Tough Markets

You don’t do marketing because you want to.  You do it because you want to grow.  Marketing is a grudge. The goal is to grow. Businesses often postpone a serious investment in marketing until they can no longer grow or find that they have exhausted all their options. It becomes a case of “What do we do now”? And the answer, unfortunately, is “marketing.”  But here’s the good news… Marketing, more than any other business function, should have a significant impact.  Finance doesn’t make an impact—they just ensure you follow the rules. HR (or whatever it’s called these days) makes no impact. They simply keep the dam wall from bursting.  Sales don’t make an impact (I said that); they harvest what’s available—picking the low-hanging fruit.  Manufacturing just makes stuff. Fill orders. IT maintains your firewall and prevents you from experimenting with cloud solutions. There’s only one function that makes an impact or that can make a real one —marketing. Mar...

Running a workshop can be a rewarding experience, both personally and professionally. As a solo consultant, I've had the opportunity to design and deliver workshops on a variety of topics. Along the way, I've learned a lot about what it takes to create a successful and engaging learning experience. In this blog post, I'll share some of my key learnings and insights. Start with a clear problem statement Before you even begin to design your workshop, it's crucial to have a clear understanding of the problem you're trying to solve. This will help you to focus your content and ensure that your workshop is relevant and impactful. Design your workshop to address the problem statement Once you have a problem statement, you can begin to design your workshop. I've found that it's helpful to have a few standard models that I can customise to fit the specific needs of each client. Create an agenda A well-structured agenda is essential for keeping your workshop on track...

The biggest challenge for small/medium companies is reaching their intended audience. This problem becomes even more pronounced in business markets where key decision-makers often hide behind an email firewall and a receptionist. "Reach" is the crucial reason SMEs do marketing: "help me announce myself to my target market".  Interestingly, with established brands and larger companies, the reason for doing marketing is different. Awareness has already been achieved, and it becomes a case of encouraging existing customers to remain loyal. It is this reason why a company like Coca-Cola continues to advertise. Small brands advertise to become known; large brands stay relevant. Same activity; different objectives. The problem smaller companies have is how to achieve reach with limited resources. Small budgets mean that certain heavy-hitting, mass-marketing tools are unavailable, and so too highly targeted ones that require a substantial investment in upfront research. Ev...