Seeing the government's ‘get ready for Brexit’ adverts on the telly is a stark reminder that whether we leave on the 31st October or not, a change is coming and it’s one that is likely to continue to harm the nation.

Whether the effect is an economical one or something much more profound and long-lasting, like the divide it has created among the people, it will make things feel different. The ripples of Brexit will be felt even by those who thought it wouldn’t affect them long after the exit strategy has been agreed.

Now more than ever, you'll be happy you put all that effort into tracking and organising your data and reports. The foundations that have been laid and the insights you have gathered will help you move with the economic ebb and flow over the coming years.

Get More For Less

With so many uncertainties around the economy, it may seem crazy to increase the targets. In some instances, there may not be any choice. Cash flow and company payroll may be the determining factor when it comes to the C-suite setting their annual revenue targets.

The increase may come with a decreased marketing budget, which is always a bitter pill to swallow. Especially if your data is telling a very different story and you've struggled to hit your targets for the last few years.

Firstly, go back to basics to ensure your marketing goals fit with the overall business goal. If you need 1000 sales this year to hit a target, then make that your goal, not some enquiries you think you’ll need to hit that target like you may have had previously. Things are changing, demand may be lower, so your previous conversion rate may not be a metric you can rely on going forward.

Don’t Be Afraid To Do Something Different

Think about what you’d need to do to hit the target. Examine the data from the channels, look at the yields from each. Consider this...if you doubled activity would it double the result? Or are you near saturation for that channel? In which case, where are your marginal gains? What haven’t you tried before? What’s new in marketing?

Throw out the rule book, examine your prime prospects, what are they thinking about? How is Brexit affecting them? Remember business is about people, even though we’re in the data business we have to consider there’s a human element to everything that we do.

Review your messaging, is it strong enough or has the high demand over the last few years caused you to think more about mass distribution of the message and the quality has dropped as a result of pumping it out.

Don't Get Confused By Marketing Acronyms

Make sure you’re working SMARTer than ever before is like teaching a granny to suck eggs at this point. I’m not going to go into what SMART is. But what I will say is don’t confuse your goals with your metrics (KPIs). Your goal is your objective, which should be SMART for e.g. 1000 sales over £2000 by 31st December 2020. Your KPIs are more likely to be several enquiries required to hit the goal, let’s say 10,000. At the end of the year, you may have 10,000, you’ve hit your KPI but the quality was so poor it only delivered 500 sales. Meaning you haven’t hit your overall goal. Track your KPIs against your goals during the year, if it’s not tracking to hit the target then don’t just add more enquiries to the KPI, look at the quality and how to increase it.

And Most Importantly, Keep Calm And Be Realistic

To achieve your goals, you’ll need to consider variables outside of the key metrics and how you’re going to track them. You’ll also need to consider your Critical Success Factors (CSFs), these are important and if they’re overlooked your goals are going to be hard to achieve. What factors will your strategy depend on and will you get what you need? Is further investment required? Is that likely? If it’s not then better to know now, amend the strategy to suit than go wading in. Consider the following questions when creating your strategy:

  • What factors are likely to lead to our desired outcome?

  • What conditions must exist to create that outcome?

  • Is everything being tracked properly?

  • What tools do we need to achieve our goals?

  • What skills do we need to achieve our goals?


Get Ready To Challenge And Be Challenged

Prepare to be challenged by your agency on your strategy and goals, likewise take this opportunity to challenge your agency’s proposed strategy for supporting you. It’s not the time to rinse and repeat, or at least if you do make sure you’ve sanity checked it first.

Key Points:

  1. Don’t think Brexit won’t affect you - change is coming, don’t stand still

  2. Use the data and insights to be more agile - if you needed any more reasons to prove the value of data to a business, here it is!

  3. Throw away the rule book and revisit your prime prospects - what are they doing now?

  4. Scrutinise the marginal gains - where you may of been wasteful in the past, these could be the golden nuggets

  5. Arse and elbow - don’t confuse your acronyms :)

  6. And until we’re out the other side...always apply a sprinkling of ‘Brexit uncertainty’.

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