Our Growth Operations Director, Lucy Pollard, has overseen a host of marketing transformations for clients during her time at ITG. It’s a period of great change that can easily become overwhelming if you don’t put the correct processes in place. Here, she explains ITG’s model for effective, lasting, people-first marketing transformation.
Marketing transformation feels overwhelming because the marketing itself never gets a pause.
You’re expected to keep campaigns moving while adapting to unfamiliar tools and the new ways of working that come with them. The work intensifies before the benefits surface, and that imbalance is what puts most transformations under strain.
Independent studies show that nearly 70% of transformation initiatives fail, often because teams face more change than their capacity can absorb. And McKinsey’s latest research shows the same pattern, finding that only 16% of organizations deliver improvements they can sustain in the long term.
When teams are overwhelmed, progress stalls and the business begins to doubt the transformation.
This approach has seen ITG deliver 100% of transitions successfully and unlock long-term, sustainable change for our clients.
Big bang vs phased transformation
Risks of a big bang transformation
Here’s where the contrast shows up in practice: a big bang transformation forces every change into the organization at once. Systems shift without the sequencing that teams need to stay in control, leaving them to catch up while the transformation accelerates.
This makes complexity build faster than the organization can stabilize it, and the gaps that appear make it harder for people to use new tools with confidence. McKinsey’s global data reinforces this. Even in digitally mature industries, transformation success rates rarely rise above 26%, and in traditional sectors they fall as low as 4–11%.
The pressure comes from:
- Change landing faster than people can absorb it
- Workloads rising before benefits appear
- New tools being deployed without the context teams need
- Fragmentation increasing as complexity builds
All that said, sometimes there are pressures that demand a big bang transformation. And whilst it’s not (in our view, backed up by the data) best practice, there’s a place for it when there’s an urgent demand or pressure on the business.
At ITG, we’re famous for meticulous transformation but we’re perhaps just as well known for delivering something miraculous, under pressure in accelerated timings. However, even when that has to happen due to forces beyond your control, it’s vital that you loop back and make sure change management supports people and processes to catch up.
Why a phased model works
A phased approach avoids that disruption. It breaks the work into steps teams can absorb, giving the organization time to understand what’s changing and how it connects to the wider strategy. Instead of pushing everything live at once, progress is released in controlled stages so teams can adjust without compromising day-to-day performance.
A phased model delivers because it:
- Aligns the pace of change with team capacity
- Creates early clarity around what each step achieves
- Gives people time to build confidence as new tools land
- Sustains adoption by keeping workloads manageable
Most transformation plans fall apart here. People move with the change only when the work arrives with clarity and proves its value step by step. But it’s where ITG’s approach comes into its own.
That was the backbone of our work with Wickes. The order was deliberate: customer segmentation came first, core data connections followed, and early CRM programs rolled out in controlled phases. Each release was contained enough for teams to understand it, influence it, and keep delivery stable while the transformation expanded.
This structure kept the program alive. Teams understood why each phase mattered, stayed engaged throughout, and kept performance rising because the work stayed within a pace they could hold.
People-first change management
Change doesn’t have to be hard, and winning hearts and minds is just as important as the technology and processes we implement for our clients. We’ve touched on it above, but defining and explaining the ‘why’ is crucial, helping to reassure stakeholders and map a clearer path to our end goal.
On an emotional level, it’s about empathy for the people and the journey they’re on. Change is often scary, and shying away from that is counterproductive. At ITG we listen, support, embrace feedback, and demonstrate that we understand their experience.
There are a number of levers we pull to ease the transition, whether that’s appointing dedicated Change Champions within the business, or leveraging early adopter markets to showcase success. A big part of our role is maintaining energy and enthusiasm for the change.
Strong communication is integral, and a generic weekly email alone doesn’t cut it. Personalized, consistent, and targeted messaging delivered through multiple formats, including in-person sessions and webinars, helps to keep teams engaged and inspired.
And remember, new systems are only as effective as the people using them, which makes training essential to this process. We give people the knowledge and confidence to adopt new ways of working and new technologies, ensure we cater for different learning styles, and continue to deliver support for our clients’ teams beyond the go-live date.
Quick wins that build real momentum
Early wins shape how teams experience transformation in marketing. When people see progress they can measure in the first phase, the rest of the work feels more manageable. Confidence rises because the effort starts to produce visible results, and adoption follows naturally once teams trust the direction.
The early phases of the Wickes program reinforced this. Weekly customer communications generated more than £7 million in incremental value within six months. The uplift didn’t come from trying to move faster.
Instead it came from sequencing, beginning with targeted activations grounded in clear data insights and CRM logic that teams could work with comfortably.
As the TradePro and DIY programs rolled out, each phase strengthened personalization for distinct customer groups. Sharper segmentation improved repeat visits and retention, and the impact continued to build because teams understood the purpose behind each stage and had the space to work with the tools properly.
Quick wins tend to surface when the work lands in manageable steps and each phase gives teams something meaningful to build on. That structure keeps the transformation moving in a direction teams can sustain.
A structured transformation model for marketing teams
Marketing transformation works when people, processes, and technology move in sequence. When those elements fall out of step, the plan becomes harder to sustain and the value becomes harder to prove.
A structured model fixes that by giving each phase a clear purpose and the space needed to land properly.
ITG applies this through a model that organizes the work around how marketing teams really operate daily. Our approach brings together human insight, AI-driven analysis, CRM integration, and automation in a way that gives teams clarity on what’s changing and how to use it. The strength comes from the order.
Each step builds the understanding required for the next one to make sense, which keeps the transformation from drifting into complexity.
You can see this in the later stages of the Wickes program. The Missions & Motivations Engine mapped customer behaviors into defined missions and journeys, allowing the teams to shape offers and content around real motivations.
AI-supported analysis sharpened targeting, and the supporting dashboards made performance visible at every stage. Nothing moved without context, and every improvement could be tracked and refined as the program expanded.
That structure compounded the impact over time. Each phase created the foundation for the next, which is why the transformation delivered more than £50 million in incremental revenue, including £35 million in the most recent trading year.
The sequencing mattered because it kept the work aligned with capacity, customer insight, and business goals instead of forcing everything into a single moment of change.
A transformation model built around people
Marketing transformation works when it respects the pace people can hold. When the work is sequenced with intention and every phase arrives with a clear purpose, teams stay aligned and the results continue to build.
That stability is what protects performance while the organization adapts, and it’s the difference between momentum that lasts and momentum that disappears under pressure.
ITG’s approach is designed around that principle. A structured model gives marketing teams the context they need to act confidently, the data they need to make decisions, and the space required to integrate new capabilities without being stretched past capacity.
We know that even in times of change, you can’t drop everything. It’s why we take on the heavy lifting ourselves, removing any unwanted and unnecessary distractions so that you can continue to work with as little disruption as possible.
Most of all, we understand that true marketing transformation happens in partnership. When we deliver change for a client, we see ourselves as one team working in close collaboration — celebrating wins, solving challenges, and achieving our goals together.
If you want support designing a transformation model that works for your people and delivers progress you can measure, fill in the form below to get started.