5 Signs that Your Tech Company Needs to Do Something about Marketing

More wisdom from my HBR marketing mentor-5 signs that your organization’s marketing needs some work:

1. Declining sales. No need to elaborate here.

2. Sales are flat and your company needs a growth strategy. Sometimes that means you need to add to your marketing team. Sometimes it means your marketing team needs to work more closely with sales. No organization can really grow without support from marketing. Why? Because effective marketing projects your company as a winner, no matter what the reality. Everyone would rather do business with a winner.

3. Sales pass through high and low seasons that need to be leveled. This requires a strategy adjustment, but marketing can’t do this alone.

4. Sales are OK, but margins are too low. This is a rut that some companies find themselves in for a LONG time because it can mean abandoning the bread and butter and going after more lucrative segments. It’s a risk all vital companies must take at least once, but marketing can reduce the fear factor.

5. The profits from certain products, customer segments, or distribution channels are too low. Once marketers know the organization well, they will be able to suggest new products, or tweaks to existing products that are likely to do well in the marketplace. Most people don’t think of this as a function of marketing, but many marketers are actually excellent product developers.