By Ahmed al-Akber/Dubai

The most successful companies will attest to the fact that marketing is not an event. It’s a process that constantly happens. Each and every day, we should take time out of our busy schedules to spend as little as twenty minutes on something that will help us to generate more revenue to be made.
Those that are successful realise that this twenty minutes a day, (which should be seen as the minimum investment of time), doesn’t just happen. It’s scheduled. If something urgent pops in the diary, it’s not put off till another day. It’s done no matter what.
Here are some questions I’m asked by people all the time with regards to making marketing a daily habit:
“Why do we need to constantly market our business every day?” The answer could lie in the link between marketing your business and your revenue. The revenue you generate is in direct proportion to how much you market your business. You need to be making money constantly, and therefore you need to be marketing your business constantly too.
“When do we stop?” You don’t. If Apple stopped marketing, the company wouldn’t be the giant that it is currently. Sure people would still recognise it, but steadily, day by day, the brand would start to disconnect from the customers that believe in it so dearly. Until one day, a competitor will take its position. That’s not my opinion, it’s the law of marketing!
“How do you find the time to market your business everyday?” Firstly, make sure you commit to doing it every day. You’ll then find a way. Second, schedule it. Have marketing activities booked in your calendar, so you don’t have to think about them.
“I run a large business and we have dedicated marketing staff. How do I make sure they are spending their time wisely?” Set clear and aggressive results that you need that are linked to your growth plans. Do not expect them to know what those are! Then break those down into objectives that they must achieve. Finally, have all the activities that they are supposed to carry out to achieve the objectives outlined. In summary, results are achieved by achieving objectives, which are achieved by carrying out a set of activities.
“I run a small business and have very few employees. How do I balance between spending time on operations and marketing?” While on holiday I met up with a relative who told me I was very active posting articles on my blog the same week. ‘Ahmed, you need to relax on your holiday!’ he exclaimed. My response: ‘I haven’t touched my blog in over a week!’ My blog is not physically updated by me, though I write all the content it contains. Not all marketing activities need to be carried out by you. You can do the main strategic elements, and outsource the rest. Think of what you can do that takes you little to no time but would be valued by your customers. Outsource the rest.

- Ahmed al-Akber is the managing director of ACK Solutions, a firm that helps companies to improve their marketing and sales results by offering more effective ways attracting customers and significantly better products and services. Ahmed has worked internationally in marketing, sales, and strategic planning at companies such as the Coca-Cola Company, Philip Morris International and Dell. Questions or comments can be sent to Ahmed on ahmed@acksolutions.com