Most marketers have more on their to-do list than they have hours in the day. But, they keep chugging along hoping that their list will dwindle down and become more manageable. Unfortunately, the list doesn’t get shorter, it gets longer with competing priorities and looming deadlines.
When do you know it’s time to say uncle and get some marketing help?
- You’re in meetings all day long.
If you spend your days sitting in meetings, preparing for meetings or scheduling meetings, then you’re not making a dent on your to-do list. In fact, your list grows with meeting outcomes and follow-ups. Ask yourself what on your to-do list can get delegated while you’re locked up in the conference room.
- The sales team keeps complaining about the lack of quality leads.
Not all leads are created equal. And, time is money. So, if leads are handed to the sales team and those leads aren’t ready to convert, it creates friction between sales and marketing. Understanding which channels are driving the most qualified leads takes time and implementing a lead scoring methodology takes even more time. This strategic and analytical work can be outsourced to reduce frustration and create harmony.
- Putting out fires is all you do.
A small fire can become a wild fire quickly, especially if you don’t have enough of the right people putting them out or problem solving on the spot. Ideally, you have experts on your team that can anticipate these blazes before they occur so you can reduce the frequency of disruptive emergencies.
- There’s no marketing plan.
Your marketing team is doing a ton: email marketing, social media, print ads, events. But, it’s sporadic and there’s a lack of integration across all channels. A marketing plan will create cohesion in messaging, timing, and delivery method so that each communication and tactic builds on each other for maximum impact and performance.
You have all these specialized needs but don’t have the budget to hire subject matter experts to fill internal skill set gaps. And, you don’t necessarily have the same needs month over month.
- Web traffic, foot traffic, conversion rates, or sales revenue are trending downwards.
If it feels like you’ve tried everything and nothing seems to be working, it helps to have an outside perspective review the analytics, interpret the data, and recommend (and implement) strategies to optimize your marketing program.
- Marketing technology eludes you.
Marketing automation, CRM, and content management systems are changing the marketing landscape, and companies that invest and adopt new technologies gain a competitive advantage through improved marketing performance. But, it takes time and experience to vet, demo and decide on which tools make sense for your business. Get help figuring out your technology stack and implementing it.
- You lack a social media presence.
Your company may have a LinkedIn page, a Facebook page, a Twitter account, a YouTube channel and/or Pinterest account. And you post on these channels when you remember to do it. That’s a good start. Now what? A social media strategy complete with which social channels make sense for your target personas, tactics to grow your reach, and an engaging content strategy will maximize the impact of your social media efforts.
- You know you need digital marketing but don’t know where to start.
Digital marketing covers a lot of ground: web development, email marketing, PPC and display advertising, SEO. It can be overwhelming. Good news is that you can get help developing and implementing a digital roadmap with clear priorities and outlined steps that will drive leads.
- You can’t track return on marketing investment.
Marketing budgets are constantly scrutinized because results aren’t correlated to marketing efforts. And, well-meaning marketing departments are scrambling to meet demands from several business units with no clear direction on how those demands will translate into increased revenue.
There is a silver lining. You can get marketing help from agencies that offer a wide range of marketing services to reduce your stress level and allow you to get more done faster. They can even advise on which key performance indicators to track and create a meaningful report for increased visibility into what’s working and what’s not.
Want to learn how? Download our eBook
“The Complete Handbook to Outsourcing Marketing.”
