Archive for Six Sigma
The Marketing Funnel using Six Sigma DMAIC – Define stage
Posted by: | CommentsSix Sigma or Lean practitioners would view what I say about DMAIC as hardly revolutionary. Marketers may view it as just a way for a Black Belt to find a way to maneuver themselves into some of their market share. I happen to be more of a marketing guy, than a Lean or Six Sigma technician. But I believe that Marketing should be a process and when viewed that way, many of the principles and tools of Lean and Six Sigma start making a lot of sense.
Marketing people view their role as a series of events, task and campaigns versus a process. Not to over simplify but a calendar is a static document and does not support the use of a process. Once you start systematizing or building a marketing process deliverables, stability, variation and measurable results become important. Hence, Lean or Six Sigma can be a significant partner in improving the Marketing process.
Use of the DMAIC process is usually reserved for solving problem with existing processes. Other methodologies, such as DMEDI are used in the design functions and may be more suitable for certain marketing campaigns. In this series of Blog Posts, I am going to concentrate on the DMAIC method.
My early post correlated the Marketing Funnel to DMAIC and how we may use that methodology to walk our customer through our marketing process. The first stage in the DMAIC Methodology is the Define stage. In the marketing funnel the opening stage is usually reserved for the awareness stage. We typically think of this as our lead generation efforts of getting someone to enter our funnel. Even though we may use efforts as permissions style marketing it is still very much a bait and switch tactic. If we truly believe the Inbound Marketing is what is necessary in today’s marketing, using the Six Sigma Define stage opens a more correct way of entry into the funnel.
My explanation of the Define Stage previously:
Purpose: Identify the clients, their needs and requirements.
Deliverable: State the need of the client and the problem
Expanding on this explanation the Define stage typically asks us to start with a problem statement. In the marketing sense, can you define the problem that you solve for your customers clearly? Where the problem statement describes the pain, the next statement should describe the relief that is to be expected. After that, we go into a process that is typically defined as Voice of the Customer. There are typically two major categories that are required; Output requirements and Service Requirements. The output requirements relate to the final product or service that is delivered to the customer. The service requirements relate to how the customer would like to be treated and served during the process.The final step in the Define stage is to document the process. Typically, this is done with a high level process map. Don’t worry about it being completely correct as we will use it and develop it further in the remaining processes.
Six Sigma has some great tools on how to obtain and measure these processes such as Kano Analysis, Process Map and SIPOC . I just wonder why marketers shy away from them.
Related Posts:
Marketing needs Six Sigma Methodology to Improve
Using DMAIC for your A3 Report in the Lean Marketing House
Start Fixing Marketing Mistakes with a Process
Do you know much value you provide? If not, how can you be more effective?
The Marketing Funnel using DMAIC
Posted by: | CommentsIf you search Google, there are 88,800 thousand images for the marketing funnel and 38,100 for the marketing hourglass depicted. All of them depicting a systematic way to go from initial contact to buy and many of the adding the referral and repeat stages. I believe a systematic way to manage your marketing should not be an option but a fundamental of marketing.
In previous blogs, you have heard me mention that one of the main culprits is variation and the lack of proper segmentation. We think of segmentation both in a horizontal fashion and a vertical. Horizontal will typically result in segments such as: Direct, Internet, Distributor, Joint-Venture and so on. The vertical aspect of your Marketing Funnel is the image on the right depicted below. This funnel allows you to assign different products to each process stage in the hope of maximizing efforts.
However, if you attempt to improve your Marketing Funnel, how would you go about it? Being a Lean Six Sigma Black Belt, the Marketing Funnel bears a close resemblance to the DMAIC process of Six Sigma. Not that I am trying to replace the marketing funnel with DMAIC, but it certainly would not hurt to analyze the resemblance to improve our marketing process. Using some generic definitions of DMAIC and just relating them to the Marketing Funnel can create some interesting observation.
Define
Purpose: Identify the clients, their needs and requirements.
Deliverable: State the need of the client (CTS) and the problem
Measure
Purpose: Quantify Process Performance
Deliverable: Determine baseline process performance
Analyze
Purpose: Identify, Verify and Quantify Root causes
Deliverable: Statistically linking input with output
Improve
Purpose: Create the Solution and Validate
Deliverable: Optimizing Process Operating Conditions
Control
Purpose: Document and Standardize Process
Deliverable: Meet Critical to Quality(CTQ) consistently (Involvement)
Looking at your Marketing Funnel from the DMAIC viewpoint is not that farfetched, is it?
Related Posts
Your Marketing Vision should define your Customer’s Core Problem
Following the Customer’s Need in your Value Stream Map
The Marketing Funnel using the Six Sigma DMAIC Methodology – Measure stage
Posted by: | CommentsProcesses lend themselves to measurement. If you treat your marketing as a process, then you should be able to measure your marketing. The define stage answers the question: What is important? The measure stage will answer that question by asking: How are we doing?
I stated in a previous post that the purpose of the Measure stage was to quantify process performance and deliverable was to determine baseline process performance. Without these facts, you will be very ineffective in improving performance. This is the stage which is most difficult for the novice. Adequate measurements in the current state are simply not there many times and as a result we either never get out of this stage be trying to be too precise or we move on without inadequate information that causes us reduce effectiveness of the latter stages. Another common fault is that we start analyzing the data which is the next stage of the process.
Remember that this is a current state not a future state step in the process. Remember, if you think something that you are doing is not measurable, there is someone already measuring it, YOUR CUSTOMER. This brings us back to the marketing funnel and I am correlating the measure phase to the consider phase. In the consider phase, or the like stage of the funnel, prospects are aware of you but now you must prepare them to consider you as a worthy candidate. How do you do that? In the DMAIC methodology we use tools such as Critical to Quality and other tools to determine what is important to a prospect. Instead of thinking about this step from an internal point of view step back and consider what the prospect would use to measure your product or service and make the decision to move through the funnel. Developing measures with customer input will certainly help a prospect move though the funnel.
At this stage, do you know how a prospect is measuring you? What is the most Critical to quality standard that influences your product or service? What is more critical than others? The old saying is that people perform by how they are measured? If your company is based on how they are being measured do you have measurements in places that you are performing too?
This is an area that we taking the process map to a deeper level or developing the current state in a Value Stream Mapping process?
From the Developing and Measuring Training the Six Sigma Way: A Business Approach to Training and Development
Developing marketing measurements requires a mind-set for accountability. Measurements must be understandable, quantifiable, and economic. Customers objectively and clearly state these requirements and pay the supplier for meeting their explicit expectations. We must be there listening and responding to them. The more these requirements are met, the more the customer is satisfied.
Do you have listening posts built into your processes? What targets are you meeting?
Related Posts:
The Marketing Funnel using Six Sigma DMAIC Methodology
The Marketing Funnel using Six Sigma DMAIC – Define stage
Related book: What Customers Want: Using Outcome-Driven Innovation to Create Breakthrough Products and Services
