Ready, set, go: A new start for direct marketing. Will Green investigates what the IDM and DMA merger means for the industry
After three decades of separately pursuing the goal of professionalising and supporting the direct marketing industry, the two organisations most involved in this process have merged.
The Direct Marketing Association (DMA) and the Institute of Direct and Digital Marketing (IDM), last month announced that they have formed a single group, which aims to promote the highest standards and professionalism for a £14.2 billion industry with a workforce of over 530,000.
Until now, the organisations have been separate with responsibilities for different parts of the direct marketing world: the DMA working with companies to grow their one-to-one marketing through research, political lobbying, legal advice and industry guidance; the IDM working with individuals to provide qualifications and training.
Now, though, both organisations feel they will be able to better serve the industry and promote its interests as a single entity, representing best practice and setting the political agenda at the same time as awarding professional qualifications, much in the same way as the BMA awards medical qualifications and the Bar Council awards legal qualifications.
Julia Porter, chair of the DMA, commented on the merger, stating: “The recently launched DMA Code and Guides establishes a modern framework for responsible marketing in our profession. IDM training provides the skill sets and knowledge needed for practitioners to succeed. They are two halves of a shared mission that will be better achieved together.”
Why now?
In fact, a more pertinent question is, why not sooner? As Joel Harrison, editor-in-chief of B2B Marketing put it in his column: “The only negative aspect of this news is that it should have happened years ago.”
Chris Combemale, the new group CEO, agrees, arguing that in an ideal world the organisations could have been working towards their shared objectives as one organisation since the beginning.
A more pressing recent reason, though, has been the rise of digital and its profound reshaping of the entire marketing industry. For a sector largely associated with ‘physical’ marketing – direct mail, telemarketing and so on – the prolific rise of digital could have spelled the end, or at least a decline, in its importance in the industry. Not so, according to Combemale: “We see digital marketing as one-to-one marketing, as data-driven marketing. It builds on the heritage of the direct marketing industry.
“The difference may be that now it’s in real time. Technology enables companies to integrate and deliver their experience against every point of contact. If anything, the world is moving in the direction of one-to-one and data-driven marketing.”
The merger between the DMA and IDM, rechristened to include ‘digital’ in its official title in 2011, will help ensure the new data-driven imperative will continue to be at the heart of direct marketing.
What the merger means
In structural terms, the DMA and the IDM will continue to operate as separate brands. The DMA’s corporate memberships and the IDM’s individual membership will remain as they are now. This is good news, according to Gerry Weatherley, head of operations, at Clickwork7: “The two brands will still operate as separate companies and memberships will continue to serve the same purposes that they have done prior to the merger. This is good news for digital marketing companies, as technological innovation is often shrouded with barriers of the unknown.”
The preservation of the IDM brand within the DMA framework was a crucial part of the merger ensuring that the credibility of the qualifications received by over 10,000 people through IDM is maintained. And in terms of qualifications for the next generation of marketers, this change should be welcomed as a boon to professionalism, as Shane Redding, owner of Think Direct, makes clear: “It will now be much easier to embed the DMA code which enshrines industry best practice into the IDM’s practical relevant training. It is especially exciting to me that the two charities have also merged as I think this will provide new ways of encouraging the next generation into our digital, direct and data world, and allow organisations easier access to new talent.”
Perhaps the most exciting aspect of the merger is the creation of a new operating division focused on employability, a team which will have merged assets from both organisations and will be dedicated to attracting talent from universities. This will increase the focus and investment in working with students, both within universities and for new graduates, as well as professors, in order to attract the right talent to the industry. As Combemale states: “This is an area where activity that has previously resided in one or other of the organisations will now merge together into a separate business unit.”
Practically speaking, the organisations will be maintaining separate offices and staffing roles for the foreseeable future, though there is an acknowledgement that a shared office space is a long-term goal, along with the structural synergies this will entail.
The merger, then, seems for the time being to be more of a partnership than an immediate integration of the brands. While Combemale will be the group CEO and Ken Goulding the group finance director, there will be separate MDs for both sides, with Jane Cave appointed MD of IDM and Rachel Aldighieri acting as interim MD of the DMA. Certainly though, the change will result in any competitive element between the organisations disappearing and should mean direct marketing has a more cohesive voice in the future.
Good news for B2B?
With regards to B2B in particular, the group is well aware of the importance of B2B in the direct marketing industry. As Combemale states: “B2B makes up 30-40 per cent of the total spend of one-to-one marketing. And, of course, businesses rely on prospecting customers through telemarketing, generating leads through their website, and nurturing those leads, and there are particular skills required in a B2B context. Rightfully, the IDM has some specific qualifications and specific courses that recognise these differences.”
With regards to industry responsibility, legislation and the overall framework of direct marketing, he also argues that B2B and B2C are part of the same conversation: “The way we’ve handled it within the DMA has been to have a focus on B2B in each of our workstreams. So email marketing is important for B2B and B2C. Print advertising mail is the same. Within the IDM side, there are very specific skills in terms of lead nurturing and conversion, and how marketing interacts with sales teams that are unique to B2B, so that’s where we see the continued speciality focus in terms of education.”
The future
Of course, every merger faces its challenges and this will be no different. But for the moment, both within the organisations themselves and in the wider marketing industry there is a belief that this decision makes a lot of sense and there is a good deal of optimism about its success. As Melanie Howard, co-chair of IDM, states: “The newly created group is committed to continuing the purpose for which the IDM was established. We believe that the value of the IDM brand, the importance of reputable qualifications to the industry and our role in attracting high-quality talent to the industry will be expanded in a shared future.”
And as Marc Nohr, CEO of Fold7, concludes: “The merger makes sense on paper – but leadership of the merged organisation now needs to make sure it makes sense in reality. Experience suggests that isn’t easy – one plus one doesn’t always equal two in mergers and acquisitions. The need to champion direct and digital marketing, to engage with a whole new generation of clients and organisations who may not recognise themselves in what the IDM/DMA once were, and the imperative to have well-trained people, all augur well for the combined force but provides an important challenge. It will require scale, imagination and great delivery – but it’s infinitely possible.”
