I recently read an article by Michael Brenner of B2B Marketing Insider entitled “Are Marketers Becoming Digital Dinosaurs?”.

A great quote from the blog:

“According to a CMO Council study of more than 200 marketing executives, covered by MediaWeek, marketers are being left behind by the digital age.

The report stated that 90% of companies do not have an integrated digital marketing strategy. And more than a third admitted that their marketing plans were nothing more than a combination of tactics.”

This absolutely blew my mind. It got me thinking about my experience over the last 3 years working with hundreds of business owners, marketing execs, CXOs, and others in the digital marketing space. I came to realize that any of these mentioned job titles fell into two buckets: The Marketing or Executive Dinosaur or an Evolved Marketer.

• The Marketing or Executive Dinosaur is exactly the same as the Brontosaurus in the Jurassic age, destined to carry the distinction of extinction.
• The Evolved Marketer is one who adapts to its surroundings, developing knowledge through veracious reading, paying attention, getting dirty, and using critical and strategic thinking to apply digital solutions to take their clients or business into the evolution that is the current marketing world.

Even further, this article from Michael Brenner spawned my idea to start Digital Solutions Blog. My goal is for the blog to have several contributors comprised of cutting edge strategists, social and digital tinkerers, those not afraid to crash planes or get dirty, and those who are thought leaders in their own rights and can add value to a marketplace (unfortunately ill prepared for today’s digital savvy consumer). Let’s all help those who are willing to do so, evolve.

Ah…and one last point to prove the mythical Executive Dinosaur exists. I recently told someone I wanted to take my business knowledge from helping shape and build a social media start upand go back to school and learn more about computer and marketing science. This Executive Dinosaur stated, “You don’t want to do that….those types (the ones who code and know technology) only like to live in caves…and well…that is not you.” I completely beg to differ, and it led me to write this poem (and this post):

Gone are the days of those who can code, but can’t speak business.

Gone are the days of those who speak business, but can’t code.

If you can’t adapt to technology and become the digital business person, I’m sorry, business in this marketplace is passing you by.

Adapt. Evolve. Or go the way of the dinosaurs. In the end….Darwin is STILL right.

So which one are you? A Marketing or Executive Dinosaur or an Evolved Marketer?

Share and Enjoy