Do or do not..
Probably of the most often quoted lines from the movies is Yoda from Star Wars when talking to Luke: “Do or do not, there is no try”. Apologies if I mis-quote that for all the Star Wars experts out there.
I have used this a number of times and usually it is in connection with trying to do something. In other words saying that we will try to do something sets us up for failure, gives us an excuse where we can say: “well, at least I tried”.
However there is another side to this quote that applies to marketing and it’s this: Do or do not are the two options. This is often what we see with small businesses, the desire to do something leads us to carry out a lot of unfocused activity, many of it unconnected to the goal.
The alternative, “do not” is the other thing we see. Paralysis - rearranging the business cards and filing papers because there is uncertainty about what to do next, indeed where to start.
So, it is important that we do things, equally important that we don’t do everything but stay focused on our target market, the flow of our business and the message we want to send. On this basis we can decide to do it or not do it (a particular marketing took that is) and then really do it (or not) and not just try!
Tags: focus, marketing activity