Digital marketing transformation at global level - Bacardi Global Brands, Diageo plc and SABMiller
The Situation
As the digital revolution rolled across marketing, beginning in earnest around 2000, first websites, then social media, then content, then mobile, then data and analytics in turn disrupted how brands are built and grown, and how consumers are engaged and sold to. International consumer brand owners needed actionable thought leadership and entirely fresh insights to reframe and reconfigure their approaches.
The Task
Between 2006 and 2012, I was engaged by the global digital leadership, first at BGB, then at Diageo, and later at SABMiller, to support them as essential – and often beleaguered – change leaders, in their task of understanding, shaping and embedding new philosophies of branding, marketing and advertising into the world’s largest drinks companies and their scores of leading brands.
The Action / Approach
Having begun on my own digital path as early as 1989, and published one of the earliest and respected digital textbooks in 2002, I was well positioned to provide the experience and guidance that these clients urgently needed, in a period when the marketing landscape was being severely and frequently disrupted, and traditional rules and tools were no longer sufficient.
I advised the digital and marketing leads across all three firms, also engaging with the marketing leadership at global brand level – e.g. in Bacardi Rum, Grey Goose, Bombay Sapphire, Johnny Walker, Tanqueray, Blackbush and Peroni – to provide support and guidance in converting new strategic approaches into digital brand campaigns and consumer engagement platforms.
I also created and implemented powerful planning methodologies that – for the first time – integrated all key advertising channels and combined traditional impression-based advertising with the new engagement-based models dictated by experiential and content marketing.
The Result
Across all three clients – in particular BGB and Diageo – the frameworks, concepts and day-to-day language of brand marketing and advertising were conclusively changed. Diageo developed an entirely new narrative of digital value, “Behind The Line” marketing, which was adopted across the C-suite and, when introduced to Wall Street and the City, resulted in an immediate and sharp life in its share price. Most important, the global digital teams were equipped to confidently drive positive innovation and transformation into and across all key territories and brands.
The following endorsements perhaps summarise the key impacts and outcomes best:
“His deep experience and expertise in consumer value in digital, the impacts on social and content strategy, and the implications for both the creative and planning aspects of brand building, were invaluable to me at the time, and we continue to collaborate closely today.” (Global Director of Digital, Bacardi Global Brands)
“Mike’s razor sharp mind, his depth of experience and knowledge in the behavioural drivers of the social networking revolution and his ability to bring it to life through analogy, are some of the qualities I experienced that have made him the respected thought leader and author that he is.” (Global Director of Digital, Diageo plc)
