You own a business and you made the decision to invest in marketing. You know that marketing can contribute positively to your bottom line, but you don't know exactly how. A good marketing strategy is more than a weekly ad in the local newspaper, or posting on social media.

The Netherlands is home to many small and medium-sized businesses. Many entrepreneurs struggle with marketing. They still don't know exactly what marketing is and how it works. Marketing is about being found and recognized by the right target audience.

To be found and recognized, it is important that your brand remains consistent across all touch points, on and offline. A good strategy But what if you are overwhelmed by a lack of resources, tools and processes? What if, as a startup, you are faced with the demands of multiple marketing channels? Do you have time to keep up with it all?

What is Spaghetti Marketing? 

You often see entrepreneurs not writing a strategy and just messing around, without thinking about who the target audience is, what the customer journey is and what the entry and exit points are in this journey. Then we have "spaghetti marketing" where everything goes in all directions: often with a lot of money and energy, but without results. 

This spaghetti marketing can be identified by the following 3 characteristics: 

1. No clear strategy
2. No KPIs
3. No focus on target audience

When you have a clear strategy, you know exactly when, how and where to go: online and offline. You also know what your KPIs are, so you can measure whether your efforts are successful or not. The most important thing is focus: if you focus on one channel or target audience, for example, you can see which campaigns are working well and which are not. If you don't have a clear strategy or clear KPIs, then it's impossible to see what's working or not. You just throw spaghetti against the wall and hope something sticks to it!

1. Define your target audience.
2. Analyze the customer journey
3. Create a strategy for your target audience
4. Create content for each stage in the customer journey.
5. View more tactics and benefits

Takeaway: Spaghetti marketing is actually not very effective.

Conclusion : Don't just throw something against the wall and see what sticks, but think about exactly what you want to achieve with a campaign. 

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