A frequent mistake service businesses make is hiring a dedicated marketing employee and then gradually shifting their responsibilities to customer service or dispatching. This negates the role's strategic value and turns a key growth driver into an overpaid administrative position, ultimately stifling marketing efforts.
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If a marketer's primary function is to react to and optimize for algorithms, their job is highly susceptible to being automated. True value lies in strategic thinking, human insight, and abilities that AI cannot replicate, rather than engaging in short-sighted tactical execution that AI will inevitably master.
Assigning expansion quotas to Customer Success (CS) is a critical mistake. CS should focus on implementation, adoption, and value realization, creating the conditions for growth. However, the act of selling the expansion is a core sales responsibility that requires a sales skillset and incentive structure.
Many companies mistakenly hire salespeople and then define their job and compensation. The correct sequence is to first determine the business need, then construct the specific job role to address it, and finally design a compensation plan that incentivizes the required activities before ever posting the job.
Marketing is an accompaniment to a great operations team, not a replacement. If your company culture, leadership, or service delivery is weak, increasing your marketing spend will only expose and accelerate those foundational flaws. You must fix the core business before scaling marketing efforts.
Where the SDR/BDR team reports has significant cultural and career-pathing consequences. When Snowflake moved SDRs under marketing, they began aspiring to be marketers, not salespeople. This created a hiring bottleneck for the sales organization, which needed that talent pipeline to fuel its growth.
Marketing plans often fail because they are created in a vacuum. A robust marketing strategy must be built upon the company's core business strategy, including its vision, values, and business model, to ensure it supports overall objectives like growth targets.
Technical founders often mistakenly fall in love with product marketers first. However, at the early stage, the single most important function of marketing is generating leads. A new CMO who prioritizes a website redesign over demand gen is a major red flag; the focus must be on building pipeline.
When sales teams hit quotas but customer churn rises, the root cause is a disconnect between sales promises and operational reality. The fix requires aligning sales, marketing, and customer service around a single, unified strategy for the entire customer journey.
Small companies often overload their first salesperson with both new logo acquisition and existing account management. This is a trap. Prospecting will always lose out to servicing known customers. Plan for account continuity early to protect your growth engine, even before you can afford a second hire.
