Marketing as a Service — Beyond Mad Men
Louise Doorn, Founder and CEO HelloMaaS left her career as a global marketing executive to work on creating a 21st century, decentralized marketing collaboration platform.
Marketing doesn’t stay the same for long. The speed of change keeps increasing and it’s nearly impossible to understand the full breadth of options today. After 15 years in marketing, building new global operating models with prominent brands, showed me that even with ample resources it’s challenging to operate in an always-on, consumer-first world, with global platforms that change their product frequently. Not to mention, the 5,000 mar-tech tools. Keeping up with the ever-changing trends, understand how new tools and channels work, and how technology and social aspects shape the success of marketing has become very time-consuming and intense.
That’s the reality for marketers. Think about what it’s like for small or medium-sized business owners…..
Go Bottom Up!
I firmly believe that the conventional client-agency model need a drastic update. As in software development, there are plenty of opportunities to work more collaboratively, open and connect based on shared interests.
Bottom-up, self-organizing teams, open knowledge sharing, crowdsourcing, incentive competitions, transparency through reviews are going to be the building blocks of the future of marketing. These are also hallmarks of an exponential organization.
And you know what? The future has arrived!
Are our marketing teams the hotbed of inefficiency?
Not necessarily, but it is not easy to create a team that is incentivized to stay on top of their game, has the freedom to experiment and up to date know-how on new tactics and channels. The underlying challenge is that the marketing operating model hasn’t changed since the era of Mad Men.
While not only people are changing, also marketing technology, tools, trends, customer behavior, and expectations are adjusting by the minute. Business owners need to be up-to-date with specialized marketing knowledge that is far beyond their expertise or interest. Having a marketing team on the regular payroll is often not cost-effective nor smart, in addition to the difficulty of building and sustaining a good team.
Why use an organizational model that hasn’t evolved for decades in an industry that is changing at the speed of light?
Forward-thinking digital nomads
True innovation happens on the fringes. As part of my early research I went to a digital nomad conference in Thailand, and was blown away. I met lots of smart and driven digital marketers working remotely in places like Bali and Chiang Mai, with an excellent portfolio of clients. They chose to be in charge of where and how to work while some made an exceptional living as well. This experience has helped me to understand that marketing can be redefined. When you put people and expertise first, and use technology smartly, you get high-quality output with little hassle.
Hey freelancer! Switch to HelloMaaS to focus on what you like to do best.
The fastest-growing group of freelancers are knowledge workers and creatives. My goal is to create an environment where freelance marketers not just make a good living, but they can thrive. Being a freelancer had some negative connotations in the past. However today it is an efficient and modern way to create high-quality output with maximum flexibility.
I met freelancers who did not want to waste time sitting in meetings, get tired from daily commutes, managing people and writing reports. They just really wanted to do what they were passionate about without much drama or overhead.
However, in reality, many freelancers struggle to find new clients, and they don’t always feel confident with the business side of their dealings. After all, their expertise is in something entirely different than continually chasing new businesses. Also, quite a few freelancers feel lonely due to the nature of their work environment and would like to connect with peers or be part of flexible marketing teams.
It’s our goal to support a like-minded community and encourage freelancers to take an active role in it. By connecting, but also by co-creating our product, for instance through the Blockchain Lab. As a freelancer, you’ve got freedom, and we love to collaborate in designing a 21st-century marketing operating model.
No, you don’t need/have to employ an entire marketing department!
After conducting various interviews, and feedback sessions with companies, it became clear that many don’t want to build and manage marketing teams. At the same time, they struggle to find freelancer marketers to get the job done. Furthermore, they often don’t have in-depth knowledge or understanding of what they need or what needs to get done.
HelloMaaS is a platform where clients can search based on business goals and get connected to local, vetted talents. We join people who prefer working in a non-traditional environment with companies that need professional marketing work done smartly. Bring fresh talent temporary in-house often ignites new ideas and boost innovation.
Our approach to team matching is based on personality and skill matching. Short feedback loops through weekly checking will measure progress in highly data-driven and analytical way.
Lifelong learning is not a luxury, but a necessity
In marketing, it is essential to keep learning and developing. For this reason, I wanted to create an opportunity for freelancers to share and sell their know-how through tutorials with optional coaching. Talented freelancers can generate passive income and share their knowledge that is honed through years of practice.
Let’s say you’re a fashion brand and like to get into Snapchat. Rather than taking weeks to figure it out on your own, buy a tutorial from an expert in your vertical and your market with a few hours of personal coaching and off you go.
Freelancing Augmented
Where we differ is that HelloMaaS only has community vetted marketers that speak the local language and understand the local culture, which is crucial for marketing. Many companies are open to remote work but like to meet freelancers for a coffee first and appreciate in-person meetings or brainstorming sessions every other week or so.
The HelloMaaS marketplace we’ve just launched is just the start. Next, the product on the roadmap is a marketing planner, powered by the brains of the HelloMaaS community. Using augmented intelligence, allows us to build an equitable and scalable platform that hopefully result into a viable alternative and a truly 21st-century marketing agency model.
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How does your ideal future in marketing look like? Please share your ideas and wishes with us!
