| By Christine Fife |
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| July 18, 2009 02:45 PM EDT |
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1,111 |
Seth Godin recently posted a blog titled Mowing the Lawn in which he talked about hating mowing the lawn as a kid with a broken down old mower. He goes on to advise:
“Every person who does marketing, sales, product design or any other job that influences customers directly should spend at least an hour a week answering the customer service lines, using the same tools your customer service people use.”
Well said, Seth! I want to go a step further and challenge marketing and sales professionals to eat their own marketing dog food. Every time you and your company make a decision to post ads, email prospects/customers, send newsletters, cold call, email unsolicited sales pitches, flat out spam people, troll for leads in special intrest groups or forums, create self-serving noise in social media outlets, post ad-style comments on blog posts, etc., etc., etc. first think of all the conversation Locations you use personally (blogs you read, sites you visit, mags you buy, Twitter hashtags you watch, forums you go to, etc.) and consider how you would like it if a company did those “marketing” things to you.
As I drove off to college I never would have guessed I would end up here! But it’s been a fantastic journey. My career has been richly diverse giving me an advantage over marketers who are siloed into niche positions. I strive to be a true Renaissance person—I love to learn about everything and trying new things comes naturally. My career has been no different; I’ve successfully launched enterprise software and medical device development startups, improved communications processes for the regulatory department of a major financial exchange, increased client business and product development for several international exchange program companies and founded an international educational non-profit organization.
My master’s degree in Integrated Marketing from Golden Gate University gave me a broad understanding of traditional marketing best-practices, but my BA in theater gave me the skills to understand how people communicate with one another and the importance of promoting a brand in a voice that is right for the audience.
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