

He believes that finding people's personal drivers or passions will unlock the key to a motivated, healthy staff who are then able to deliver on the organisation's promises.

The MFSA is running a well-organised conference with an impressive line-up of speakers, yet attendance has been poor and there has been a surprising scarcity of advertisers, when much of the material under discussion is of direct relevance to them.