Marketing Tip of the Week: Question Your Marketing Strategy

The best marketing strategy is a flexible marketing strategy. It’s great to have a tried and true methodology, (such an approach makes a wonderful jumping off point for your strategy) but on a dynamic marketing landscape, a truly successful strategy will be able to roll with the punches. The saying goes, “If you do what you’ve always done, you’ll get what you’ve always gotten,” (thanks Tony Robbins) but that’s only true if the circumstances around you haven’t changed.

With marketing, as with business, the circumstances are always changing.

Change is Good

Look at each aspect of your marketing strategy and ask yourself:

1. Does this still work? – Things that were successful last year may go over like a lead balloon this year. Be mindful of how your strategies are received and the results you see from them. 
2. How can I make this work better? – Sometimes it’s not necessary to scrap an entire idea. Perhaps a little tweaking is all that’s needed.
3. Would a different option be a better option? – And then there are those times when you can’t find anything salvageable in an old idea. But don’t just throw it out! Hang onto it. After all, just because it didn’t work this year doesn’t mean it won’t work next year!

Failure is Your Friend

This seems counter intuitive, but it’s true! It’s impossible to know what’s going to work in your market without first trying, and failing, at many different things. The failures are not wholly negative. Yes, they neglected to meet your expectations, but what can you learn from them? What aspects of it worked and which ones didn’t? Why or why not? It’s these questions which will lead you to the successful strategy you want, and the best strategy can only be achieved through such trial and error.

C.S. Lewis said, “Failures are finger posts on the road to achievement.” Or, if you prefer someone more timely, Colin Powell said, “Success is the result of perfection, hard work, learning from failure, loyalty, and persistence.” Failure is an important stepping stone toward success. Don’t bemoan its presence. Instead rejoice that you have the opportunity to do better.

Marketing is about appealing to the masses, and as such there is no definitively right or wrong way to do it. The best advice you can get is not to be afraid to break out of your routine and try new things. If you always say the same things to the same people, they will eventually tune out your message. Change it up to keep it fresh.