Corporate marketing is stifling innovation in the digital age

Dean Seddon, founder of Maverrik. the unconventional training and marketing business, has warned that corporate marketing is a sure-fire way to failure. He believes that in the digital age a lot of industry practices, particularly in larger businesses, are a waste of money.
Dean Seddon has been working with SMEs and corporates for the past 20 years to help them develop sales-driven marketing, which focuses on marketing that reduces obstacles in the sales process and helps businesses grow sales revenue over the medium to long term. Since 2018, Maverrik has helped clients in the UK, Europe and Asia implement these strategies and support new revenue generation in excess of $10 million.

“We’re writing corporate waffle that nobody reads whilst enjoying how pretty our branding looks. Generic, corporate waffle won’t help your business. That era is over. Even the biggest brands now have to think about humanising themselves, getting closer and more engaged with their customers. I wonder sometimes whether some people love their marketing a little too much” shares Mr Seddon.

The crux of Dean’s argument is that marketing has become so corporate that much of it is ineffective. In the business-to-business environment, Dean believes that jargon, waffle and marketing content misses the mark for many.

Dean believes that marketing should be focused on making revenue generation easier: “The mission of marketing is to make sales easier. It’s become something different and actually stifles sales. Having worked with thousands of businesses, I can see where you need marketing for different stakeholders, e.g. shareholders, customers and markets. But in reality, all these stakeholders judge the business on its financial performance – sales and profit.”

Dean is incredibly passionate about sales-driven marketing: “I am sure this will sound like a rant to some, but the facts speak for themselves. Sales people are being tasked to work harder to close business. That for me is a sign that sales people are having to compensate for marketing that doesn’t work as well anymore. Whether you are a £1 million turnover or £100 billion turnover business, it is about reducing friction in the sales process. Everything should be centred on that.”

Maverrik, the company behind Mr Seddon’s exploits, also boasts some impressive credentials, having some of the UK’s major names as clients and having consulted and trained over 100,000 people to date.

Mr Seddon closes by saying: “I’m not trying to beat up marketers. I’m trying to highlight that many businesses are missing an opportunity to combine the power of sales and marketing, working together to hit the numbers”.