Microsoft’s Chief Marketing Officer on building strong teams, surprising research, and the technologies that are shaping the marketing of the future.
develops the brands and businesses they work for.
We talk with Kamila Cichocka conduit cn mobile phone numbers database Marketing Director at Microsoft, about the role empathy plays in marketing, what current trends shape the marketing of the future and what can surprise an expert in this industry with many years of experience.
For over 13 years, Kamila Cichocka has been involved in marketing, and in her current role, she leads extensive activities in this area, covering all Microsoft product groups. She is an enthusiast of inclusive marketing and believes that brands should engage in socially important issues. In her opinion, marketing of strong brands is a combination of empathy, respect for the consumer and long-term, strategic planning. At Lab, Kamila Cichocka runs one of the most popular courses – “Marketing Director”.
What specialists make up a strong marketing team and how to hire the right people?
It’s time to appreciate the diversity of teams. For me, a marketing dream team is a group with diverse competencies, where different ideas and views are respected. Today, marketing teams need analysts, people managing complex projects, as well as specialists in narrow areas of marketing tactics and communication skills.
Today, technology is an essential element of marketing how to check website traffic which is why hard skills are especially important. However, the biggest challenge is still building a team of strong personalities and creating an organizational culture where creative courage can flourish.
Soft skills remain equally important at the moment. Empathy is very important in marketing, because this is where understanding our customer begins. It is crucial to speak to people with respect and care for their needs. It is also important to match the message to the recipient. Reach them with examples and specific solutions in a way they understand. Respecting and respecting the recipient’s privacy, systematically and patiently building trust, through the highest quality content and fully tailored to the recipient’s needs, are the foundations of building engagement.
For me, marketing is more than just making a creative campaign, improving a sales funnel or the lowest possible cost of reaching a target group. Marketing is not short-term manipulation of people through low prices, playing on their emotions or exploiting their unconsciousness. Marketing is a large dose of empathy and strategic long-term actions with respect for the recipient.
In your opinion, do university marketing studies prepare specialists for very important the modern realities of working in marketing? Are there any skills that are most often lacking in those who come to work fresh out of college?
Studies of course provide the foundation ej leads knowledge and the ability to acquire it. The times when we acquired knowledge at university once, using it later in our professional lives, are long gone. Today, we all learn our whole lives, and, repeating after Alvin Toffler, the illiterate in the 21st century are not those who cannot write or read, but those who cannot learn, then unlearn, and then learn again.
What do you do to keep your finger on the pulse at all times?
I learn every day. I take care of the time I devote to my development, whether it is a new book, podcast, presentation, participation in conferences or exchange of ideas with other practitioners. In the face of the many tasks we have every day, sometimes it is difficult to plan time for learning, because this task is most often not enforced by anyone from the outside, has no deadline, so it is easy to lose sight of it. I like the saying that in life there are important and urgent things. Naturally, we jump into urgent tasks and sometimes the important ones slip away from us. My proven method is to plan time for learning in the calendar.