My Best Marketing Tips #17: Alliance Healthcare / Atilla Cansun / Chief Marketing Officer
Atilla Cansun began his career at Procter & Gamble after studying engineering and subsequently joined the Walgreens Boots Alliance as CMO of Alliance Healthcare in July 2020. Working through the Covid-19 pandemic in the health industry has given him some particular insights into how empathising with consumers can change marketing.
Not enough brands are adapting their message to take into account the way we live now and what new realities are. This is something that Atilla calls “digital empathy” – the heightened importance of understanding what consumers are going through and responding to it with digital marketing.
What would be your best marketing tip?
I believe in mantras a lot. One of my favourites comes from Patrice Louvet, CEO of Ralph Lauren: Big ideas always find ways to become bigger.
If you identify a brilliant idea and follow it, everything else will follow.
How have you put this marketing tip to good use?
Throughout my career, I’ve seen so often how working on one great idea can make a difference vs. putting a lot of effort into many mediocre ones that will always feel like carrying water up a hill. This is why, in any environment, I try to focus on the core of any idea, stopping the clock only when we’ve found the greatness. It’s something that’s fresh and new, and importantly, very flexible and adapted to the digital world.
What marketing tips does the industry need most right now?
We need to become more in tune with our consumers and reflect the new realities of life during and after the pandemic. I still see brands featuring business executives wearing suits traveling to business meetings across continents! In reality, we’re all sitting in small flats, working from home in casual wear. That’s only a small example, but basically, brands need to adapt their messaging and become better at empathy in the digital world.
What is the marketing tip you give most often?
Don’t spend time and energy on mediocre ideas. It’s always better to spend it on one great idea that has huge potential than on ten smaller things that won’t be remembered.
Listen to Atilla speak about his experiences in healthcare marketing and how digital empathy is key for connecting with consumers on the latest episode of our Shiny New Object podcast: https://open.spotify.com/show/03SUtq4qPFOhz0MYTAdOTX
Subscribe to Automated Creative’s Newsletter