Why You Need To Make Flexibility Key In Every Successful Marketing Strategy

It’s widely understood that change is the only consistent feature in the modern business environment. If organisations don’t build marketing strategies with built-in flexibility, they won’t be able to adapt to – as well as respond – to this change.

If you can have the best marketing strategy in the world it won’t be successful for long if it doesn’t give you the opportunity to take advantage of an opportunity in almost real-time or change your messaging based on shifting market conditions.

Alterations in consumer behaviour or new competitive offerings may make any good marketing strategy obsolete, however the ability to adapt allows businesses in order to respond to problems as well as seize new opportunities the moment they arise. Modern communications platforms are able to assist businesses in order to identify opportunities and respond with flexibility to give them a competitive advantage.

All The Preparation In The World Can Only Take Your Marketing So Far

An annual marketing plan should definitely not be set in stone. This is your marketing plan, not the Constitution of South Africa. You mustn’t put your “pencils down” when you have finished writing your annual marketing plan as your plan isn’t finished until the year is over when you have to begin writing it all over again!

Your marketing plan needs to remain flexible. You can’t conceivably predict what will take place over a 12-month period. This means that you can’t be certain that the plan you’ve written will be helpful throughout the year.  Look what can take place in one week, let alone a year!

You need to be ready, willing as well as able to respond to:

• New, unplanned competitive activity: Your competitors could have pulled a trick on you, requiring either a quick response or an alteration in your plans.
• Changing customer attitudes and behaviours: Something could have changed how your customers think about your business as well as how they are engaging with it, which could cause you to rethink a number of your plans.
• Marketplace fluctuations: Let’s face it, practically every category is a dynamic one, and there’s no way to foresee all the ebbs as well as flows. You could need to change your thinking while on the ride.
• Sales attainment: As you track your sales performance against your forecast, you may want to change up your plans to push even harder or to refocus your efforts.

Long-term marketing goals need to focus on the bigger picture, however it’s important to remember that these goals are also achieved through every short-term win. With all the pioneering marketing tools out there, organisations no longer have to make lagging marketing decisions or carve out their campaigns in stone.

Modern communication platforms give us the opportunity to change – as well as optimise – our marketing efforts in real time, offering opportunities for improvement at every milestone of the way. With that type of flexibility, success is only a matter of identifying opportunities and then making a few smart changes.

Get in touch with the Digital School of Marketing

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