The Battle: Marketing contra Finance
Are
marketing professionals and finance executives still arguing about the
relationship between ROI and marketing? That’s a good question, but as time has
passed marketing has taken a major shift as most know towards social media.
Marketing executives are now not only trying to prove how marketing strategies
affects the bottom-line but now we are taxed with how social media affects it
as well. The disagreements between marketing and finance seem to revolve around
the aspect of how the two are relative.
In 2007, Joseph McCafferty - CFO
Magazine, wrote an article about this downhill battle between the two equally
important business functions and at that time the two could not come to terms.
McCafferty noted “At many companies the two functions do not work together to
develop measures; sometimes they battle one another.” It could even be said
that some years ago, not too long ago, companies in economic downturn would
make marketing cuts first. Now any savvy finance executive would know better as
marketing drives growth.
The marketing manager must understand numbers and
how relative they are to the growth of the company and in addition to that the
finance director must comprehend strategic marketing. The two must work
together to properly display and account for the practices and strategies in
place to increase overall growth. Luckily marketing metrics have been improving
and it is no longer a rare and uncommon practice, but more so than ever any
company no matter which industry is interested in the metrics, especially
considering multi-channel marketing or integrated marketing plans.
With
proper tracking, planning, benchmarks, segmenting, and programs that will
promote the best ROI marketers can provide directives for future investments as
well as capitalize on current investments. Finance counterparts will ensure
that the cash flow and ROI continues to generate but they must be able to see
the data from marketing’s tracking system. This should be an amicable marriage
in business, not a battle.
No Contest!
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