Marketing automation is one of those popular buzzwords.
Like all buzzwords, marketing automation comes with the promise of being able to deliver things more simply, more consistently, and with better decision making capability.
This concept lines up pretty closely with a lot of the other things I have been thinking about lately like the loss of true innovation in so many parts of the American economy, loss of humanity in marketing, less creativity in many areas.
In many cases, this whole concept of automation and the similar ideas that reflect it in other areas like quantification, best practices, etc. show a deeper need for insight now as opposed to what we really need now more than ever…insight.
Insight is the key between why and how and that’s where our focus needs to be as much as possible right now.
Look at politics, it is easy for everyone to try and figure out how to silence or beat Donald Trump, but the bigger issue is why did something like the election of Donald Trump actually happen.
Think about baseball, there was a report this week about MLB looking at expansion as a way to help alleviate some of its attendance and ratings issues.
That’s a prime example of how you can stop something that is already in the middle of happening.
The better question is why?
Why has baseball struggled to maintain popularity?
You can follow the same exercise for live concert attendance, superhero movies, or any other perplexing issue.
How is often easy. Or, at least easy to hypothesize about.
Why is often the more difficult and more important question.
And, it is the one we likely need to ask more often now more than ever before.
So let me pose the question: Why aren’t you looking at why more often?