MarTech Interview with Angeley Mullins, CMO & CGO at Latana

Angeley Mullins, CMO & CGO at Latana chats about new age marketing skills and practices that marketing teams should adopt more of in this catchup:

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Welcome to this MarTech Series chat Angeley, tell us more about yourself and what inspires you most about marketing?

I actually started out my career in sales and later on became very interested in marketing.  I am always very curious about what motivates and drives people to make decisions . With marketing you have the opportunity to speak with consumers and connect with them- that is one of the most inspiring things about marketing. We get to understand our customers on a core level and connect with them through our products and services. I am also very passionate about Brand and Brand Building and how to use creativity and storytelling to engage our customers. 

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As a CMO, how do you feel the role of the CMO has evolved (or needs to evolve!). In your view, what are some of the skills a CMO-in-office needs to sport more of?

The role of the CMO has changed over the years from being primarily focused on just marketing to now having a much broader scope into growth, revenue, and the broader strategic focus of the company. Organizations are now understanding that marketing is one of the major growth drivers. In the past , product market fit was primarily focused on the relation between the product and the need of the consumer. However now, marketing is playing a larger role as companies understand that even the best products need a marketing machine behind it in order to enable growth. 

As far as a CMO is concerned, I believe they need to have more of a cross-functional background. Too often I see marketing leaders who only come from the marketing function and that is the only experience they have had. In today’s environment, companies really require leaders who have knowledge and experience in many disciplines so they can relate to the effects of their decisions as the most effective organizations are cross-functionally minded. My recommendation for CMOs is to learn as much as you can about product, technology, sales, etc. Likewise for other C-Level executives to learn as much as you can about Marketing so you understand the impact of your decisions cross-functionally. 

We’d love to hear a little more about your marketing practices at Latana and of course, more about the martech you use to drive core marketing goals!

At Latana we are excited to help consumer companies understand the perception of their brand which includes their brand awareness, understanding, preference, consideration as well as how they stand versus competitors in their industry. To connect with our customers we are able to use data from our own surveys about different brands around the world. Part of our marketing includes giving our assessment of other leading brands and why we believe they have achieved their success. We have taken this approach because one of the main questions our customers ask us is: how can they grow their own brand awareness and what are the success strategies of others. 

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What do you feel affects marketers today most when they try to deploy new martech to improve how they collect customer data and assess it to streamline/personalize future marketing efforts. What core challenges do you still see teams face and what tips would you share here?

One of the biggest challenges I see marketing teams face is time. In the era of “data-driven marketing” I have found that many longer term brand building and customer retention goals are sacrificed for shorter term results. Meaning marketing teams are faced with “getting quick wins” rather than proving out longer term sustainable growth strategies. To balance the short term success with longer term strategies, I would focus on communicating the different types of levers and approaches and which ones will result in certain outcomes. This is about tying together the longer term goals of the organization with the strategies that marketing needs to take to achieve those goals. 

As martech and B2B marketing evolves, how do you feel a typical B2B marketing needs to shape up to work/what kind of team members need to comprise a ‘’healthy’’ marketing team in your view?

In B2B, it is more important than ever to have marketing teams with cross-functional backgrounds. B2B is highly focused around context and value, so it is very important to have a marketing team that understands different functions and how everything works together. Regardless of B2B or B2C, the best marketing teams are the ones who have trust and faith in one another, in addition to openness and transparency. By instilling these values any team can effectively work together to become successful. 

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We’d love to hear a few predictions you have in mind for the future of martech and B2B marketing!

It’s going to be interesting how personalisation changes over time given the dichotomy of consumers wanting both more privacy yet more personalized experiences. There is a lot happening now with facial recognition and the metaverse. How will that impact the customer journey and buying experiences? What implication will that have on data driven marketing and MarTech tools going forward? I believe that this will create two separate cohorts of consumers: some will go for personalized experiences and will be more willing to allow data tracking and others will go the other direction and want more privacy. This split in consumer expectations will make it a very interesting time for marketing and also for MarTech tools. 

Some last thoughts, takeaways, before we wrap up!

B2B Marketing is all about the “context” behind the information. Especially in B2B Marketing,  the context is so important to the buying journey!! Data points are important, however context is even better so having a great balance between the two is one of the keys to making B2B Marketing successful.  

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