Question

Would a client's valuation be negatively impacted by inconsistencies between short-term and long-term strategies?

Answer 1

B2B Marketing Strategies: Long-term vs Short-term

I often meet prospective clients that want marketing strategies with quick results. The conversation goes,

“We launched a couple of weeks ago and we need to get customers quickly.”

“OK…who is your target customer?”

“Everyone! We have a great product.”

Long-term Strategies are Effective But They Take Time
Studies show that long-term strategies are more effective at supporting profitability, revenue and market share goals. There’s also evidence that businesses are more likely to achieve their marketing goals. This is particularly true when marketers allow marketing campaigns to run for at least six months before deciding whether it is effective. In the case of our IT client, it took 10 months. The size of the deal more than paid for the months of blogging. Months of following our client’s blogs created trust and credibility in the mind of the new customer.

Long-term vs Short-term Marketing Strategies
Successful marketers (those who say they outperformed their competition) allocate over half of their budget to long-term marketing goals (more than 6 months). The mentality of the business owners in successful companies is to build, experiment and make changes – not to cut and run.,So while the marketing strategy is long-term, successful marketing strategies operate on regular feedback loops. We make some assumptions at the start based on our understanding of the customer. Then we try a few things and wait for the feedback. The feedback helps us make changes to our assumptions – then we test again.

Short-Term Marketing Strategies Should Support the Long-Term View still, short-term marketing is widespread. Studies show that this has a negative impact on brand awareness, the share of voice and profitability. A recent article in Marketing Week reveals that less than 25% of B2B marketers say that they run campaigns for over six months. Despite typically long sales cycles in B2B markets, marketing campaigns end before the average sales cycle comes to fruition.

Therefore, sales and marketing teams are not around the customer’s buying journey long enough to see it through. It’s no wonder that their marketing campaigns are ineffective.