On March 20, 2024, Positionless Marketing was presented at MarTech.org and my keynote at the Optimove User Conference.
Since that initial announcement, we’ve introduced the term “Positionless Marketing” to hundreds of leading marketing executives and learned that readers and audiences interpreted it in a variety of ways. This article will document some of these interpretations and clarify what “less position” means in terms of marketing prowess.
As a reminder, data analytics and artificial intelligence, integrated marketing platforms, automation and more make the positionless marketer possible. In addition, new generative AI tools such as ChatGPT, Canna-GPT, Github, Copilot, and DALL-E provide human access to powerful new capabilities that generate computer code, images, songs, and videos, respectively, with human guidance .
Positionless salesperson does not mean a roleless salesperson; not even close
Talking to a senior level salesperson at a global retailer, their first interpretation may be a salesperson without a role/position. This was a definition at first glance for more than 60% of marketers who heard the term for the first time. But upon hearing the story and relating it to “being out of position” in other professions, including music and sports, most understood her as a multidimensional salesperson or, as we noted, realizing her multipotentiality.
One executive said, writing without a position in a way that made it clear to me was “unlocking your multidimensionality.” She said, “I really like that sentence.” Actually, the word we used was “multipotentiality” and the fact that it landed on multidimensionality is correct. As we noted, you can do more than one thing.
The other 40% of marketing executives did think of “Positionless Marketing” as a marketing professional who is not limited or defined by traditional marketing roles or boundaries. In this sense, they are not focused only on branding or digital marketing; instead, they are versatile and agile enough to adapt to new conditions created by the tools offered by new technology. As a result, the positionless marketer should be comfortable working across channels, platforms and strategies, integrating different approaches to effectively achieve marketing goals.
Navigating the Spectrum: Balancing Specialization and Positionless Marketing
Some of the most insightful comments came from data analytics experts at consulting firms and marketing directors who took a more holistic view.
Most discussions of the concept of “Positionless Marketing” began with a nuanced perspective on the dichotomy between entrepreneurial firms and large enterprises.
They noted that entrepreneurial firms are agile and innovative, but lack scalability and efficiency. Conversely, large companies excel at execution but struggle with innovation due to rigid processes.
Drawing parallels, many related this to the marketing functionality, with specialists excelling in their domain but needing a more holistic perspective and marketers without a position having a broader understanding but needing deep expertise.
Some argued that neither extreme is ideal and emphasized the importance of balancing specialization and generalization based on the company’s stage of growth and the competitive landscape.
They highlight the need for leaders to protect processes while encouraging innovation, citing Steve Jobs’ approach of creating separate teams to drive innovation at Apple. They emphasize the importance of breaking down silos and fostering cross-functional collaboration, even if that means challenging existing paradigms.
Ultimately, these experts recommended adopting a non-positional marketing approach as a competitive advantage in today’s landscape, where narrow specialization is common. They suggest that by connecting dots between different functions, companies can offer unique value to customers. However, they caution against seeing generalization as an absolute solution, emphasizing the importance of context and competitive positioning.
These marketing leaders advocate for a balanced marketing approach that leverages specialization and generalization to drive innovation and competitive advantage while recognizing the need to adapt strategies based on industry dynamics and competitive positioning.
Be positionless, but not too much, realize your multi-potentiality
This supports what was pointed out in the March 20th article: being out of position, but not too much. When we realize our multipotentiality and multidimensionality, we stand out as humans. AI becomes an augmentation.
But just because you can individually fire on all marketing cylinders and perform data analysis, writing, graphing and more from your desktop doesn’t mean you should.
Learn when it is not best for the organization and when it is not. Just because you can write copy with ChatGPT doesn’t mean you’ll write with the same skill and finesse as a professional copywriter. So it’s out of position, but not too much.
Less position vs. being pigeonholed
At the same time, if you’re a manager, don’t pigeonhole people. Let them spread their wings using today’s latest AI tools for human augmentation.
For managers, finding the right balance between guiding marketers to be unpositioned and, at other times, maintaining their position as specialists and bringing in specialists from different marketing disciplines will take a lot of work. We are at the beginning of this new era. However, working towards the right balance is a step forward in a new world where humans and AI work hand in hand to optimize marketing teams.
We are at a point of reference for the marketing profession. Those who may have less position and managers who can optimize teams with flawless execution without position will secure their position for life.
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