As a dyed-in-the-wool DIY’er, I like to joke with my wife that “It’s not a project unless you get to buy a tool for it.”
On the whole, this sort of logic is completely lost on her. Her response is generally “But don’t you already have a doohickey that basically does the same thing as that new thing you want to buy?”
This sets me down a path of explaining how “doohickey A” is different and more suited to the prospective project than “doohickey B”.
Just before her eyes start to glaze over, I realize I need to use the example of how I can get by with three pairs of shoes while she absolutely needs three dozen. Even after this comparison, she rarely understands the necessity of “doohickey B”.
As a result of this relationship, my rather-large DIY project list “dictates” that I spend a lot of time thinking about the right tools for each one. Do I have the right tool for the job and if not, what is it? The same principles apply to the tool sets that marketers use to do their jobs. It helps to keep the following criteria in mind when making those decisions for yourself and your team when the time comes.
1. Frequency of use
I’ll admit to having used the handle of a screwdriver as a hammer. This typically happens if I’m doing something small like hanging a picture, the screwdriver is within arm’s reach, and I have no idea where my hammer is. It’s not elegant but it gets the job done.
Framing a house with a screwdriver as your hammer is obviously a different story. Marketers are framers, not single-picture hangers. You need a good hammer and you need it every day. Will Excel work if your use is light-duty and you only need it once in a while? Sure. But there is a limit to how effective you can be if your content scope is more ambitious.
2. Quality
There is a saying that a dull knife is far more dangerous than a sharp one. You are much more likely to cut yourself when you’re struggling to force a dull blade through something.
The quality of your tools matter when it comes to the kind of finished product you can expect. We talk to marketers every day whose proverbial hands carry the scars of way too many dull knives. You can “carve” faster and more efficiently with the right marketing tool in hand.
3. Cost
There is a circular saw that my wife would very much like for me to stop talking about. It is German-engineered and belongs in a product design museum. It also costs about four times what I would like to spend on a circular saw. I use a circular saw infrequently enough that I can’t justify the cost…yet. I have learned from the cheap circular saw I currently own that you get what you pay for. Every time I make a cut with it, I am dismayed with its inaccuracy, which will lead me to bite the bullet eventually. As the saying goes, “Buy the best, and you only cry once.”
The Sweet Spot
When choosing the best marketing tool for the job, you really need to weigh all of these factors. Everyone’s requirements are a little different, so the right choice for you depends on your situation. At DivvyHQ, we’re constantly tuning our service to make sense in all of these areas for the widest-possible set of marketers.
In an ever more crowded market, it can require a little more effort to first evaluate your needs and then to find the marketing tools that best fit them. Having worked with, and listened to, teams of every shape and size, we can usually tell pretty quickly just how good of a fit our solution will be. It’s very rewarding to witness those “aha!” moments when Divvy has hit the customer’s sweet spot and proven its value.
Those customers then get to stand back, look at their work, and bask in the satisfaction of a job well done.