“Don’t Hit ‘Publish’ Until You’ve Read This”
“10 Business-Critical Stats Social Marketers Need To Know”
“Why Your Digital Strategy Is All Wrong And How To Fix It!”
If you listened to the headlines (a not-so-joyous product of the content marketing bandwaggon) you’d never do anything.
Or, at least, you’d spend your whole day questioning yourself, re-doing work and generally stalling.
As digital marketers, we do proper research, draw up coherent plans and relate our work to tangible targets. Whatever your field – social, SEO, PPC, email, web, apps – that’s a familiar process. It’s a methodology the industry bangs on about no end: plan; test; refine; repeat…
And yet – the digital world is so deeply complex and ever-evolving, there’s an enormous – usually un-acknowledged – level of conjecture, guesswork, involved in every plan. For all we might try to work towards a ‘target’ or run a ‘plan’ (and we do!) things never ever work the way we think they will.
At some point you just need to go for it and do something.
Crucially, working in the blind – beset with constant reminders of ‘why your strategy is wrong’ etc – you need to commit, and actively investing in what you’ve got. Otherwise you spend 100% of your time looking for reasons things need improving: passively trawling analytics; reading advice; seeking consultancy.
The following all proffer clarity in the digital maelstrom:
- Big data and intricate analytics
- Specialist agency consultancy services
- Reports, white papers and meta-datasets on trends
- Blogs upon blogs upon blogs
- Smart digital tools
- Audits and checkups
- Anyone and everyone who offers ‘surefire steps to SEO success’, ‘the all-in-one guide to Facebook ads’, etc
Yes – these have their place, and should form a key part of any digital marketer’s day. But a lot of the time we use the insightful tools at our disposal as a crutch, a distraction, a diversion.
It’s easy enough to prove what’s being done wrong or what could be better – there will always be 1000’s of people lining up to tell you every little error. But there simply isn’t enough time in the day to incorporate every piece of input and advice. In fact, most of the time, it contradicts itself or is simply too obscure to have any meaning.
Back in the real world, I find a bit of “la la la not listening” often goes a long way!
Every day, I doubt plans I’m putting in place. That doubt helps me improve, and without it I wouldn’t be able to do my job. When the doubt prevents me from committing to anything, though, it’s gone too far.
So, when I see advice like “Don’t Hit ‘Publish’ Until You’ve Read This”…
…a lot of the time, I just think ‘sod it’ and publish anyway 🙂
