In our country, most businessmen have retained an ambivalent attitude toward marketing.

This is due to the period from the early 90s to the mid-2000s when non-market competition methods were often used to win the competition. A lot has changed since then.

Let us remind you that marketing is the science of how to win in the competition. If your company operates in a competitive market, you need to use the concept of marketing to be successful. 

We will simply answer your questions, without using complicated terminology.

1. When do you need to engage in marketing?

Let’s start with the fact that marketing, like your health, should always be taken care of.  Let’s draw an analogy. It is much more effective to maintain good health by regularly visiting a doctor, following the rules of nutrition and sleep, avoiding nervous stress, etc. But most people don’t do this. As a result, they come to the doctor when something is already bothering them. Firstly, it is dangerous, and secondly, it is much more expensive than monitoring your health regularly and preventing illness.

80% of clients who come to our agency come when there is already a problem. Most often, it is a drop in financial performance, sales problems, and low efficiency of current marketing tools. 

2. Is marketing necessary in a company or can you do without?

Many owners treat marketing as a formal attribute, an expense item that they have to carry like a cross because the company must have a marketer…

Marketing is not an expense, but an investment, and the sooner the owner realizes that good marketing is designed to stimulate sales, the better.

3. In-house marketer or agency?

The question of whether an in-house marketer (marketing department) is needed or whether an agency should not be involved should not be raised. As an agency, we always advocate that there should always be a marketer on the client’s side. This allows for good communication between people who speak the language of marketing. We, for our part, do not waste time explaining simple points to a person who is not familiar with marketing. 

A company needs to have people or one person on staff (depending on the size of the company) who thinks about the company’s marketing all the time. 

4. Who should set goals?

When you come to an agency, you must clearly understand what you want to achieve. The abstract I need marketing does not give us an understanding of your problems. Just like I want more sales. More than who? More than when? Compared to whom? The right goal is measurable in numbers, achievable, realistic, and time-bound. 

Marketing cannot exist in a vacuum. Marketing goals are formed to achieve certain business indicators. 

For example, an expressive goal may sound like this: I want to enter the market of country A with product B and achieve sales growth of 5% per month by the end of 2021.

With this goal in mind, the agency develops a strategy for promoting the product in the market of country A, sets various indicators by channel, and forecasts the performance of the leads. Next, they determine the required number of leads to achieve these goals. At the beginning, forecast values are set. Over time, based on these indicators, budgets are adjusted depending on the achievement of the planned indicators. 

5. How do I know if my marketing is good or not?

Good and bad are subjective criteria. Employees’ performance should be evaluated in terms of their effectiveness, namely the achievement of goals. Marketing should have measurable, achievable goals. Which, in turn, should be aimed at achieving business goals. 

A company is lucky to have a proactive CMO who, in the absence of clear business goals, implements marketing functions for the benefit of the company following his or her experience and understanding. However, in our experience, it is more common for a company to have a marketing department or a marketer who performs nominal functions, ordering business cards or imitating activities. 

6. I’ve tried marketing before, but it doesn’t work

Almost every second client of our agency talks about disappointment as a result of cooperation with “marketers”. 

According to our favorite analogy, it’s like being disappointed in medicine after an unsuccessful visit to a quack doctor. Not every person who puts on a coat is a doctor, just as not every person who has learned the words traffic, conversion, and lead is a marketer. 

Working with a freelance student cannot be equated in terms of efficiency to working with a full-service marketing agency. 

By working with an agency, you gain the combined experience of a large number of multidisciplinary specialists, whose knowledge cannot be compared to the knowledge of one person, especially an inexperienced one. 

Marketing cannot fail to work. The problem may be that your products do not reach the points of market parity (industry standards), incorrect positioning, lack of a systematic approach, etc. 

That’s why it’s important to get to the professionals. 

7. Let’s say I’ve contacted a marketing agency. Where should I start?

Like any good doctor starts by collecting tests to form an anamnesis, good marketing specialists research the company, its competitors, market, and customers. They screen the situation at the moment and it becomes clear which way to move. What are the main problems, what are the ways to solve them, and what tasks need to be set to overcome the situation?

Then, based on the analysis, treatment is prescribed – in our case, a marketing strategy and a marketing plan are developed, usually for 1 year, with measurable goals, control, and analytical tools.

8. Why is it so expensive? I had a girl working for me who did everything for 100 dollars.

To begin with, let’s return to question #6 on the current list. You have already tried this approach and were not satisfied. By definition, one person cannot replace the effectiveness of an entire department, no matter how professional they are. In marketing, as in medicine, there is a specialization. There are analysts, SMM specialists, SEO specialists, contextual experts, content managers, designers, etc. It is impossible to be equally competent in all areas. 

Accordingly, the work of a whole team of professionals cannot cost the same as the work of one freelancer. However, this difference is the price of the result. Remember, marketing is not an expense, but an investment.  

9. Great. How will I control the work?

There is a catch in the question. Many business owners want to control the work of a specialist, while they need to control the result. As Steve Jobs said: 

“Why hire smart people and tell them what to do?”

The task of the owner or CEO is to formulate business goals, and then a good marketer plans the work based on the budget, deadlines, tasks, and opportunities.

A convenient form of controlling key indicators is the Dashboard, a page with a visualization of the monitored results that is updated online.

If you think something is wrong in your marketing, there is a lack of transparency in processes, or no understanding of what the marketing budget is spent on, you should think about how well the team works and how to improve the process.