Advantages exist for modern marketers that their forebears could never have imagined. Consider the monitoring and tracking of campaigns in real-time. The marketing department now has access to real-time data and can respond quickly to changing conditions. But if the marketing staff isn’t working efficiently, they won’t be able to seize any possibilities that arise.
Inefficiency comes at a high price in this type of dynamic setting. Initiatives like lead generation might be harmed in more ways than one by a slow reaction time. The company may not be able to meet quarterly revenue targets or keep up with the competition. The inefficiency of marketing makes expansion even more difficult. To manage rapid expansion, businesses need to optimise all of their processes.
Methods for Boosting Group Performance
As a marketing director, you should strike a balance between your team’s productivity and output. Efficiency at the cost of efficacy is counterproductive. Both are essential. The following five suggestions provide a good balance between efficiency and effectiveness and should be seriously considered.
First, Your Marketing Team Needs a Common Goal
Teams that row in unison will naturally travel in that direction. You need a common goal to have your subordinates rowing in the same direction. When everyone is working towards the same goal, conflicts caused by everyone doing their own thing are minimised.
The consultancy services firm The McChrystal Group frequently aids teams in working more quickly without sacrificing productivity or communication. The survey found that only 37% of participants agreed that everyone on their team had the same view of what it would take to succeed in their field.
Workers must recognise their contributions’ significance and agree on the best way to proceed. When asked about their level of engagement at work, employees are nearly three times more likely to say they understand how their team’s goals relate to organisational objectives.
You can’t expect everyone to get on board with your goals simply because you state them. Instead, the marketing staff should include the goal in everything they do. Use measures like project quality and staff satisfaction rates to track your progress towards your aim wherever possible. What gets measured gets handled; keep that adage in mind. When you quantify your goals, you can rest assured that they won’t be overlooked.
Refine Your Selection of Marketing Technology
It’s easy to get swept up in the excitement of the latest and greatest marketing tools and platforms. However, you should avoid using too many different kinds of technology. According to an SHRM report, many workers are using ten or more different applications at once. Constant interruptions cause them to waste time, which is exacerbated when the apps don’t work together and necessitate several accounts.
How can you tell whether your martech stack is preventing you from achieving a more streamlined process? Get your staff involved in cataloguing your systems and outlining their functions. Then, check for overlaps and gaps. After that, you can start looking at solutions. One such platform could be a project management system, which is often underutilised. Alternatively, you may try to find a single technological product that can replace multiple existing ones.
In the end, you may only require a handful of high-quality, interoperable pieces of technology. You shouldn’t let a complicated martech stack get in the way of your team’s productivity, even if your marketing goals are lofty. Find methods to cut costs without sacrificing the capabilities you and your team rely on instead.
Computerise All Applicable Processes
Imagine if your team’s artists had extra time to make stuff. What about the plan? They can, but only if they are freed from the most monotonous physical labour. According to research conducted by Automation Anywhere, over 40% of all office work can be classified as repetitive. That equates to 16 hours a week, or 40%, of your team members’ time being spent on monotonous work.
Using automation software can free up some mental space for creative thinking. And there is no shortage of marketing automation tools. There is a wide range of tasks amenable to automation, from content distribution and invoice tracking to metrics collection and report generation. This frees up more mental bandwidth for your team to devote to high-priority initiatives and ideas.
It’s important to note that marketing automation software can be helpful even if you have a limited budget. In addition, you might not need as many employees to carry out the same level of productivity.
End the Need for Constant Unnecessary Meetings
An effective meeting depends on its timing. But how many gatherings can you put within those categories? Sadly, there aren’t that many. Meetings about marketing, on the other hand, often take on a life of their own. As a result, team meetings are a major cause of wasted time and effort.
Meetings are indeed necessary to propel crowdsourcing ideas forward. However, neither development nor productivity can be sacrificed for meetings. There are three key things you may do to bring them under control. First and foremost, make sure all meetings strictly adhere to the agenda. (Any sidetracks should be put on hold until the real players can have a conversation about them.) Two, try to limit the length of meetings. Third, show the group how to act in such a meeting. Making exceptions will make it harder to change the culture of constant meetings.
When will you know that you have successfully handled an unexpected meeting? You’ll find that individuals do not immediately convene meetings to address every issue. In reality, asynchronous channels of communication like Slack and email may experience a growth spurt.
Give Your Team the Authority to Operate Independently
Authority issues are a major stumbling block for marketing teams trying to improve their productivity. A video marketing screenplay, for instance, may require multiple approvals before production can begin. In a perfect universe, there wouldn’t be a big deal about this. However, this environment is far from ideal. The entire campaign might come to a painful halt if a single key figure is unavailable.
When there are too many people between you and your goal, things can get lost in the bureaucracy. Examine your whole system of approving things. Might it be possible to condense a few? Could there be more than one person with the power to approve projects?
You don’t have to give up control as a manager just because you’re delegating authority to some members of your team. Just delegate, and you’ll gain efficiency in another way. Each approved team member will be responsible only for making deliberations based on relevant information and circumstances. The only real change will be less time spent waiting and more time spent pushing forward.
You can’t just cross your fingers and hope for the best when it comes to the productivity of your marketing team. The only way to get rid of ingrained routines is to actively discourage their continuation. Making adjustments carefully planned for optimal optimisation is the only way to reap the benefits of a well-oiled system.