I work with companies every day who have blind spots in their marketing. This has led me to put together some thoughts on how and why blind spots develop, how to know if there are blind spots in your marketing, and most importantly- how to address those blind spots.
Most marketing professionals have one or two areas in which they excel above all others. Maybe your team has some kicka$$ writers, website designers, graphic designers- but their SEO knowledge and advertising prowess isn’t what it could be. If your team is made up of only creative people, there’s a good chance that the analytics side of your marketing could be neglected. Here’s a couple of tell-tale signs that your companies’ marketing has blind spots.
- Spending massive amounts on advertising. This is a popular course of action when your marketing isn’t working. Example: I recently saw a company that was spending 60k per month on GoogleAdwords/ PPC. This spend might be reasonable if you’re a huge company with a huge ad budget- but for most middle market companies, this ad spend is completely unreasonable. Upon further inspection, their SEO was nonexistent. Meaning they literally had to pay for each and every site visit. This would be like owning a restaurant and giving a free meal to each table, just for walking in the door. This campaign can be beneficial, but isn’t sustainable long term.
- Lots of turnover in your marketing department. Turnover creates gaps in thoughts, ideas and implementation. What the last marketer began may or may not be followed through, this inconsistency is a breeding ground for blind spots as the team is always in “catch-up” mode.
- Lack of knowledge on trends. Marketing in our age is a quickly evolving art. Knowing what Google likes today in terms of your SEO and ads is key to a successful marketing strategy. If your marketers have been in the game for many years and are on “cruise control” they are likely missing many marketing opportunities that have emerged in recent years/ months/days.
- Lack of data. If your marketing team isn’t able to easily show ROI, they are almost certainly misusing funds somewhere along the line. You can’t manage what you don’t measure. If you can’t see your return, the chances that you have huge blind spots in your marketing are high.
- Miscommunication between leadership and marketers. It’s not uncommon that I hear from marketers that getting in front of their leadership is difficult and sometimes impossible. This disconnect means the marketing team isn’t aware of the high level goals of the company. If you’re a leader, you likely have 12, 18, 24 month goals for your company- if these aren’t clearly communicated to the marketer, they could be marketing yesterday’s message and missing an opportunity to communicate your heart in their message. Keeping your marketing team engaged in the dream can go a long way in preventing blind spots. Maybe you have plans to reach other verticals- this info is key for the marketer to know ahead of time, preparing for that campaign in advance.
How to prevent or solve blind spots:
If you and your marketing team can’t see the forest for the trees, it could be a great time to bring me into the conversation. Having a fresh perspective on your brand and your companies’ growth strategy will not only give you new ideas, but will help to implement those ideas on an ongoing basis.