We hear it all the time in blogs, white papers, newspaper articles and from industry experts. “….marketing budgets continue to be slashed, programs are being dropped and marketing staff are being laid-off.” This creates the challenge of strategically choosing the marketing tactics that make the most sense for your firm and your brand.
Rather than focusing on the negative, let’s take a step back and look at how firms and businesses are responding. Being flexible and nimble is the essence of a successful firm having the ability to respond to change. How you respond to change can positively or negatively affect your brand and your bottom line.
Marketing departments should be conducting marketing audits to analyze the most important and effective marketing pieces, events, etc. that drive business leads and meet goals and objectives. Much more scrutiny is being placed on each marketing project. This type of scrutiny should always be a part of the marketing process, allowing you and your firm to target more efficiently and effectively.
Online marketing spending will be about 15% of the total marketing spend in 2011, which equates to about $34 billion. This is up by almost $10 billion from 2009.(Forester Research Study)
As a result, many professional services firms are moving more and more of their marketing online. Outside the benefit of being a more cost effective medium, firms are beginning to understand and learn that this is where their audience is finding a majority of their information. With that said, just because others are “doing it”, does not mean it makes sense for you and your brand. Make sure you do the research to determine whether this trends is true for you and your brand. Traditional means of marketing such as event sponsorship, direct mail, printed magazines and even advertising in industry pubs are not going away. However, marketers are beginning to see the value of diversifying their marketing mix and capitalizing on the mediums that produce the biggest “punch”.
Traditional marketing spending is shifting to online marketing. Below is a graph (via HubSpot) that shows marketing spending in 2010 based on specific tactics. We at Moiré expect that these numbers will stay relativity consistent in 2011, with more firms putting emphasis on their online marketing mix.
At Moiré, our clients are expressing interest in transitioning typical printed pieces such as alumni magazines and annual reports online. The capabilities of producing an online marketing piece offers your visitor or potential client an interaction with your brand that many printed pieces cannot emulate. As law firms' and accounting firms' marketing departments and partners become more educated with online marketing, we anticipate the interest to grow.
How has your firm’s budget allocated for online and offline marketing? Would love to hear your stories and suggestions for marketing success in the coming year.