Many people don’t fully understand the importance of planning ahead. They progress through a series of steps in a sequential manner and when all the steps are done, the project is done. Often, they realize at some point along the way that there isn’t enough time to get it done. Then they either miss the original deadline, throw money at the problem, or cut corners and compromise quality to deliver on time.

Some deadlines like the start of the tradeshow or the date when a publisher prints and mails a trade magazine are beyond our control. These deadlines cannot be extended. So, our only choices are to cut corners or throw money at the problem. The first corners cut are typically those that assure the highest quality work, like additional proofreading and fact-checking. Throwing money at the problem can involve getting additional resources involved and paying exorbitant rush charges for shipping, printing, and so on.

Careful and responsible project management can help marketers achieve a high-quality result while meeting deadlines and budget requirements. A simple system of timing requirements, communicated to everyone involved, makes a world of difference. Having a good grasp on this gives project managers control over the process and a high confidence level in the results.

The first step in managing a project responsibly is to list all the steps involved. Think the project through from the end result. If the end result is 25,000 printed brochures in the literature fulfillment center ready to be shipped, then start with that and work backwards. The brochures need to be shipped from the printer to the fulfillment center. Before that they are printed. Before that, they are approved to print after being reviewed by those with the authority to approve the final. These final steps happen after stakeholders review the second draft, first draft, etc. And ultimately it all starts with someone kicking off the project in some form: calling the agency in for a meeting, preparing a strategy brief, or having some other type of initiation activity. You can get as granular or broad as you’re comfortable with and add as much detail as needed to manage the project and the project team towards a high-quality result.

Try to keep the time frame of reference consistent through the steps. That is, if you have an end date for “review first draft” that naturally includes providing comments on that draft. You don’t need to list a step for “provide comments.” If you think this level of instruction will be helpful to your team, combine that step into “Review first draft and provide comments.”

Once you have all the steps lined up, apply your best guess to how long each takes. Later, you’ll be able to adjust for actual practice as you track and analyze the results from individual projects. Build in a reasonable amount of time for each step, keeping in mind that people are unavailable sometimes and everyone is always busy. Once you have all the steps and the time it takes for each, add it up and you have the time it will take to complete that project, or that type of project.

If you typically rely on your experience in managing projects to estimate project timing requirements, you might find your estimates or rules of thumb need to be adjusted to allow more time. You might discover through this process that you need more time to do a good job.

Also, keep it as simple as possible. Have a few “generic templates” that all follow some standard project workflow or sequence. Then apply the templates to a wide variety of projects as needed. This helps when communicating the system to your stakeholders. If you can simplify it to just one or a few generic workflow tools and use them each time, it would be even better. Add or remove steps if you find the planning documents to be too complicated or too simple for your project team.

How does this system help in practicing marketing and marketing communications on a daily basis?

Many project stakeholders don’t believe the time involved in completing a marketing project the right way. Why should they? They don’t live it day to day. They have other things on their minds. They may think the timing requirements are overestimated and that extra time is built-in to make the project manager’s jobs easier. They push or ignore timelines and deadlines and don’t take them seriously.

In this case it helps to explain each step involved, what’s going to be done, and when. If your timeline for the development of a new ad is going to take 10 weeks, and you now only have 7 weeks, you can go through the individual steps with your team and adjust.  For example, you may need a faster turn-around of draft reviews, or you might need to reduce the number of reviewers.

Keep production windows and required start dates in front of everyone and top-of-mind. Make sure they know the timing requirements for each type of project. Remind them frequently in a way that keeps everyone thinking far enough out into the future. For example, if you know a new product introduction is on the horizon, but a launch date has not been identified, make sure they know how long it will take to prepare. If it’s June, and you require two months to prepare for a launch, make sure they don’t expect a July product launch.

The written agreement also gives you a tool to manage stakeholders. When your team is considering a new project and they want you to identify the date you can have it done, you have a useful tool to quickly give them an answer that you can back up.

Use the system to track projects. List the timing and dates and then monitor progress. Mark down the planned dates and the dates it actually happened. You can use it later to evaluate the project. (You might need to explain why the original deadline was missed). You can also evaluate a number of projects and adjust your system accordingly once you have some data. If you have the tracking dates from a number of projects, and they all show that it took consistently 10 business days to review the first draft, you’ll have more credibility when you build 10 business days for first draft review into the schedule.

The name of the game is having a clear grasp on exactly what it takes, and how long it takes, to complete a project. Then, you can better manage your team towards a good quality result.

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Social Media extends your marketing reach beyond your website and other marketing activities. When you maintain an active presence on Social Media, you reach people that may otherwise had never found your company online, visited your tradeshow booth, or seen your advertisement in the trade publication.

The social media sites you use for marketing your business should be based on what type of business you’re in.  For example, a Business-to-Business company like and engineering firm will see better results on LinkedIn than if they use more consumer-oriented sites like Facebook. A consumer product or service may have better success on Facebook.

The use of photos and video in your social media posts helps your posts stand out from the rest.

It’s also very important to consistently update your social media pages. Many companies try it for a short while and then stop posting updates which look like they have nothing new going on, or worse- that they’ve gone out of business.  Don’t do this. It can negatively impact your brand image. If you start a social media page for your business, commit to it and keep it updated. A simple tracking form can help keep track of how often updates are posted on each site and remind you to create posts before too much time has passed.

If you need any assistance establishing or maintaining social media marketing for your business, Let’s Talk

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