Does Your Marketing Need a Shot of Energy?

Marketing needs an energy boost beyond the triple espresso double latte mocchachinos to improve marketing effectiveness and maximize their shrinking resources.

Archway offers the shot of energy marketing departments need – outsourced marketing operations management. Marketing Operations Management, is end-to-end marketing optimization, from planning and budgeting, through marketing content management, to marketing execution and analysis resulting in improved marketing effectiveness.

Many Fortune 500 companies are turning to third party service providers like Archway to outsource components of their marketing operations allowing them to focus their marketing resources on revenue generating activities such as product development, brand awareness and customer-centric activities.

Reasons companies outsource:

• Adoption of a variable vs. fixed cost structure model
  
• Supports internal focus on core competencies
  
• Allows rapid adoption of new capabilities, versus building internally
  
• Supply-chain efficiencies
  
• Centralized approach to vendor management
  
• Improve customer experience
  
• Cost Reduction

“Companies deploying outsourcing solutions experience a return that is 245 percent greater than their annual investment and a 62 percent improvement in customer satisfaction, according to the results of new research from Standford University”1

Reap the benefits of outsourcing

Companies are increasingly outsourcing marketing operations to third party service providers for numerous reasons. Successful outsourced partnerships result in:

• Increased focus on core competencies
  
• Reduce spending on infrastructure and technology upgrades
  
• Redeployment of human capital to revenue generating activities
  
• Reduction in FTEs and temporary staff
  
• Higher internal customer satisfaction (Sales network, franchises, retail branches, etc.)
  
• Enhanced decision making
  o Access to more robust data
  o Improved data quality
  o Multiple data sources centralized
  
• Sophisticated inventory management
  o Reduce number of canceled orders or returns
  o Reduce inventory stemming from better data and forecasting
  o Increased visibility during transit through Advanced Shipping Notifications
  
• Improved vendor management
  o More accurate purchase orders
  o Quality control at receiving
  o Streamline supply-chain
  o Delays and out of stocks avoided – ability to purchase items from other suppliers when supply-chain issues occur

In-house execution of marketing operations can be difficult to manage and are often outside of a company’s business scope. By leveraging an outsourced partnership, companies are able to integrate multiple systems and let the outsource provider manage across multiple platforms and across different parts of the supply-chain. Utilizing the expertise of an outsource provider helps companies advance market position.

Outsource part or all of marketing operations

Common outsourced marketing operations components include:

• List generation
  
• Lead management
  
• Data entry
  
• Printing & promotional item procurement
  
• Supply-chain vendor management
  
• Sales Portals
  
• Kitting
  
• Fulfillment
  
• Logistics
  
• Reporting
  
• Campaign Analysis

Archway perfected outsourced marketing operations management over the last 54 years by leveraging industry knowledge across clients. Today, Fortune 500 clients turn to Archway to manage their marketing operations, freeing critical marketing resources to focus on growing the bottom line.

Industry experience

In 2006, it was reported that spending on prescription drugs topped $600 billion worldwide with marketing campaigns driving consumer spending. Billions of dollars are spent on advertising, marketing and arming pharmaceutical representatives with the right marketing collateral to target doctors and hospitals. With so much money being invested in marketing there is clearly room for efficiencies. Many drug patents are expiring in 2007 that will lead to a loss of revenue. Executives are applying the pressure now to reduce spending without sacrificing marketing campaign performance.

How are marketing teams responding to these steep demands? They are turning to alternative marketing models. One of the top ten pharmaceutical companies turned to Archway to leverage the outsourced marketing operations management model. The marketing executives at this leading pharmaceutical company selected Archway for its proven track record of outsourced marketing operations management. Archway has successfully implemented this model for leading Fortune 500 companies like Target, Ford, and JP Morgan Chase.

At the start of the relationship, Archway was selected to provide fulfillment services of marketing collateral to the 6000 network of sales representatives. They started by taking over the current fulfillment providers warehouse and instituting best practices and their proprietary technology. As a partner, not simply a vendor, Archway outlined various opportunities for the leading pharmaceutical company to streamline their marketing operations beyond fulfillment. Archway convinced the client to leverage Archway’s logistics management services and in the very first month they were able to add $180,000 in freight cost savings to their bottom line.

Archway also created a sales portal for the sales representatives to order marketing collateral, premiums and even product samples. Using the sales portal as a platform, Archway implemented ArchAnalytics™. ArchAnalytics is comprised of Archway’s decision support tools, dashboards, reports and business analytics. Introducing these tools gave the marketing team and executives real-time access to inventory management, sales utilization and marketing effectiveness.

Marketing executives at the company now leverage the dashboards to evaluate marketing campaigns real-time while brand managers utilize the drill down options to understand what components of programs are driving success.

Outsourcing the operational aspects of marketing has allowed this company to redeploy resources, both human and capital, toward brand management and product development. A year later this client has saved over a $1 million from the marketing budget at a fraction of the cost of their historical spend.

Archway is saving pharmaceutical companies and other life sciences companies valuable marketing dollars that are being redeployed to core marketing programs. Another example of Archway managing marketing operations is with a leading maker of blood glucose monitoring systems. Archway has a ten year relationship as a preferred provider with this manufacturer on their direct to consumer programs for blood glucose monitoring systems. Beyond providing fulfillment services to consumers, Archway created a Customer Service Interface Application to drive and track promotional responses to attitudinal surveys and provide a platform for ArchAnalytics, Archway’s business intelligence application. Additionally, this application links to lot and serial number tracking that were designed specifically for the client, to track warranty registrations and upgrade programs for each of the monitoring systems. Archway manages this program with on-site account teams from orders through fulfillment and rebate processing.

Each of these clients leveraged Archway’s experience to implement best practices in their marketing operations. They utilized onsite account management, buying power and proprietary technology to gain efficiencies and improve marketing effectiveness. Archway recently engaged with another leading pharmaceutical company to provide marketing operations management in 2008.

Leverage outsource provider’s experience

Outsourcers, like Archway are able to use their experience across multiple industry verticals to deploy best practices. When working with an outsource provider leverage them to:

• Create an outsourcing strategy
  
• Define financial justification
• Execute internal change management plans and project plans
• Develop the risk management strategy
• Attain stated business goals
• Understand current cost structure(s):
  o Warehouses and related support space (including insurance and property taxes)
  o Printing, Media, Shipping, Storage, and Handling costs

Energize marketing efforts

Boost marketing energy by giving marketing departments back the resources they need to focus on marketing strategy, product development and brand management. Archway focuses on the time consuming, labor intensive aspects of marketing that bogs marketing departments down.

Archway offers end-to-end marketing operations management providing streamlined processes with automated technology to eliminate unneeded cost, speed time to market and improve brand experience. Beyond savings, companies leveraging an outsourced marketing operations model with Archway gain decision support tools that provide executives with instant access to illustrating marketing program effectiveness.

Archway marketing operations management includes:

• Business Assessments
• Market Planning
  
• Sales Portals
  
• Product Procurement
  
• Vendor Management
  
• Fulfillment and Production
  
• Logistics Management
  
• Reporting & Analytics

Archway engages with marketing departments and teams with creative agencies to manage the time consuming, cumbersome role of marketing operations. They have decades of experience working on major brand campaigns. Archway can engage at any point on a campaign to improve the customer experience from e-tools to recalls. To engage deeply with clients, they offer on-site management or a co-management model at a single location or multiple locations.

Leverage spending power

As the leading outsourced marketing operations management provider, Archway commands massive purchasing power. Consider the volumes Archway purchases and moves each year. They are able to leverage their buying power to the advantage of clients. On average their leveraged buying power totals $400 million in logistics spend and $250 million in print spend which enable them to beat many Fortune 500 negotiated freight and print rates.

Resource alignment

Partnering with Archway allows clients to streamline processes, reduce costs and at the same time redeploy valuable resources. Resources can be realigned with marketing strategy, creative solutions or brand management. Meanwhile, Archway applies its expertise to marketing operations management so clients can focus on what they do best.

Some clients have opted to transition key staff to the Archway team to accelerate the learning curve and disperse valuable knowledge about your business. Archway has done this for many clients which helps create a smooth transition and recognizes the efforts of dedicated employees. Across their client base, Archway has embedded account managers on-site at client facilities to fully matriculate into our clients business understanding their brands, their culture and their goals.

Archway has a footprint across North America that includes two million square feet of distribution space located in the following areas:

• Minneapolis, Minnesota (2)
• Detroit, Michigan (4)
• Baltimore, Maryland
• Ontario, Canada

No cost, no contract evaluation

Archway offers free marketing operation evaluations pinpoint areas of opportunities to redeploy marketing spend. Can you afford not to explore how Archway can save your company money and help drive your business?

Contact Archway at 763-488-6814 or at sales@archway.com.

Stanford Global Supply Chain Management Forum researched companies outsourcing B2B operations to understand the customer benefit. – Driving Business Value through B2B Outsourcing Oct 2007