by: Alain Thys
A few weeks ago, T-Mobile in the UK appointed Mr. Srini Gopalan as its new CMO. I do not know the gentleman, nor his beliefs, but if there were one message I would give to him is "please don’t tell your people to change direction". Because I believe that they are "getting it".
And this is great news. I’ve grown tired of complaining and lamenting about the things that are wrong with marketing. How marketers are not adding value and frankly speak a language no other business person understands. How campaigns annoy us. How billions are wasted.
While this rethoric is still required in the less brightly lit parts of the marketing universe, I want to talk about the emergence of a sustainable type of marketing that builds a monetisable reputation for a brand by engaging its customers in a relevant way.
From a comms perspective, the latest T-mobile crowd-project does exactly that. It is relevant, it definitely engages and if they keep it up I can see it build advocacy and loyalty across the country.
So while I don’t know whether the thinking has already permeated to the other marketing parts of the T-Mobile business (product, business models, channels, …) I just wanted to give a double thumbs up for “Hey Jude”.
Marketing should change. You’re showing the world it can be done.
A Post Scriptum to the agencies, brands or others that now feel compelled to have 10K of their customers sing the Chiwawa song: DON’T.
