7 Marketing Misconceptions Absolutely Crippling Your Organization
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The average CMO tenure is the lowest among the C-Suite, and?53% of Marketers ?report that their role is misunderstood by their companies (according to a recent MarketingWeek survey of 3,000 marketers). Today, allow me to clear up a number of misconceptions about Marketing, which will help well-intended executives better support the Marketers in their organization.
Misconception #1: Everyone is a Marketer.
What would be your reaction if I said that anyone could do the job of CEO or CFO? If you're a CEO or CFO, I bet you got frustrated just reading that question because you know how hard you've worked, the difficulties you've endured, and the sacrifices you've made to get to where you are today.
Like the role of CEO or CFO, it is also essential to recognize the vital role of Marketing leaders in the success or failure of the business. Marketing is a critical function that helps organizations connect with customers, build brands, and drive revenue growth. The fact is, not everyone in your organization has dedicated their lives to studying the Marketing profession or spent years working in the field solving Marketing problems. To be effective, Marketing leaders must bring diverse skills, including communication, business strategy, economics, analytics, culture, leadership, psychology, and more. They must also be able to inspire and motivate their teams, build strong partnerships across the organization, and adapt to the ever-evolving economic landscape.
Misconception #2: Marketing is synonymous with [insert specialty].
This is one of the biggest misconceptions around. Marketing is not strictly advertising, social media, content marketing, SEO, email marketing, public relations, branding, product marketing, etc. Marketing is the sum of all its parts, spanning many disciplines that work together to enable your company's Go-To-Market (GTM) approach. Marketing plays an essential role in the product (service or solution), its placement, price and promotion (The 4 Ps). Marketers must understand the needs and wants of customers, stay ahead of industry trends, and leverage insights to inform strategy and investments. Marketing is about much more than creating catchy ads and social media posts.
Misconception #3: All we need is the latest tool to get results.
Let's call this the shiny object syndrome. Today, there are approximately 7,000 martech products. Don't get me wrong, tools are necessary to help organizations scale, but tools are only as good as what they are being applied to and the strategy they serve. For a team without effective communications, processes and approaches, automated workflows won't magically make problems go away or the content suddenly compelling. "It just means the team can now send out crappy, irrelevant content faster and to more people," according to Pardot's Elisa Silverman. Before you get distracted by the newest release, talk to your Marketing leaders about how to best leverage your current tech stack and whether new tools are necessary to carry out your company's strategy and improve the team's effectiveness.
Misconception #4: Marketing's job is to take orders from the other functions.
Marketing is not primarily a support job. Marketing's strategic role within the organization is vital. Marketing is the only function within your organization that can lead a movement, build brand equity and develop new markets and revenue streams. Consider the role of Marketing in positioning and category development. As Andy Cunningham (positioning expert who helped Steve Jobs launch the Macintosh) says, "Great positioning is the epicenter of great Marketing, and great Marketing is the epicenter of great business."
A great marketing team understands the business and the target market. They are a critical part of your company's Go-To-Market success. This is why it is important that Marketing does not become a help desk for other departments.
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Misconception #5: It's all about the data.
Data is essential for understanding past behavior. But just like with the stock market, buyers are both rational and emotional. To know where a market is headed and assess potential future behavior, you also have to understand psychology and sense the pulse of the market. This means going beyond the data.
Misconception #6: Great products sell themselves.
Great products may sell well at first if the founders already have a solid base of support and existing connections to drive sales or if the company is fortunate enough to catch a big wave. But what happens 12-24 months later when those connections are exhausted and the market changes? This is when you'll wish you had invested in developing other Marketing channels, establishing greater influence with buyers, and having a stronger overall presence in the market.
Misconception #7: Marketing is a cost center.
Only when it's done incorrectly.
Set your organization up for success.
Ultimately, the success of any organization depends on the collective efforts of its teams. The good news is that your Marketing team wants your business to succeed as much as you do. Let's recognize the strategic role Marketing plays and its potential impact on the business if better understood and supported. Let's move beyond the misconceptions and work to empower Marketing as they aspire to grow your market share and expand the value and perception of your brand.
Thank you ?? for your attention this week!
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Author | Writer | Speaker | Podcast Show Host at The Yakking Show - Guiding You to Health, Balance, and Wholeness.
1 年Whilst agreeing that not everyone in an organization can be a marketer, understand every function of marketing, or make top-level marketing decisions, everyone in the organization should have a marketing perspective and follow a customer-first philosophy. One disinterested, unhelpful service person can negate the efforts of a marketing campaign and a sales team in securing a major new customer. Marketing is a cost centre just like production, accounting, maintenance or HR for accounting purposes. However, it should be seen as a revenue generator, just like investing in Sales, R & D or improved production systems.
The Small Biz Pathfinders // Community-Based Business Education ? Strategy ? E-Commerce
1 年A thought-provoking post. I think that you cannot change the fact that many people in a company who do not have "marketing" in their titles think that they know how to do marketing, and will go ahead and do marketing activities without calling on the marketing team. And likely they actually have natural abilities in some marketing areas. I think the issue is that people misunderstand that marketing overlays the entire company and instead only think of the tactics as marketing. Maybe Marketing needs to fill some of their time helping everyone in the company be better at doing the marketing they are already doing in their jobs vs. trying to control and centralize those daily marketing activities that are happening at the company.
Top Voice in Personal Branding, Marketing strategist, keynote speaker, university educator, futurist, and bestselling author of "Marketing Rebellion," "KNOWN," and "Belonging to the Brand."
1 年I take exception with #1 and #7. Remember at The Uprising how Kimberley Sweet Gardiner of Tractor Supply is involving everyone in the organization in marketing? Accounting touches the customer. Transportation touches the customer. Everybody needs to feel they are part of marketing. #7 I think it is dangerous to think marketing will always be a profit center because it is nearly impossible to always assign attribution to your marketing, especially when it comes to branding. Marketing creates customers. You can't have a business without customers. But there are lots or things we do in marketing that may take months or years to make an impact you can truly measure. I just think it is dangerous to set this "profit center" expectation for every organization, every time.
Chief Marketing Officer | Leading startup and scaleup companies' growth through GTM excellence and partner ecosystems | Writing guidebook on business acumen for marketers | B-Corp evangelist.
1 年It's not a misconception that a substantial number of marketing organizations demonstrate a cost center mentality. This creates tension throughout the organization, diminishing their credibility (not to mention their future state). With the increasing complexity of buying behavior and longer sales cycles, the cost to acquire new business is more expensive than in recent years. Successful marketers will evolve their thinking to take co-ownership of the company's P & L results. Marketers who stand shoulder to shoulder with sales and finance are indispensable business partners. Everything else is a cost center waiting to be cut.