How Much Marketing in 2010?

Marketing plans (and some business plans) went out the window in 2009. Now it’s time to determine strategies and tactics for 2010. Is the recession over? Are we headed for a double-dip downturn? How much marketing should we be doing?

Business owners struggle to know how much marketing to do. Often times they choose based on reasons that make sense...until you see them in a list on a blog somewhere. Decisions based on:

1. How much can we afford?
   

2. What is our competition doing?
   

3. What’s the latest thing I can try?
   

What Can We Afford?

Budget is a concern, obviously, but determining budgets at the tactical level (how much direct mail can we afford to print...) is not sound business reasoning. The conversation should be at the strategic level, basing our activities on our goals (whether financial, project count or other goals). The key is choosing tactics (and their budgets) based on their return in the selling process.

What is the Competition Doing?

Many business owners cede their business decisions to their competitors...which assumes that their competition somehow is smarter and makes better decisions. Sure we sometimes HAVE to go to the trade show because our competition is there. Yet this thinking can lead business owners to spend their valuable dollars, time and effort on marketing tactics that aren’t the most effective for their selling process.

What’s the Latest Thing?

Sure, the latest thing could be the next big thing. But just like websites (back in the early days of the web) or social media marketing more recently, no tactic is going to be THE ONE to yield instantaneous and amazing results. But often business owners chase the latest marketing idea because they are frustrated by the lack of results from their existing marketing and selling tactics. That’s why it’s so important to understand how to integrate new ideas into the current selling process.

The first step to developing an effective go to market plan is understanding how much marketing to be doing. We’ve developed a downloadable video that teaches this first step in building a quantifiable process. It’s quick and easy, but can pay big dividends as you consider your 2010 strategy.

Not the video download type? Email me to schedule a one-to-one session. And start taking control of your marketing process.

SLE