to reach your marketing goals: The shocking truth

You may need to forget about your customers. The key to growth is not what you expect.

Most companies today are focused on growth. Growth at any cost is often the goal. We haven’t thought about what drives real growth.

What is the secret to growth? What is the most important factor that determines whether we achieve our targets? What if, and this is the most important question, we got it all wrong?

Marketing has always revolved around people. Our marketing team is another important group that we tend to forget. We will go to great lengths to engage, attract and capture customers but invest very little in building and improving teams.

Why do marketing teams seem to be an afterthought in the business?

It could be because they have too many priorities, unrealistic expectations, and not enough time or resources to build a team that is high-performing. This is not an excuse.

Your marketing team is your biggest predictor of success. A marketing team that is ineffective will not be able to reach even modest goals. It creates chaos and stress that you don’t need.

We must rethink our priorities as marketers and stop putting things first. In an airplane safety demonstration, you are told to first put on your oxygen mask before helping anyone else. It may sound selfish, but that’s not the case. This is to keep you from becoming incapacitated, so you can help other people. You will serve neither yourself nor others if you try to help someone else before you take care of your own needs.

Marketing teams are so focused on growth that they have forgotten to put on their own masks first. We need to turn marketing on its head.

Marketing Inside Out

If your marketing organisation was a large tree, you’d want it to grow quickly, continuously and dominate your locality. This is the usual focus of growth: constant, fast and dominant.

When we think of growth, we tend to only consider what is visible and not the invisible. The depth of the roots determines how fast or large a tree will grow. A tree that has grown too fast can be blown over by a storm if its foundation, structure, and support are not in place.

This happens a lot in marketing organizations. Marketing teams burn out when they are constantly focused on growth, CMOs get traded and the company is forced to start over.

Sustainable growth is essential for massive growth. To reach new heights you must first establish deep roots.

It’s about people, not customers, KPIs, or revenue. It’s all about people. This is marketing from the inside out.

Your marketing success depends on the people you hire. To collaborate and communicate effectively, you need people who have the right skills.

The first step to building a powerful team of marketers is to determine which stage your team is at.

Three stages of marketing team

Three stages are involved in the development of a marketing team. It is important to know the stage of your team before you begin improving them.

Momentum

Many marketing teams start in this phase and stay there for a long time. This is the stage where your team defines goals, determines roles, and works to understand how to communicate and collaborate effectively.

There is a lot of passion, but little structure. The goal is to survive in this chaotic but exciting environment. Start establishing boundaries to bring order into the chaos.

Maturity

You have a team that has a strong foundation. Now you can focus on improving and growing. The team may still be facing challenges and bottlenecks, but they are at least aware of their existence. Your team should focus on formalizing operations and building systems at this stage.

Mastery

You have the right team members who understand your goals and make daily progress towards them. Now they can spend more time learning, testing and improving their process and performance. You can now help them maximize their efforts and share their insights.

Assess your team and determine where you are in the process. You can then meet your team where they are, and create a plan that will help them to build a strong foundation and grow.

We like to think that our team has more skills, is more capable, and is more advanced than it actually is. It’s possible that you are right, but it is important to take a step back before embarking on a steep climb.

How to raise the level of your team

You need to rethink your marketing strategy when you are doing Marketing Inside Out. You have to realize that a new tool, channel or tactic won’t help you reach your goals.

Focusing on your team can help you achieve your goals more quickly than you thought possible.

Follow these four steps if you want to change the way you think about marketing.

• To understand where you are starting from, evaluate and assess your team.
• Invest the time and space in growing and building your team.
• Create a plan for 90 days that shows how your team can improve.
• Keep the team focused by checking in regularly.

Rethinking growth, marketing and goals

Marketers will always set aggressive goals and have unrealistic targets, but they’ll also be limited in their resources. Admit that our current approach isn’t working. The current marketing strategy is not sustainable or sensible. Let’s instead approach it from within.

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