by Joyce Alonzo, Director for Accounts, Strategy, and Marketing
Modern marketing teams rarely suffer from a lack of tools, but rather the lack of integration. It’s easy to end up with a collection of disconnected campaigns: digital marketing operating on one island, PR on another, and AI optimization somewhere in between. When marketing solutions run in silos, teams waste resources, send inconsistent brand messages, miss key audiences, and ultimately fail to solve the business problem.
Through decades of working across brand strategy, digital marketing, creative production, events, and public relations, TeamAsia has seen firsthand that sustained brand visibility goes beyond delivering outputs and calling it a day. We look at how integrating these services can help solve the marketing problems of our partners the most effective way possible..
To illustrate in video game terms, the way TeamAsia integrates these different solutions can be likened to playing Tetris. Different building blocks can form a single aspect of a solution to a marketing challenge. But true integration means identifying and putting the right blocks together to help solve the entire problem.
Identifying the ‘real’ challenge
Every marketing campaign starts with a challenge that gives every marketing decision a clear purpose. Perhaps it’s making your brand shine amidst all the noise, or getting more leads and converting them into clients. At times, however, the challenge identified by our client is different from the actual challenge that needs to be addressed. Say, for instance, a client would ask for help to launch their brand, when their challenge is actually standing out in an already saturated and highly competitive market.
Identifying the actual challenge of a brand is key to guiding them towards the right strategy to take. Too often, brands would think that the best way to solve their marketing problem is to copy what their competitors are doing. One brand, seeing that their top competitor had updated their website, would think that building a better website would give them the edge. Another brand would come up with an idea for a TikTok campaign in the hopes of going viral.
Through research and audit, we then take a look at what their actual challenges are and propose the right strategy that fits their needs. From our examples, the first brand would actually need to beef up their credibility through PR rather than build a better website. The second brand, meanwhile, might need to focus on LinkedIn, where their audiences are.
A common pitfall among brands is to utilize a tool or a marketing solution just because it’s “in” or “trending.” However, following what’s trending could change what makes your brand unique in the first place. Every challenge is unique, the same way every brand is different, and as problem-solvers, TeamAsia strives to steer brands towards the right direction. Amidst all the trends and noise, always follow the heart of your brand.
Laying out the strategy
From my experience leading Accounts, Strategy, and Marketing at TeamAsia, I’ve learned that effective integration doesn’t have to mean a more complex strategy; overall, an effective strategy is simpler and more focused. The simpler, the better.
This is easier said than done, especially for brands that come to us without a clear understanding of the real challenge. Rather than overwhelm ourselves with all the possible routes, we get to the root problem and identify the best, straightforward strategy that will effectively solve the objectives. It helps that TeamAsia is composed of a diverse set of marketing experts with technical expertise in PR, digital, and events, contributing various perspectives and insights on how we can address the challenges.
While integration is at the core of TeamAsia, we don’t just solve multiple problems with a single marketing strategy because a brand’s dilemma may be composed of differing pain points. Instead, we view it and evaluate to see if the approach needs to be a multi-phased marketing strategy or simultaneous activation of marketing channels. Either way, the approach is not making the path complex but keeping it clear, simple and direct.
Crafting a strategy doesn’t end with the initial touchpoint with our clients. As we measure the success of our campaigns through KPIs such as impressions, engagements, media values, or share of voice, we also look beyond these metrics and see how they could translate into other aspects that could elevate the brand.
The way TeamAsia does strategy is built around genuine partnerships with our clients, with integration at the core of how we solve marketing challenges. Rather than treating PR, digital, events, or creatives as separate entities, we bring these disciplines together from the start to identify the right challenge, develop the right strategy, and ensure that every touchpoint leads to the same goal. This is our promise to our clients - that we ultimately go beyond the problem and the solution and towards the growth of our brand and business.
