By Theresa Witham
Attendees at the first annual CUES School of Strategic Marketing, going on this week in Seattle, are a diverse bunch. There are CEOs, marketing managers, vice presidents and senior vice presidents, as well as the heads of IT and operations. When asked to list what they hoped to get out of the week, there were several themes:
Stay relevant, stand out in the crowd, use data to drive decisions, focus direction, social media 
Randy Schultz presents in Seattle.strategies, create a culture, be strategic.
No one mentioned brochures or post cards, not because those things aren’t important but because those items are not part of the strategic work that the head of marketing at a credit union should be focused on.
Randy Schultz, VP/marketing at CUES Supplier member Weber Marketing Group, Seattle, and one of the school's facilitators, described the four tiers of marketing as an inverted pyramid.
At the bottom, with the smallest slice, are the newsletters, brochures, events and bling (the freebie pens, mugs and such).
Next up the pyramid is the campaign work. Up one more, with a slightly wider slice, is the business development, sales culture and public relations.
Finally at the top of our inverted pyramid, with the biggest piece, is the role of the chief marketing officer, who is a strategist, social media and PR expert, tracks return on investment and return on opportunity, develops products and services, is involved in branch retail planning and builds the internal brand culture. This is the strategic level.
Picking out the perfect pen isn’t a strategic decision. Unfortunately, at many credit unions, one person is tasked with the whole pyramid. In this case, you might not be able to spend all your time on strategic stuff, but you should be spending some.
Ask yourself, Schultz suggested, “What should I be more involved in (that I am not now) to make a bigger strategic impact?”
What would you do?
Theresa Witham is a CUES editor.
