Change is hard. Really hard. It’s even harder when you’ve been in the routine of doing something for a long time. However, change is a good thing, and it’s possible with guidance and assistance from others. You must have a plan of strategy and action. This can be applied to anything in life, but specifically I’m talking about implementing a new marketing and business development plan. This can be challenging for many companies., because it’s different and many don’t know what to do. They don’t have a plan to change or know how to start.
Writing and implementing an effective marketing strategy is a change in your firm that doesn’t happen overnight. It takes time, effort, consistency, and determination to implement a marketing and business development plan. By assembling a plan, you know where you are going and how you are going to get there. There may be hurdles or forks in the road, but you know what your end results will be once you have clearly articulated your plan. Writing the plan is much easier than implementing it. The real magic happens when you start seeing results of the implementation. That’s when you know you’ve successfully made the right changes.
Finding the right internal or external resources to help you write and implement this plan is instrumental to the success of your company’s marketing program. These individuals need to be change agents for your company. They need to motivate you and your staff to take action, embrace the changes, and move your company forward. Being creative and innovative is also a requirement of this person. Someone who understands your business but isn’t too close to your business is a good place to start. The architecture, engineering, and construction industry is very different than retail or healthcare, so make sure you find a good outsourced partner or employee that understands your industry but has a keen sense for marketing and business development.
Most people who are given a clear direction will eventually reach the goals that have been set for them. As firm leaders, you must involve your high-level employees in assembling the plan and then communicating it with the entire company along with the end results. (This is why business strategic planning is so important as a prelude to your marketing and business development plan. Strategic planning takes a lot of time, too, but it’s well worth the effort.) If you don’t know how to market and develop business, hire a fulltime employee or a consultant to help you with this.
Change is a process and takes a long time. Once you have a written marketing and business development plan with goals, the action steps become much easier. You have your plan and then you have the implementation of the plan. Don’t take the easy road. Make the change today. You won’t regret it. I promise!
