EFFECTIVE MARKETING REQUIRES COURAGE AND SKILLS

                                                          

The impetuosity of youth is of little consequence without sheer ability. Add a third quality, courage, and the combination is the perfect fit for success in marketing Edwards (2015).

The eminence that marries effective salespersons right across the level scale is ability

That value needed for effective salesmanship is courage. Here are just some of the reasons why it matters more in marketing than it does in most other careers.

Marketing is vulnerable to fashion. Consumer understandings, behavioral economics, big data, social media, and engagement, the internet of things: all play a significant role in contemporary marketing. It’s the unexpected ferocity that drives one to the fore, and compels all to genuflect before it, that is our industry’s abiding weakness. Being the one person willing to question the flavor of this particular month can feel like turning up to a party where everyone but you is in fancy dress.

Marketing means leaps. Imagine you are looking at a ‘need-state’ analysis (from one of those outside ‘experts’) and it shows that, for the product innovation you have spent months developing, there is no need. Yet you have this hunch, this irresistible intuition, that consumers, when presented with the new product, will suddenly find their own need. Now the stakes are high. Do you have the bottle to press forward? Because from here, there are only two choices: take that leap of faith – or don’t. (See panel for some who have.)

If young marketers are less cautious than those with a few miles on the clock, it’s not hard to see why. Sticking your neck out when school fees and the mortgage are at stake is harder than when it’s just you and the rent.

And there are other ways that courage can become blunted over the years: by being ground down once too often, or, conversely, by winning great accolades, and then getting into a groove of repeating the techniques that earned them, rather than seeing each new challenge in its own right.

Talent, though, is forever. It may lie dormant, it may be suppressed by an excess of caution, but it is always there. What the intake of fresh-faced, energized young marketers brings to the team isn’t any special skill or ‘native’ understanding that the mature marketers lack. What they bring is daring, chutzpah and fearlessness. And the very best managers will ensure that at least a little of that rubs off.

ARTICLE BY JEROME ADZAHA