Many types of marketing risks are provided here.
First questions first, what is a marketing risk?
What happens if your marketing campaign turns sour and a flood of criticism follows? What if your creative team triggered the wrong kind of emotion in specific global market? What if huge chunk of your marketing budget is spent on 0 ROI or even negative perception of your brand?
All of that, my friend, is marketing risk.
If you can understand marketing risks, you will be better prepared to stay away from any ill fate and cast off any trouble that could be brewing.
Mistakes happen, anyone can make mistake. But, as a leader, it’s your responsibility to stay vigilant, understand cultural norms or know business well-enough that you always come triumph.
Marketing Risk Management happens before, during and after your campaign – yes, throughout.
I am going to share some marketing risks here and hopefully you will counter any bad incident before it happens.
Remember each of the given marketing risks can be a sub-category in their own, but I’ve given a bird-eye view.
Marketing Risk #1 – Market Competition Risk
Some times SLT (senior leadership team), marketers or consultants just underestimate the competition. Now, I am not saying you don’t dive deep into something you dream to win and celebrate, but here’s a realist take; if marketing costs exceed the ROI then better don’t do it.
If possible results are possible but it takes you 5 years to get there so are you ready to sacrifice 5 years just to get there? How will you ensure other player doesn’t take your place that you worked so hard on?
Instead, you can look for blue ocean strategy, or look for something unique that will make your clients get glued to you.
Marketing Risk #2 – Brand Reputation Risk
What’s right for you might be wrong for someone else. Few things may look trivial and has no clear right and wrong but just a choice and no one can call themselves to be the righteous one.
While brand reputation is not the unique set of problems itself but different risks like cultural sensitivity, false promise, social media nightmare and other such risks make brand lose their reputation.
Marketing Risk #3 – Cultural Sensitivity Risk
Think about knowing what’s culturally liked, and disliked. No sane brand would like to risk their sales and reputation for a small giggle if it is going to enrage large audiences.
That’s the thing with cultural and moral sensitivities all over the world. They vary country to country, sometimes city to city and village to village.
Think about dressing, food, affection in public, even how to sit properly. Some people are extremely cautious that a small trivial act can make them lose their cool.
Marketing Risk #4 – Regulatory Compliance Risk
Take an example of GDPR or False advertising in Europe. Or other TVC laws. Really, plenty of stuff one needs to be careful about for regulatory compliance. No one want to stir the pot, right?
Marketing Risk #5 – Technological Change Risk
Think about Kodak or Blockbuster. Kodak faded into oblivion by digital cameras and Blockbuster faded into oblivion by Netflix. Both were giants, but fell like Godzilla.
Marketing Risk #6 – Pricing Strategy Risk
This risk is associated with setting the wrong price. It doesn’t mean you have to be too low or too high, but you have to support both strategies respectively and have a clear methodology to cohesively run complete cycle or product journey based on that.
You can also create a price fluid strategy by using different mechanics at your disposal.
Marketing Risk #7 – Market Saturation Risk
This is similar to market competition risk. If market saturation is really high and there is no way to differentiate yourself then that is a red ocean market (opposite of blue ocean market).
Simple suggestion would be to stay away from such unless you have a magical recipe that no one has.
Marketing Risk #8 – Customer Perception Risk
Take an example of the brand lifebuoy in a non-english country. Many people in the country only knows that male is a boy, and the brand name is lifebuoy, for lack of knowledge about the language or the brand, people will perceive the brand as a male only brand. This means brand could lose half of the targeted audience.
Marketing Risk #9 – Supply Chain Risk
Okay, so you reached 100,000 customers, 10,000 of them wants immediately but it’s not on the shelf. This wave of promising new customers will die and you will lose market share just like that for new brands that are not yours.
Marketing Risk #10 – Economic Downturn Risk
Now, I don’t suggest shrinkflation, but economic downturn and recession can hit any economy, so you should have a plan how you will navigate it if such a situation arises.
Instead of shrinkflation, you can have alternate products/services, that people will have purchasing power to buy and it will not hit your bottom line in a massive way.
Marketing Risk #11 – Wrong Platform Risk
Small example would be Twitter (X). You allocated huge budget to Twitter (X), but the authorities in the country blocked twitter – then it’s a marketing risk.
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