Marketing Study Results
Last month, I blogged about the CMO Survey that demonstrated how few companies are able to prove the impact of their social media activities quantitatively. And, that social media contributes little to company performance. So, now what?
The Leapfrog Marketing Institute’s 2016 Planning Report adds more fuel to the fire. The report focuses on how marketing executives are evolving their strategic and financial plans to become more consumer-centric. Yet, its findings show that marketing budgets seem to be less accountable to companies’ ROI this year over last. Huh?
Dave Reibstein, Professor of Marketing at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business has a hypothesis on why this is happening. Continue reading
It seems that marketers are spending big on social media (SM) marketing without the results to show for it! So says the biannual CMO Survey by Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business, the American Marketing Association, and Deloitte.
As a percentage of marketing budgets, B2C and B2B companies plan to increase their spend on SM from 10.6% now to 13.2% in the next 12 months, and up to 20.9% in the next five years. This would be good news if other factors were in place. But, they’re not!
For example, most survey respondents aren’t doing a great job at integrating SM marketing with their overall marketing strategies. Say what? Continue reading
Although 45% of small businesses say that increasing profit is their biggest challenge, and 43% say it’s growing revenue, many are missing important marketing opportunities that can help them reach these objectives.
The 2016 State of Small Business Report from Wasp Barcode Technologies, demonstrates where these opportunities lie.
Marketing Investments
Starting with marketing investments, the majority of small businesses (SB) invest less than 7% of their annual revenue in marketing.
- 5% said they’re not sure about their marketing investments (Yikes!)
- 9% don’t invest in marketing at all!
- 25% invest 1-3%
- 29% invest 4-6%
Whether you run a small business or a multi-million dollar corporation, marketing is essential to your profitability and growth. Yet many small businesses don’t allocate enough money to marketing or, worse, spend it haphazardly.” Caron Beesley, US Small Business Administration (USBA) blog
