Using Life Lessons to Build Successful Marketing Strategies

The trouble with life lessons is the way in which they usually only tend to be considered in hindsight. Or in other words, you learn a lesson the hard way (or any way at all) just a moment when it is too late to do anything about the event or result in question.The thing is though, if you genuinely take a few moments to sit back and consider some of the most common and important life lessons…examples you will be more than familiar with…there’s a lot that can be taken away and applied in a web marketing context. It isn’t what you would call particularly groundbreaking or inspiring information, but nonetheless clearly illustrates how everyday life lessons really can be used to help build successful marketing strategies.  Consider the following examples:Never make long-term decisions based on short-term circumstancesIn a marketing context, this basically manifests as an extraordinary number of marketers who use immediate and often real-time analytics to mould and influence their long-term decisions. Access to comprehensive analytics is of course a fantastic thing, but there are far too many instances where poor decisions for the long-term are based entirely on what is happening right now. Or in other words, making long-term or permanent decisions without fully understanding your data is never a wise move.Do not allow good decisions to be influenced or stunted by emotionsYou are emotionally invested in everything your business does and the way it operates in general, which can often lead to poor decision-making in a variety of capacities. Unfortunately, it isn’t realistically possible to simply switch emotions off at the flick of a switch, which is precisely why important decisions should always be made in conjunction with others. And not just others, but ideally those that do not necessarily have the same emotional attachments to the business. Just as good decisions shouldn’t be adversely affected by emotion, decisions in general should never be made on the back of emotion.Surround yourself with those that are smarter, sharper and better than youAgain, a simple life lesson which in a marketing context perfectly encapsulates the importance of bringing in outside help to watch over pretty much anything that you yourself are not a fully-fledged expert in. If you genuinely do not have a clue what PPC marketing is all about, speak to the experts. If it is clear that your own in-house SEO strategy isn’t exactly fabulous, think about outsourcing to a third party. It’s simply a case of reminding yourself that you cannot and will not ever be a master of everything, so it’s a good idea to bring in as much help as necessary.Always base decisions on factsUnderstanding the available options is one thing, but at the same time there is nothing more important than ensuring that all marketing decisions are based exclusively on facts. Hunches and gut feelings are all well and good and have the potential to pay off. But then again, so does a lottery ticket or a spin on a roulette wheel. When decisions are based on facts, it becomes possible to effectively and accurately predict the outcome. When decisions are based on guesswork, guesswork is all you have to rely on when it comes to what follows.Choose your battles wiselyWhatever line of work you are in, choosing your battles wisely is a good idea…and an important one at that. For example, if you decide your primary and perhaps sole objective is to get to the number one position in Google for a handful of the most popular search terms on the planet, you probably are not going to succeed. Likewise, attempting to beat successful and established brands at their own game as a new business startup isn’t necessarily as advisable as trying to come up with something new and unique. It’s all about results, but ANY results that you can actually attain are worth a million-times more than results that are well and truly out of your reach.Time is the most valuable of all resourcesEven in business? Absolutely – the reason being that while you can earn money, there is absolutely nothing in the world you can do when it comes to time. Time is of limitless value in all areas of business, marketing being no exception. The more time you waste on any venture that was never going to work, the more time you could have invested in something quite remarkable.Hope for success, plan for failureLast but not least, the word ‘failure’ may be a little on the strong side, but it is nonetheless of crucial importance to fully expect that things will go wrong on the way. You have to believe that a marketing strategy will be successful in order to commit to it in the first place and set it in motion. Nevertheless, considering every ‘what if’ scenario and having contingency plans in mind will always set you up with a seriously valuable insurance policy.