INSIDER ACCESS
Extreme MARKETING Productivity :
How To Get The Most Out Of Every Activity , Every Dollar , And Every Minute You Invest
This month , I thought I ’ d take a brief hiatus from the usual marketing lesson and discuss another topic every bit as important and very closely related to marketing success and your ability to make money : MARKETING PRODUCTIVITY .
Never before in our lives has there been such complexity in managing a marketing department and a need for disciplined discrimination about where you spend your time and money . For nearly 30 years , I ’ ve sold and consulted companies on marketing , advertising , sales , and lead generation . It ’ s not that long ago in our history when all an IT services business owner had to do in marketing was to re-up their Yellow Pages ad , print up some business cards and a brochure for the occasional networking event , send out a few postcards , and maybe — maybe — have a website . Outside salespeople were called “ outside ” salespeople because they had to leave the office — go outside — to hunt . Now , sales floors are eerily silent , with many salespeople timidly hiding behind email , LinkedIn messages , texts , etc . to prospect . ( NOT a strategy I recommend , by the way .)
Now look at what ’ s involved … You can ’ t just have a website . To be effective , a website must have excellent search engine optimization ( SEO ), which requires not only a correct architecture from the initial design but also a constant updating of fresh , new material and correctly written , keyword-phrased optimized content , fast-loading and responsive design , strategic backlinking , social media integration , opt-in pages , instant messaging , and live-answered phones during business hours ( at a minimum ). But it doesn ’ t end there …
Now you must have your Google Places listing claimed , completely updated , and monitored to respond to online reviews — not only on Google , but also Yelp , Glassdoor , and any number of review sites relevant to your audience . You have to be “ findable ” online or your integrity is questioned ; what kind of business must you be running if I can ’ t find ANYTHING about you online ? Then there ’ s social media — and you cannot just say “ social media ” as an all-encompassing unit . Each platform has different uses , strategies for lead generation , rules for optimization and building an audience , etc . To add to the steaming pile of “ STUFF ” you need to pay attention to and manage , paying clients and even potential prospects feel completely justified in assaulting you on EVERY social media platform , instant messaging you random questions about your services on your personal Facebook page , posting a ( serious ) customer support question or request in a tweet , sending you a message on LinkedIn asking for help or to buy , commenting on Instagram , asking a question in the comments of your YouTube video , and even posting a negative or unfavorable review for the public to see . And they expect an instant response .
Assuredly , all of this social connectivity is a dual-edged sword where you CAN reach hundreds , if not millions , of potential clients online and via email , texts , retargeting , SEO , posted content , etc . — but simultaneously open the door for a tsunami of irrelevant information and a need to sift , sort , and respond to it all or generate a significant un-wow , costing you lost opportunity , a bad reputation , etc .
To simply deal with it ( and I mean “ deal ” as in “ dealing ” with a cockroach problem , not capitalize ), companies are being forced to hire full-time customer service departments to monitor ALL social media platforms to watch for and respond to such messages at a significant expense . If you ’ re a small business , this is a cost you are most likely unable to afford to put in place .
So , what do you do ? Here are my top three best strategies you can ( and should ) implement to ensure maximum productivity in your marketing .
1 . Choose carefully where you advertise and have a presence based on where YOUR clients go , NOT where the “ cool kids ” are today . A colleague of mine hunted me down at an event we were both attending to pick my brain about how we ’ re using YouTube to drive leads and sales . He had invested countless hours recording and posting