strategy

Marketing Today: How to Diagnose A Brand By Mark Ritson

by Alan Hart , June 26, 2019

This week on the “Marketing Today” podcast, I speak with Mark Ritson, adjunct professor of marketing at the Melbourne Business School, who also runs the Mini MBA in Marketing program in collaboration with the U.K. publication Marketing Week, and writes for Marketing Week as well.

Ritson has worked globally as a private marketing consultant for clients like PepsiCo, Subaru, Eli Lilly, Donna Karan, Westpac, Shiseido, Flight Centre, Johnson & Johnson, De Beers, Sephora, and Unilever. He also spent 13 years as the in-house professor for LVMH, the world's largest luxury group that handles brands like Louis Vuitton, Dom Perignon and Hennessy.

Ritson uses his wealth of information and his sharp sense of humor in the podcast, addressing topics like the often-misunderstood topic of brand diagnosis.

And if you are a fan of the Effie Awards as Ritson and I are, you will enjoy hearing what Ritson has learned during the course of his extensive Effie research. Also, find out why Ritson is getting really excited about the idea of “post-digital marketing,” and why he feels you are currently listening to the best marketing podcast in the world.

Ritson shares his valuable brand understanding: “You have to go to the place where the brand was born,” says Ritson. “You split up brand management into three distinct slices: the first part diagnosis, the next strategy, the final part tactics.”

Highlights from this week’s “Marketing Today”:

-- Mark Ritson shares what he has been working on with Marketing Today. (01:58)

-- How should people go about diagnosing their brand? (04:44)

-- Ritson shares his take on social listenin, with Twitter as an example. (09:40)

-- Why is it so hard to get CMOs to talk about how to manage brands? (11:25)

-- After brand diagnosis, should the next step be positioning the brand or defining its core purpose? (13:49)

-- Brands can support a multitude of causes while also turning a profit. (16:55)

-- Purpose watching is, unfortunately,being used as a smokescree nby some companies that aren’t living up to their claimed behavior. (19:58)

-- What has Ritson learned from his research about the Effie Awards? (22:21)

-- What is the difference between distinctiveness and differentiation? (25:47)

-- The biggest ROI factor is that you already have scale. (27:37)

-- Why aren’t we discussing whether media quality is any good or not? (28:55)

-- Why is Ritson so excited about “post-digital marketing?” (30:54)

-- What is the most absurd thing that Ritson is thinking about now? (37:56)

-- Where does Ritson get most of his information? (41:34)

-- Is there an opportunity that marketers should be capitalizing on right now? (42:57)

Resources Mentioned:

EP43: First time Mark was on the podcast

marketing

Next story loading