What beliefs stand in the way of your marketing success?

One of the interesting aspects of being an external supplier is watching how companies approach marketing activity. Like many chaotic systems, it sometimes seems there is no pattern at all. But step back to see the full spectrum of personalities, inter-departmental empires and embedded supply chains and some of those weird decisions start to make sense.

For all the planning, meetings, research, discussions, presentations, submissions and tenders, where do your final decisions come from? The most obvious feature of "human adjusted" decision making, is the gulf between strategy and action. Here are some of the beliefs we come across that seem to stand in the way of fully achieving marketing objectives.

"Internal resources are free!" This concept has stood the test of time. There are two main reasons why a business continues to work on a project long after it should have been delegated to an expert supplier. The first is that it is fun or interesting. Photo shoots and logo designs tend to have senior management being very hands-on. The alternative is the junior employee who can "handle that." These tasks, such as print production, go fine until there is a problem.

It is important to fully judge the true cost of internal resources, not only in terms of time, salary and lost production, but also new equipment, training, stress and re-dos. A good supplier brings ideas and experience to your brief and takes ownership of the outcome.

"Everyone shares my interests!" We have seen huge sponsorships put into horse racing and motor sport that would have very limited cut-through for grocery shopping customers. Marketing budgets seem ripe to become a slush fund for personal hobbies.

When considering projects, a good guide is to refer back to your customers' decision making process. By analysing customer behaviour, you can better judge the potential successful of an activity.

"I would never wear that colour!" Another obstacle is confusing the values of staff with the values of the brand. Some managers live their products but many don't, yet still create ads to appeal to them, not their customers.

A strong, well defined brand will make decision making easier and less subjective. It will  move discussions away from personal opinions, towards ideas that best represent the interests of customers.

"That worked well, now what's our next idea?" So often marketing ideas are run for a while before being dropped or replaced unnecessarily. Many in-store campaigns are only run once until the allotted time or budget expires. Then there is an assumption a whole new activity is required for the next campaign. 

Staff work with a campaign day-in, day-out, but for customers your marketing is probably a small part of their life. Applying a continuous improvement philosophy to marketing will slowly improve outcomes and give you the greatest return on good marketing ideas.

"Everyone is doing it!" This can also be called, "I've just seen a great idea!" Following the herd is tempting, they must know what they're doing, right. Groupthink applies not only to branding and ideas, but also to media. A lot of activity seems to be produced by people looking over their shoulder and not focussing on their own goals. This is a shame, as new media has incredible potential to deliver customised and powerful solutions.

Get some space from your competitors by having a clear understanding of where your business sits in your territory. Carefully identify which aspects should be unique and push them hard, both in terms of creative and media. This will ensure you are not following others for security, but offering your customers real reasons to consider your offer.

So, as you develop marketing plans, consider these issues and make sure you are not selectively interpreting data, or being swayed by your competitors. The less chaotic your decision making, the easier it is to see how your project went and plan for improvement.