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Breaking Through the Marketing Mayhem

I was a guest on the pilot episode of the GOMA’s Candid Conversations series “Breaking Through the Marketing Mayhem.”

The discussion was geared toward helping business owners take control over their marketing, and I want to share the a few highlights with you – you can also click here for the full episode.

Breaking Through the Marketing Mayhem Highlights

There is a number of barriers that business owners encounter when creating and implementing a sustainable/effective marketing campaign. The most common is a lack of resources – both human and financial.

Typically, this means spending less time on developing a strong strategic foundation prior to creating a marketing campaign – the approach that rarely generates long-term cost savings or results that justify the initial investment.

Further, without a clear strategy, there’s also a tendency to glom onto every piece of marketing advice or trend that comes along – whether it’s right for the company or not. A lot of energy and resources can be spent on this scattered approach, which, ultimately, is far more costly than strategic, focused, disciplined marketing that’s grounded in the company’s goals.

The key to building an effective and sustainable marketing machine is to resist getting caught up in a never-ending cycle of fixes and to approach your company’s marketing strategically from the start.

Three Steps to Sound, Sustainable Marketing

Step 1: Create a Differentiating, Remarkable and Memorable Brand

To do this, you must start with a strong strategic foundation followed by equally superb execution.

Ask yourself: What is truly different about our company? What do you we do better than anyone else? And, no, “great people” or “quality of work” are not truly differentiating brand attributes.

Remember: All of your marketing efforts will stem from this strategic core, so make it as strong as it can be.

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Step 2: Know Your Audiences Extremely Well

This is especially critical in today’s marketing environment where we have an almost unlimited number of communication channels from which to choose.

If you don’t know your audiences intimately, you won’t know where to engage them. You might be delivering the most interesting and relevant content on Facebook, but to an empty auditorium.

Ask yourself: What resonates with our target audiences? What motivates and inspires them? Where do they congregate? What channels do they trust?

Step 3: Have a Plan

Finally, you need to have a solid marketing plan, including high-level goals that are specific, measurable and realistic; the strategies you’ve identified for achieving each goal; and the tactics you will employ to execute each strategy.

Creating a sustainable, effective marketing plan does not require 40 pages of marketing jargon. It requires a clear roadmap for getting your company from point A to point B.

If you want results, set meaningful goals and select communication strategies and tactics that make the most sense for achieving them.

Spend the time upfront and you’ll find your company leading the marketing game, rather than frantically and continuously playing catch up.