The Five Biggest Mistakes in Marketing

By Barbara A. Alba, President

WellStar Marketing, Inc.

Why do some marketing programs crash and burn, while others grab the proverbial brass ring? That is a question that has rung in the ears of every marketing executive or business owner since the beginning of time. Even the great retail tycoon John Wanamaker was famously quoted as saying, “I know that half of my advertising efforts don’t work; the problem is, I don’t know which half.”

The truth is that there is no clear answer to that question because success in marketing is dependent on a myriad of factors, some of which can be controlled, most of which can’t. It is no surprise to learn that the average tenure of a marketing director in a major corporation is 18 months. When the stakes are high, and there is an implicit expectation to consistently deliver results in such an unpredictable game, heads roll pretty fast.

In other words, marketing success lies somewhere between in the vast divide between a crap shoot and a sure best.

Having said that, however, there are conventional wisdoms that those of us who have been around this crazy business for a few decades (or more) are happy to share. More than happy, in fact. Because these are the factors that are typically out of our control (as the marketer or agency) but often in the client’s control.

We’ll call them our Five Biggest “Forehead Slapping” Mistakes in Marketing.

Mistake #1: Forgetting the Other Three “P’s”

Anyone who has taken Marketing 101 (particularly if they’ve taken it from me) knows the Four P’s of Marketing: Product, Price, Place and Promotion. But it’s the first three that are conveniently forgotten when a promotional campaign fails. The best bull’s eye creative and most brilliant promotional strategy cannot succeed if the product or service they are designed to showcase is sub par compared to the competition. Likewise, if it is priced inappropriate (too high or yes, in some cases, too low).

The concept of “Place” in today’s electronic global marketplace, encompasses not just physical retail space, but also the entire concept of distribution and delivery (which is why “I can buy it cheaper and faster online” has become every brick and mortar retailer’s most hated phrase.)

Before throwing darts at your marketing director (or God forbid, chopping off his/her head), take a good hard honest look at your first three “P’s”.

Mistake #2: Not Setting an Appropriate Budget

This is an issue that haunts marketing agencies that tend to work with small to mid-sized businesses, especially those that are new to the game. No one wants to spend money (especially these days) that they don’t have to, but too often, marketing is viewed as an expense and not an investment. Savvy business people know you have to spend money to make money, and there is really no alternative to marketing (kind of like breathing…). Yes there are businesses that have existed for years on referrals, but those ranks are decreasing every year. If you want to grow, your strategy has to be more proactive, and being proactive almost always requires smart marketing (which I define as strategic, creative and well funded).

Rule of thumb: Depending on your industry, your competitive arena and a few other important factors, you should be spending between 4% - 6% of your gross income (gross revenues less cost of goods but before operating

expenses) every year in marketing. If you are just starting out and need to fund a development phase (i.e., launching a new website, introducing a new product or service, etc.) you are clearly closer to 6% (or sometimes higher). So if you are running a business that brings in $1 million in gross income, you should be spending a minimum of $40,000, and probably closer to $60,000 if you need to be aggressive or are just starting out. If you are a $5 million enterprise, you should be allocating between $200,000 and $360,000.

Yes, I heard all about David and Goliath, “out-smart, don’t outspend,” etc., etc. But at the end of the day, you just can’t get away from the numbers. Don’t sabotage yourself from the start by not stepping up to the plate to provide the

Mistake #3: Giving up Too Soon

This is another common problem among “amateur” marketers as well as the faint hearted.

Good marketing programs take time; hitting it out of the ball park in week one rarely happens. In fact, the most successful marketing campaigns are born out of trial and error, and evolve slowly into winners. Breaking through the consciousness of consumers today is a maddening process. Ten years ago, we used to say that a typical individual is bombarded with over 8,000 marketing messages a day. Can you even imagine what it is in our internet-surfing-text-messaging-Twittering-UTubing-Facebooking world today? (I think whoever comes up with those statistics gave up counting last March.)

If you went through the proper steps to develop a marketing program (appropriate research, well-thought out strategy, strong creative concept – and as I mentioned in Mistake #1 – an honest assessment of your other 3 “P’s”), give it some time to gain traction before pulling the plug.

That doesn’t mean letting a failing campaign limp to the finish line alone and untouched. Set an appropriate campaign time period AS WELL AS a benchmark to evaluate results to date and consider some adjustments that could improve its performance without losing its momentum (which can happen if you try to change too much). That benchmark should typically be 1/3 of the way through the campaign (i.e., at the two-month mark for a six-month campaign).

Mistake #4: Putting All Your Eggs in One Basket

There is clear and compelling evidence that a marketing effort that involves two or more tactics (such as print advertising, e-mail blasts, media relations, direct mail, etc.) is always more successful than one that utilizes a single tactic, assuming that all other factors are equal.

This is based on a simple premise – you are more likely to remember something if you have been exposed to it in various forms and from different angles. Here’s an example: you’ve been casually thinking about replacing your living room furniture for about a year. Because you are not in active buying mode, your eyes glaze over print ads that might be situated next to an article you’re reading in the paper. But somewhere in your subconscious, a company brand plants a mental seed. Several months later, as you get more serious about your purchasing plan, you see a television commercial from the same company featuring a leather couch that is remarkably similar to the one you had in mind for your new living room. Your subconscious updates its imprint; this is a company I’ve heard of before and they carry the kind of furniture that I like.

But the incentive that gets you to finally get in the car and hit the store of this savvy marketer is an online banner ad on one of your favorite websites, announcing a 25% off sale for the current month (a banner ad that was placed on that site because it attracts visitors who fit a psycho-demographic profile just like yours).

There are many dimensions to this strategy – one is the recognition that you need to build awareness and promote your brand identity to future potential shoppers, in addition to using price/promotion strategies to reel in those who are ready to buy. The other is that you can’t necessarily judge the effectiveness of individual marketing tactics in a vacuum, since you never know what effect the ad you placed a year ago – one that barely penetrated your consumer’s consciousness – had on his/her decision to purchase 12 months later.

In sum, an integrated marketing program – with consistent, complementary and well-coordinated components – is like a tortoise. A flashy one-time marketing tactic is like a hare. And we all know the moral of that story.

Mistake #5: Playing the Blame Game

As acknowledged previously in this series, marketing is indeed a high stakes venture, typically with a lot of money at stake. When things don’t work out as expected, it is often hard to keep emotions in check. And when negative emotions are looking for a relief valve, they can sometime resort to the “blame game.” Fire the agency, fire the marketing manager, dump the product, and start all over.

“Placing blame” is not the same as analyzing the elements of a campaign or program in a starkly realistic manner (the same general theme as Mistake #1: Forgetting the Other 3 “P’s”). The difference is that one is destructive the other is constructive.

Think for a second about all of the variables that can impact the effectiveness of a marketing effort. Here’s a short list:

Your creative approach did not hit home
(Too safe? Too radical? Not well executed?)
Your media plan was off the mark
(Poor media research? Other market factors that impact its effectiveness?)

Your competition “trumped” you during the same period of time.
The economic climate (boy, we’ve all been hit over the head with this one in the past 18 months)
Insufficient budget to reach the “boiling point” for awareness or action
Lack of training/awareness for staff members who had to deliver on marketing plan’s promise

Marketing is in fact, a series of lessons learned, some big, some small. Our failures are there to guide us to our successes, if we allow them to teach us. Assemble your team and have a comprehensive and intelligent dialogue about what went wrong, what can be done in the future so the results won’t be replicated, and then go to work on the next campaign.