What Disney taught me about marketing
Although I’ve been watching Disney movies for the past 25 years, I didn’t think about how they relate to marketing until recently. And once you start to consider it, you realise there’s so much you can take from it. I know, this sounds crazy, but read on and you’ll see it makes so much sense!
If you don’t know where you want to go, then it doesn’t matter which path you take
Whenever I think of Disney quotes, this is top of my mind, from Alice in Wonderland and it stays true for B2B marketing (and B2C probably too, but I'll focus on what I know best).
You can't start marketing planning without looking at overall business objectives and market context. What does the business need to achieve in terms of sales? What services/products are top in terms of A) margins and B) volumes? Who are you targeting? What alternatives are there to your service/product? How is the competition positioned?
The questions to all these questions (and a few more) will help identify key segments and messages that you need to focus on. I've lost track of the times a client tells us "we target everyone". Each main segment should have its own strategy, messaging and channels. And its own tracking/performance metrics, to show you if you're still on the path to where you want to go or if you got lost along the way.
The only way to get what you want in this world is through hard work
Tiana must be one of my favourite Disney characters in the world, because she was struggling to start her own business. And she knew that she can only achieve that through hard work, which is very relevant for marketing.
I’m not going to say it takes hard work to create a good marketing plan....no, actually, I am saying that. It takes time, understanding of the client, looking at data, testing, measuring, redoing, creativity, different channels, budgets, resources. It is a lot of work.
You might also be lucky, but luck can also last so much. The key to a long life in business is to be constantly reviewing and updating your marketing strategy.
The past can hurt, but you can either run from it or learn from it
Lion King is full of great quotes, but none are better for marketing reporting than this one. Regardless if your marketing strategy performs well or not, take feedback and note down key learnings, to help you for the future.
Hindsight shows things in a different light and it helps highlight what decisions you took that delivered above your expectations or what might have worked better. Ask the team involved in implementing the plan and ask your clients and leads to find out how they see the company and what was the impact of your messaging/channels mix.
This analysis can be performed either with a survey or by asking a few people from the target market during an interview. Try to keep a balance between asking too much and asking too little. Prioritise your most important findings and make sure they are included in the planning stages for your future tactics, to ensure you learn from the past and keep doing what you’ve done really well.
What’s your favourite Disney quote? I’m sure you can find a lot of good ones you can take knowledge from, but please, don’t be an Alice:
I give myself very good advice, but I very seldom follow it.
