Guest Post by Ardi Kolah. Ardi is a marketing and blogging expert and the host of Vocus Europe’s 10 Golden Rules for Blogging webinar this Thursday.
For many business-owners, running the business, satisfying customers and clients, making sure inventory gets out on time, dealing with complaints, chasing invoices to get paid – and keeping people motivated – can feel like walking a tightrope.
Is there time for marketing when you’re working 25 hours a day?
Sure there is!
Often, it’s not only what you should do that counts but also understanding what you shouldn’t do that can be the fine line between success and failure.
Here’s my list of the most common marketing mistakes that can be so easily avoided.
#1: Lack of focus
One of the most important foundations of any marketing programme is the vision and purpose behind it. If the vision and purpose are blurred, indistinct, unclear or simply confused, how on earth can your team understand what they’re expected to do? Failure to plan means that you’re planning to fail.
Solution: Don’t do it! Have a plan! It will help you focus!
#2: Assuming you know who your customers are
When was the last time the perspectives of your customers got discussed at the last management meeting? Within your own organisation, who’s champion of the customer? Anyone put their hand up yet? No, I didn’t think so. Just stunned silence and embarrassment all round? You bet.
And yet it’s the customer that’s ultimately responsible for generating the financial success of the company. They keep the lights on. They pay the bills.
It’s simply breathtaking that the voice of the customer isn’t heard amongst the galaxy of other decisions taken on a daily basis that may affect customers.
Sadly, this is a very common mistake, particularly amongst those organisations with traditional, monolithic cultures and structures.
Solution: Appoint a ‘Customer Champion’ who at every management meeting is there to give the point of view of the customer before any important decision is made. Better still, make yourself the Customer Champion!
#3: Linear thinking
Logic in business is important. But critical thinking isn’t the only mode of approaching a problem, challenge or issue. Dr Edward de Bono identified several modes of thinking that can help solve problems and gave each one a different color hat.
Solution: Start to think laterally. The solutions you’ll come up with will solve customer and your own business problems much more effectively.
#4: Only looking at the world from your POV
You may firmly believe that your brand, product or service is the best on the market, offers the best possible performance that meets the needs and requirements of your desired customers and is at a price point that your competitors can’t match. In fact you’re so convinced about this that all your marketing broadcasts this very loudly.
Spot anything missing? Nowhere did you talk about the customer. This is a classic marketing mistake to avoid. How on earth can this be great marketing if it isn’t packaged from the point of view (POV) of the recipients?
Solution: Start looking at the world from your customer’s POV. After all, it’s more profitable!
#5: Not making the link between sales and marketing
Marketing isn’t just about awareness. It’s about selling more stuff! Otherwise, why bother?
Solution: Ask yourself whether a piece of marketing will create an environment where a sale is more likely to take place than not.
#6: Being stuck in ‘transmit mode’
You may feel you’ve been blessed with the ‘gift of the gab’ and as a result you’re stuck in transmit mode. Stop! How are you going to get someone to slow down long enough to listen to what you have to say?
Solution: Move from being in ‘transmit mode’ to being in ‘receive mode’. In other words, do more listening!
#7: Living in the past
Have you worked for a long time for the same company, perhaps your own? Have you become comfortable with the way you do business? As the complexity of managing customer relationships grows, so too should the need to change and adapt.
Solution: Don’t assume because what you did last year worked well, it would work again. Challenge assumptions.
#8: Thinking that all you need are more marketing outputs
Writing, blogging and networking. Great. But how did they make a difference? Sending out a news release to over 100 journalists doesn’t mean you will get 100 sales leads or 100 new customers, does it?
Solution: Before wasting your time and money, focus on a measurable outcome that you want to achieve. Let this drive your thinking as to what you need to do in order to achieve it.
#9: Forgetting to learn from your customers
It’s staggering how many marketers will try and figure out why something may or may not work as a campaign, a promotion, a competition, a news story or a newsletter. The experts who can answer these and other questions don’t turn up for work every morning at your office or shop.
Solution: Crowdsource! Ask your customers and prospects what they think about a forthcoming marketing campaign. Use social media channels and online networks and forums. Remove the guess work!
#10: Failing to learn from your previous mistakes
Customers are on a journey. And so are you.
In the best-selling book Failure is Not an Option, former flight director of NASA Gene Kranz observes that successful missions such as Apollo 11 could only have been achieved as a result of all the previous missions to space as well as the disasters and setbacks that befell the Gemini and other NASA space programmes. That’s hundreds of thousands of hours – and it was still touch and go as to whether the Apollo 11 mission would be successful and land on the surface of the moon.
Solution: Remember how we got to walk on the moon in the first place; we learned from our mistakes. Learning from your mistakes can ensure that you’re successful in the future. And anything is possible. Failure certainly isn’t an option.
Want more from Ardi Kolah? His books are published by Kogan Page and available on Amazon. Check out The Art of Influencing and Selling and High Impact Marketing that Gets Results.
Image: natalielucier (Creative Commons)