THE COST OF MARKETING STRATEGY

When creating a business, too many people overlook the importance of marketing strategies. A marketing plan is just as lucrative as a business plan, so why do entrepreneurs so often create one, but not the other? Is it the lack of value they place on marketing in general, or maybe it’s the lack of vision they have for their business? A marketing strategy is nothing more than a roadmap for what tactics will be used and how these tactics will be executed. It takes time to create a strategy, but the benefits are less headache, fewer dollars spent, and a better chance at success.

VISION FOR YOUR BUSINESS

The best marketing agencies in town will be the ones with a vision for your business! They will have the insight to look at your business and come up with a marketing strategy that will give you the best ROI. They will have the ability to see the future of your company and create a strategy to reach those goals. Former CEO of General Electric John Welch said: “Good business leaders create a vision, articulate the vision, passionately own the vision, and relentlessly drive it to completion.”

Marketing strategies are the tactics that help you meet the vision for your business. Whether it’s a branding strategy, website, or retail design. All these need to be included in a robust marketing plan that can be read and executed. Advertising agencies should be able to answer the question “why are we doing this”, for every individual marketing tactic. 

Each tactic needs to be well thought out and researched to know the impact that should result when executed. Marketing is not a guessing game and you don’t have to recreate the wheel. There is a science to marketing that can be measured and any knowledgeable marketing company will be able to fulfill all of these tasks.

“Science is a collection of successful recipes” -Valéry

SUCCESS THROUGH STRATEGY

“Success is 20% skills and 80% strategy”, -Jim Rohn. If this really is true, then maybe this is a key to why businesses fail. A strategy is one of the biggest keys to success for any business. If you go into a business with no research or plan and just hope that it will work, that is a sure plan for failure. You might be the first business to market with your product. You might currently have no competition. 

Even if you’re experiencing success now there’s one certainty, attrition. Attrition can come in a variety of forms: bad financial decisions due to lack of strategy, high turnover due to mismanaged people or lack of vision, and last but not least, competition. Our goal is to ensure your business, service, and product don’t result as a flash in a pan.

TRUE COST OF MARKETING STRATEGIES

Marketing costs money, plain and simple. I am not here to tell you that you can create and execute a marketing plan for pennies on the dollar. Marketing is definitely one of those products that you pay for what you get. It is not typically a discounted service. However, if you create some marketing strategies then you can not only give yourself a clear plan of attack but save yourself a ton of money as well. 

Some advertising agencies are only out for the quick dollar and will say yes to any project that you ask to do without a thought. This can be extremely wasteful with both time and ultimately money. The ethical thing to do in this scenario would be to understand why the client is asking for that marketing tactic and follow that up with research to make sure that tactic is the right fit for the type of business that your client is in.

That’s why it’s important to choose the right marketing agency that will leverage their expertise and know their limits to setting your business up for success. Ultimately the true cost of a great marketing strategy is that it will save you in the long run in both your time and money. A well thought out marketing plan will save you the time of testing out marketing tactics that may not succeed as well as the money that will be thrown out towards these unsuccessful tactics.

Strategy costs money but trying to market without it is going to cost you more.