The Top 3 Obstacles for Marketers in 2015
The 2015 State of Marketing report surveyed over 5,000 marketing professionals on everything from the top technologies of the year to this year’s major trends in social and mobile integration. We asked which hurdles marketers are most likely facing in the upcoming year and discovered a three-way tie.
This chart shows the full ranking of marketers’ most pressing business challenges of 2015. The three biggest challenges are:
- New business development
- Quality of leads
- Remaining up to date with current marketing technology and trends
1. New business development
It’s no surprise that nurturing existing relationships is essential to the successful marketer, but this year, you may need to spend more time and energy on finding and developing new opportunities to enrich your marketing strategy. In fact, this obstacle outranks simply building deep customer relationships by six spots, indicating that marketers are less concerned with their ability to foster business relationships than with the initial challenge of bringing new business into their pipeline.
2. Quality of leads
Quality over quantity is more than a cliché. With the quality of business leads tying for first out of twenty possible obstacles, it’s clear that marketers want to fill their funnels with leads that count. Think this one should be a given? Let’s consider the many responsibilities on your to-do list. Marketers recognize that by prioritizing quality leads, they are using their valuable time wisely.
3. Staying up to date with marketing technology and trends
Today’s marketers are challenged with managing the entire customer journey — and its myriad of touchpoints — so it’s easy to guess that staying up to date with the latest technology and industry trends would be a major obstacle. Not only do you have to interact with customers using the cutting edge of marketing tools and content, but your teams must also consistently be one step ahead of new platforms and developments in market strategy.
Let’s think of these obstacles as marketing opportunities for the year. Our survey shows that challenges like budgetary constraints and uniqueness of content fall far below these top three challenges — in spots 11 and 13, respectively. This indicates that marketers have both the resources and vision to overcome top hurdles.
Ready to take the leap? Download the full report for deeper insight into the modern marketer’s mindset.
