How to Lead Change in Marketing : 5 Proven Action Guides
Today ’ s marketing executives are in the race of their life – the Revenue Race . In order to be competitive in the B2B marketplace , taking responsibility for a revenue number and growing a Revenue Marketing practice that drives repeatable , predictable and scalable revenue is the game changer and the key to success .
There is nothing more difficult to take in hand , more perilous to conduct , or more uncertain in its success , than to take the lead in the introduction of a new order of things – Niccolo Machiavelli
Yet , how many companies are willing to let marketing be a part of the revenue team and drive in this race ? Few and this is why Change Management is a critical skill for today ’ s marketing executive .
Leadership in Five Stages
I ’ ve been in this market since 2004 when I bought my first marketing automation system . Since then , I ’ ve seen companies power through change and I ’ ve seen other companies hit the wall . What is common in this change process for all companies is an understanding that there are five stages to successfully driving change . They are Disruption- Resistance-Acceptance-Adoption-Advocacy . Let ’ s take a look at each one , identify the key outcomes and provide an executable Action Guide to complete this journey .
Disruption
The change model begins with Disruption . In this stage , the status quo is no longer good enough both for the company and marketing . Some tipping point has occurred typically as a result of company performance , changing market dynamics , competition , new strategies or shareholder influence .
In other words , your organization is open to change including changing the role of marketing in the company . Once this situation is in place , be ready as a leader with a vision for change and a credible business case for change . This is leadership 101 and is essential to the outcomes of the next steps in this process .
The outcome of this first stage is acceptance of a broadly communicated set of reasons to change , a business case for change and a vivid description of the role marketing can play in driving revenue .
Action Guide : 1 . Educate key stakeholders and use the language of business .
2 . Talk about a new way to grow top line revenue , save money , become more efficient and more competitive .
3 . Gather and present research ( including what the competition is doing )– there is a lot out there and this builds the case for change .
Resistance and Awareness : Resistance is a natural part of change in organizations and this stage is all about recognizing this resistance and implementing strategies for each major stakeholder group . Resistance may present itself in a number of ways , including the web team objecting to any changes to the external site , sales teams unwilling to commit to utilizing CRM , executives who don ’ t see how marketing can contribute to revenue , or sales not participating in defining new processes because they don ’ t think marketing knows anything about qualifying leads .
14 Strictly Marketing Magazine September / October 2016