Tag: email marketing

In context

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In it’s most popular form, Goodhart’s law states that when a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure.

You do not have a healthy company because your revenue increases year after year. Revenue is just one measure of the health of a company, and it should be put in context.

You do not have a great place to work because your engagement score says so. Engagement score is just one measure of how your employees feel, and it should be put in context.

You do not have a terrific team because they meet their targets quarter after quarter. Numbers are just one measure of how well your team is doing, and they should be put in context.

You do not have a successful campaign because you are getting clicks. Clicks are just one measure of the success of a campaign, and they should be put in context.

The point is, measures are easy to game, and the more you put them at the center of every conversation, the more people will be inclined to game them.

It takes time and effort to take the whole picture into consideration. It takes awareness, it takes courage, it takes honesty. It is the only way you can truly assess how you are doing and make adjustments, so that you don’t wake up one day in a place where you had never wanted to go.

What works

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Things that work in marketing:

  • Building your brand
  • Creating content that resonates with you audience
  • Being featured in publications your audience trusts (not because you paid them)
  • Being found when people experience the pain you are addressing

Things that do not work in marketing:The greatest illusion

This one is from Rand Fishkin, worth remembering after the summer.

Lazy adjectives

Fabrizio1 Comment

A pervasive offering is not going to make you win.

A best-in-class solution is a fake promise.

Seamless integration with other tools is a given.

An optimized tool to increase productivity is just not enough.

A customer-driven way to increase leads is meaningless.

Unless it is to describe something that’s truly making you stand out, avoid using adjectives in your copy. Their use is inflated and they do not add any meaningful hint at the value you deliver.

They are a lazy shortcut.

Take the time to explain instead. In as little words as possible. In a clear language. In words your audience can relate to (and other audiences can’t).

Do the work.

Aligning

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Internal alignment is often that spot where every manager in the organization is happy, while everyone looking from the outside (customers included) have no clue what is going on.

Aligning is important, but it needs to happen on broad topics. Values, principles, long-term targets.

When alignment gets down to the tactics, to the details, it turns into agreement. It becomes a patchwork that at best reflects the ego and desires of a limited amount of people.

It’s natural

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Understand that it is normal to want to make things complex.

To want to add just one more feature. To want to make a clause for that particular case. To want to split the price to make it more flexible. To want to tell exactly how it works. To want to cover all the needs of all possible audiences. To want to factor in all the preferences of all possible stakeholders.

Understand that it is normal to want all of this.

And understand also that customers want simple. You yourself want simple when you are the customer.

Complexity is natural. It is also not what is going to make your business grow.