There are many challenges that marketers face today: a fiercely competitive marketplace, the pressure of producing memorable content for multiple media channels, and the day-to-day management and execution of marketing projects. If we shine a light on managing creative projects, a common issue that marketers face is deadline delays, a symptom indicative of other issues bubbling away below the surface.
In a paper published by Gleanster and Kapost "$958M Marketing Problem Quantifying the Cost of Inefficiency in Your Content Production Processes" 92% of respondents cited approval delays as their top reason for missing deadlines. Sitting close by, 82% of marketers claimed that communication between stakeholders was to blame for not delivering creative projects on deadline. The snowball effect of missing deadlines is that freelancers are often brought in to complete work expediently. Before you know it, your budgets are out of control along with your deadlines.
So how do we get better at meeting project management deadlines?
We've made a list of the top challenges marketers face when meeting project deadlines and budgets. Take a look at how admation's select features can help remedy these issues.
1. CHALLENGE: Approval delays
In an executive brief by Workfront "The 3 Keys to Reducing Review Rounds in Your Marketing Department", 36% of marketers said that approval hiccups delayed work at least twice a week. So what are marketers doing wrong? Typically, approval delays occur when creative projects lack an organised approval workflow process and easy access to files. The result sees feedback and approvals going back and forth, stakeholders are often missed in the approval process, those working remotely aren't able to access the files and, meanwhile, the artwork revision count keeps climbing. In other words, many marketing professionals today are working in daily chaos.
ADMATION SOLUTION: Approval Templates and cloud-based software that can be accessed 24/7
Admation's Approval Templates allow users to nominate unique approval pathways to ensure that all stakeholders review and provide feedback in an orderly and timely fashion. Admation is also cloud based marketing project management software that can be accessed wherever an internet connection is available, so stakeholders can log in and provide comprehensive feedback or approval at any time.
2. CHALLENGE: Poor communication between stakeholders
Transparency is the key to managing marketing projects effectively, but all too often a breakdown in communication leads to deadline delays. Even with reports indicating that 63% of marketers spend more than three hours a day in email, this isn't compensating for the fact that stakeholder feedback and approvals are still getting lost among the email clutter. In addition to this, too many stakeholders are still marking up artwork by hand, which can be difficult to decipher. Often more emails are then required to confirm the precise feedback. Meanwhile, the clock is ticking and deadlines are looming. With these sorts of communication issues, it's hard to believe that only 29% of marketers are utilising online proofing tools (according to the In-House Creative Industry Report 2017 by The Boss Group & Cella).
ADMATION SOLUTION: Online proofing tools
Admation's Online Proofing Tools enable stakeholders to review and mark up artwork onscreen. The feature also batches feedback and notifications so that marketers aren't pulling their hair out over having to read or locate a number of emails for feedback or approvals.
3. CHALLENGE: An over-reliance on freelancers
It's not uncommon for freelancers to be hired to provide specialist skills on a creative project, which is all well and good if it has been planned and budgeted for. Nonetheless, if freelancers are predominantly brought in because projects are delayed then it's likely this hasn't been sufficiently budgeted for. The importance of budgets in these projects is indisputable, and blowing your budget earlier on could very well compromise the overall success of your campaign down the line.
ADMATION SOLUTION: Resource Planner
Admation's Resource Planner enables marketers to plan and allocate their resources more strategically to ensure that projects are sufficiently resourced to avoid an over-reliance on freelancers.
4.CHALLENGE: Regularly going over budget
With so many approval delays and deadlines being pushed back, it's hardly news that your budget is at risk. While improving your approval workflow and planning your resources more effectively will help avoid delays, it's also imperative that you have a time log tool which allows you to see how much time is being spent on tasks to review any inefficiencies. This feature should also enable marketing managers to more accurately forecast resources and budgets for future projects.
ADMATION SOLUTION: Online timesheets
Admation's Online Timesheets enables marketing managers to better forecast and budget for resources and projects in the future.