How to Manage and Grow a Remote Marketing Team Effectively

COVID-19 has pushed many people who would normally work in the office into working from home. Marketers are one group of professionals who are having to adapt to this way of working. For some, being closer to family and having the chance to wake up a bit later has been great. For others, not being able to socialize and using the kitchen table as an office is proving to be a bit of a pain. Whatever be the case, remote work is staying for the time being – making now the perfect time to get ahead in the game. So, let’s understand how to manage and nurture a remote marketing team effectively. 

Face-to-face meetings may be on hiatus, but you can still have an effective marketing team. There are also many ways to engage customers and flaunt new products when working from home. Moreover, each day employees are learning remote work tips to make the team connection stronger.

Building a remote marketing team will put any business ahead of the pack in these fragile times. Hence, this article will look at the benefits of making a marketing team a remote one.

Why is Remote Working Beneficial to Marketers? 

According to Cimabvi, 25% of remote employees are marketers. This implies that a marketing team can efficiently operate from remote space.

Take content marketing, for example. All it takes is a few ideas and a computer and off you go. You could write a blog, make GIFs, videos, or memes. As long as it’s shareable and you can get the message across, you can make great content from anywhere.

Source: Buffer 

Remote Workers Are Generally Happier

Being able to roll from the bed to the ‘desk’ every day isn’t so bad. Your very own private snack collection is also just a few feet away. And you can wear whatever clothes you like. Not to mention, saving money and time on commuting feels great.

With remote work, there is a chance to be more flexible and say bye to 9-5’s. This makes employees feel more relaxed. That, in turn, makes them more productive and motivated without time pressure boxing them in.

Giving employees more control over their work schedule creates a feeling of autonomy. They can take time to learn about the tools they need or skills that might benefit them.

These elements make happier employees who would want to stay with your organization for long.

It Benefits The World

Remote working is a great way to connect with the world, as being flexible means being more global.

For example, if you want a meeting with a team in Los Angeles at 10.30 am PDT, you can talk to them at 6.30 pm GMT. Without having to resentfully wait around after work to talk to them.

Using something like a time clock app will help you to figure out the best times to talk to people around the world.

You will also have a larger global workforce to choose from, too. Meaning you can hire contractors with other languages, skills, and knowledge.

Say you need an SEO piece on bread. It doesn’t matter if you’re talking cornbread, barm cakes, cobs, naans, or pandebonos. It’s good to get someone who knows what they are talking about.

Source: Workable Resources

Ways to Achieve a High-performance Marketing Team 

It’s obvious that you need to make sure that people are working in a quiet environment or are prepared for online meetings.

But, there are other ways of enhancing productivity while working remotely that people tend to miss. Here are a few suggestions:

It’s All About The Team 

Firstly, when thinking about global expansion within your team, try to hire outside of the background of the usual skill sets. This might sound a little counterintuitive. However, it’s important to hire people with a diverse range of skills.

Hire someone with experiences such as online ebook making or video conferencing. Now is the time to be diverse and move things forward. Bring in some fresh ideas from different perspectives by hiring out of the norm.

Then, get to know your team. This is especially important when working from home as people may never meet in person. So, you need to create trust amongst your staff. People are more likely to help people they actually like.

Set Some Rules

You want to give your workers some autonomy. Yet, you don’t want them to take advantage. So, you will have to agree on some ground rules.

It could be something like letting people be flexible with work hours. As long as they are available for meetings between the hours of 11 am and 3 pm, it should be good.

Maybe you will insist there is no flexibility on deadlines. Perhaps you can let people work through the weekends in exchange for a day off in the week.

Whatever you decide, make it fair on all sides. You can always change things (with a warning) if it isn’t working. A  remote work tracking tool would also be a great helper to monitor and boost the team’s productivity.

Source: Adam Farm 

Appreciate And Trust Your Staff

It’s important in any role to thank your staff. Though, when working remotely, you don’t get a chance to do that as much.

Trust that they are doing the work and are putting in their all. Sometimes, people have no clue if they are doing a good job or not. So, let them know they are.

That goes for freelancers too. Don’t make them chase you up for pay or work. Freelancers tend to have more than one client. If one client treats them better, they will probably prioritize that relationship. Consider implementing a global payroll system to streamline payments and foster positive relationships with freelancers

Make work a place of mutual respect. Set up a great culture and make people want to work for you. Permanent or not.

After all, nobody likes feeling underappreciated.

Helpful Collaboration Tools for Remote Marketing Team 

There are plenty of paid and free tools out there that will help remote marketing teams work together. Getting the right tools for your team will mean work getting done more efficiently.

Related Read: Top tools to use during the Pandemic

Tools are also perfect for online team collaboration. They enable people to work together from anywhere in the world. They can create an environment where they produce creative and interesting ideas. Have a chat with your team and see what they would enjoy.

As marketers, some specific tools to use are:

Communication Platforms – These help teams put ideas and work into one place. Make sure whatever you choose is secure.

Video Calling Tools –When working remotely, online meetings are going to happen. Hence, this is an essential piece of tech.

Instant Messaging Tools – It is good for sending less formal work messages to colleagues when they need a quick response. Use one specially designed for a work setting to avoid personal life interference.

Online Collaborative Calendars – An online calendar helps prevent clashes. It will also help managers see when everyone is free for team meetings. You can prepare for important team meetings with such tools.

Task Tools – This will enable people to keep on top of their marketing tasks. It can also be used to help everyone else see what others are working on so that inputs can be offered if needed.

Remember to help people with using these tools if they need it. There’s no point in having a state of the art piece of software if your team doesn’t know how to use it.

Source: Hacker Noon

Building a remote team will put your firm ahead of the competition. It will also create a happy and efficient team, making people want to stay.

Focusing on certain tools and working on culture will encourage creativity – something which is particularly important for the marketing team.

It’s up to the team to put the work in, but it’s up to the leader to put the right practices in place to make it happen. Keeping your team happy will help them thrive and let your business grow.

Author’s Bio:

Sam O’Brien is the Senior Website Optimisation & User Experience Manager for EMEA at RingCentral, a global UCaaS systems provider. Sam has a passion for innovation and loves exploring ways to collaborate more with dispersed teams.