The 10 Biggest Mistakes Marketers Make

The 10 Biggest Mistakes Marketers Make

• Marketers are key strategic assets to any company's bottom line. But executives and other key players frequently fail to see the connection between marketing and revenue, and oftentimes instead of seeing marketers as true strategic partners, these C-level execs see them just as a tool for building awareness for their products and services. The result? Marketers are underutilized and companies miss out on the maximum ROI from their human capital.

But if you're a marketer, you can turn this situation around by correcting the misperceptions of marketing's role by avoiding these top 10 mistakes marketers make from Roy Young, director of strategy and development for Los Angeles-based online publishing company MarketingProfs.com and co-author of the new book Marketing Champions: Practical Strategies for Improving Marketing's Power, Influence and Business Impact.

1. Handing off leads to sales—and then forgetting about them

• Too many marketers think their job is done when they deliver a stack of leads to the sales group. But unless marketing and sales both agree on what constitutes a "qualified" lead—and marketing helps to move potential customers towards done deals—you can't turn hot prospects into cold, hard cash. Make sure you follow up regularly to see the leads through to completion.

2. Failing to speak the language of business

• It's great that you've strengthened brand awareness or increased the click-through rate on your Web site banner ads. But unless you translate those achievements into business language used and valued by top management, executives throughout your firm won’t make the mental connection between marketing efforts and revenue. For example, when talking with the CFO, don’t say, "We've increased click-through in our online advertising campaigns." Say:“ “We've used click-through to accelerate inventory turnover rate and enhance return on our company's assets"—two achievements that mean profit to any executive

3. Using metrics that don't matter to top management

• Your mastery of business language isn't complete until language isn't complete until you define and track the you define and track the performance metrics that performance metrics that matter to the executive matter to the executive team. Identify the firm's team. Identify the firm's revenue sources (such as revenue sources (such as new customers and category new customers and category share) as well as its business share) as well as its business models and then models and then demonstrate how each of demonstrate how each of your marketing activities your marketing activities ultimately affects these ultimately affects these profit drivers. Don't be shy profit drivers. Don't be shy about making assumptions, about making assumptions, but be clear when you do but be clear when you do and attach a financial value and attach a financial value for the risk you incurfor the risk you incur

4. Living in the marketing silo.

• When department managers don't communicate their most pressing challenges and important initiatives, company misdirection causes customer service to suffer. To retain customers—and turn their loyalty into profits—replace your individual department agendas and build company-spanning collaboration. It will bring an understanding of your customers inside the company if everyone has an understanding of what part they play.

5. Using ad-hoc marketing processes

There are many ways to carry out marketing processes such as building brands and segmenting markets. But if you don't select a consistent and transparent approach for each process—and communicate that approach to peers throughout your organization—you'll never be recognized as reliable, and you'll spawn profit-sapping confusion. It's not important that you select a specific method—what works for one company may not work for another. But what is important is that you establish systematic methods.

6. Letting R&D shoulder all the risk

Developing new products is a risky business. Companies invest hugely in R&D, and yet a disturbing number of new offerings fail. Boost your company's chances of launching a hit by assisting your R&D team in targeting the most promising markets and identifying products that would offer unique value to consumers

7. Ignoring your company's business model

• Different companies use different business models. By identifying the business model your firm uses, you can more easily develop marketing strategies that support that model. For example, if the dominant model used in the organization is velocity—rapid turnover of inventory—then your marketing strategies should include low pricing and aggressive promotions.

8.-Swallowing fads without gaugingtheir potential

• New opportunities such as innovative technologies, vendor services and corporate best practices may look enticing, but you'll end up wasting a lot of invested time and money if they

don't help you generate profit. Make sure to evaluate each opportunity through a cash-flow lens. Ask how the innovation will help increase return or more accurately determine marketing's impact.

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•Customers know what your firm and its products stand for because of your marketing strategies. Draw on these same skills to build a brand for marketing inside your organization. Identify and promote what makes marketing unlike any other function, what makes marketing relevant to the mission of the organization and what makes marketing's value sustainable. Consistently reinforce your brand's message—that marketing generates cash-flow—throughout your campaign

• Harley Marketing Strategy the picture below

• Harley Marketing Strategy

9. Failing to market marketing inside your organization

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As a true marketing leader, you do more than just enhance the revenue streaming into your company and help others see the connection between your team's efforts and profit. In the short term, you have responsibility for revenue goals and cost targets——don't forget that you're accountable for profitability. But in the long term, you're also accountable to use your understanding of the big picture and your identification of the most promising customer segments to set a strategic direction for growth that the rest of the firm will follow.

10. Failing to be a cash-flow leader

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