Marketing’s unfortunate habit of confusing ‘test with ‘gamble’
In this guest post, Alex Kirk explains why ‘shiny and new’ and ‘tried and tested’ are often at loggerheads when it comes to making marketing decisions.
I saw yet another post this week on another it-just-won’t-die theme, how marketers aren’t investing into enough newer channels due to – boo! hiss! – a focus on ROI.
This latest post (which I won’t link to because it’d be mean, it’s not their fault) is a classic of the genre, referring once more to a survey of marketers:
“At one extreme, a third of respondents disagreed with the statement ‘we reserve a proportion of budgets for more innovative but untried marketing activities’… these companies can be said to have risk-averse marketing strategies with little room for innovation”
Could not agree more, Kirky is so on point with this. So many are so focused on following the hottest new media trends, chasing that extra “shine” on the media plan and losing sight of the fact that trends are inherently temporary. What’s left over is what works. Just look at YoYos versus mobile phones.