Finding Balance Between Short And Long-Term Projects

In marketing, you need to balance long AND short-term wins to secure safety in your role. As marketers, we know we’re playing the long game and that most of our work today will be for long-term wins - a year+ away. Knowing this and the fundamentals and foundations of marketing can often consume our work prioritizations and focus. But at the end of the day, we also need to play into company optics. And a big optic is driving results in a short-term view. I was talking to an incredible CEO/founder recently of a martech product who *gets* marketing, who also voiced this need. The understanding for long-term builds, but needing someone to put wins on the board right away. If I were starting as a new VP of marketing, my plan would include a few sections, two of them being clearly identifying these long and short-term wins/goals. Sample areas to put under both: Short term: → Optimize paid search (demand capture channel) for higher, more efficient high-intent conversions → Deploy pipeline acceleration campaigns, especially within paid → Evaluate integrated marketing/sales personalized win-back campaigns → Optimize the lead handoff process (convert more of what you’re already bringing in, instant $) → Ensure paid social retargeting is fully funded → Run integrated upsell campaigns with sales → Run integrated retention campaigns with CS (less churn = hitting net goals with less new acquisition) Long term: → Evaluate/create message house and message campaigns → Invest in a new demand creation program (podcast, LinkedIn, etc.) → Cut inefficient sources/programs/tactics to redeploy spend to efficient ones → Invest in paid social brand awareness → Customer research → Create influencer partnerships → Team buildouts → Evaluate customer marketing efforts The list can go on forever for both and would need to be tailored based on the company, performance, ICP, and team skill sets. We’ve heard the doom and gloom of CMO tenure. There’s only so many low hanging fruit you can pick, but optically, as you’re building for the future (the point of marketing), ensure you’re also being very visible of quick wins so you can see the long-term payoffs - which will lessen the short term requests once they’re seen.

How to balance results NOW vs EVEN BETTER results later. The Pilot Method: Balancing short-term goals to long-term transformation is a dilemma every leader faces. If we focus too much on the NOW, we’re likely to miss opportunities to create exponential future results. If we focus too much on the FUTURE, we’re likely to miss our short-term revenue or growth targets. Here’s how I use pilots to account for both: Look, I’m always willing to consider decisions that may mean short-term hits to revenue targets or growth goals IF they align with our strategy. If they do and they’ve been well-thought-out and calculated, I’m often of the mindset, “Let’s try it.” Now, using the example of my time at Baker Tilly, I wouldn’t roll out a new initiative we wanted to test to all 5,000+ team members. Instead, I’d use a pilot approach. I’d pick a practice to be my pilot group. The rest of the organization continues marching toward our goals as usual. Within the single practice, we implement the change. Could be: - A new CRM or tech platform - A 4-day work week - A new sales process - A new client service model With this approach, I’ve limited the exposure of the change. If it goes well, we can roll it out to the entire organization with increased confidence it will accelerate our progress toward our long-term goals. If it doesn’t go as hoped, I’ve limited the impact and the organization as a whole is still likely to hit our short-term goals. Then, on to the next pilot. This is one way I go about balancing results NOW while striving for EVEN BETTER results later. #strategy #growth