How often during your career have you heard such comments as “we have to move with the times” or “we need to look forward?” The challenge as one gets older though, is that you get tired of the changes and having perhaps “seen it all before” – Stop the World, I want to get off!
Ok, so you have the experience to take a breath before (for want of a better analogy) you throw the baby out with the bath water. In marketing though you have to keep in touch or ideally be ahead of the times to keep your business vital and profitable of course.
Moving with the times
Keeping ahead of the times though can be somewhat of a gamble and ok, tiresome. True, there are stories of fantastic successes and perhaps none of them faster moving than on the Internet.
Topically, I recall the many articles I have read about the struggling print industry trying to sell their wares on the Web, world famous names like the Times, Financial Times and others have had to make very considered judgements about selling their news online or indeed giving it away and trying to create revenue another way – difficult would be an insulting and desperate understatement I think.
For me, sometimes I’m just tired and I want to get off, although with this in mind, I read with interest the stunning success of Deborah Joseph, the editor of Condé Nast Traveller, my very favourite travel magazine, which to my hubby’s bemusement I spend many a day drooling over… but I digress – the point is that Ms Joseph has bucked the print sectors trend with sales over the first six months of 2012 being up by (what in this sector is a staggering) 17% – so how did she do it?
Well I guess moving with the times! Plus a deep understanding and grasp of her readership (read “customers”). Ms Joseph tells how she related to her readers who wanted to dream and those who had children didn’t want to be reminded of being a parent by seeing holidays for children – so out went any mention of kids! Furthermore she added the odd raunchy story, news (to guarantee each issue was different) and to finish (well ok, that’s a huge over simplification for this fab magazine) a range of perhaps better known and higher profile stars on the front cover.
So the point of my latest blog post? You have to be bold and move with the times…although sometimes it’s a real pain and I just want to shout out “Stop…I want to get off!”
