Digital Leaders are more interested in how digital can drive change within an organisation and how they, in turn, can deliver a holistic marketing strategy which embodies digital across the entire business.
They’re strategic, forward-thinking, people-focused, open-minded and willing to learn. So, heads of marketing that want to become effective digital leaders need to focus on how they can bring about change in their organisation through digital transformation.
To do this, digital leaders should focus on their ability to:
- Create an overall vision for digital that everyone can share
- Structure teams to bring them closer together
- Introduce new ways of working that promote better collaboration, more flexible thinking and experimentation
- Get backing from leadership to support this new approach and ‘let’s explore how’ culture
1. Setting the vision
Right now, marketing teams need a culture change that goes beyond the need for digital competence, digital literacy or new technology. They need more. They need the support of a leader who knows what direction the team is headed in.
Therefore, the first port of call for digital leaders is in creating a consistent vision of what the goals for digital marketing are. No matter how ambitious or low key the initial aims are, the mission and the message must be both clear and simple to understand.
The marketing team need to understand this vision and be on board in order to keep pushing forward.
Marketing leaders also need to demonstrate their ability to champion success. A critical element of change management is marking and measuring progress, showing what success looks like and celebrating when it’s achieved.
