Account-based marketing, growth marketing, inbound marketing, outbound marketing, marketing automation, content marketing… The list goes on. There is so much information out there, new theories, new methods — it actually makes my head spin.

Are we there yet?

In life, we’re encouraged to celebrate the journey, not just reaching the destination. However, the marketing journey can feel like the equivalent of driving around Milton Keynes — lots of time going around in circles, but every time think you’ve broken new ground, it’s actually just the same view albeit from a slightly different perspective (sorry Milton Keynesians!). In marketing terms, I want to arrive already. I just want to know what will get me where I need to be and nail it.

Miss Universe

I’m sure you can appreciate that overseeing marketing for a PR agency where everyone is a highly qualified marketer is a bit like being a dietician at the Miss Universe beauty pageant. To hold my own, it’s important that I have a few nuggets up my sleeve and I’m not referring to the chicken kind.

Nugget numero uno

As a work-based blue-green on the Jung personality test, I love being the one to put the pro in process (providing it’s done nicely). However, in my personal life I’m probably much more yellow and I guess I could be described as being easily distrac….ted. As such, at work I work hard on having laser-like focus. I’ve mastered a handful of measurable marketing processes that truly deliver against our bottom line. I continuously monitor those rather than spreading our resources too thinly by deploying teams on random initiatives and adding complexity and cost that we simply don’t want or need.

Don’t bounce about

For sure, like all marketers I have a duty of care to keep the business abreast of the latest marketing trends and developments. However, as any decent dietician will tell you, bouncing from the Akins, to the Zone, to the South Beach, to the Mediterranean diet is a poor strategy and the same is true in marketing. Getting distracted by the latest theory or gimmick won’t help you reach your goals.

Work it through

When something new does roll around and I feel like hoisting all of my eggs from existing baskets over to a new shiny one, I’ve learned to stop and really consider whether there is going to be significant benefit. I’m lucky (or perhaps unlucky) enough to oversee both sales and marketing for Wildfire, which means the only ‘departmental conflict’ is what goes in in my own head! Having a birds-eye view of the whole process from start to finish is helpful though because I can quickly work through how a new marketing theory, initiative or channel is going to impact my primary objective, which is to generate new business.

Challenging PR

All in all, my approach to marketing for Wildfire mirrors the agency’s approach to PR for clients. We concentrate only on what truly matters, ensuring campaigns focus on doing things that make a proper difference, and away from frippery that simply takes up time and budget. If something isn’t contributing directly to creating business impact, we challenge it.

It keeps our campaigns lean and our results mean. Our campaigns have serious legs that help us present the very best version of our clients and enables our clients to compete more effectively on the world stage.