Episode Details

Having the right elements and the right design is critically important to reaching the right people the right way. Detria Williamson, the CMO of IDEO, has years of experience working with clients to create meaningful impact through design, and throughout that time she has seen the world of design shift and the buyers’ needs change. To meet those needs, Detria says it’s all about listening carefully to what customers are saying. 

“The new design buyer, they're CMOs, they're CEOs, they're CTOs, they're Chief Diversity Officers. So we really needed to make sure that we were expanding our listening ability and in terms of making sure that our services were known to other leaders across the C-suite. Articulating all of our communities and deeply listening internally and across all those communities. 

On this episode of Marketing Trends, I was excited to hear more about what it takes to actively listen and respond in today’s world. Plus, Detria and I got into how  she is helping to not just create more inclusivity, but allow it to become common practice across the industry. Detria has a revolutionary way of thinking about building her team of designers, seeking maximal creativity and diversity of ideas as the primary focus, and she explains it all in this episode. All this up next on Marketing Trends! 

Main Takeaways

• Inclusive Customer Experience: Break away from the idea that it’s only important to focus on diversity and instead think more about inclusion. You can fake diversity but true inclusion is harder to imitate. 
• The New Design Buyer: As design has become more democratized and the design-buyer has changed, it’s more important than ever to tune into what they are asking for. Some of the leaders in these positions may not even know about the resources available to them, so there is an educational part of the process as well. 
• Don’t Over-stack: The explosion of MarTech tools means that marketing solutions are abundant but it’s important to maintain a healthy balance in your budget to  ensure that you have the people and the resources to put it to use. Make sure you are constantly evaluating your tech stack based on what is performing and what is not. If something isn’t performing, get rid of it in favor of a tool that is a driving force for your business.  

Key Quotes

“The most well-known digital tool that I created while I was there is called inclusive customer experience. It really fell out of a design-thinking workshop that we were doing. So again, design-thinking has always been this kind of three-way savior.  I would say through my career, it's a safety net.”

“Diversity can be engineered, but inclusion can't.”

“There are so many CMOs that don't have the luxury, the privilege, or sometimes even the awareness to have design built into their budgets. So when you say design for inclusion, that requires intention and requires you to allocate financial resources and team resources behind it. What you gain from it is beyond imagination. Having a more inclusive brand and a more inclusive experience has to be designed for.”

“The new design buyer they're CMOs, they're CEOs, they're CTOs, they're chief diversity officers. So we really needed to make sure that we were expanding our listening ability and in terms of, you know, sort of making sure that our services were known to other leaders across the C-suite. So articulating all of our communities and deeply listening internally and across all those communities.” 

“Three things from a design perspective: One is designing for inclusion. Two is designing for privacy, and three is designing for experience. CMOs have to do that.”  

“You can't hire your way through [inclu