Question #1: Old-time Thinking of Print vs. Online

Stephanie writes:

Hi You hit it right on: Must Unlearn what you Learned. My struggle is old time thinking. 'How come we aren't in print magazine and our competitor is.' How do you convience old time thinking of Print versus Online?

It's important to reframe the question differently:  Are we where our customers are?   You'll often have competitors who are in marketing channels that are irrelevant or distracting to you.   Do you follow them, or do you find where your prospects are gathering today.  The other thing is that this isn't an either/or situation.  We're too early in the game to say that "x is dead," where x is anything that marketing was doing more than 10 years ago.   Consider adding new media to your existing tactics and dial back the old ones slowly.  And make sure you have a solid set of metrics in place so you can assess your results more objectively.

Comments

[David Meerman Scott]

You're fighting change. Ask those who like the old stuff "How do you find answers to problems and research questions?" Everyone answers that they use Google and other search engines. So why do you need to do so much print advertising if everyone is online?

If you get severe pushback, quit your job and find a company that values your skills.

[lrmtrainer]

great points. I totally agree that you have to target your customers, wherever they are.