3 productivity ideas for busy marketers

Lyndon Evershed
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Lyndon Evershed
Posted
29 May 2017
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It’s all hands on deck for marketers as the all important final quarter of the year is fast approaching.

Marketers are busy completing their summer projects, trying to achieve their KPIs, preparing annual marketing budgets and putting the finishing touches on their Christmas promotions.

If you need to step up your time management skills, this blog is for you.

Here we share 3 productivity hacks that will allow you to focus on the projects that will deliver most value to your business and, even better, further your career prospects by doing so.

Keep abreast of industry trends more easily

Marketing is evolving at the speed of light. Industry updates are published 24/7 and it is sometimes overwhelming trying to keep up with all the news.

As an ambitious marketer, you will need to understand what opportunities new trends and innovations represent for your marketing strategy. So how can you speed up your ‘research homework’?

  • Receive all the important news directly to your inbox by signing up to newsletters and joining professional trade bodies. Set aside time every day to actually read these emails.
  • Use the commuting downtime to listen to marketing podcasts.
  • Many marketers love Twitter for catching up with news. Why not set up Twitter lists with relevant industry influencers and your favourite marketing publications? This will allow you to quickly access the most up to date information.
  • Here are 5 Twitter accounts you should follow for marketing news: @DMA_UK @CampaignMag @BrandQuarterly @CIM_Exchange @MarketingWeekEd
  • Get out of the office and attend industry events as they will bring together all the key players, most interesting experts and vendors all under one roof

Supercharge your collaboration and planning skills with Trello

This handy productivity app allows you to schedule your workload better. Users can create project boards, produce interactive delivery plans and assign individual tasks to colleagues and their external agencies, making collaboration seamless.

Trello is ideally suited for managing a marketing campaigns or events schedule. Our favourite tools include handy checklists, calendar features and email notifications.

You can choose between a free or premium version, but even the free version will help you to better oversee your workflow and monitor progress.

Review what tasks you can outsource to save you time

It’s easy to do things the way they have always been done.

After all, we sometimes feel resistant to change as it takes longer to introduce new ways of doing things or new systems. Key questions to ask are: do you have the relevant expertise in-house to manage a project? Do you need to keep the learning in-house?

We believe it pays to review this at regular intervals and to identify which activities are better delivered in-house or outsourced.

Feedback from leading brands we work with, including Jägermeister, McDonald’s, Investec and Kia, has shown that it pays to outsource the management of branded merchandise, for example.

By doing this, marketers save time when it comes to managing stock levels, storage and arranging deliveries for key events. And when you work with the right supplier you can also cut the time it takes to pinpoint just the best merchandise product for your brand.

Start now to save time

Are you ready to make more time for the marketing projects that will create most value for your business and your career? Get in touch if you want to explore how we can save you time with your next merchandise project.

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