Professionals who work in jobs like revenue assurance are known to routinely curse their colleagues in the marketing division of the business. The marketeers get blamed for making sloppy promises to customers that cannot be kept in practice, for foolish pricing decisions, for a lousy attitude to securing data, and for generally taking too many risks because they are incentivized to chase gains without being held responsible when mistakes lead to losses. Commsrisk has also served up plenty of criticism of marketeers over the years. Just last week I rubbished a marketing email that made exaggerated claims about STIR/SHAKEN. Some past targets for marketing broadsides include:
- the US business that claimed to be first to deliver revenue assurance via the cloud, despite competitors offering their services via the cloud three years earlier;
- the occasion when the TM Forum slapped down an Israeli RA vendor which claimed their products were compliant with RA standards that only apply to telcos; and
- the Iranian RAFM consultant who promoted his business by connecting with telco managers around the world via fake LinkedIn profiles for imaginary employees.
Marketeers often pester me with demands for data about the number of visitors to this website, so I hope they are going to appreciate this article will receive far fewer views than articles I might otherwise have written. The reason this article is going to be unpopular is because I want to thank marketeers for all the times they do the right thing. Think of all the occasions when they remain truthful despite being infuriated by a competitor that makes wild promises in order to gain an advantage. Or consider all the times they share useful information with a professional audience, and how sometimes the response is that they are rudely ignored.
I am also grateful to all the marketeers who have supported Commsrisk over the years. The conclusion of another half-yearly auction means there will soon be a change of adverts displayed on Commsrisk. My thanks go not just to the winners in the most recent auction, but to every business that ever bid to place an advert on Commsrisk. The readership has grown tremendously since we first started displaying adverts in 2015. We all owe a debt of thanks to the marketeers that have backed a website that can be a lot more critical of marketing than most mainstream outlets for news and views about technology and communications.
That is the end of the thanks; it may be another 7 years before I publicly express gratitude to the advertisers again. I still keep a sharp eye on the marketeers, and that will not change. Most marketeers do not even know the right label to apply to their role. The correct English term is marketeer, not marketer, because they are like engineers, mountaineers, puppeteers, auctioneers and restauranteers. The suffix ‘eer’ signifies being a specialist, whilst ‘er’ can be applied to anyone who just does something, like a maker, climber or seller, whether they are a specialist or not. Those of you who work in marketing should take pride in being a marketeer, even if I continue to point out every mistaken letter in every word you use…
