The Value of a Handful of Patience.

Today's Marketing Cookie is about patience.

Some of you have a really nice, great big bushel of brains. Your brains are well-formed, always running, and they are ready to solve the biggest problems. I know you've got beautiful brains because I see your tweets, I read your blogs, and I see the smart stuff you create. But do you have patience? Do you have the endurance, capacity, and grace to accept delay without getting upset?

Marketers cannot often afford the luxury of patience, nor spend their equity on hope, as the cost of waiting outweighs the unknown reward of the potential outcome. In an ideal world, marketers would do well to plant trees that will grow high and strong, and with the proper pruning, will yield fruit for a lifetime. It takes years for a tree to grow. Unfortunately, marketing professionals don't have the time or patience for such endeavors and so they must resort to planting fields of grass, which can germinate and grow quickly. While a full lawn may look good, the yield is limited and temporary. This may be why companies who wish to enter a new market often acquire someone else's full-grown tree and transplant it in their garden.

My mother always said, "patience is a virtue." If she was telling the truth, my mother is probably the most virtuous woman on the planet, if for no other reason than having been given the arduous assignment of raising me. I am grateful for the virtue of patience, but I believe that having patience also requires one to possess a vision for what is possible, and perhaps hold a little hope for what may initially seem quite impossible. This may be the place where patience and intelligence intersect.

You must think about building a sustainable marketing plan for the long term, planting trees as it were, as well as generating leads and sales in the short term, such as providing some ground cover with a burst of advertising. You may not get the fruit you need from your tree for a long time, and it will require great patience to prune and nurture the program in those early days. However, if you have hope for the future and a vision for what is possible, your handful of patience may prove to be worth much more than just a bushel of brains.