I got a reminder on Microsoft Teams earlier this week that it was my turn to write a blog.
Nothing came immediately to mind for a topic, so I started googling, reviewing a few of my favorite marketing newsletters and casting about for a trend on which I felt competent to comment. Nothing really struck me as something I wanted to write about.
Then I noticed my Google search terms: “marketing trends.”
Those terms led me to some conversations I had in the past few days, and also reminded me why I’d received a reminder about this blog post.
It’s very easy to get caught up in the latest marketing trends. We all want to piggyback on others’ successes. I’ve seen many a company lurch from campaign to campaign, latching on to one trend or another.
But “campaign thinking” is a mistake. There are two strategies that will change how you think about marketing forever: consistency and repeatability.
Marketing consistency ain’t sexy. Many of us got into marketing from the creative side of the business, and rarely do you hear consistency and creativity in the same breath. But consistency wins.
When I’m talking about consistency, I’m not talking about posting the same content over and over in the same channels, with the same calls to action. What I’m talking about is the process – creating a system by which your marketing activities reinforce each other, leading to a strong pipeline. No campaign should live in isolation. Each should be examined for how it reinforces your other marketing efforts and is reinforced thereby.
I’m a gearhead, so I like to think of this as an engine. Every part of an engine does something that impacts every other part. Anyone who has built high-performance engines quickly discovers that an improvement to one part or system within the engine requires a corresponding improvement to another part to get consistent, reliable performance.
Consistency and repeatability go hand in hand. The marketing system you create should be iterative and repeatable, particularly when it’s successful. If it’s working, and you’re getting a consistent volume of leads from it, why wouldn’t you want to repeat it? The repeatability of the system is why the process is important and documentation is crucial.
Another thing that comes from repeatability is efficiency. If you’re performing a repeatable process, you’ll get better and faster at it over time. One result of that should be improved lead throughput. The other should be the ability to recognize potential improvements.
That’s the final thought with which I’d like to leave you. While repeatability and consistency aren’t sexy, they also don’t leave out creativity and improvement. I mentioned building high-performance engines earlier, where improvements in one system require corresponding improvements in another. Your marketing system is the same. As you recognize areas where you can improve, you’ll discover those areas impact other areas, and you’ll make corresponding improvements in those as well. You’ll also know better how to operate that engine to get the most out of it.
Eventually, your marketing Yugo becomes a marketing Ferrari.
And you’ll win.