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Marketing is a Highway

Have you noticed how there are so many components related to marketing. Advertising, customer relationships, surveys, customer satisfaction, employee satisfaction, employee motivation and on and on. Each of these components require attention, and attention will ebb and flow as different situations arise.

Think of this the next time you are driving down the highway. The road is the marketing plan that you began with. There can be weather conditions, construction, detours as well as other drivers. Each of these situations require you to alter your planned trip. As you alter your route, new obstacles and opportunities will arise.

You need to be aware of the destination, but at the same time be aware of obstacles and opporunities that will arise. Here are some suggestions:

  • Know what your end goal for the marketing plan consists of and determine where initial efforts will be spent to begin the process. (Initial Route)
  • Be aware of what your employees and suppliers are saying and doing to support your efforts. (Construction)
  • Be aware of what your competition is doing to provide better products, services and motivation. (Alternate Routes)
  • Be very cognizant of opportunities that arise as your plan progresses. Be ready to change direction if sales stagnate or if alternative uses are found for your product or service. (Detours and Express Lanes)
  • Ask you customers and employees their thoughts and suggestions, make them a part of the company success. You alone cannot drive the company and the marketing efforts. (Update GPS)
It is easy to have a plan and stick to it, it is even easier to have a plan and file it away. What sets most marketers apart is the ability to have a plan and adjust to the environment where they operate. It is easy to sit upon your laurels and watch others struggle. It is harder to look at the foundation you have built.  In your mind it is solid, secure and it will not fail because you are in charge! 
Especially now in the challenging economic environment, change is utmost, as is the ability to sell the proposition of doing business with you and why it is to the stakeholder’s benefit. Ask! and more importantly listen! 
POWER ON!–Mark

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This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 7th, 2009 at 5:39 am and is filed under Generating Ideas, Power Tips. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

3 Responses to “Marketing is a Highway”

  1. Timur I. Says:
    January 27th, 2009 at 7:40 pm

    Wow! Thank you!
    I always wanted to write in my site something like that. Can I take part of your post to my blog?
    Of course, I will add backlink?

    Regards, Reader

  2. POWER ON! - Mark Says:
    February 1st, 2009 at 2:22 pm

    Timur,

    Please feel free to use this as a trackback.

    Mark

  3. vageplattewly Says:
    February 5th, 2009 at 6:22 pm

    Hi. Your site displays incorrectly in Explorer, but content excellent! Thank you for your wise words.

    The site will work with I.E. 7 or higher. If you have an older version of IE, you can also use Fireox.

    Mark

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