There are some stark differences between people who succeed
with their marketing and those who don’t even get off the ground or fail.  Over the years, I have made a conscious
effort to understand the reasons for the success and failures and apply them in
to my own efforts to get clients where they need to be, faster but with more
stability than ever before.

Here are the 5 main reasons your marketing might fail:

• You have mismanaged your communications

The responsibility for good communication
doesn’t just sit with the marketing department it sits across the company.  Communication can cover everything from how
you brief your internal staff on new marketing tools, how the message is conveyed
and by what medium, how you communicate with prospect clients, how you engage
with existing clients, the vocabulary your staff use, the state of the
marketing tools in the boots of your sales peoples cars and the timeliness of
your Eshots or mailings.  I could go on
for hours (don’t worry, I won’t…) but communication isn’t just the odd email
that goes out to your existing customers.

How to avoid: Set a communication plan and
live by it.  Create a tool box of tools
for the next 6 months and map them out with a responsible marketer to manage
and monitor them.

• You are not consistent

Longer-term stability and growth require
consistency from all angles.  If you tell
a customer they will receive a product or service update on a Tuesday at 6pm,
ensure they get it.  If you say that your
brand stands for superior customer service, prove it and prove it time and time
again.

If you deliver 98% customer satisfaction
rating keep it that high or improve on it, don’t give the customer any reason
to doubt you or look elsewhere.  If you
are posting to social media or writing blogs like this one, map out your titles
and topics for 6-12 months with flexibility, don’t over deliver for 2 weeks and
then give up – that loses trust with your audience and slows your growth.

How to avoid: Map out your tactics over a 12-month
quarterly planner, this way you will see your drivers for growth and actual
tactics ahead of time so you’ll stay completely in control of your marketing.

• You are not accountable

In order to know what has been done well
and helped you achieve your goals; you need to set objectives and KPIs and
monitor them over time.  There must be
responsibility allocated to each area of tracking in order for its delivery to
be well-managed and well-timed.  Being
accountable for what you set out to do can teach you far more than ‘winging it’,
especially over time for reflection.

How to avoid: Create a goals and
responsibility planner where all tracked areas are mapped out with a person
responsible for each and a deadline with deliverable.

• You are missing some creativity

Creativity is an art and if you don’t get
inspiration daily, it can feel like a real tough nut to crack.  Being creative doesn’t mean learning to
colour in or introducing pretty colours in to your brand, it means matching
customer needs to your solutions, analysing the competition (and staying ahead
of them), thinking outside of the box and maximising resource.  Without creativity, your brand can become
stale and lose its distinctiveness which you need to keep the customers
attention.

How to avoid: Set regular intervals to gain
the customers point of view and integrate it back in to your marketing offering.  Engage with creative types and big picture
thinkers and stay focused on your vision, mission and values.

• You are not planning ahead

You may have found a way to make flying by
the seat of your pants work (or at least tick over) with your marketing but
that doesn’t mean you are maximising every opportunity that is put in front of
you.  It can make things so much easier
to map out your marketing by year, by quarter, by month, by day and by
hour.  I do this for my clients and
manage it so everyone from the board room to the shop floor knows what is going
on at all times.  It increases staff retention,
customer service and reduces staff turnover.

How to avoid: Create an exhaustive planner
for all strategy and tactics employed.

If you would like to avoid more marketing mistakes and accelerate your growth, let’s chat http://www.gemmaangharad.com/vision