There is a saying in carpentry that you measure twice and cut once. This is the essence of success in just about everything we do. We need to plan ahead. You can easily wreck your own marketing campaign if you just wing it.
It is entirely too easy to assume that because the web is so forgiving that you don’t have to plan ahead. If you put up a website and notice a typo or think the header graphic isn’t just quite right, you can just make the corrections and changes and upload the new improved site.
Marketing is a little different. You are sending the words out to the world and if you are not careful, the wrong message can be out there floating virally around and doing your whole marketing efforts a lot of damage.
I have heard horror stories of people who decide to use a pay per click approach and like some sort of gambler, keep pushing the same keywords and losing their entire budget until they are maxed out on their credit cards.
Or even worse, decide that some keywords will draw more traffic because they are more popular even though those keywords are not related to your website or only peripherally related.
Another dangerous marketing approach is to follow one of those famous blueprints that just don’t fit your topic.
The point of what I am trying to tell you is that there are many ways to implement marketing and even more ways to mess up the implementation. We get caught up in tweaking and testing our marketing campaigns but by this time, we are already likely in the middle of the campaign.
Sit down, look at your budget, list three marketing approaches and start with one. If it is article marketing, lay out the steps you need to take and drive yourself to complete the steps. Implement that plan and then move to the next approach and repeat the process.
Be sure to look at each step and ask yourself the question – “what will this accomplish in my marketing plan?” Write down the answers and keep coming back to check on the plan. Are the stated goals of that plan being met?
Do not wreck your own work because you are too impatient to plan. Otherwise you are like the person who leaves reading the manual until after their project is wrecked beyond repair. Do not wait until all else fails before you think about your plan.
{ 0 comments… add one now }