R-NOTES
Insights and tools you can use to grow your business's relevance.
Is your marketing communications on a diet?
Introducing the term "Spigoting", and how avoiding it will help your firm gain an appetite to market with guts.
In this R-Notes: Diets - Spigoting - Guts
Diets
It seems like everyone’s on one.
Every reader probably is or has a friend, neighbor or relative that’s on the Atkins or South Beach diet. The truth is that these ‘diets’ are not really diets at all and the people who try them are not really dieters.
Diets are change agents. The dieter seeks transformation and therefore undertakes a diet. For some, the diet causes a complete rethinking of the approach to fueling their body. In a hard-fought mental game, the dieter solely controls the diet’s success. Stick with it and great results happen. Partially embrace the diet, or turn it on and off, and the results will be limited, inconsistent or actually negative.
Dedication creates results.
Spigoting
Spigoting: def: the sporadic or infrequent usage of marketing communications activities.
Marketing communications is no different than dieting in that it can be a tremendous change agent. It starts with dedicating everyone to the activities involved in providing and communicating new value to customers.
The marketing world’s analogy to roller coaster dieting is spigoting. In many cases, your firm’s growth opportunities are limited by restricting your contact with the marketplace. You know the saying, "if no one knows, no one cares, and no one buys."
Spigoting, although it may seem less risky, is actually more risky – and potentially damaging – over time. Just like periodic dieting, because of inconsistent activity it becomes very difficult to accurately gauge what's working and create sustainable dialogue with your marketplace. So every initiative and tactic seems like reinventing the wheel.
To determine whether your organization is spigoting its communications, consider these five common symptoms:
- External communications talk more about you, not your customers or solutions,
- Definition of the target market is constantly changing,
- Executing tactics without specific objectives,
- Pushing creative design that blends-in with the industry, and
- Guessing which tactics will perform the best.
In a previous column, we defined marketing as “increasing value to customers profitably.” By avoiding spigoting, it is possible for your marketing communications to do this. It starts with dedicating your firm to providing and communicating new value to customers.
Now you’re ready to take the next step...market with guts.
Marketing with guts or pushing the boundaries.
If you’re immediately thinking edgy creative, stop! While that could be part of it – guts is more of an attitude change. It means having the courage to analyze and explore new ways that you can provide value to the market through your marketing communications.
Consider the following to market with guts and improve your results:
- Plan. Improve your marketing performance with a focused plan. Thorough analysis, creative thinking and facing the reality of your particular situation will create an objective review and solid foundation to build on.
- Stop one hit wonders. Don’t dump your annual marketing spend into one high-risk tactic, such as a single direct mailing. It’s costly, ineffective, and stops you from any further marketing outreach.
- Think about WIIFM. It’s what your customers ask, “What’s in it for me?” Are you educating your prospects, supplying them insights and building a dialogue? Or are you just looking to sell ‘em? Communicating the unique value that you provide helps build trust and credibility. Here’s a simple example: Switch from “Please give me your email address” to “Here is what we will do for you in return for your email address.”
- Design. No you don’t have to be zany, but the truth is that remarkable stuff breaks through the clutter. For creative inspiration try getting outside of your industry.
- Courage. Sure, it’s easy to look at your competitors and say, “Let’s do it like they did. It worked for them.”
Here's the bottom line -stand out on your own and don’t copy your peers. The more you benchmark your marketing strategy, creative approach and messaging to your industry peers, the more you will be perceived just like them. That's a road to commodiziation. Be courageous and confident in what you offer and how you offer it.
No doubt, marketing with guts takes more work. It does take more steps, from planning through execution. But don’t let yourself fall down. By laying the proper ground work, you’ll create a sustainable marketing effort that presents the right offerings on which your customers and the market will feast.
Hungry yet?
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