Overcoming Short-term Thinking in the Digital Industry
Business

Overcoming Short-term Thinking in the Digital Industry

9th November 2012

My single biggest gripe I have about the digital marketing industry is the pervasiveness of short-term thinking in clients.

Too many corporate leaders seem to think that digital marketing has a magic bullet, a secret button that can be pressed and voilà  tens of thousands of website visitors come rolling out eager to give their hard-earned money to the company.

Of course we know that it’s a ludicrous idea. This stuff is hard. It takes time and effort and patience.

I can understand where the ‘quick fix’ mentality comes from, though. Because there actually is one digital marketing channel that delivers instantaneous and measurable results. That channel is, of course, Pay Per Click advertising.

PPC advertising advertising provides immediate results. You spend money and visitors arrive. Its basic principles are very straightforward and easy to understand for business leaders. And because it provides that instant gratification, it’s addictive.

Which is why I find myself having to justify small monthly SEO retainers to a client who already spends ten times as much every month on Google AdWords. Almost every single time it’ll be this conversation: “Why aren’t we getting more traffic from SEO?” “Because it takes time, and this is just the third month of our one-year retainer.” “But I’m already getting thousands of hits from AdWords.”

It’s painful and it’s frustrating and I can’t seem to find a way around them. Every time before we engage a client on SEO, we make it abundantly clear that this is a long-term effort and that the results will materialise towards the latter half of the one-year retainer.

And almost every time after a few months – even if the graphs are already pointing upwards – the client starts complaining about a lack of significant results. Even if they don’t invest in PPC, there is an entirely unrealistic expectation of immediate results.

In those rare cases when a client does show a commitment to long term results, inevitably we manage to meet and exceed expectations. Unfortunately those types of clients are few and far between.

I suspect this is a pretty pervasive phenomenon – there are companies across the world that are inflicted by short-term thinking.

It’s hard to fault business leaders, because our governments are packed with politicians suffering from the same narrow focus. For example, yesterday’s announcement of a £200m investment in Northern Ireland’s economy was probably greeted with cheers from many local business leaders.

I wasn’t cheering though, because that £200m will go almost entirely to farming, industry, and construction. This despite the fact that the vast bulk of Northern Ireland’s recent economic development originates from the digital sector.

Ironically some of this investment will go towards science & technology education. So we’ll have more IT graduates, but I suspect there’ll be no jobs for them as the government doesn’t deem that sector worthy of further investment.

Build conference
Build conference

The digital sector in Northern Ireland has such tremendous potential. There are great educational programmes in place that churn out high quality graduates (the University of Ulster especially leads the way there) and there’s a boom in digital companies – both among established agencies and fresh startups – that are doing amazing work.

We also have some superb technology events here in Northern Ireland, from the world-class Build conference to the CultureTech festival and many more.

There’s a genuine buzz about the place when it comes to the digital industry, but at the same time it’s a hard struggle to drag the country’s established businesses and entrenched politicians kicking & screaming in to the 21st century.

I suppose it’s a fight that every modern industry wages. The moment you have to stop convincing people is the moment you’ve reached your peak.

[Featured image Future And Vision Signs source]

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Barry Adams is the chief editor of State of Digital and is an award-winning SEO consultant delivering specialised SEO services to clients worldwide.
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