Addressing a high-powered group of marketing executives last week, one question they asked was about cutting marketing expenditures during a downturn.
Go cut. Why not?
Earlier I had polled the group as to their definition of marketing; only one had a good answer. The rest saw marketing as sales support or doing marketing things: ads, direct mail, catalogs, websites and emails, trade shows and so forth. They might as well cut their budget since they were wasting their money anyways.
Until you understand the fundamental basics of marketing and have a sound strategy in place, there's no reason to spend money on tactics.
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2 comments:
Jack, could not agree more with your posting. Perhaps one of the reasons that most marketers don't understand marketing is this -- they're too focused on short-term results (akin to Wall Street). When the short-term rules the day, sales and finance managers become heroes...who got the last sales, who found another penny to cut from manufacturing costs, etc. This approach becomes the rule and permeates the marketing team. The ability to take risks (small and large) is erradicated and status quo is the rule. Inevidently, when the short and long-term become indistiguishable, the company can no longer the devote time and resources that are necessary to develop and implement new, market-based initiatives that truly solidify customer relationships and grow the business. Then again, there are a lot of folks that just don't get it...
Jack, your blog is spot on as I have a business leader who thinks marketing is a color palette only. Brands, products and services can't move without marketing - an example given recently is the Compact Fluorescent Light Bulb, first developed in 1975, introduced in 1980 and died as there was no marketing to support it. Now, there is marketing and the ever helpful legistlation, and bulbs are flying off the shelves. A string of product introductions, new logos for each, is not branding or marketing.
Mahala Renkey
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