Accountability exists in all professions. Physicians are accountable for their diagnoses, receptionists are accountable for the messages they route, and marketers are held accountable for the strategies they propose and the methods they choose to implement them. A good first step in keeping up with what’s expected of us and staying in touch with the primary goals of what it is we’re trying to accomplish is performing a marketing audit.
Marketing audits allow us to discover problems and ask questions as to what goals we were trying to accomplish in the first place. Because marketing audits are so important to increasing ROI and maximizing revenue, we often begin our new client-agency relationships with a thorough look at how our clients go about marketing their products, goods, or services. Over time, we’ve found 5 main reasons why a marketing audit isn’t just a good idea, it’s a necessary one:
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Marketing audits reintroduce you to your product or service.
There’s nothing more embarrassing than a customer calling up your call center and, in not so many words, telling you that you don’t know your product. Believe it or not, it’s happened. Account executives, product marketers, and even CMO’s have fallen victim to the “just get through today” mentality and have forgotten what matters most: the product. When beginning a marketing audit, you go through your marketing plan, project plans, and budget documents to get a better understanding of why it is you chose “option B” instead of “option A”.
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Marketing audits remind you of the initial campaign goals so you can adapt and succeed.
I remember back when I was in grade school I wanted to be a doctor when I grew up. Looking back, it was definitely an accomplishable goal, but somewhere along the line things changed and I no longer wanted to venture down that path. The same is true in marketing: campaign goals can, and most likely will, change along the way. By looking back at your planning and goal-development process you will get reacquainted with the original reason you got the project funding in the first place.
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Marketing audits allow you assess what’s worked, and what hasn’t.
It doesn’t take much to realize that the best way to survive a crash is to avoid it altogether. Marketing audits give you an opportunity to take a look at what you’ve done, how you’ve done it, and any positive (or negative) results that may have come of it. Assessing the path you’ve chosen to follow with your marketing budget will enable you to sense an error in direction and pivot to avoid the proverbial crash.
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Marketing audits uncover inefficiencies that you didn’t know existed.
You know that sinking feeling you get in your stomach when you pull into your local gas station, fill up your car or truck, and drive a couple blocks down the road to find the next station offering gas 20 cents cheaper? That happens a lot in marketing- you think you’ve gone down the right path only to find that if you’d chosen that “option A” you would have saved your organization $100,000 per quarter in ad spending. The results you gather when looking at your current marketing strategy allow you to see where your dollars are going and search for ways you can make that dollar go even further. Who knows what you’ll find?
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Marketing audits recharge your campaign and spark life into new strategy and direction.
For me, there’s nothing more exciting than taking a client from planning to launch. Whether you’re unveiling a spiffy new website, sending out a new creative to the masses, or trying your hand with a new media publisher, launch dates get the adrenaline pumping and instill a sense of focus like none other. After looking at an old, aging campaign and identifying weaknesses, you can propose new ways to achieve the old goals you’ve been seeking all along. Modifying an old campaign shows the same promise of success that a new one brings so it will reignite the fire and take your product or service to a new level.
At Responsory, we take pride in providing marketing that’s measurable. If your marketing campaign is in need of an audit, get in touch with us today.
