An easy way to simplify your marketing

When working on your marketing plan for 2016, consider one, key message before you are too far along in the planning process: Do half as much.

That’s right, my prescription for a successful year is to do half as much marketing. Here’s what I am not saying:

· Spend half as much.

· Invest half as much time.

· Try half as hard.

· Reach half as many people.

What I am saying is that I’m betting you stretched yourself too thin in 2015. Here’s an example of a typical company’s marketing effort. See whether you find any similarities to your own:

“Company A” has a robust marketing program, with most efforts focused on attracting new customers. These new customers are needed, according to the marketing and sales team, to achieve the aggressive sales goals set by top executives.

The company committed to a print media purchase and fully intended to create a new series of ads for this effort. Unfortunately, the team was spread thin and created only one ad that ran throughout the schedule. The team identified some top industry trade shows, but by the time they got around to planning the new booth, the rush charges would have killed their budget. Instead, the team will end up using last year’s strategy.