Working hard on your marketing and nothing seems to be working? You feel like you're trying everything possible.

Yet – instead of seeing the numbers, you end up burnt out and feeling not very smart

If that's the case, maybe it's time to revisit SMART goals and restart your marketing.

Let's get started.

In this Marketing Mondays issue:

  • Smart or stupid?
  • Marketing is trying many things.
  • 5 lessons from a restauranteur.

SMART or stupid?

In 1982, a consultant by the name George T.Doran published a paper titled, "The's a S.M.A.R.T way to Write Managements's Goals and Objectives"

42 years later, today – everyone seems to "just accept it", applying SMART goals to everything.

But George, the guy himself has mentioned that the acronym doesn't mean every objective will have all five criteria.

For example: Is your relationship with your spouse, measurable? Do you count how many dates you go on? Well, good luck trying to SMART goal your relationships.

Not everything worth achieving is measurable. But MANY things in marketing are measurable – and should be.

Let's break SMART goals down.

  • Specific: Create well-defined goals. Don't say you want to be rich. Say you want to make a certain amount of money.
  • Measurable: If you can't measure your goal, you can't improve it.
  • Actionable: Develop the action steps to reach your goal.
  • Realistic: Your goals should be realistic. They should challenge you, but not too much that you give up on them.
  • Time-bound: A goal without a timeline is a dream.
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Over the years, the acronyms in SMART goals have been interpreted differently. For example, the A is sometimes Actionable, Achievable, or Assignable.

Case Example: Marketing Underdog E-Commerce Con

Here's how we SMART goal-ed marketing Underdog E-Commerce Con.

Specific: Our goal for the conference was to attract 250 attendees. That's specific. Although we're just 50% to 250 attendees at this time, essentially what we did was we shot for the moon and landed on the stars.

Measurable: This is simple. Every time someone purchases a ticket, their information is zapped into our email newsletter and we see the numbers.

Actionable: We had to develop the steps to achieving our goal. Here are some of our steps:

  • Invite 11 speakers.
  • Contact and partner with 4 communities.
  • Run a META ad campaign with a budget of RM5,000
  • Speak to 10 businesses and get 4 sponsors.
  • Shoot 11 interviews.
  • Publish 2 social media content every day.
  • Send an email newsletter every day.

Notice how our steps are measurable as well.

Realistic: How realistic was our goal? If we wanted to hit 250 attendees and had 50 days to market, we'd need to achieve 5 sign-ups per day. Is that realistic? What action can we take to hit 5 signs up per day?

Time-bound: To be 100% honest, all of the marketing for Underdog E-Commerce Con happened, once we set a date. After setting a date, it was do or die – face the embarrassment and failure of having nobody show up for the event.

Setting SMART goals helped us plan, manage, and market Underdog E-Commerce Con.

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2 days left to Underdog E-Commerce Con. Some of the smartest marketers and business owners are attending. Don't miss this.

Interesting stories & ideas 💡

When SMART goals fail.

If SMART goals were so great – why do so many people fail at it?

That's because SMART goals don't evoke emotions. Human beings are emotional creatures. Our emotions guide our motivations more than we care to admit.

  • That's why we invest in Crpyto without doing research.
  • Buy stuff we don't actually need.
  • Binge-watch Netflix when we should sleep.

We can do some pretty stupid things because of emotions. At the same time, emotions can make us do great things too.

People fail when they create goals they can't stick to. Then they blame themselves:

  • "Why am I not motivated"?
  • "I'm such a disorganized person"
  • "This shouldn't be hard at all. Oh I'm so stupid."

That's why we add two more letters to SMART goals – making it SMART-ER. Here they are:

Engaging/Exciting: You shouldn't always have to push yourself to work on your goals. They should be exciting and fun! Our goal of 250 attendees was measurable But one thing I really enjoyed was talking to other marketers & creating content. That made the marketing exciting!

Re-evaluate: Things change. Situations happen. In marketing, things can take a 180° turn. By periodically re-evaluating your goal, you put flexibility into your system – and make life better.

If not now, then when? ⏱️

The secret to growth: Plant seeds 🌱

Here's a recording from Chef Liang of Red Red Botak Head restaurant, from the last Underdog Founder's Con.

Key lessons summarized:

  1. Create a purple cow - Liang's strategy for building restaurants was to do the opposite. Most restaurants set up at high-traffic areas. Liang started his first cafe in a warehouse, and restaurant on the rooftop of Gardens Mall.
  2. Build connections – "The road between ideation to execution is paved with good connections" - Chef Liang.
  3. Delegate - The best CEOs and founders, don't do any real work. They focus on building relationships and a team.
  4. Market on a micro-level - Stuff like influencer marketing is flashy. But what worked for Chef Liang was building relationships on a micro-level with everyone who walked inside his restaurant.
  5. Always be leveraging - Find a way to work with non-competing brands or personalities, tapping into their network.

Our pick of the week 👌

We got the invitation to Campfire – a Slack alternative. You only pay ONCE. The catch? It's not as polished as Slack, of course.

Enjoy this newsletter? Forward to a friend or hit reply to share your thoughts. We love to hear from you.

Want build your network? Join us at Underdog E-Commerce Con on 21st March, at APW Bangsar. It's not just a conference for E-Commerce guys. It's or marketers and businesses.

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