Hello.
Excuse me if I’m a bit dazed and confused this morning.
Last week I hit my head against that familiar brick wall – managing a client’s expectations about what marketing on a budget can achieve.
It’s an oft-told story; small organisation, funded by grants, fundraising and the generosity of its patrons, can’t afford to invest in full-time marketing and communications but needs and often expects………………full time marketing communications.
Well, wouldn’t you?
It’s frustrating when you’re a senior manager who wants the best for your organisation when you only have marketing support one day a week.
You want a clear strategy with targets and performance indicators, you want everything to be integrated and on-message, and you want LOADS of publicity.
But you end up with an endless game of catch up, a serious lack of continuity, and suppliers and contacts who get frustrated with trying to remember that they can only brief or be briefed on a Tuesday.
The rest of the organisation has to ‘make do’ when the marketer isn’t in the office and put together their own materials, develop their own contacts and forget to tell the part time person they’ve done it.
The marketer finds it equally frustrating.
You’re only there one day a week and there are ongoing tasks to perform (especially if, like me, you’re employed as press and communications officer), calls to take and follow up from last week to be done. You find yourself doing the more important things in between because it can’t all be done in a day – and then you have to explain why you didn’t get that extra coverage or support senior managers in dealing with journalists.
Not a happy situation for anyone – but there is a solution. It just needs a bit of thought.
Use my support guidelines to choose the right support for you.
Now, I’m going off to wipe the blood from my forehead.
About Philippa