Strategy or Tactic? Battle or War?
Which do you have, a marketing strategy or a calendar of tactics; are you planning to win the war or simply a few of the battles? I recently read Katherine Neville’s novel, ‘The 8.’ If you are a Dan Brown fan you’ll enjoy this book. The theme of the book revolves around a human chess match. Throughout the book there are quotes regarding strategy and the game of chess. Two really left an impression:
Tactics are knowing what to do when there ... << MORE >>
Top 6 Things to Think About When Creating Your Strategic Marketing Plan
1. Establish Long Term and Short Term Goals
You need the ability to measure anything you plan to implement. Your marketing plan should bring you closer to the goals for your company. Each tactic executed should bring you closer to tangible goals, whether they are revenue, margin, new customers, etc...
2. New Customers vs. Existing Clients
Within your plan you need to develop a strategy to build your existing client base as well as expand further into current clients. The ...
What You Need to Know About Outsourcing Social Media
Leanne ... << MORE >>
Strategy - Don't Sell the Marketing Dept Short
On a phone call today with a client, one of the marketing managers made a comment regarding how marketing doesn’t drive the strategy in the company. While I agree that marketing doesn’t necessarily drive the goals of the organization, it does drive the strategy to meet the goal at hand.
In a VAR business, it is the marketing department’s job to create the plan that will lead the business to the goals the leadership has set out. This is highlighted in an article in BtoB On-Line ... << MORE >>
Marketing to the Pain
In reviewing various channel partner websites, my eyes glaze over from repeatedly learning how ”Company X offers unique scalable, technology solutions that fit your business… and how our comprehensive offering includes storage, servers, application software, etc. ” BLAH, BLAH, BLAH…..
So often, VARs get caught up in the technology and forget to look at why the ‘solution’ was created in the first place. The Field of Dreams mantra of “If we build it, they will come” has died when you ... << MORE >>
What is Your 'Pop Tart'?
On a previous post we discussed knowing your customer and the importance of a profile. Once we hook a new client, then typically we move on to the next conquest. But what if we analyzed our existing customers and learned something?
Crazy talk, right?! Yes, I know.....learn something from the mounds of data we have stored in the same data storage we actually sell......BRILLIANT!
Data intelligence was the focus of an article in the Economist magazine. ... << MORE >>
Supplier Partner Marketing Funds - Are You Getting Your Fair Share?
At the end of every year vendors such as Sun, IBM, HP, etc… put millions, yes millions, of unused dollars for channel market development funds to the bottom line. The vendors would rather see their VAR channel using the funds to grow their business.
I can hear the groans from the audience as I type... "Getting these funds are too difficult." "There are too many rules about eligible expenses" (i.e. they won’t approve golf tournaments). These are common, and in some cases, valid complaints. But a well-formulated, ...
<< MORE >>Marketing Growth
by Linda Hartman
Marketing in the channel often conjures up notions of seminars, webinars, telemarketing campaigns and the like….. However, what if, for one second you stopped and considered marketing as the growth engine to your business? Imagine the possibilities of every tactical implementation leading to a tangible organizational goal, such as, better sales penetration of current customers. Wouldn’t that be a great thing?! In a previous post, we discussed the importance of commitment from senior management. Part of that ...
<< MORE >>Planning
Often times when working with a VAR business I will pose the question, ‘What does marketing mean to you?’ Needless to say, the responses are all over the board. One of the most common responses is “events”. When most VARs or channel partners think of marketing strategy they ...
<< MORE >>Winning football teams and winning sales and marketing teams have a lot in common!
by Jim
Markisohn
There is an ages old debate between sales and marketing people which attempts to define the purpose of marketing – namely, does marketing exist to provide sales with the materials and support they
need (e.g. collateral materials, lead and demand generation programs, etc.) or does marketing in fact, direct and enable the efforts and success of a professional sales organization?
In my view the answer is surely the latter.
...
