Blog Author Mellissah Smith - Page 50

I've been away now for one week and am completely relaxed and recharged with a half decent tan courtesy of being in the mediterranean. Travelling has always been something that I have loved to do. I travel constantly for work and also for pleasure, usually mixing the two together. To travel is a luxury and a privilege. For the first time in a long while, I am seeing just how amazing my life has been because I have been able to travel and experience so many different cultures and environments, that broaden my perspective on life and how I view the world. 

It's been a mammoth month in so many ways. End of financial year in Australia is always draining. As a marketer, there is no fun in fulfilling your obligations as a business owner for the taxation department.

Unlike many other professional services firms, I cared less about how many billable hours my employees were doing until the fatal day that it was brought to my attention by my internal accountant that some people were "performing" not as good as others and the gap was highly significant.

It is harder to work in a professional services firm than in corporate. Knowing that you have to do a certain number of billable hours is a lot of pressure until you actually stop thinking about it.

Marketing campaigns fail for a variety of different reasons, but don't let not following up be one of them. 

Everyone has been there. You know, when you look in the mirror and wonder to yourself 'why you haven't achieved what you set out to achieve' and then give yourself an 'upper cut'. For those who don't know what that means, it's very Australian!

You control our own destiny and deep down, every person, even the one's that blame others for their 'lot in life', know that if you are not achieving something, then it's no-one's fault but your own.

They are harsh words. You may say that you wanted to be rich, but were never given the opportunity but we have heard lots of stories of people growing up dirt poor who become squillionaires or elite sportspeople - so that alone is no excuse.

We all want something. Many of use strive to achieve it and put the right actions in place to make it happen. When failure crosses our path, we get back up and dust ourselves off, then try again, perhaps in a different way. We don't let failure stop us. 

A few days ago in Melbourne I did a speech in front of a group of hugely inspiring business women on how I built Marketing Eye to be in the position we are in today.

In writing that speech, I realised something very important. Our success didn't really have much to do with what we were selling, as ultimately in that market, we have a lot of competitors.

What made us so successful, and ensured that our phones ring non-stop with inquiries is social media.

If you don't believe that being average is an option, then as a buddying high flying marketing executive there are a few tips that may take you to the next level and help get you noticed in the market.

High performing marketing executives have a couple of key traits that are imperative to their success.

1. Dream big: Marketing Executives that stand out from the crowd often have big dreams that they want to fulfill. These dreams are documented in diaries, post-it notes, and importantly deeply entrenched in their mindset. Big dreams leads to big achievements. 

As a marketing consultancy firm, we have experienced a variety of different marketing managers; the obsessive compulsive, the sales-orientated, the technology geek, the fly by the seat of their pants kind, and the one's that really only know one or two things and have to wing it the rest of the way.

Marketing managers today have no excuse. Everything you need to know is online and available just by surfing the net. If you want to know how to write a strategy, it's there. If you want to know how to write a press release, it's there. If you need to know how to put together a social media calendar, it's there.

The sales manager is arguably one of the most important people in any office. Often when you are a smaller business, the entrepreneur or CEO doubles as a sales manager, and this can get a company so far, but not all the way.

Over the past 16 years, I have worked with more than 300 companies, and over that time there have been a number of things that I have learned simply by listening and observing.