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Your Marketing Strategy Vs Your Sat Nav – 10/02/2023

After a minor car bump just after Christmas, we were without a car for almost 3 weeks. In that time, there was a lot of adjustment of routines as suddenly, we had to walk everywhere and that of course takes much longer than hopping in a car. It was a nightmare logistically but we had no choice and had to get on with the daily tasks as best we could with a new plan. Our hands were forced as the car couldn’t move off the drive and life continues on regardless, it was new plan or sink!

As I walked the mile to collect my son from his nursery, complete with headphones in my ears and my favourite playlist on, my mind started to wander. I watched all of the cars driving past me, thinking about how lucky they were to be carrying on their daily lives with a car to drive. I looked at all of the new cars going past with their built in Sat Navs and fancy technology and how easy it has become for us to get from A to B. With that ease of use comes laziness and printing Google Map directions off before you start your journey has now become a thing of the past (remember when we all did that?!) Now you just get in the car, tell it where you want to go and you follow their lead. It even tells you what the speed limit is, what congestion lays ahead and notifies you to cameras.

I thought about how running a business, particularly marketing a business has changed over the years like our cars. Again, things have become easier to use like Meta Business Suite allowing you to schedule posts, using #tags to search for specific topics/posts and additions of company pages on LinkedIn to provide a different marketing message to our personal profiles. A lot of it is automated as well with you being able to get from A to B with less clicks than ever. Sounds perfect right? What if it isn’t always a good thing……..?

We follow the Sat Navs lead when it tells us to go left/right, if we follow the marketing lead too, is that actually good for our business? If the Sat Nav tells us to avoid the motorway, what if we avoid that part of our marketing too? Sometimes the Sat Nav isn’t always right and your gut tells you this but you press on as that is what you are ‘meant to do’, after all, technology knows better than us, right? Not always. Have you ever tried ignoring the Sat Nav and going with your gut? Yes, it will shout at you to do a U turn and try to re-route you back to its way of thinking but you have made your decision and you stick to it. Did it work out better for you on that journey? I bet it has on more than one occasion when you think about it.

Can we therefore challenge the marketing trends/expectations that we are all lead to follow in our businesses as time marches on? Before you take the next journey using the latest Sat Nav notification, sit down and think about whether it is right for you. You will have a deep routed ethos and meaning to your business, there is a reason you set it up or work for this company, something ran through your mind to make the decision for you at the start. Regardless of the sparkly new fancy technology, don’t lose sight of that, as that is your printed Google Maps directions sat on the passenger seat next to you. That is your original mind set and its important to keep that as part of your new equation to stay truthful to yourself and your goals

Sometimes we need to embrace the Sat Nav of the marketing world, sometimes we need to turn it off and pick up those printed directions again. Which one are you using on your next journey?