What outcome are you trying to achieve with your marketing? Are you trying to create more leads or are you trying to raise awareness? If you have done any online advertising, these are typical questions when setting goals for a campaign. However, there should always be one ultimate outcome for any marketing – to win the sale. Too often, this has become the forgotten goal of marketing. The reason it is often forgotten has to do with shortsighted marketing and fear. Shortsightedness because it is easier to get a lot of people to browse to a website, but much harder to get them to make a purchase; and fear, because marketers don’t want to admit what they are doing is falling short of reaching that ultimate goal.

The truth of the matter is to take a potential customer through a series of marketing steps requires a careful plan and stellar execution to make it work. Taking the steps to get there means that you need a strategy that breaks marketing into bite-sized pieces you can implement and then measure. We take potential customers through steps that first makes them aware of your brand, transitions them to being made an offer to try the brand, and then makes sure their experience with the brand is compelling enough for them to buy it again. Completing one step does not mean you have reached the goal, it just means you have completed one task and moved the customer closer to a sale. So I would tell you it is important to map out just what you are trying to accomplish with each step and then verify that you are getting the desired results. For instance, getting people to see your logo does not make them want to buy from you, it helps them remember you. That belongs in the awareness part of a marketing plan. Getting people to your website does not equate to sales, but it is a step because they are seeking out information on your brand. That also belongs to the awareness part of your marketing efforts. Getting them to click on your contact form is a transition step towards a sale. Getting them to actually use the contact form to get in touch with you is another step.

Market with the end in mind. Build each step in your marketing plan to move your customers to the next step. Keep an eye on measurement tools, such as analytics, to make sure you are getting the desired outcome with each step. Don’t fool yourself into believing that getting good results in one step has accomplished all there is to do in marketing until you have reached a sale, have created a satisfied customer who will buy from you again. It is at that point that you have reached the ultimate goal in marketing.