That Groundhog Day feeling and how to avoid it

(Posted on 01/02/18)

Groundhog Day is a popular tradition celebrated in the United States and Canada on 2nd February. It derives from the superstition that if a groundhog emerges from its burrow on this day and can see its shadow, winter will persist for another six weeks. If it can’t see its shadow, then spring weather will soon start. Immortalised by the comedy film of the same name, the expression Groundhog Day has come to mean a repetitive and boring day, where you feel as if you’re stuck in a never-ending rut, with the ‘same old, same old’, happening every day. 

If this is you, then you need to bear in mind the popular quotation, “If you always do what you’ve always done, you will always get what you’ve always got.” This has been attributed variously to author Tony Robbins, Mark Twain, Albert Einstein and Henry Ford. Whoever came up with it, its truth is undeniable. If we keep doing the same thing, we can’t be surprised if we always get the same results. This applies as much to marketing as it does to every other facet of our working lives. 

Many companies, especially those run by people with an entrepreneurial spirit, find themselves focused on creating a fantastic product or service. In the drive to create perfection, marketing can be neglected or too often treated as an add-on and not given the priority, senior management time and budget it deserves. In order to be effective, marketing, or in other words, communicating with your customers, should be central to everything you do. 

Of course, it’s important to remember, if your current marketing is the same as it’s always been and is continuing to fail in getting the results you want, then it’s time to take positive action. 

Very often, everyone gets so bogged down in the minutiae of everyday life that there’s never any time to step back and give yourself time to think strategically. Plan what you should be prioritising for the next six, twelve or twenty four months. Ask yourself, who is your target audience? What do you want to tell them? What is your customer journey? What results do you want to achieve? Does your marketing team have some SMART goals? What does success look like? 

In the Groundhog Day film, self-obsessed TV anchor, Phil Connors, can only break out of his mind-numbing time loop when he re-examines his life and priorities. It’s time to do the same with your marketing. Contact the Zebra team to see how we can help.