get travel marketing tips 
Recently, I saw a stat in Marketing Week that gave me – a marketing counselor – a headache:
More than half (54%) of digital commerce projects are deemed unsuccessful.
Further details on this stat turned the headache into a migraine:
The main reason for this is a lack of customer alignment (34%), poor logistics (29%) and insufficient investment (29%). Some 51% of digital commerce leaders don’t believe their organization invests enough in commerce, while 28% say digital projects move too quickly and lack strategy. (Source: Wunderman Thompson Commerce)
Know what all of that fancy-stat-reporting really means? People are not spending enough time thinking about, researching, and planning their marketing efforts before taking action.
Oh wait… did you just gloss over that last sentence without stopping to really absorb what it means, and what you should do about it? As if that was just another piece of blah-blah advice from a marketer? “Spend more time thinking about your marketing before taking action.” Duh. Of course that’s good advice, you say. So basic. I knew that. Give me something REALLY meaty to chew on, like something I didn’t know before.
Folks…there’s a difference between knowing and doing. As a rule, we humans aren’t that accomplished at just sitting quietly and thinking for extended periods of time. If we have a marketing plan to write, we want to sit down and “just bang it out”… hopefully in the 93.5 minutes we’ve allotted in our schedule for it. The moment we sit down to just think, we get antsy about wasting time…and so our fingers seek out the keyboard so we can feel productive.
But just look at those stat percentages above, detailing the reasons why digital programs were deemed unsuccessful. ALL OF THEM could be solved by spending more time planning… even “insufficient investment,” because more time up front can help you 1) spend the same funding with wiser choices, 2) figure out how/where to get more funding, or 3) decide NOT to spend in that arena and invest the money elsewhere to get a better return.
Sitting down and thinking for an hour is not wasting time. Taking a full day off email and away from work to mentally explore strategy options, while curled up in a comfy chair, with your favorite snacks, beverages, and – dare I suggest it? – pajamas… is not wasting time. Blocking an entire half-day each week to seek solitude and reflect on marketing progress is not wasting time.
Carving out time to just be still and think is never going to be easy. Never. The business world moves at a fast pace, and we have colleagues, supervisors, and clients/guests who actively and passively demand our attention. But if we don’t find the fortitude to MAKE the time, we’ll all be doomed to live with some pretty sucky stats forever.
