Long-term Marketing - Not a Quick Fix..

Found an interesting perspective on what should marketers looking for a long-term marketing career invest in, to ensure that their businesses are sustainable and successful.

John Jantsch, author of Duct Tape Marketing, recommends 3 imperatives for Long-term marketing - the 3 essential marketing practices required for producing results - the 3 Cs: Content, Connection and Community.

• Content - self-growth and increasing self-worth and market credibility. This could be done through blogs, white papers, workshops, articles, etc.
• Connection - personal relationships need to be reinforced to be leveraged subsequently - through co-creating experiences with them, by way of stories, training and other brand elements
• Community - a social network, that moves beyond personal relationships and penetrates into the local communities, and social circles. This can be done by way of investing time & money in social projects, get-togethers planned with clients, initiating and maintaining forums, creating opportunities for continuous engagement with the communities, referral networks, etc.

To summarize, one needs to invest into enhancing self-worth, building personal relationships and get involved with the community, to ensure payoffs in the long run. Quick fixes tend to work for self-claimed marketers holding on to a short-term orientation.

Thanks to John Caddell's post on Strategic Marketing, who also gives an insight into his own experiences and learning from this perspective.