This Super Bowl ad gets to the point. You can’t just throw money at a problem and expect it to solve your problem.
Here are some commons mistakes I see all the time with small businesses & non-profits.
- Counting list/following growth as fiscal growth
- Confusing increased activity with increased revenue
- Investing in what worked yesterday with what will work tomorrow
- Building a brand vs. building sales
- Developing a feedback channel vs. building a marketing channel
- Using marketing and sales as synonyms
A broken strategy, no matter how well funded or how well hyped, is still a broken strategy. Investing in your past will never lead you to your future. And confusing hype with sales will never pay off.
Some small businesses are small because their niche` and product is meant to be small. Other organizations want to be big and see their offerings as game changers… but internal attitudes, struggles, and politics keep them small.
Personally, I like my work measured on things I can count. Revenue, transactions, deadlines met, human impact, on and on. I am not satisfied with hype. I’m not satisfied with increased activity or engagement. And I’m certainly not excited about the amount of money a project costs.
But I am satisfied and excited by results.
Stop throwing money at your problems! Instead, do the hard work to fix what is broken.
