The Marketing Decathlon

With the 2012 Olympic Games underway in London, I am eagerly looking forward to the track & field competition. I am especially anticipating the decathlon, the ten-event, two-day competition to determine “the world’s greatest athlete.”  I competed in the decathlon in my younger (and faster) days, so I understand the focus, talent and dedication each decathlete must have to succeed.

Because the decathlon is scored on points based on an athlete’s performance, you can actually win the overall event without winning a single one of the ten component events. To succeed you don’t have to be the very best at any one thing, but you need to be very good at all things in order to accumulate the maximum number of points.

The same can be said for marketing. There are so many channels of communications available today that a marketing professional must become proficient in a wide variety of “events.” You don’t need to be the world’s greatest writer, or graphic designer, or publicist. But you must be very good at these tasks and more.

Here is my list if events in the “marketing decathlon”:

1.     Strategic Marketing Planning

2.     Website Development

3.     Social Media

4.     Advertising – traditional and electronic

5.     E-mail Marketing

6.     Direct Marketing

7.     Public Relations

8.     Blogging

9.     Event Marketing

10.  Graphic Design

These individual “events” are all important components of a well-balanced marketing program. A marketer may be called on to perform in any or all of these disciplines for a client, and often must tackle the full range in the course of a single day!

Does your company’s marketing plan incorporate all ten marketing decathlon events? If not, identify the holes in the program and work to create a plan that is complete so that you can compete for the gold.