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The Basic Principles of Agile Marketing

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Shifting from traditional methods to agile methods is not just following trends, but a necessity in a constant change, which can significantly improve efficiency and accelerate the timing of projects. Agile approach developed in the field of information technology has found its application in marketing.

What is Agile Marketing? It is flexible marketing whose work processes consist of small tasks and experiments, it is marketing that reacts immediately to changing market conditions, it is marketing that improves the customer experience across all channels. The primary objective of Agile marketing is to provide flexibility in marketing processes and marketing plans, and the goal is to engage as many users as possible.

The basic principles of Agile marketing are shown in Figure 1.

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Figure 1 - Basic Principles of Agile Marketing Let's look at what these principles imply.

So, the first principle is "Abandoning opinions and conventions in favor of analytics. Agile marketing involves abandoning corporate-wide patterns, views and opinions (including those of senior management), methods and established practices, if the analysis shows that they do not bring the expected results. In addition, Agile marketing requires a thorough customer study, implementation of changes and subsequent evaluation of the results. And it should be a cyclical and continuous process.

The second principle "Customer interests are more important than internal hierarchy and rivalry" implies that in Agile marketing the priority is given to the customer, his needs, expectations and interests are put in the first place. With the traditional approach, departments of the company may have conflicting goals, which often leads to disagreements between departments and destructively affects the results, whereas Agile approach unites all the departments of the company by one goal: to provide the customer with a product or service, which has a high value, in accordance with the expectations and needs of customers. Undoubtedly, this approach increases efficiency and minimizes the possibility of conflict situations.

The third principle "From large and complex campaigns to small and adaptive ones" is revealed as follows. Today change is a constant, and traditional marketing strategies are difficult to adjust, because everything around is changing very quickly. As for Agile marketing - it has a significant advantage because it is a flexible and adaptive approach, and campaigns are divided into iterations, at the end of each stage the data and results are analyzed and, if necessary, appropriate changes are made to the original plan.

Let's move on to the next principle, which is "Customer research instead of forecasts. What does this imply? In the past, research once a year on average in a traditional marketing approach was considered normal practice, but as already written above, things change very quickly, consumers' opinions and preferences also change, new products enter the market, etc., so the Agile approach implies a constant study of consumers and research. This makes it possible to make timely changes in the marketing campaign and improve its effectiveness.

The next principle is "The priority of agile planning over rigid planning". Agile marketing does not deny the importance of planning, this approach only emphasizes the need to change plans in accordance with changing market conditions.

The sixth principle "Willingness to change" also emphasizes the need for change. This principle implies reacting as quickly as possible to changing situations or other external conditions, rather than adhering strictly to the original plan.

Finally, the last principle "Several small experiments are better than one big one" implies that the results of short-term and small tests will be more meaningful than the results of one large-scale and long-term experiment.

Agile marketing is a great opportunity to keep up with changes in the external environment and the changing expectations, demands and needs of its customers. Agile marketing encompasses all tools and marketing channels, from social media to email, allowing for maximum synchronization of all company departments using the same information and united by a common goal.

by Charlie Jones