I recently had the chance to interview Caroline McClelland, who has practiced Agile Marketing since 2009, both with her previous company HoundDog Technology Ltd and now in her current position as Digital Account Manager at Waracle, a mobile application developer based out of the U.K. Here are my questions and her answers.
When did you get started with Agile Marketing, and what were your motivations at the time?
Making that initial move to agile marketing was an easy decision back in 2009. As a Marketing Manager for a start-up technology company (HoundDog Technology Ltd) I could already see the success of the Development team. When one of our Software Developer friends taught our Marketing team the ins and outs of an agile process – we were onto a winner. Never before, had I been part of such a focused team. Marketing adopted the scrum method of agile marketing. Team work was confined to two-week sprints allowing us to experiment with new marketing techniques. All creative ideas were added to a future backlog, completed projects were reviewed and we continually improved performance. It was like night and day. Suddenly, instead of just acting out our own roles, we were a team in every sense – we were all committed to the same goals, we had a sense of purpose, great communication – those daily stand-ups added more value than you could imagine, we became more creative and our Marketing Director was overwhelmed at the speed at which we regularly completed tasks.
Imagine your best customer. They understand your products or services nearly as well, sometimes better, than you do. They tell other people about how good you are, and they’re always ready to serve as a reference. When you launch a new product, or a new version of your existing product, they’re often the first to adopt, and they provide you with great feedback.
