The idea of the three marketing Rs has been around for some time, but now it seems that Mars has added a fourth R: risk. Now, I have always been told that people remember things that come in threes and fives better than even numbers, so how about I add one more R? That would be receptivity.

For those of you wondering what the first three Rs might be according to Mars’ Allison Miazga-Bedrick, they are reach, relevancy and reaction. But I am going to propose a slightly different list that includes receptivity and risk.

Reach

If you want to influence someone you have to reach them. That is why TV remains the mainstay of most media campaigns. However, it does not have to be that way. Recently, I came across a case study for Wall’s Classics in the UK that primarily used outdoor and Facebook (old school and new school street media) to good effect.

Receptivity

Maybe receptivity got dropped from the list because most marketers just don’t want to think about it, but increasingly they have to do so. AdReaction Gen X, Y, Z finds that Gen Z is more averse to advertising than older consumers and more likely to block ads with technology, or use other ad avoidance strategies.

Risk

At the Association of National Advertisers' (ANA) 2017 Brand Masters Conference Miazga-Bedrick noted that risk-taking was embraced at Mars, although she also noted that testing and metrics were important to judging the success of a campaign or not. This is in line with the 70/20/10 philosophy that encourages experimentation.

Resonance

The success of risk taking is judged by the audience; do they engage with the content, talk about it and share it? I have deliberately used the word “resonance” rather than relevancy because it speaks to the fact that most campaigns need to engage people’s emotions in order to succeed.

Reaction

Success is ultimately defined not by likes or shares, but by the sales response. However, it is worth noting that this could come in the form of additional penetration or reduced price elasticity; there is more than one way of growing the financial value of a brand.

Of course, now that I have listed these five Rs some others have come to mind. How about recency for instance? And maybe you have some others you would like to add to the list? Please share your thoughts.