I have worked many a time with people who are competent and confident marketers who are intimidated by the web.

When I encounter someone who is having this experience I always talk to them about their marketing goals, what they are trying to accomplish in other mediums. I coach them through the idea that their goals are the same across mediums and we simply need to learn to carry them out over the web.

Barriers to entry:

  • Technology – sometime we put far to much emphasison technology being difficult, most CMS’s today enable marketers to convey their messages successfully with little to no tech knowledge
  • Grumpy or unwelcoming web person – many times a web person, (from a more IT than marketing background) has problems communicating about technology in laymen’s terms, i think in this case both sides need to empathize with the other person and find a common ground
  • Failure to contemporize – integrated marketing requires you to keep up with marketing trends whether social media, web, qr codes or whatever the future might hold. In order to be relevant you must be where you message is most effective. Simply ignoring channels because you dont understand them is not an option

So again I challenge you as a marketer to work with your web experts and speak the common language of goals and how to get there. You need to get beyond lingo and slang and find a middle ground where you can communicate in a clear and simple to follow format. I have numerous times helped bridge the gap between a marketer and a web person. It only needed that initial push to start what can be a very successful and fruitful relationship.