Stop Coordinating Chaos: A JTBD Approach to Truly Integrated Marketing

Applying Jobs-to-be-Done to align Business Units, Partners, and Customer Experience

We've all felt the pain. Marketing campaigns that clash between business units. Partner programs that generate noise but few quality leads. Endless meetings trying to sync messages, budgets, and schedules, only for the customer experience to remain fragmented and confusing. It feels like we're constantly coordinating chaos.

The hard truth is that most marketing integration efforts fail because they focus on the wrong thing: coordinating activities. We invest in complex CRM integrations, mandate shared calendars, and debate brand guidelines, but the underlying friction between business units (BUs) and partners persists. Why? Because we haven't clearly defined the real job the business needs integrated marketing to accomplish.

Jobs-to-be-Done (JTBD) theory offers a powerful lens to shift our perspective. Instead of asking "How do we integrate these marketing activities?", JTBD asks, "What fundamental progress is the business trying to make by having BUs and partners work together on marke…