How To Win Big In the Hearts Of Your Customers, Colleagues And Stakeholders – Top 3 Traits Of Successful Marketing Leaders

In an article on Inc. Magazine, Warren Buffet shared his hiring advice. 

“We look for three things when we hire people. We look for intelligence, we look for initiative or energy, and we look for integrity. And if they don’t have the latter, the first two will kill you, because if you’re going to get someone without integrity, you want them lazy and dumb.” – Warren Buffet.

Hiring the right people to groom and promote in the ranks are important to the success of any organisation. It is beneficial to employees as it boost their morale and make them loyal employees. At the same time, it is also important for the employer as they retain the best in the field who will bring increased productivity and profits.

Just like any leaders in the team, marketing leaders play an essential role in the success of an organisation. They usually possess a combination of organisational experience and individual capabilities to develop strategic marketing campaigns that will transform their organisation’s brand to one that is reputable and trusted in the eyes of their customers. 

Personal Engagement Drives Brand Success

In the digital world, our customers search the internet and go online before they make a decision to follow or buy a product or service. Marketing leaders are the heart to the organisation’s reputation centre. They provide clear communication goals, ensure consistent messaging across all owned, earned and paid platforms. They also need to be great influencers to gain support and buy-in from colleagues, management, stakeholders and most importantly, their customers, for the business to thrive.

A good or popular brand is usually associated with good reputation, engaging tactics that catches the customer’s attention and followed by many people.  How did these brands end up so successful are simple – their marketing strategies are well-thought out, supported by all levels in the organisation and captures the hearts and minds of their target audience.

No Disneyland Magic

Now, marketing success does not happen on its own. Unfortunately, it is unlike Disneyland where the Fairy Godmother waves her wand and turns magic into making your brand number 1 in the market. Behind a successful and well-executed marketing strategy is strong leadership who can entice your customers to swear by your brand, drive high number of website traffic, get good leads and conversions and even inspire people to be hired in your organisation.

Traits of a Top Marketing Leader

Let’s discuss three of the top traits that makes a great marketing leader.

Intelligence. Marketing leaders are good decision makers, transparent and innovative. They are sharp and are totally tuned-in to the demographics of the target audience, their customer’s persona and feedback. They study intelligence reports from various sources to make informed decisions on what worked and what needs to be improved. Being transparent encourages positive conversations and allow them to provide advice and opportunity to implement strategies to the stakeholders as well as come out with more innovative ideas. Through engagement and research, marketing leaders develop content and tactics that meet their target audience needs and increase leads. Intelligent marketing leaders are also able to attract and build a team full of highly intelligent people and motivate them to drive success together.

Initiative. A great market leader is one who sees collaboration as opportunities to drive sales. They are the live wire of the organisation and work with various units to ensure they accomplish similar goals for the brand. This includes being an innovator, a good listener, analytical problem solver and peace-maker when arrowed with various views and debates. At the end of the day, establishing a customer-centric solution is key. They also look at all the various communication channels to ensure consistent messaging in their blogs, websites, social media platforms and print brochures, advertisements and management communication. 

Good marketers leaders will know what kind of questions to seek and the answers they need to make their brands successful. These include:

• Did we hit our target this month? 
• What were the biggest opportunities or challenges?
• What problems did we help to solve?
• Which channel and messages were the most successful and why?
• Will we get repeat customers or new ones?
• What can we improve on?

Energy. Despite being digital natives, nothing beats a face to face engagement between a customer and their brands. Customers appreciate these exchanges and it is important that marketing leaders incorporate that in their strategies. IBM Watson Personality Insights describe energetic leaders as those that “lead fast-paced and busy lives. They do things and move about quickly, energetically and vigorously and they are involved in many activities.”

They are driven and are rather active leaders rather than passive. They would rally the team and activate activities and events. They include preparing for networking events and communication conferences, driving events and arranging stakeholder’s engagements with senior management to build relationships. It is precisely their energy, high enthusiasm and personal communication traits that drives actions and achieves goals.

I suppose these top traits are not unique only to marketing leaders but having them will definitely make you a sought-after leader in your niche area. What are some of the other traits a marketing leader should possess?