Doing less can be the answer to delivering more

Growth targets are getting ever more challenging and business expectations ever higher, so how can doing less possibly be the answer to the marketing function delivering more impact against the bottom line?

Throughout my career the phase “less is more” is one that I have found myself going back to time and again when it comes to setting a B2B marketing strategy. And it’s proved to be more than an empty promise. I’ve discovered that a less is more mindset focuses minds and resources on what will really drive growth and in turn, can deliver significantly better bang for your buck.

Here’s 5 ways how:

1). Get serious on prioritisation

You only have so much marketing budget and resource to go around, so you need to place your bets carefully and then protect them. 

Sadly, in some organisations, marketing is still viewed as a passive servant, rushing to assist whichever part of the business shouts the loudest (often with sales enablement requests). To really connect marketing to delivering growth this must stop! Instead, marketing needs to work in partnership with the business to identify the top commercial priorities most likely to yield the biggest results against growth targets (and this must be a manageable list of genuine priorities – not everything can be a priority!). Plans should then be built to support only those priorities, being ruthless not to service any products and services that don’t make the list. CEO buy-in and strong governance is essential here in successfully protecting your plan and ensuring it doesn’t get “diluted” by focusing resources elsewhere.

2). Align with the wider GTM team

In working with the business to understand the top priorities, marketing, sales and any growth operations functions must be completely aligned in supporting the same priorities. This will enable your business to get the same messages out to the same groups of buyers.

Alignment across the whole GTM team provides an opportunity for an effective Account Based Marketing (ABM) strategy with sales and marketing aligning on processes, systems and activities. Particularly for high-value and complex sales where a targeted and personal approach is required, flipping the traditional sales funnel to an ABM strategy by starting with high quality accounts, then developing a detailed understanding of the organisation and the key contacts who make or influence decisions, can deliver greater impact. This “spear fishing” style approach adds more focus and reduces “waste” from targeting those less likely to buy or on potential customers falling through the cracks. It also allows for more personalisation, improving relevance and resonance with the audience.

3). Select the right tool for the job

Choose your marketing approach for each commercial priority carefully as its rare a one-size-fits-all approach will work. Instead, consider the business objectives, growth potential and the business’ ability to capitalise, to identify where in the funnel to focus efforts. This could range from engagement programmes using thought leadership for solutions where you want to become known, to straight to demand programmes for your core solutions where you are already established and trading market share with competitors. The tactics and level of support applied will differ by programme type.

In selecting your tactics, you must choose the right tool for the job. For example, events are often the go-to tactic in B2B. Their unparalleled ability to support relationship building make them an obvious choice. And, in organising them everyone can get involved, can look busy and can feel pleased with themselves as the registration list grows! However, an event won’t always be appropriate and should be thoughtfully challenged before proceeding. They are very expensive, time consuming and restrictive in terms of reach when compared to other tactics available to you.

4). Squeeze out the value 

Have you ever been in the situation where you run a new event or release a new research report, it’s a huge success and so, with much excitement and encouragement from the business you decide to do lots more of them?

Before you rush ahead and add even more to your plate, wouldn’t it be better to build on what you have first by making it even more impactful next year rather than potentially diluting your efforts? Doing fewer things better will always beat doing lots of things poorly. Make sure you and your team apply the time and energy to an activity that the business investment in it deserves before rushing off to do the next one! If you do, you will get deeper audience engagement and better results.

Make sure you re-use, tailor and create derivatives from any source content you create so you can extend its life and hit as many different segments and verticals through as many different channels as possible to maximise exposure. Consider if multiple smaller events aimed at the same buyers can be wrapped into one. Your team, budget and your audience will thank you for it!

And never undercook the event follow up. The follow up is more important than the event itself which arguably is just the excuse for starting the conversation! Ensure a robust follow up is in place and your business colleagues are held to account for doing it.

Lastly, get the business working for you. If you produce an expensive piece of thought leadership or an event, internal engagement is a massively important and underused channel which gives you direct access to customers. Ensure your customer-facing colleagues know about the great work you’re producing, understand how it is relevant for their customers and how they can use it to build a conversation and help meet their personal objectives.

5). Look after your team

You and your team will often be one of your business’ biggest marketing investments. The job of a marketer isn’t getting any easier, often working at a relentless pace and under pressure to deliver more for less. And with skills shortages and recruitment remaining at the top of many marketing leaders’ worries, you cannot afford to lose your talent to burnout or to the competition.

What’s more, according to Gallup, companies with engaged employees are 21% more profitable and show a 17% increase in productivity.

Prioritising your team’s wellbeing by allowing them to focus on fewer tasks with greater impact will reduce burnout and increase job satisfaction, helping them to stay at their best. If you and your team are simply reacting and running from one thing to the next, you’re also sacrificing time for learning, thinking and innovating.

Furthermore, by not maxing out your resources on pre-planned work and building in some flex, you can stay agile and give yourself a better chance of grasping any lucrative emerging opportunities and market developments that may arise.

Prove it!

As we’ve explored, adopting a less is more approach can be advantageous in optimising marketing for growth – both from a strategic and team effectiveness perspective.

Alignment with and support from your CEO and the wider GTM team is key to making it happen. This will allow you to put the governance in place to protect your plans from dilution. Receiving CEO support, however, is easier said than done. To get that you need to prove your strategy works through regular reporting and through talking the same language as the business. It’s not about click throughs, event registrations or downloads – instead use business metrics (e.g. marketing influenced pipeline and revenue) to demonstrate how their investment in marketing is driving growth for the firm.

Once you prove that, you may even find you receive more resources to do “less” with!