3 Growth-Smothering Marketing Mistakes
There’s no proven formula to marketing worldwide. Strategies heavily depend on resources available, the industry you are in, and the strengths of your team.
For this reason, there is a lot of room for error in marketing strategy. Here are some common struggles that I’ve had to cope with in my career.
Persona Dissonance
There are several methods to choosing business personas and segmenting your target audience. For example, you may segment by:
Purchase behavior
Key demographic factors
Your “bread and butter” consumers vs. ideal consumers
Websites that offer persona building templates and guide books are puzzling. There is no single correct way to build personas - it’s just whatever way works best for your business. This could take some experimentation to determine.
That being said, there is one common mistake I’ve noticed… focusing solely on “aspirational” personas (ideal customers).
If you do want to include an aspirational persona, make sure you don’t ignore the current personas that are bringing in your revenue. Once you have consistent income coming from your “ideals”, it’s time to make the full switch.
An example of persona dissonance with a bakery.
You own a neighborhood bakery that makes the best cookies and milkshakes. You want to make fancy expensive wedding cakes instead.
You decide to gear all of your messaging and ad spend towards brides. After months of marketing, you aren’t getting anywhere.
What should you do instead?
You're going to have to maintain where you are now while building your new brand, slowly making the transition when you’ve built a reputation for wedding cakes. Set aside a budget to test new messaging for wedding cakes. Run a promo or a sale, and take time to observe how brides are behaving.
That should also give you time to research and learn more about your new personas before you make a full transition.
Ideas Without Purpose
Everyone in the company wants a piece of the marketing pie. The creative and innovative aspects are exciting to so many people!
But good marketers know that ideas only work if:
They solve a problem that is already apparent
They are actually feasible to carry out
They are measurable
They are hypothesized to produce results
What should you do instead?
Maybe you are considered less creative than idea generators. Maybe you you are accused of being a nay-sayer.
For this reason, it’s important to show the data that supports new ideas and thoroughly track results to share insights. At the end of the day, no one is going to argue with the data.
And when people come up with ideas for the sake of creativity, always ask them what problem it helps solve. Seek out creative solutions instead of creative activities.
Lack of Workflow
Marketing skillsets involve some grey area. Teams likely have overlap, and often responsibilities stray from job descriptions.
To stay productive and keep things moving, it's important to define:
Who creates tasks to execute campaigns
Who is involved in the approval processes, and how long should they have to approve
Who executes the tasks
Who is in charge of compiling, reviewing, and assessing results
A good project management tool - like Asana, Trello, or Monday.com - can help establish a process.
Why are these mistakes such a big deal?
Because they hurt productivity and decrease results, these mistakes can lead to department dissatisfaction and turnover. It’s important to have a strong marketing foundation established to keep employees happy, productive, and successful.
