Not every company needs help with their strategic marketing. Your company may have certain characteristics that simply require an occasional “sprinkling” of inspiration or best practices sharing to cultivate winning strategies.

But some companies need more assistance than that.  For example, many B2Bs fill marketing and product management roles with technical experts or ex-sales personnel.  You can’t simply point to the latest B2C marketing trend and expect these “accidental marketers” to translate a case study into a powerful plan.

Here are the 5 most important questions to ask yourself  in determining whether you would benefit from bringing in a third-party firm to improve the output of your strategic marketing plans.

Factor #1:  Is your company frequently surprised by the under-performance of products or services that you believe should win in your markets?

Factor #2:  Is there a wide disparity in the skills and performance of different marketers on your team?

Factor #3:  Do your less-experienced marketers have to “connect the dots” of their marketing education on their own?

Factor #4:  Is your business threatened by new types of competitors and new types of business models?

Factor #5:  Does your company culture or executives support you getting the perspective of outside consultants?

If you answered “yes” to 3 or more of the following questions, you should consider getting outside counsel. Keep reading for a deeper understanding of opportunities related to each factor.

Factor #1:  Is your company frequently surprised by the under-performance of products or services that you believe should win in your markets?

If you answered “yes” to Factor #1, your company likely has a blind-spot or bias towards your own products that your marketers, cross-functional teams and/or your product development processes aren’t uncovering.  Believing in your own products isn’t a bad thing.  You especially want your sales team to passionately champion your offers.

But marketers need to be able to help the organization take the often-cold shower of reality during product development and planning periods, so the organization can create market-driven value propositions.   If this isn’t happening, an outside firm can provide the proper perspective AND teach your marketers how to have a more realistic perspective.

Factor #2:  Is there a wide disparity in the skills and performance of different marketers on your team?

Most firms have a range of talent in all functional areas.  The key to success is to make the poor performers good and the good performers great.  In other words, move everyone up at least one level.

You’d also like to leverage your already-great marketers in the process by having them teach others how to do what they do.  The problem is that the best performers aren’t often great coaches.  Their innate skills are hard to translate.

If this sounds like your company, a third-party strategic marketing coach could help.  It’s the job of these outside consultants to study “what good looks like” — and this includes the skills that define greatness in marketing.  

The third-party can provide a framework for upskilling those who need it. They can also help your top performers develop a language and tools that explain what they are doing well so they can better help others in the future.

Factor #3:  Do your less-experienced marketers have to “connect the dots” of their marketing education on their own?

Because of the complexity of most B2B products, more and more companies are opting to hire technically trained personnel to fill marketing roles.  If this is the case in your organization, how are these people learning how to be better marketers?

There are a lot of marketing learning resources available today; but even if all of your inexperienced marketers are seeing to their own professional education, it’s hard to reap the benefits and develop a common language and approach.  Instead of marketers “doing their own thing”, the best B2Bs have a defined marketing process — just like they do for their accounting, legal, manufacturing and sales processes.

If your marketing leadership and L&D team can put together such a process, you don’t need outside help.   But many companies find they need assistance building a robust, relevant and practical approach.

Factor #4:  Is your business threatened by new types of competitors and new types of business models?

Are new competitors trying to hijack the most profitable parts of your value proposition?  Or are competitors offering customers different ways to pay for products and services that lower risk and provide easy transitions to new technologies?  

Any outside strategic marketing firm worth working with is studying and cataloguing these strategies and approaches — from inside AND outside your industry.  They can provide you with a broad view of the emerging landscape.  

Some of these innovative strategies should be considered and discarded.  But others would be worth their weight in gold to your firm.  

If you have personnel charged with monitoring happenings outside your industry, it’s even better than working with a third party.  These internal analysts know your industry and also have an external perspective.  But most firms don’t have this luxury and need an outside strategic marketing company to provide a wider view.      

Factor #5:  Does your company culture or executives support you getting the perspective of outside consultants?

This can be a tough one to overcome.  Some companies want their marketing personnel to do all of the above internally.

If this is the case at your firm, then all of the other factors may not matter.  But if you fall into  the category of “maybe” on this factor, perhaps the reasoning below any factor that you answered “yes” to above can help you make the case for outside help.

If your company has an experienced team of marketers and is big enough to have internal marketing development and trend-watching teams, you may not ever need outside strategic marketing assistance.   Your company’s investment in these resources should be honored and leveraged.

But if you answered “yes” to 3 or more of the factors above  — or have a significant deficit in one of them  — third-party strategic marketing help can be just what you need to raise marketers’ performance, stay ahead of trends, and beat new/emerging competitors.  Contact us (link) and we’ll help you figure out how to rapidly improve your marketers skills and confidence in a way that is tailored to your company’s unique industry and circumstances.