As a woman who looks at life through a marketing lens and who loves to create marketing harmony for all my clients, seeing this photo reminded me not only of a bad photo shoot fashion decision (jacket and pants shouldn’t have been paired up) but more importantly, about the value of coordination. To get the most mileage out of our marketing, it’s critical to question how coordinated your marketing efforts are.
As a noun, the word “coordinate” refers commonly to matching items of clothing. For example, my professional blazer in this photo was not only a little tight (see the wonky button on the lower right?) but it does not coordinate with my tight leather leggings and heels (which reminds me of what Sandy from Grease wore in the final “You’re the one that I want” dance number – ha!) In retrospect, I should have worn long, straight-legged pants. The pants and jacket have very different looks, creating a visual disconnect (insert screeching car breaks sound). There’s a marketing teaching opportunity here, whether you care about clothing or not, stay with me.
As a verb, the Oxford Dictionary beautifully defines coordination as bringing the different elements of (a complex activity or organization) into a relationship that will ensure efficiency or harmony.
Marketing coordination serves to bring all the different elements of your marketing strategy and efforts into a relationship that will optimize, and ideally harmonize the way you build your credibility, usability, visibility, sellability, and scalability.
Now, if you are reading this and thinking all of your marketing needs to match and you are only thinking about this from a design perspective, let me be clear that this is not the case. This is a holistic, big-picture approach, not a myopic viewpoint.
Coordinated marketing is about having consistency and flow.
I began my career in marketing working in luxury retail, so when I talk about coordination, I always feel the need to reiterate that that does not mean all your marketing has to be “matchy-matchy” (a non-flattering retail term used to refer to clothes that did not coordinate, but over-matched in a thoughtless, robotic or fashion-victim way) but instead have a harmonious flow, ideally in a seemingly effortless way.
Marketing that matters is about building meaningful relationships via maximizing exchanges.
These exchanges can come from a number of sources – referrals, people from your email list, paid ads, who search and find you, who read about you in PR, hear you speak, content you write, social media posts, videos, the list can go on and on.
What is essential is that there are no screeching halts that disturb marketing’s ability to support sales.
For example, let’s say someone refers you or your company to a prospective client via a lovely connection email. Does your website’s message communicate who you are, what you do, and whom you serve if they visit it? Is your LinkedIn profile (personal and business) updated? If they Google you, are the search engine results pages reflecting your brand in a positive light? Is your social media current or has it been neglected for a while? When you respond, are you doing so in a classy, professional manner? When the 1-1 call happens, are you prepared, engaged, solution-oriented, listening, and following up in a meaningful way? All experiences from these little steps can deepen a relationship or create breaks, weakening it.
Marketing coordination is also about the experience post-sale. At WMT, we have a “there is no small client” philosophy. Our level of responsiveness, service, and solutions are equal to clients of all sizes. We serve clients we believe in and it’s not about the size of their bank account, it’s about a shared mindset, one of growth, investing in solutions, being willing to adapt or change, and truly, deeply loving the work they do. It pains me when I see companies put so much time, energy, and money into closing new clients and then totally discounting the service and support part, it’s such a disconnect and a waste.
Speaking of disconnect and waste, in the name of marketing examples gone wrong, I was invited to an event that turned into a tragic uncoordinated marketing experience. The invitation was for a virtual business planning session and charcuterie tasting experience. I always love an opportunity to look creatively at business and I love to eat so I instantly accepted my invitation. I was mailed a lovely box with meats and cheeses but wasn’t communicated with after I signed up to keep an eye out for the box so the cheeses sat outside too long and were inedible, but the meats were okay. A little disconnect, but, I wanted the business planning value most, so I wasn’t going to let that get to me. The night of the session arrived and I put my meats and laptop in a quiet place and was ready to be guided through a sensory experience and get some business enlightenment. The CEO came on to Zoom and shared her super impressive background (like woah, mega impressive) and I was beyond excited to learn from her, then she bombed through some mediocre unattractive slides that were pretty nutrient-less and then she pushed repeatedly for us all to book a 1-1 consultation call. Other members of the company popped in to sing the company’s praises, which felt planted and over 45 minutes went by with no mention of what to do with the charcuterie stuff. Turns out, there was a guest they hired to lead the lasting, but that wasn’t until the very end of the non-enlightening sales pitch, and by then, I was too mad to stay online for it. I loathe having my time wasted, but what made me most infuriated is that this company targeted an ideal group, made a compelling offer, spent a TON of money mailing these charcuterie kits to prospective leads plus hiring a professional to lead us, yet spent zero time coordinating how to deliver a valuable experience to create meaningful relationships. All the effort was on the front end to get us into the email funnel, with no effort on the experience, coordinating the CEO and charcuterie professional in presentation, or preparing and practicing how to lead a value-rich meeting.
Great marketing ideas are only great when they are executed in a coordinated way.
It’s funny, back in the day, I got so much mileage out of this headshot below, and now I laugh at how off those pants were in the full-length shot! Little disconnects can make a big difference. Experiences matter.
This question of marketing coordination covers a lot of ground – branding, content marketing, email marketing, messaging, design, user experience, personal branding, social media marketing, SEO, CRM and so much more. Before anything is evaluated, get to the heart of your marketing. Let that be your guiding light to help you critically evaluate your efforts.
Understanding your why (why do you do what you do?) must be considered before the art or science of marketing gets evaluated. Deeply understanding your client and prospective client’s needs so your marketing efforts are serving them to build awareness, communication, connection, and service will multi-task to support sales.
And if you need pro marketing help, I invite you to reach out to me. I still speak personally to every potential client and give value-rich advice, so tacky sales pitches, can’t promise I won’t have coordinated pants on that match my shirt on Zoom though!
