Marketing is all about communication—the way you advertise your business is the kind of message you put across. With a simple shift in focus or approach to communication, the type of audience your business will attract changes drastically. But that doesn’t mean a kind of marketing strategy is less effective than the other—each has its own set of pros and cons. The kind of marketing strategy you opt for heavily depends on your company’s structure and operations.
Kinds Of DTC Marketing Plans
Marketing strategies come by default as you set up your company, often based on your products/services, organization size, and structure. While neither is harmful to a company, one kind can suit your business more than the other. And that’s why it’s always better to understand what would help your business more—centralized, decentralized, or distributed marketing.
Let us take a closer look.
👤 Centralized Marketing
When organizations produce a single product or service, or products/services that are all closely related to each other in terms of their functionality, then a singular marketing department controls all the marketing activities for the business. This may include handling all initiatives, creating and managing campaigns, and producing future strategies. Since this kind of marketing is spearheaded by only one team, it produces a unified brand image across all platforms.
Pros
✅ Economically Efficient
Since all data, resources, skills, and systems are clubbed together into one department, it’s easier on your company’s budget and helps you cut down on costs.
✅ Complete Control
With a single team handling all your marketing operations, you can have complete control over every marketing venture. With complete ownership of every initiative, the team can be hands-on for every project they deploy and overlook.
Cons
❌ Lack Of Personalization
Since all your marketing operations are centralized, it limits your business’ ability to provide hyper-personalized experiences for your customers.
❌ Chances Of Poor Services
Your products and services might bear the brunt of a poorly managed centralized marketing team. It can lead to poor local management of products, leading to a loss in revenue.
👥 Decentralized Marketing
When a business offers a collection of services or products, all completely contrasting or unrelated, they usually opt for a decentralized marketing approach. With no similarity in the products/services, their marketing, approach to advertising, pricing, and strategies are also completely different. This is more common in large corporations or businesses.
Pros
✅ Product/Service-Specific Marketing
Product-specific marketing can bring your business better results. That’s why decentralized marketing can help your brand perform better on every product/service you offer.
✅ Customer-Centric Experiences
Since your marketing structure isn’t centralized, you can focus on developing a customer-first experience that caters to the audience locally. This can help them go through a better, enhanced, and more persuasive customer journey, increasing the chances of your business gaining a loyal customer.
Cons
❌ Increased Costs
With multiple teams handling marketing for different products/services, your finances can take a hit.
❌ Chances Of Miscommunication
With multiple teams strategizing for, deploying, and tracking campaigns, there are higher chances of miscommunication. This poses a threat to brand integrity and focus.
Distributed Marketing
Distributed marketing helps you enjoy the best of both worlds. With a centralized approach, your team can develop strategies for marketing campaigns and through a decentralized approach, you can localize your campaigns for better results and customer satisfaction. The marketing approach is like a wand—it chooses you. No, we’re not entirely kidding. Depending on the kind of business you’re running, you’re bound to lean towards a kind of marketing strategy. However, with a few tweaks to your business processes and operations, you can create a marketing team structure that best suits your DTC business and customers’ needs the best.
