The compass has to be one of the most ingenious inventions of all time. Around 1,000 A.D., the ancient Chinese made a very key discovery. They found that if you took a small piece of iron and rubbed it against a load stone, it would become magnetized. Furthermore, if you put the iron on top of a buoyant material and floated it in water, it would point north and south. This revolutionized traveling by boat. Prior to this, captains of ships were limited to navigating near land so they could guide their ships by landmarks. The discovery of the north and south poles upon a magnetized piece of metal meant that boats could now set a course from one point on the map to the other, greatly reducing the time it took to move goods to market and people from one location to the other. It also meant that you could sail at night during cloud cover. You did not need the stars to know which way you were going. All you needed was a compass.

The compass is still the mainstay of travel today. If you have flown on a plane, a compass guided your pilot to your landing destination. If you use a GPS system in your car, a compass is used to determine the orientation of your vehicle so that the correct directions can be given to you.

Marketing is crucial to your business success. Marketing helps you define what you are selling, to whom you are selling it, and what you have to do to make a sale to stay afloat as a business. Without marketing, you will have a hard time selling anything. Just like sailing on the ancient seas, marketing can be tried with and without a compass. What does a marketing compass look like? It is a strategic plan that gives you guidance regardless of the situation you find yourself in at the time. I have met with clients in many different businesses over time. Those that have a strategic plan are aiming for a goal and know how they want to get there. Their marketing compass tells them when they are heading in the right direction and when they are getting off course. Those without a strategic plan are left to the whims of the decision makers in the company. They may be jumping at every new trend that comes down the pike. They may be doing nothing and expecting sales to just walk in their front door. In other words, they are directionless. Whenever they have problems with revenue, the business without a compass will try to guess at the problem. When you have a marketing compass, you see the problems before you find yourself in the midst of them.

The funny thing about the discovery of the compass is the world did not change. What I mean by that is this: before someone invented the compass, there were north and south poles. Magnetism was nothing new. Everything was in place for finding ones direction, it just took someone to harness the resources of nature and the world of travel was revolutionized. The needs of people have changed very little since the beginning of time. We all have basic needs and a bevy of things we want. In marketing, we are dealing with the same emotions that drive people to buy from us. That has not changed. However, methods and delivery have changed drastically. There are subtleties from one generation to the next. What is in vogue goes in and out of style. A good marketing compass will help you manage all of this.

Our economy has flat-lined over the past several years. But signs look positive that we are coming out of the dismal past and business is getting ready to move again. The stock market is up. Consumer confidence is up. Businesses are getting revved up to sail into better days. A word to the wise: put together a marketing plan now. Otherwise, you will be sailing towards nowhere in particular – lost without a compass.