{"id":198,"date":"2009-12-12T07:02:45","date_gmt":"2009-12-12T13:02:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.shaydigital.com\/?p=198"},"modified":"2016-09-22T11:15:19","modified_gmt":"2016-09-22T17:15:19","slug":"looking-backward-and-forward","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.shaydigital.com\/index.php\/insights\/looking-backward-and-forward\/","title":{"rendered":"Looking Backward and Forward"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_236\" style=\"width: 160px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.freedigitalphotos.net\/images\/view_photog.php?photogid=809\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-236\" class=\"size-full wp-image-236 \" title=\"2010\" src=\"http:\/\/www.shaydigital.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2010\/01\/2010.jpg\" alt=\"Image: Francesco Marino\" width=\"150\" height=\"100\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-236\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Image: Francesco Marino<\/p><\/div>\n<p>As we approach the end of the year and the close the of decade, a number of people and organizations are rolling-out retrospectives on 2009 and the last ten years. If you didn&#8217;t do it as part of your budget process (you definitely should have), now is a great time to conduct your own online marketing program &#8216;year in review&#8217; by looking at what worked and what didn&#8217;t. \u00c2\u00a0Remember, you &#8216;pull yourself out of trees&#8217; so you can see the forest. \u00c2\u00a0In other words, don&#8217;t just look at numbers but really give some thought about why some activities worked and why some didn&#8217;t.<\/p>\n<p>In looking forward to 2010, consider questions such as the following:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Have your business objectives changed?<\/li>\n<li>Have your customers changed &#8211; what they want, how they shop, who influences them, what they prioritize, etc.?<\/li>\n<li>What critical factors are influencing your business?\u00c2\u00a0 For example, the economy, social media, mobile, changing values, etc.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>In answering those questions, make sure you talk to other departments &#8211; sales, customer service, product development, etc, looking at what your competitors are doing and looking at innovators outside of your industry.\u00c2\u00a0 Also, don&#8217;t forget to challenge current assumptions and policies. \u00c2\u00a0It never fails to amaze me when I ask why something is done, how many people answer, &#8216;I don&#8217;t know.\u00c2\u00a0 We have always done it that way&#8217;.<\/p>\n<p>Ultimately, every initiative you undertake and ever dollar\u00c2\u00a0you spend should be justifiable and\u00c2\u00a0correlate directly to a business and marketing objective.\u00c2\u00a0 You should be able to explain why\u00c2\u00a0you are focusing on one tactic versus another (i.e. alignment with business goals and expected return compared to alternatives).\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 If you can do that, your chances of having a successful 2010 are greatly improved.\u00c2\u00a0 If you can&#8217;t, don&#8217;t worry &#8211; \u00c2\u00a0it&#8217;s not too late.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As we approach the end of the year and the close the of decade, a number of people and organizations are rolling-out retrospectives on 2009 and the last ten years. If you didn&#8217;t do it as part of your budget process (you definitely should have), now is a great time to conduct your own online [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-198","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-online-strategy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shaydigital.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/198","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shaydigital.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shaydigital.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shaydigital.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shaydigital.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=198"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.shaydigital.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/198\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shaydigital.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=198"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shaydigital.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=198"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shaydigital.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=198"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}