Alison Simpson is the new leader of the Canadian Marketing Association and an award-winning marketer with experience in all facets of the profession.
Marketers have plenty to worry about these days. Their budgets are under closer scrutiny than ever. They are being asked to do more with less, just as the discipline grows more complex with every passing day. Consumer attention is scarcer than ever – ad avoidance is now the norm – buying habits are unpredictable. The planning and orchestration of multi-channel campaigns has become fiendishly complicated and highly technical. And there is a shortage of “T-shaped” marketers to do the work. The profession is mostly populated by novices who are infatuated with “fonts and followers”, as the notoriously acerbic brand consultant Mark Ritson puts it, bemoaning the fact that marketing has been dumbed down.
Marketing has split into two competing factions – brand and performance marketers – who co-exist in a state of constant tension, each battling to gain the upper hand, convinced the other side has it all wrong. In fact, the entire profession seems to have come apart at the seams, splintering into many different specialty disciplines, without a unifying model to rally around. Every budget decision, it seems, is a slugfest between dueling priorities. And these days the performance marketers are winning out, since they have the “clicks” to show for it.
On top of all that there are grave threats to the profession itself. Marketing is at risk of obsolescence unless it stops being seen as a cost centre and proves it can make a more meaningful impact on the business. In his book “Quantum Marketing”, Mastercard CMO Raj Rajamannar says marketing is facing an “existential reckoning”. He states that no one at the board level actually understands what marketing does anymore. The general impression amongst board members, he says, is that marketing is just about “ads and selling”. Marketers are held in such low regard, in fact, that most CMOs aren’t even welcome at the boardroom table. Their job is to obey the marching orders, not have a say in which direction to go.
It used to be so much simpler – companies made stuff and marketing’s job was to create demand. But today it is much harder to draw a direct line between brand-building and market performance. That’s why marketing budgets are always skeptically received. And the low financial literacy of most marketers makes it hard for them to secure more funding. They tend to fall back on jargon that no one gets, least of all the CEO, who doesn’t see much value in marketing to begin with.
Most worrisome of all is the long shadow of generative AI, stoking fears of massive job displacement. The grunt work of churning out low level communications – sales copy, press releases, promotional blurbs, e-mail messages, social media posts, and the like – could easily be handed off to an AI tool, wiping out a long-time training ground for marketing interns. The same goes for routine market and campaign analysis. Marketing’s value could be called into even greater question, its scope of responsibility pared way back. All that would be left for marketing to do is make pretty pictures. And AI could even take over that job.
With these doomsday scenarios playing out in their heads, no wonder most marketers are concerned about the future, according to a recent survey by the Canadian Marketing Association. The CMA commissioned the survey under the new leadership of Alison Simpson to help map out the future priorities of the organization which was first established in 1967 as the Canadian Direct Marketing Association.
Alison’s roots in fact are in direct marketing, specifically digital marketing, but her career path since then has crossed over in to many different disciplines, making her a true “full stack marketer”. That gives her a particular appreciation for the importance of upskilling and continuous learning. As a recent McKinsey report states: “The modern marketing opportunity is a skills and talent challenge”.
I began by asking Alison why she agreed to take on the job as head of the CMA.
Alison Simpson (AS): I certainly wasn’t looking at the time, and I’d had a number of recruiters reach out to me with some really great roles, but it was always an easy no, because I was working at a startup in the PropTech space and loving the opportunity to build a brand from scratch. We’d launched in Toronto during the pandemic, and were scaling. So, normally if a recruiter called, it’s like, “Great opportunity. Thanks, but no. Happy to connect you to someone in my network.” But when this call came, it really was, it got my attention for a lot of reasons.
I’ve grown up in marketing. I absolutely love our profession. I’ve benefited greatly from being in the marketing profession. I’ve been involved in giving back, through being on the board for the ICA and for NABS. I’ve certainly been involved with the CMA on committee, speaking at events. And just the opportunity at this stage in my career to come in and have an even bigger impact on a profession that I adore and have benefited from, I just couldn’t say no. So, I took the first interview, met with the board, got to see what a talented board we have, really connected with them and their thoughts around the association. One thing led to another, and it really became an easy yes. It was hard to say goodbye to the startup, but the opportunity to really have a lasting impact on our profession is simply too good to turn down.
Stephen Shaw (SS): What do you understand to be the vision and mandate of the CMA? And I’m old enough to remember the CMA used to be called the Canadian Direct Marketing Association, and you may remember this too. Converted to the CMA, and hasn’t looked back, obviously. But going in, I mean, the marketing profession, we’re gonna get into this subject quite a bit today, is going through some fairly transformative change, especially in the years ahead. What’s the board’s direction to you in terms of how you steer the CMA into the future?