In today’s day and age where digital marketing feels almost old school to us agency types, I still find that it can be pretty daunting for most marketers.
Why is that? What makes “digital” so tough to nail down? What makes it so elusive to our counterparts on the client side?
Are they just not able to “get it”? Of course not.
Is digital a bad fit for their goals? Hell no.
Are they unaware of the need to stay relevant? Don't be silly.
Is it because the digital space moves faster than corporate culture? I think so.
Let’s unpack that one a bit. In the corporate world, there are certain ways you must go about things, often times involving a lot of meetings and committee based decisions - these things do not come together quickly. By the time our marketing friends have had enough time to research what they want to pursue, put together a plan and then achieve buy-in from the multiple teams he/she needs to run new initiatives by, that initiative is often times no longer current or relevant.
Once they have researched it from every disciplines angle, prepared their PowerPoint presentation to sell it into each department, then crafted the abridged PowerPoint to sell it to the execs . . . the time for the deeply researched revelation has passed. Whatever it was has come and gone, gets killed at the top, or has ill-conceived goals assigned to it making sure it never sees daylight. Your carefully crafted campaign is old news, the market has moved past it, and all of your efforts, though well intended, are rendered ineffective.
Doing all of this takes an awful lot of time. In that time our marketing friends weren't keeping up with and learning about what was happening in real time. They missed the latest algorithm change by Google... they don't know that Facebook revamped their paid ads platform... or haven't heard of the new App people just started using to communicate in a new way. This creates a very difficult cycle making it almost impossible to stay connected to and make sense of what’s happening in digital marketing in the here and now.
I don’t know how to fix that. That's one for corporate opps...
What I do know is that’s where your agency friends come in - we have people pushing the boundaries of this “digital stuff” day in and day out. We don't get caught in the fray because that digital stuff is our jobs… that's what we get paid to know. We can help you sell it internally and get that all important buy in at an accelerated pace and we can help you actually execute the plan and achieve some results!
Ready to dive back in and give it the old college try? Again? Yeah you are! Here is a quick start guide to help bring you up to date with todays most effective methods. Free of charge. Just promise you’ll call us when you want to pick up the pace ;-)
