Another standard British summer has gone by like a flash, the kids are back at school and you are sat at your desk, back to reality facing the wonderful challenges of delivering on time, within budget whilst pleasing as many decision makers and stakeholders as possible.
As a marketer or business development professional, naturally you are expected to generate more promising leads than ever before, continue managing clients’ expectations with foresight and at the same time filter through a multitude of emails, attend meetings (that may not be as productive as hoped) and review and co-ordinate tasks that have been entrusted to you.
But don’t worry, even though you may be a bit inundated at the moment and feel like wading through a swamp of to-do’s – you’re not alone. Take comfort in knowing that many of your esteemed fellow colleagues are sitting at their desks stress eating and looking forward to their next long weekend.
According to research by Monster.co.uk, two thirds of hard working Brits would prefer not to swap the beach with the boardroom. A recent article from The Telegraph on how to beat the “back to work” blues offers a variety of rather helpful advice from leadership, career and project management experts whose own experiences may assist in improving your own career wellness and general happiness. It’s really quite a good read so do peruse.
Whilst there are new articles and bits of advice being published almost every minute of every day, as a marketer it is important that you have a reliable and flexible reporting resource that you can quickly refer to when it matters most (i.e. when having to justify budget requirements). Although creating a suitable set of reporting tools can take time, once you’ve honed in on the most effective results tracking method and have identified what really reflects the needs of the company’s own mission, you should be equipped with the best possible means to an end.
To quote one of history’s greatest change makers, Benjamin Franklin:
“If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail!”
We understand that you may not have much-needed “creative thinking” time to yourself, however when it comes to planning sales aligned marketing campaigns, developing target market relevant content strategies or organising the marketing mix of activities for the next couple of quarters, it is important to maintain an overview of what has (and hasn’t) delivered results according to expectations. For this reason, we strongly recommend that you keep track of all campaign results with KPI-aligned measurement statistics and obtain feedback from involved departments on a regular basis (monthly at least) so that you can report to your peers with ease and confidence.
