The Rewards of Planning Ahead
by Alan Gladish
Within our sphere of influence, which is exclusively the business to business marketplace, companies often believe that they can get more marketing done and control their costs better by outsourcing their work one project at a time. The problem with that philosophy is that it discounts the marketing savvy and integration that a professional marketing communications firm can offer as a full-time partner with their client.
Let's say you're a marketing director responsible for meeting specific goals with a fixed annual budget. Does it make more sense to hire out each project as it comes up, or get together with your marketing partner to plan the entire year's activities up-front? Which method is more efficient and cost effective?
We have worked with clients both ways – on a project basis and for a fixed monthly fee – and in our opinion, the only advantage that an a la carte approach gives you is that it allows you to delay or cut future projects from the scope if the budget gets cut. Aside from that, projects only offer disadvantages:
- Projects reduce or exclude the full value of integration. For example, there's no guarantee that the website overhaul project you're launching in the Spring will include the proper landing pages and conversion methods that the direct marketing program scheduled for the Fall will need if you're not thinking about both together. The marketing partner will bring lots of experience to make both activities successful, but only if they're engaged in the planning process.
- The sum of discrete projects will always cost more than the whole. If you give your marketing partner an opportunity to plan the entire year ahead with a fixed engagement fee, they'll bend over backwards to make you happy. And that typically includes giving you value-added extras that make your life easier and don't cost more. Plus, the marketing group is on the team full-time so they're available to consult on unexpected activities or just to be a good listener when you're thinking about something new.
- Full service marketing communications firms have skills that project shops don't. If you hire a web developer to rebuild your site, but they don't understand how your business works, it's likely that they will focus on graphics or back-end functionality and overlook some very critical business-specific issues, such as optimization, usability, stickiness, and conversions -- the four most important criteria of a successful site. You could end up spending a lot of money on something that doesn't meet your business goals.
In this economy, companies need more marketing potency, not less. It's safe to say that engaging an agency on a long-term strategic basis is the better marketing investment. The best way to ensure that your limited budget is well spent is to engage with a marketing team dedicated to your success, rather than on the short-term project.