Marketing has become increasingly complex and data-driven. Every year, new tools that pull better data from more sources and enable increasingly personalized marketing become available, but using them to get better results is not as simple as it sounds. Choosing the tools to use and putting them together in a cohesive program is difficult at best – even for a marketing agency.
Most small and medium sized businesses do not have the budget to hire marketing teams. When there is a marketing professional on staff, it’s usually a more junior person who understands Social Media or digital marketing, but does not have much business experience. The most common scenario we encounter is a business owner who fits their marketing efforts in after they finish bookkeeping tasks on the weekend. When you ask them about their marketing strategy, they can tell you what they are doing, but not necessarily what goals they hope to achieve with each effort or how those activities work with together to achieve more than any single activity on its own.
Marketing strategy ties all of a business’s marketing efforts together. It’s how you weave the pieces of your business development and revenue growth efforts together to grow your business. It touches every aspect of your business, from your products or services and pricing, to the people you hire, and the experience a customer has when doing business with you.
A solid strategy will help you see which activities are working best and why they are working. Developing a marketing strategy usually starts with some common assessments, such as a SWOT analysis, but it needs to go beyond that and even consider deeper market variables, such as the overall status of the market and your company’s competitive position within it.
Other aspects of your business to be considered include product/service development, customer service, sales cycle, sales process, hiring plans, budget, and technology requirements of the company. It should establish the metrics used to assess progress towards goals and KPIs that show the impact on your bottom line, so it’s no small undertaking. Most smaller companies do not have time to create a complete strategy, even if they have the expertise in marketing.
Full stack marketing is here to stay – and the “rules” – the algorithms and tools – will continue to change frequently. Marketing strategy consultants provide significant value by ensuring that the money and time spent on marketing activities result in more than just a good feeling or name recognition. A seasoned qualified marketing consultant will understand full stack marketing with respect to how it impacts business operations and revenue, and can devise a strategy for your company that grows your revenue.
Isn’t it time you get the results you deserve from your marketing budget? Contact us today and ask a senior marketing consultant to help you with an effective marketing strategy!
