Marketers urged to be innovative

The call was made by the Dialogue Group Director, Tonderai Tsara yesterday at the first Marketing and Communication Dialogue Workshop that was held under the theme ‘key consumer trends from across the continent’.

Marketers from the private sector as well as parastatals such as the BITC, Local Enterprise Authority and Debswana, to mention a few, attended the workshop.

Tsara said they decided to put together the workshop because they needed to bring together marketers and public relations people to share ideas as well as open their eyes to possibilities out there.

“I have realised that local marketers are not innovating or evolving enough as our customers already are.

“Customers are looking for experiences, engagements and looking to have a conversation while we are using the wrong tools, when we should be engaging them and creating the experience building emotions to get their adrenaline going. 

“We are doing the traditional stuff which is not necessarily effective,” he said

According to Tsara, the difference between consumers and the digital space is no longer visible as people have access to portals.

He added that the

growth-marketing environment in Botswana is stagnant while other industries are growing.

“Marketers need (to) find ways to transform into the digital era, understand their brands well and find ways to roll it out.

“They need to know the developments that are out there, the impact and the implications that they have in these brands and sharing the best work,” said Tsara.

Chief Executive Officer of brand building company, VWV, Terry Behan said marketers need to understand that brands are supposed to build an emotional relationship with their consumers, adding that brands are quite keen to decomoditise what they sell.

“There is a new emerging trend in the marketing arena referred to as consumer jacking where you engage a small number of people, record and share with the social media to reach a large audience,” he said.

Behan said this strategy is relevant as the social media is spreading very fast thus exposing products to the whole world.

He also urged the marketers to understand to ignore the brand surveys because they all wrong and have very limited metrics.

Marketers urged to be innovative