Your marketing plan probably doesn’t need another priority. It needs fewer of them.
I’ve never been particularly good at New Year’s resolutions.
Maybe it’s because most of them involve giving up something I enjoy or committing to something I already know I should be doing. Exercise more. Eat better. Drink less. Read more. Finally organize that part of the basement where things apparently go to disappear forever.
Business resolutions aren’t much different.
Every January, we start thinking about what we’re going to do more of.
This is the year we finally get serious about content. We’re launching an ABM program. We need more videos. We should invest in AI. We need a podcast. More events. Better SEO. More social. A customer newsletter. A new dashboard.
Before long, the marketing plan looks suspiciously like my list of personal resolutions.
Ambitious. Well intentioned. And probably longer than it needs to be.
So, I’d like to suggest a different New Year’s resolution for your marketing team this year.
Stop doing something.
Kill the campaign that hasn’t produced meaningful results in two years.
Leave the trade show everyone complains about but somehow keeps appearing in the budget.
Cancel the software nobody really uses.
Stop creating the report nobody reads.
Stop publishing content simply because your editorial calendar says something needs to go out on Tuesday.
Stop trying to reach six different audiences when two of them account for most of your growth.
Stop calling every new idea a priority.
That last one might be worth putting on a Post-it note.
There’s a natural bias in business toward addition. Starting something feels productive. It creates energy. There’s a kickoff meeting, a project plan and maybe even a shiny new piece of software.
Stopping something doesn’t feel nearly as exciting.
It can even feel like failure.
But one of the lessons I’ve learned working with growing companies is that focus usually becomes more valuable as the number of opportunities increases.
Early-stage companies may have only a handful of realistic ways to grow. As the business becomes more successful, possibilities multiply. New markets become accessible. More channels become viable. Customers ask for new things. Partnerships appear. Technology creates new options.
The challenge gradually changes from finding things you could do to deciding which ones you should do.
That’s strategy.
And strategy requires subtraction.
This doesn’t mean cutting programs simply to make the plan shorter. Some investments take time to work. Brand building doesn’t suddenly become ineffective because you can’t connect it to a sale this quarter. SEO, content, partnerships and customer relationships often require patience.
But patience and inertia aren’t the same thing.
You should still be able to explain why an investment exists, what you expect it to accomplish and whether the evidence suggests it deserves to continue.
If you can’t, the beginning of a new year is a pretty good time to ask why it’s still there.
There’s also a practical benefit to subtraction that tends to get overlooked.
Every program you stop gives something back including Budget, Time and Attention.
Those resources can then move somewhere more important.
Maybe eliminating three mediocre events gives you enough budget to make the two best ones significantly more effective. Maybe reducing the amount of content you produce gives your team time to create something customers want to read. Maybe narrowing your target market allows Sales and Marketing to build a much stronger program around the accounts that matter most.
Doing less doesn’t automatically mean accomplishing less. Sometimes it means finally giving the important things enough resources to work.
This is especially relevant now because marketers have more options than ever. AI alone has created an entire new category of things companies feel they should probably be doing. Add the constant stream of new platforms, channels, tactics and technologies, and there will always be another shiny object waiting just outside the annual plan.
You don’t need to ignore new opportunities. You do need somewhere to put them.
If the plate is already full, adding something new means something else should probably come off. So, when you sit down to build this year’s marketing plan, resist the urge to begin with everything you want to start.
Look at what you’re already doing. Ask what still matters. Ask what’s working. Ask what you’re doing primarily because you did it last year.
Then make one resolution you might keep: Stop doing something.
Your marketing team may thank you. Your budget probably will too. And unlike my annual promise to exercise more, this one might make it past February.
