What Does Marketing Really Do?

At its core, marketing is about connecting products or services with the right audience. 

Imagine marketing as the Swiss Army knife of the business world—a multifunctional tool designed to tackle a myriad of challenges.  This involves understanding customer needs, crafting compelling messages, and delivering them through appropriate channels to drive engagement and sales. It's not necessarily about flashy web sites, ads, graphics and videos; although those elements are enablers. It's more about defining the crystallised value proposition and the ideal customer profile, and building a relationship of integrity and trust between service provider and end user.

The Myth of 'Easy' Marketing

Some believe that marketing is as simple as a couple of email campaigns, posting a few social media updates, including keywords in copy and sponsoring a handful of industry events. In reality, it's a complex discipline requiring a diverse skill set:

• Strategic Planning: Developing comprehensive marketing strategies aligned with business goals.

• Content Creation: Producing engaging content across various platforms, and posting often.

• Data Analysis: Interpreting metrics to refine campaigns and strategies.

• Event Management: Coordinating lead generation events, often juggling multiple events simultaneously.

• Sales Enablement: Supporting the Sales team as well as running partner engagement and support.

• Technology Proficiency: Utilizing tools like CRM systems, design tools, marketing automation platforms, content creation apps/platforms, and reporting/analytics software to measure performance against KPIs.
  

Marketing demands creativity, analytical thinking, and adaptability to execute effective campaigns whilst collaborating with multiple teams across the organisation.

Beyond Lead Generation—The Multifaceted Goals of Marketing

Marketing's objectives extend far beyond lead generation. One could argue about the primary, secondary and tertiary goals – because this depends on the maturity of the product, team and wider organisation. But here’s a starting point (order tbc by the circumstances on the ground):

• Primary Goals:

  • Brand Awareness: Ensuring the target market recognizes and remembers the brand and its value proposition.

  • Customer Acquisition: Attracting new customers to content that creates the opportunity for relationship and thereby revenue growth.

    
    

• Secondary Goals:

  • Customer Retention: Maintaining relationships with existing customers to encourage repeat business, account development and cultivation of brand evangelists.

  • Market Research: Gathering insights to inform product development and marketing strategies as to what a primary prospect/ideal customer profile (ICP) needs to meet  business challenges.

    
    

• Tertiary Goals:

  • Community Engagement: Building a loyal community around the brand can be a ‘make or break’ factor. Are you trying too hard to market/sell to your identified community of professionals? The creation of a community based on authentic business partnership, and a focus on enabling the success of the person in front of you must take precedence.

  • Demonstrating Corporate Social Responsibility: Ethical practices and contributions to society are becoming increasingly important. Demonstrating that your business stands for shared values like the protection of people, society and the environment are now expected by the global community. Your brand can become damaged if the company is not seen to behave in an ethical manner.

    
    

The Consequences of Neglecting Marketing

Thinly resourcing or overlooking marketing is like throwing a party and forgetting to send out invitations. Without a solid marketing engine, even the most exceptional products remain hidden. The consequences include diminished brand awareness, slow or stagnant sales, and a poor level of customer engagement, poor quality leads and missed opportunities. The sales cycle can slow to a point where the very existence of the product or service may be questioned.

What’s the Bottom Line?

At minimum, an effective marketing professional must provide:

• Diverse Set of Skills: Combining creativity, analytical abilities, and technical proficiency.

• Strategic Vision: Aligning marketing efforts with overarching business objectives.

• Adaptability: Staying current with industry trends and technological advancements.

• Customer-Centric Approach: Understanding and addressing the needs and preferences of the target audience.

• Commercial Acumen: Skills in forecasting, analytics and reporting that support the business, and specifically the sales team’s revenue target achievement.

  
  

While it may seem that ‘anyone can do marketing’, achieving meaningful results in a complex and noisy digital world requires the expertise of skilled professionals who can navigate the needs of any company at any stage of growth, whether it’s a start-up, 5 or more years into its journey, or well established.

Questions? Comments? Feel free to get in touch.