While marketing automation tells us what we should do and when, it doesn't deliver a one-to-one marketing platform quite like it professes to do so. Companies are still shy of collaborating all marketing technologies into one single voice to customers and prospects that give an experience that is unsurpassed in past marketing efforts.

Why your marketing strategy won't last 12 months

It's simple as to why your marketing strategy won't last 12 months and its right here on our doorstep. While we make every effort to capitalize on a company's business strategy and underpin it with tactical marketing efforts that deliver upon this strategy, the reality is that we don't know what is around the corner. We don't know what is coming out in January, February, March or December for that matter - and we won't know until it falls in our laps either through the media or by chance.

If a technology developer brings to me a new solution and I am the first person to see it - and I verify that it works and will change the marketing paradigm, than only I have that solution, and the millions of other marketing plans out there have not taken this into account and may become obsolete before our very eyes.

Some say early adopters are foolish, yet if you said that to the people who registered business domain names or Twitter accounts in the names of the big brands, than you will see that an early adopter is the person that is most able to capitalize and leverage off what is new and innovative. 

Technology isn't the only factor associated with changes in marketing strategy. The volatile business environment and government influence often cheats people out of fulfilling their business strategies creating forced change and a poignant u-turn.

When I write a marketing strategy, I am a believer in the blueprint that has been delivered, yet today as we address the marketing needs of SMB's, I spend more time informing our clients that this is a blueprint but "please do not put in stone" because the reality is - things may change.

I don't want to cast a shadow over my team and other marketers, but a more nimble approach and set of objectives is the only way to operate in 2014, and a constant mirroring of other case studies and technologies that transcend our modern era into the unknown world of customer connection is necessary to save companies from failures or falling behind the eight ball.