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Your
Marketing Sucks by Mark Stevens Rating: •• (Mildly
Recommended) |
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title or picture to buy from amazon.com |
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Extreme Extreme
marketing guru Mark Stevens chose an ‘in your face” title for his new book of
marketing advice, Your Marketing Sucks. With an arrogant confidence, he’s
pretty sure that the executives reading this book will recognize that not
every dollar spent in marketing brings in a dollar or more in business. If
that doesn’t happen, in Stevens’ terms, “your marketing sucks.” Given that,
Stevens presents reams of examples of poor marketing and offers concrete
recommendations for change. Here’s an excerpt from the introduction (pp.
12-17): Why
on earth would I say that “your marketing sucks,” much less give a book this
title? Because, in fact, the marketing at most companies—big and small— has
little, if anything, to do with what is needed to grow the business. Just the
other day, I had an experience that, while unusual, is a near-perfect
illustration of what I see as a big problem. Three entrepreneurs, each
president of his own company, came to my office in suburban The
men have known one another for years, referring business back and forth. That
made sense. One sold insurance. Another was an investment advisor, and the
third did estate planning. They
had decided to join forces and create one company so that their clients could
benefit from one-stop shopping for financial services and experience the
benefits of a holistic approach to managing their finances. The
entrepreneurs expected it to be a quick meeting. They’d pitch some creative
ideas. We’d throw out a couple of our own and, voilŕ, there would be an
ad campaign for their merged company. I
think they were shocked that it didn’t go that way. “What
are you guys going to call your company?” was my first question once the
small talk was out of the way. “We’re
not sure yet.” “What’s
your selling proposition?” I asked. “We
haven’t figured it out yet.” “How
are you different from the competition?” Silence. After
that silence dragged on for about fifteen seconds, I jumped in—with a
sledgehammer. “Let
me see if I have this right. You want to run a series of ads for a company
that doesn’t have a name, doesn’t know what it’s selling or how it’s
different, and. . . doesn’t
even exist?” No
joke This
situation, while extreme, is far too typical. It also explains where the
title of this book comes from. Most
marketing does suck. And it does because people haven’t thought through what
they are trying to accomplish before they start spending money on marketing. They
don’t engage in Extreme Marketing, which at its essence means that you need
to do everything possible to guarantee that every marketing dollar you spend a. Is set in a strategic context—that is,
you know why you are spending it (for example, advertising “because we have
to advertise” is not a strategic context) b. Is based on a plan constructed to make
certain that every marketing tactic and tool reinforces every other you are
using c. Brings back more than $1 in return If
you don’t employ Extreme Marketing—that is, if your plan doesn’t meet the
above criteria—then your marketing sucks. And it doesn’t matter if we are
talking about marketing at a big company or a small one. Size is irrelevant.
Your company needs to engage in Extreme Marketing—and most likely it isn’t. Why?
For the most part, small companies don’t do it because no one at the firm has
the expertise. And at big companies, no one has a real vested (my backside is
on the line; the money is coming out of my pocket) interest in the
effectiveness of the marketing. I
am not exaggerating. As
I write this, it is my favorite time of the year—the period between
Thanksgiving and Christmas. Why am I so happy? ‘Well, I will be spending time
with family and friends, of course, but another reason is that I know I am about to make a lot of money. Every day for
the next couple of weeks, the phone is going to ring, and on the other end of
the line is going to be one of my Fortune 500 clients. The conversation is
going to go like this: “Hey, Mark. Listen, I was just going through
our marketing budget for this year, and it looks like we’re going to have
money left over. We are about $XXX,000 under plan. If
I don’t spend it, senior management is going to cut my budget for next year.
Do you think you could do something for us next year, if I sent over the $XXX,000 now?” As
far as I know not one of my Fortune 500 clients has ever offered to rebate
the money back to corporate if he found he had marketing funds left over for
the year. They’d rather spend it on anything than risk having their budgets
cut for next year. No
wonder their marketing sucks. To so many businesspeople, it’s all about
spending money—not growing their business. What
we are going to do in the pages ahead This
book will teach you how to become an Extreme Marketer, someone who gets a
positive return on her marketing investment. We are going to do that by
talking about both strategy and tactics. By
the time we are done talking about strategy, you will be able to make sure
that a. Your marketing efforts are in total
alignment with your company’s growth/profit/value-building objectives. b. You are clear about your unique selling
proposition. (You can stand for only one primary thing. Otherwise you will
confuse your current and potential customers.) c. You know what it is going to take to
reach the broadest possible audience for your product or service. d. Qualified prospects—including existing
customers—will find your offer nearly impossible to resist. And
when it comes to tactics, by the time we are finished you will know why you
need to be able to ·
Describe
what you are selling in a single sentence ·
Differentiate
what you are selling from the competition in such a powerful way that buying
from anyone else will strike a prospect as dumb ·
Determine
the best prospects to sell to ·
Have
systems in place to allow you to do that selling efficiently ·
Capture
leads ·
Know
exactly how you are going to follow up on those leads ·
Cross-sell
your products and services to customers/prospects ·
Grow
your business like a snowball rolling down a hill, steadily gaining speed
and mass each day Extreme
Marketing is good business in microcosm. Let’s
go to work. If
Stevens has caught your attention with this introduction, go on to read Your
Marketing Sucks. While you may agree with him, there’s not enough here to
form a basis for what to do next. For that, Stevens wants you to hire his
firm to help. Steve
Hopkins, February 23, 2004 |
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ă 2004 Hopkins and Company, LLC The recommendation rating for
this book appeared in the March 2004
issue of Executive Times URL for this review: http://www.hopkinsandcompany.com/Books/Your
Marketing Sucks.htm For Reprint Permission,
Contact: Hopkins & Company, LLC • E-mail: books@hopkinsandcompany.com |
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