Telefonica Vice President of Marketing Maxim Weitzman

Marketing executives want larger, more visionary role in companies

Top marketing directors working for multinationals in Miami and elsewhere are increasingly being invited to join top management at the table and, if not, are often angling for a seat and the opportunity.

The idea is to evolve beyond being merely tactical to helping orchestrate company vision, according to a discussion at WorldCity’s Marketing Connections led by Telefonica USA Vice President of Marketing Maxim Weitzman on Nov. 20.

The potential benefits to the company include better aligning its products and services with both market needs and profitability.

“Most successful companies in the world are built on marketing,” said Olympus Marketing Director Tito Rodriguez. “Proctor & Gamble — they’ve shown it works.”

“If you ask ‘Who is the CMO of Apple?’ most people would say Steve Jobs,” said Cesar Sabroso, vice president of Marketing for A&E Ole Networks.

Informal polling of those in attendance at the Marketing Connections meeting, sponsored by Hewlett-Packard and hosted at the Hyatt Regency in Coral Gables, shows a wide range of perceptions among the CMOs on their roles, from simply placing advertising — a limited and more tactical role — to a broader role in helping define and direct the company’s growth and strategy.

Specific factors influencing the role of marketing mentioned include the attitude and experiences of the “CEO,” in this case it is often the head of the Latin America operation; the economic climate; the specific industry sector of the company; and the increasing complexity of the position, driven by the advent of the internet, social media and other new channels.

Telefonica’s Weitzman, inspired by a book called “The Shift: The Transformation of Today’s Marketers into Tomorrow’s Growth Leaders,” spoke about his efforts to transform marketing within the Americas operations for the Spanish telecommunications giant, one of the largest in the world.

“We’re the check and balance,” he said to the marketing executives gathered. “Are we marketing to the right segment? Giving sales the right tools? Do we have the right message? Getting back to the role of visionary, marketing is the role of putting all the pieces together.”

One of the challenges for some companies is the notion that the product or service sells itself, according to some participants.

“Having been so successful for so long,” said Elisabetta Bell of Caterpillar, where demand often outpaced supply, “it’s a transition.”

“That sounds familiar,” said Novartis’ Andres Graziosi. “ ‘Why do we need marketing? This stuff sells itself.’ “

The global downturn is another factor. As Nortel’s Roberto Ricossa, vice president of Marketing for Nortel, said, “In good times, you’re great. In bad times, they turn you off. It should be the opposite.”

A&E’s Sabroso said, “When they need money, they will cut from marketing. We know that.” And yet, said Diageo’s Colette Noe, “If we don’t protect our brands, we have nothing.”

Support from the top is another factor, as Marcelo Costa, the marketing director of IT consultancy Neoris said. “The way marketing is perceived is the way leadership sees marketing.”

Additionally, the world might be getting smaller thanks to technology and globalization, but it also can be a more complicated.

“Our jobs have become much more complex to reach consumers,” said Noe, representing Diageo, the British liquor company. “The whole internet world is so different. Plus it’s free. How do you operate in that world? How do you control it?”

She indicated in the Latin American operation, about 8 percent of the marketing budget goes to digitial efforts, while company-wide the percentage is about 12 percent.

Also, selling the right product to the right customer is another benefit of early engagement of marketing, several attendees said. That helps to make sure the company can perform as efficiently as possible, neither missing opportunities nor wasting effort where there isn’t one.

For example, at Telefonica, Weitzman said, marketing now has a role in the commission structure for sales, which allows it to link the company’s most profitable products and services to compensation.

“We have a particular segment of the market,” said Olympus Latin America’s Rodriguez, “where we should be working with a particular product. But the sales force has been selling a cheaper product to take care of it (because it’s an easier sale).

“We have a $10,000 product and sales has been using a $5,000 product,” he said, by way of example. “We have got to give you some goals and some training.”

Caterpillar’s Bell had a similar hypothetical. Where marketing can help, she said, is serving as a bridge between Cat’s engineers and its prospective customers, so that a piece of equipment isn’t designed and built at great expense without knowledge of what the customer is willing to pay for.

“The engineers were really proud of how the bucket looked. We put all these features on the machine and the customers don’t need them. If the customer doesn’t need three buckets, why have three buckets? You don’t start from here, you start from the end,” she said, with the end being what the customer wants.

That relationship between sales and marketing is critical, says Nortel’s Ricosso. The excuse “the leak is on your side of the boat” isn’t helpful, he said.

The trick is then broadening the relationship between the traditional one with marketing to the rest of the company. “The more people we touch within the organization, the better it is for us. We can show we add value,” said Costa, representing Neoris.

That, of course, gets back to having influence at the upper reaches of the operation and being part of formulating the company’s vision. “We’re one of the few departments in the company that talks to all departments,” said Luigi Bellizzi of Grupo Latino de Radio. “We talk to sales, we talk to finance, we talk to the CEO.”