Coworking with Michael Della Penna

Each week, we spotlight Marketing Brew readers in our Coworking series. If you’d like to be featured, introduce yourself here.

Michael Della Penna is chief strategy officer at InMarket, a marketing and measurement company. He was previously chief revenue and growth officer at the consumer insights company Cuebiq. He’s spent more than three decades working in digital advertising, marketing, data, and tech, including roles at Oracle Marketing Cloud, Epsilon, Bigfoot Interactive, CNET Networks, and ZDNet.

What’s your favorite ad campaign? One of my favorites is Dunkin’s multi-year DunKings campaign. Consider it a masterclass in preventing your brand from getting lost in the tornado of Super Bowl ad hype. It’s emblematic of the success brands can achieve when they really understand their customers and the strategies needed to reach them every step of the way. Understanding local pride in the brand, DunKings tapped Boston star power with Ben Affleck, Matt Damon, Tom Brady, and Jeremy Strong, even bringing customers into the mix when Affleck worked at a local Dunkin’ drive-thru. Dunkin’ met customers’ need for value through meal deals and launched new products like the Dunkalatte to drive interest and demand. Dunkin’ leveraged other seasonal moments like Halloween with its DunKings tracksuit drop to stay top-of-mind throughout the year. Finally, it extended across channels and screens to ensure it didn’t get lost in the sea of Super Bowl ads or crowded QSR space. Dunkin’ also tapped into the mega-power of Sabrina Carpenter, demonstrating once again how the power of new product introductions, star power, and advertising can combine to create great outcomes. It’s not surprising how in just the last year, Dunkin’ surpassed Starbucks in InMarket’s Fidelity Index, which measures a consumer’s love, passion, and loyalty for a brand by evaluating its share of visits to share of locations.

One thing we can’t guess from your LinkedIn profile: I’m passionate about food, travel, family, dogs, and crushing the youngsters at Orange Theory on the weekends.

What marketing trend are you most optimistic about? I’m most excited about the shift towards real-time marketing and leveraging more AI capabilities, which are ushering in a new “sense and response” era of marketing. As marketers today, we are incredibly lucky because of the technology and tools we have so readily available. We’re able to not only uncover shifts in consumer behavior as they’re happening, whether they be changes in shopping behavior or media consumption, but quickly act on them accordingly. This ability to dive deeper into the “why” behind consumer spending and when and where to best reach them in real-time will give marketers the ability to optimize and grow performance from their investments. This will also drive greater efficiency and allow them to unlock next-level opportunities, experiences, and loyalty even in the most difficult economic and market situations. It’s no secret that marketers are facing increased pressure from leadership to drive revenue growth for their brands, so a sense-and-response, outcome-based, real-time approach has and will increasingly become table stakes.

What’s one marketing-related podcast/social account/series you’d recommend? There are two podcasts and one social account that I always have queued up. The podcast How I Built This With Guy Raz is a must-listen. It offers amazing stories and advice from entrepreneurs, including their unique journeys and efforts to build their brands and achieve success. It’s filled with many creative marketing lessons! Ad Age’s Marketer’s Brief podcast is also great. I love to hear about the creative campaigns and strategies that industry leaders are seeing success with. And the Marketing Millennials social media account never misses. The memes are top tier and perfect for lunchtime entertainment.