Stay on top of new trends and technologies
The essence of brand marketing and communication has remained the same, yet the outlying contours have been ever-evolving. Channels have increased and so has the technological prowess behind content creation. A decade is a long time in this journey. Thanks to rapid technological advancements, you never know what the next five years are going to look like.
The nature of challenges that a content professional faced a decade ago has no reminiscence to a present lot of hurdles. With customers now being 24/7 in your face, the margin for error has drastically reduced. As a content creator, either you are going up or you are going out. And going out fast.
In this free-flowing conversation, Sudiptaa Paul Choudhary, VP of Marketing at OpenLM and an award-winning senior techno-marketing executive takes us down her memory lane and shares insights on best practices in marketing. In a free-wheeling manner, she also touches upon the road to be traversed, for a successful future.
1. How has your journey been as a marketer?
I am fortunate to have worked with many distinguished companies such as EMC, HP, Oracle, and Ericsson, as well as smaller businesses. I have gained extensive experience across a wide range of industries, including healthcare, pharma, e-commerce, technology, telecom, and shipping, both in India and globally. I have also established my digital marketing agency, which has allowed me to work with some of the most reputable IT consulting companies in India
As a global marketer, I am analytical, strategic, and collaborative, with a passion for learning and challenging the status quo. My achievements have been recognized by media outlets such as ET NOW, where I was named Women Executive of the Year, and CEO Insights, where I was named one of the top 10 marketing leaders. My expertise lies in digital transformation, specifically in digital marketing, CRM, and marketing automation. I strongly believe that understanding your audience persona is crucial in developing an effective global marketing strategy, as each region has its unique characteristics.
As a marketer, I've learned that it's important to stay on top of new technologies and tie them into your marketing stack.
In addition to my professional work, I am passionate about diversity and inclusion and have initiated positive change by founding a women's club while working at Oracle and Ericsson, which touched the lives of 100 women. I also volunteer my time to work with various NGOs globally and locally to give back to society. As a content writer, I enjoy sharing my knowledge on LinkedIn, where I have received positive feedback from readers, adding value to the platform. I am customer-obsessed, striving to maintain close relationships with my customers and working collaboratively with my global team, which has taught me to appreciate and respect different cultures.
2. How has the content ecosystem evolved over the years?
When I started my career in EMC and HP, digital marketing wasn't a thing. It was all about physical meetings, newsletters, and round-table discussions. Marketing wasn't even considered a profit center. It was just a side function. But things have changed a lot in the past 10 years, especially when I moved to Oracle and created a center of excellence with different marketing roles. We were able to save 40% of the global marketing budget by focusing on content, which played a crucial role in identifying the traffic to our website and the events that brought in that traffic. We even started doing podcasts, which was unheard of back then. We realized that visual content and genuine customer stories were very appealing to people.
From marketing automation to SEO/SEM and influencer marketing, technology is constantly changing and evolving. One thing that has remained constant is the strong linkage between SEO and content marketing.
80-90% of my budget is spent on organic content and SEO, which I believe is more sustainable in the long run. I only allocate around 5% for ads, mostly on LinkedIn.”
3. What are some of the challenges you face, especially while creating organic content?
One of the challenges of content marketing is the fragmented and competitive landscape of content marketing tools. But what's most important is understanding your audience and writing content that resonates with them. This is why persona development is crucial, as it provides insights into what your audience is looking for and how to deliver it. Lastly, video has become a central part of any marketing campaign, including corporate branding and global launches. Overall, the ecosystem of digital marketing is constantly evolving, and it's important to stay on top of new trends and technologies to be successful.
As a content marketer, I have experienced a lot of pressure to produce weekly content within tight deadlines. While this can be challenging, it's important to ensure that the content is not just meeting the deadline, but also resonating with the audience. I believe that content should be thought-provoking, engaging, and provide a lead magnet that encourages readers to comment and engage with the content.
Another challenge I've faced is measuring the ROI of my content. It's important to use tools like search console analytics, Adobe, and Uber suggest to understand what keywords are being used, identify long-tail keywords, and track the success of my content.
Additionally, staying on top of new technologies in the industry such as AI-based marketing and content writing tools is crucial. It can be intimidating to embrace these technologies and fear that they may replace my job, but I believe it's important to leverage them to improve my content and stay ahead of the curve.
4. How do you see generative AI and quality content creation from humans, co-existing in the future?
I have been experimenting with AI content writing using tools such as Writer.ai and Jasper. Chat GPT is also a popular option that I have used. Through my experimentation, I have found that AI can make a marketer's life easier by providing insights into audience behavior and predicting future actions based on customer segmentation.
I have personally used marketing automation tools such as HubSpot, Marketo, and Salesforce, which can help provide insights into customer behavior and inform marketing and customer support strategies.
However, when it comes to generative AI content, I believe that AI cannot replace the human touch of high-quality, engaging, and thought-provoking content.
While AI can provide insights and even automate some aspects of content writing, it cannot replicate the creativity and originality that only a human writer can provide. I see AI and human content writers coexisting and complementing each other. AI can help automate routine tasks and provide insights, while human writers can provide creativity and originality that AI cannot.
5. What kind of platform would you design to solve the present challenges of the content ecosystem?
So, today I researched the market and found that they used over 20 tools. From my experience, it all starts with market and company research, understanding your company's roadmap or mission, and analyzing the current market ecosystem with digital transformation, AI, blockchain, web3, and other tools. As a marketer, it's important to consider all of this while developing your strategy, and research should be at the center of it all.
The next step is to build your content strategy for each channel, both online and offline. Digital marketing has a massive scale and reach, but don't neglect traditional marketing channels because offline relationships are where lifelong followers and trusted advisors are made.
For each channel, you need to have a content strategy, and repurposing content is crucial. I produce four or five blogs with my content team and agency, and we look into all the top blogs or white papers that have worked on different channels, and then make bite-sized content for social media, emails, newsletters, and more. These small bite-sized pieces are very important and can create a lot of engagement with the audience. As far as the present market scenario is concerned, I haven’t found a single marketing automation tool that can solve all pain points, at once.
6. How important is marketing automation for you?
Marketing automation is critical, and you need to marry it with your CRM. Use persona and customer life cycle automation to develop your campaigns and track them in your marketing dashboard. Testing and innovation are crucial to staying ahead of the competition and learning from your failures.
Before launching your product or collateral, it's important to get feedback from your audience and track customer satisfaction and brand sentiment. Use Google Analytics, Google search console, and other tools to analyze ROI. I use AI tools, plagiarism checkers like Copyscape, and grammar checkers like Grammarly, along with my human content writer.
Staying close to your competition, learning from them, and understanding their next moves are also essential to staying ahead of the curve. I have done all of this in my experience as a marketer, and I have seen that it works.
