So here is a good question to ponder. If your office bathroom decides to start spewing water everywhere in your building, do you call a plumber, or do you tell your accountant to go fix it?

So what about when your marketing needs to be redefined because your customer retention rates are dropping and your new business numbers are fading? Do you call your secretary to order more mailers?

As a business owner, you are going to face a lot of challenges and you will never have the time to do everything yourself. This is a lesson most of us are forced to learn within our first couple of years. This is why we surround ourselves with individuals who specialize in the different tasks we find valuable to our companies and none is more important than your marketing. Without fuel you have no fire.

Specialization is the key to maximization.

One of the biggest advantages of bringing in a marketing consultant is that they spend every day of their lives (the good ones) living and breathing consumer behavior. Your forte is in your trade, which is why you chose to be in it. Their forte is in theirs as well so it is generally a good idea to bring someone in who can help bring new ideas to the table that you may have never thought of. One of the most interesting things about hiring a consultant is that you will very likely have things pointed out to you that were right under your nose and you will most certainly end your first session with a “why didn’t I think of that” look on your face. It is very similar to taking a visit to the therapist, pointing out things you may have glanced over about your business but never really inspected. More importantly, these consultants have a large number of contacts in different media avenues which can save you a ton of money over having some advertising agency or salesman con you into spending too much on something that doesn’t work.

Getting the big picture.

It is quite easy for many business owners to get tied up in the day-to-day operations of their business and begin focusing on the specifications of their products and services instead of the benefits the customer receives. What begins to occur is that the owner can lose focus of what the consumer is really looking for. A perfect example is that a roofing company may become fixated on the technical aspects of their new shingle products but forget that what their consumers really have in mind is comfort, appearance, and lowering of utility expenses. Bringing in a marketing consultant can help to give you an outside and objective viewpoint that you may not be able to see from the everyday trenches.

Time is precious.

Can you afford to detract your time from day to day operations to take on another full time job of marketing your business? Remember, there is a big difference between working in your business and working on your business. Many of the tasks necessary may not even be incredibly difficult but they need an expert eye to coordinate. A marketing consultant can give proper direction over a fraction of the time it would take you to figure it out and simply take care of it themselves or advise one of your support personnel on what to do without wasting their time either. Resources are precious in business as you already know and there is no sense in wasting them.

Speaking of resources

How quickly can you effectively hire an actual marketing manager? More importantly, how much would that cost? The average salary of a marketing degree recipient straight out of college is typically $47,000 a year, the highest of all bachelor degree programs. I bet that $150 an hour for only a few hours a month with the consultant is starting to look a little more tasty now eh? Not to mention, a marketing consultant can get your project fired up and rolling within a matter of a couple of weeks which is much faster than you could even find and interview the proper candidates for a full time position, thus saving yet more time and money.

Put a ring on it.

Commitment is always a serious thing and when you talk about bringing on a full time employee for marketing or devoting yourself to it, you are taking on a serious commitment. Either way you are going to be spending time, resources, money and frustration on the project, yet it is necessary to continue growing your business. Or is it? The beauty of bringing on a consultant is that they can help you effectively, and in less time, but best of all… if you don’t like them, you can easily drop them without fear of losing tons of invested resources. Either they are good and you keep them, or they aren’t and you drop them without obligation.

The icing on the cake.

At the end of the day, every business owner spends their time weighing risk versus reward. The risk of bringing on a new employee or even worse, wasting a lot of your money on a campaign that fails, can sometimes be irrecoverable. What if you have a mishap and now no longer have funds to recover from the “oops” or worse yet, can’t afford any other marketing efforts? The best bet is to consider taking a look at a marketing consultant with a strong portfolio and a great sense of creativity to help put a fresh breath of life into your marketing campaign.

I hear these guys are strong Atlanta Marketing Consultants. ; )