I Love A Good Marketing Process, Don’t You?

This month’s word of the month is process, a topic near and dear to my heart. And, any strong marketer will understand why. Successful marketing teams must have creativity and strategy, but all is lost without a tight process. You see, marketing is akin to a living, breathing activity. It is ongoing, neverending. It is not an event that is ever done.

Your well-thought-out marketing process will help you with:

  • Quality – Execute an end-product that is of value and quality (and drives ROI). Iterations, last minute edits and rounds of changes are par for the course in the marketer’s universe. Add in heavy workloads, tight deadlines and demanding C-suite executives and you might find quality suffers. A tight process will, ultimately, help your marketing team eliminate the confusion, rush projects and potential of mishaps that can result in subpar results.
  • Relationships – Avoid internal conflicts and frustrations. Your team struggles when pulled in different directions with no unified goal and no visibility to what the next step should be. A clear process defines what the handoff process looks like and who holds responsibility for which step of the marketing production process.
  • Insights – Understand what is working and what isn’t. A well-reviewed process will help marketing leaders gain key insights into what is working and what is not. Maybe one area of your production process is broken, or a certain area is overloaded, creating a bottleneck. It might be time to add to staff or offer training to get current marketing team members’ skills updated. Without a tight marketing process, these issues can go undetected and undefined.
  • Productivity – Gain insights into how your team spends their time and where inefficiencies may exist. Your team’s productivity is one of the most important metrics you can measure. It should be calculated into the actual ROI of your marketing efforts. Many times, your marketing process will help you draw the conclusion that certain efforts take too much time to complete, based on the results that they bring to your company.

Technology To Help You Get Your Process In Order:

Many tech tools are easily accessible to get your marketing processes under control. From project management to automation software, you can lean into technology to get your house in order, even if you have a tight budget.

  • PM all day, every day – Even if your marketing team is small and lean. Tools like Asana, Trello, Jira and MS Project can help you manage to-dos, set deadlines to tasks as well as illuminate those bottlenecks or underperforming areas of your marketing production. BUT don’t estimate the power of a simple spreadsheet or pen and paper. The idea is to systemize so you are better at marketing. If you are working too much on your system, you won’t be marketing! 
  • Seek out ways to automate – Automation does not always make sense. (Like don’t lose your authentic voice on social because you’re scheduling your posts 90-days out.) But, you may find some tools can save you and your team serious time. For example, Customer.io lets you send automated, yet customized emails to your customers based on how they interact with your company. Also, Infusionsoft and Hubspot let you manage your lead pipeline and close deals with its in-depth auto-pilot tool. (Be sure you talk to me about automation before you sign up because it’s not always easy to compare.)
  • Choose and use wisely – There is no one-size-fits-all technology strategy. Your business, your marketing team makeup and your resource requirements are unique to you. Having said that, use your technology with these general rules of thumb:
    • Start slow, so you don’t overwhelm your team or overspend.
    • Get early buy-in from your team and require that the tools be used.
    • Survey for feedback at set intervals to ensure your tools are actually improving your marketing processes.
    • Be sure to practice what you preach! Become a power user of the tool you choose.

Marketing process is often a dreaded word among creatives and big picture strategists, but the truth is, it can be the backbone of your marketing success. It amps up your ability to collaborate, strengthens your attention to detail and decreases the chance of error. Not to mention, it allows you to get more done! I could go on for days about the value of a good marketing process, but we all have work to do…don’t we?

Need help defining your marketing strategy and developing a process to make it happen? Contact me today for assistance!