Marketing has been around for ages, and a business with no marketing is not a business at all. But as time goes, marketing has become a big player in running a business.
According to Regis McKenna from HBR, “Marketing’s transformation is driven by the enormous power and ubiquitous spread of technology. So pervasive is technology today that it is virtually meaningless to make distinctions between technology and nontechnology businesses and industries: there are only technology companies. Marketing today is not a function; it is a way of doing business. Marketing is everything, everything is marketing.” – Click here for full article
Sure all marketers have started with creating logos, to choosing the right colors, to creating a brand and an image. But that’s just the beginning. As you start to succeed, you as a marketer will start facing tougher decisions require a lot more than a color palette.
No successful marketer has a fool-proof record. Believe me, every marketer has experienced failures here and there. The good thing now is that we can give you guides to your decision making that will help you in, of course, making marketing decisions.
Below is a list of 7 Proven Decision-Making Hacks for Marketers provided by Forbes
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Align goals with company goals
This one is (or should be) obvious. When planning marketing strategy, or determining quarterly plans and programs, make sure you are aligning with top line corporate goals.
- Use a clear structured process
Define a decision-making process and communicate it to stakeholders. Using a structured decision-making process helps ensure buy in since everyone knows what to expect, what is expected of them, who will make the decision and how it will be made.
- Expand the options
Sometimes what needs to happen seems obvious. But a better choice is almost always there at the edge of your perception. Cloverpop decision research shows if you have the discipline to think through four alternatives for your decision, there’s a 56% chance you’ll come up with a better solution, and cut your risk of missed expectations by more than half. This exercise also helps to combat groupthink, forcing the team to expand their view of what’s possible beyond the obvious or least controversial choices.
- Identify the Gaps
Write down the most important information you are missing. We risk ignoring what we don’t know because we are distracted by what we do know, especially in today’s information-intensive businesses. Take the time to call out the unknowns and document them. Doing so will enable you to explicitly determine how to address the gaps — make a tough call, take time to collect more data, or perhaps settle on a smaller decision now to validate a bigger bet later.
- Be transparent
People inherently mistrust what they can’t see. So use transparency to build trust by documenting all decisions.
Having visibility, in and of itself, will help people get on board.
In addition, decisions that are logged, and visible to all, tend to become more data-driven, and execution and follow-through tends to improve. Teams also correct more quickly when decisions don’t go as expected. And common bad behaviors — like conveniently “misremembering” certain decisions or reopening them for debate — are reduced.
- Over communicate
Marketers know customers need to see or hear a message at least seven times before they take action and buy. Yet we tend to forget this lesson when dealing with internal customers and stakeholders. Share what you are doing and why.
- Track and measure
Marketers track and measure campaigns obsessively, why not do this with the rest of your decision making? Keeping clear records of decisions enables you to track, measure, and assess your decisions, change course quickly when needed, and improve decision making over time. – Click here for the full article
You must keep in mind of having a balance in everything that you do and in whatever decision that you’ll make. Make sure that you think of the welfare of your company above yourself.