Leadership Buy-In

Hey there,

Today we’ll discuss how to overcome leadership resistance and turn your Marketing from Expense to Revenue.

But first…

We have been using a Financial and marketing Model for proving marketing, and through our experiences, we’ve updated and simplified the model.

So now you don't need a finance whizz to present the connection
between your marketing motions and your revenue numbers.

Check the launch of our Financial Template on Product Hunt…
and if you are looking to spare €150, share some love
we’ll be picking out 10 ppl to receive it for free.

Big thanks to Fabian Maume for the help in the launch 🙏

Now back to our main story today 🤙

However, if you find these insights valuable, the best way to support our work is by inviting your friends to become Dot Connecters and learn more about Connecting The Dots between marketing activities and financial goals.

Topic Of Today

• Flash Guide On Gaining Leadership Buy-in ⚡️

  • Winning the Leadership Buy-In Lottery 🎲

  • Proving Marketing's Value💰

  • The Underestimated Power of Marketing 🚀

  • Bridging the Gap Between Sales, Marketing, and Leadership 🤝

• Sneak-Peek into next week's interviews

Next week

• Interview with marketers on Demonstrating Marketing’s Value 🎙️

Flash Guide On Gaining Leadership Buy-in ⚡️

"We don’t need more budget for Marketing it just needs to generate more leads"  Sounds familiar?

As marketers, we face this kind of resistance all the time.

As hard as it is to deal with this mentality, it is understandable that leadership wants to rationalise spending.

The question is, are they really rationalising it when they defund a crucial element of business growth?

In order to shift leadership’s mindset you need to be able to prove that your marketing activities are a significant factor in reaching overall business goals.

1. Winning the Leadership Buy-In Lottery 🎲

Our first stop is the (client) boardroom where budgets and marketing strategies collide.

How do you get leadership to understand that your proposed budget isn't about spending but investing in growth? Here's the secret recipe:

1. Become a Metrics Maven. 📊 Show how previous campaigns impacted bottom-line revenue and project the potential effects of your next moves.
   

2. Speak the Same Language. 🤝 Defining what each metric means is crucial. Remember, misinterpretation is the enemy of communication.
   

3. Pilot Projects for the Win. 💡 Suggest a small-scale version of your "big project" as a proof of concept. This reduces risk and provides leverage for your budget request.

And remember to assess their current state to ensure they're not basing decisions on misleading metrics.

Talk about a reality check, huh? 🏁

2. Proving Marketing's Value (No, We're Not Just Making Things Pretty) 👩‍🎨

Now, let's clear a common misconception - viewing marketing as an expense rather than a revenue driver.🚀

Prove this theory wrong by:

1. Setting Up the "Right" Metrics. (Yes, metrics again!) Ensure these reflect bottom-line revenue.

2. Showcasing Impact. Highlight how marketing activities affect these metrics, using your preferred tracking and projection tools.

It's all about the dry facts, folks! 💼

3. Invisible Impact: The Underestimated Power of Marketing 🚀

Sometimes, marketing is the unsung hero, making waves but not getting the recognition it deserves.

Why?

Well, because as long as it can’t showcase its value it will often be seen as an arts & crafts department or a coin-based lead machine.

That is why you need to connect marketing motions to bottom-line revenue and show leadership the effect of each planned campaign.

It's time we put an end to the "nice-to-have marketing" saga, don't you think?

4. Bridging the Gap Between Sales, Marketing, and Leadership 🤝

Ahh, the eternal misalignment issue. Been there, done that? 🙋‍♀️ Here's how we can turn it around:

1. Facilitate Communication. 📢 Regular meetings, shared projects, and team-building activities can do wonders.

2. Create Common Goals. 🎯 Goals and metrics should be defined in a common language, so teams are working together, not competing.

With everyone on the same page, it's a win-win. 🥳

5. Showcasing Marketing's Value: Size Doesn't Matter! 🍆

Whether you're a team of 50 or just two people, you can still run impactful campaigns.

How?

Build a relevant media presence where your audience hangs out based on the voice of your customers » meaning feedback received from sales and customer service and create valuable, relevant content where they spend their time.

The size of your marketing department doesn't determine your success, it's how you use what you've got! 💥

You've got the insights, you've got the tools. You're ready to challenge the misconceptions and showcase the true value of your marketing initiatives.

Sneek-Peek into Next Week's Interviews 🎙️

Can you describe a situation where a marketing initiative significantly impacted sales, but this impact was not recognised or underestimated by sales or leadership? How did you handle this?

While I don't have personal experience with this in the sense of doing something from Marketing's side and then not being recognised...

I have worked both in sales and in marketing and it's safe to say that in a corporate setting marketing is

1. rarely used to its full potential

2. are rarely given the necessary tools to do its job right

3. rarely seen as something that should affect overall business goals

Sadly enough, most often in a corporate setting marketing is deemed to play an arts&crafts department role or that of a coin-based lead machine.

In these situations unsurprisingly marketing is never able to fulfil its goal and will deliver subpar results, with insignificant effect on: - other departments' jobs, - and overall business goals.

Handling this can be difficult as it requires a mindset or paradigm change. What can be done however is showcasing how marketing can have a much higher impact with tools that they understand.

Meaning that if you are able to connect marketing activities to bottom-line revenue, leadership will be able to see its impact, and will be able to support marketing better in the future. This will then avoid situations in which marketing is not appreciated.

That’s it for today…

Next week we are back with a new episode of Business Companion.

Our new podcast, where we discuss business development & marketing-related news, creative ideas we come across and case studies of our own.

Subscribe to our podcast and keep an eye on your inbox for the next edition of our newsletter as well.

Happy learning! ❤️

LinkedIn posts worth reading this week:


1. Repurposing Your Articles On Linkedin

This is exactly what we are doing each week.... not only that we are using Kévin's template for it that we've shared previously.

2. Treating Paid Like Organic

How Chris Walker views paid social = guaranteed delivery of information to all my target accounts.

3. 10 most important lessons from helping 5 B2B SaaS startups grow

10 lessons learnt while growing startups from product-market fit to 1M+ AR