Three things which you shouldn't do in 2010. If you've got some sort of a marketing plan in place for next year, and any of your expenditure is targeted at things which tick the following boxes, well …all we can say is, it's your budget, and there's still time to change it.

1. Don't buy anything which doesn't have a good return on investment
Why? Because there are enough things which do have a good return on investment to soak up anyone's marketing budget. Now, we'll be the first to admit that it's hard to quantify the value of the branding which that magazine front cover gives you. But you can at least be comparative. Let's say it costs you £1 to get somebody to visit your website, and you can convert them to a sales leads at 5%, so that's £20 a time. That gives us something to compare against. So, if an exhibition stand costs you £10,000, and you'd expect to get 50 sales enquiries (value £1,000), are the other benefits of being there worth £9,000 – or would you swap them for 450 more sales leads?

2. Don't advertise somewhere just because you always have done
Your customers' behaviour is steadily changing. The response which any form of marketing can achieve rises and falls, but it doesn't rise again. Everything has its day. If you're seeing diminishing returns from an publication, plan for even lower returns next year. That doesn't mean it won't still be good value. But don't let any sales person convince you their product is making a comeback.

3. Attracting attention is all well and good but does it turn into leads?
There's so much of this about. Big full-page adverts which leave you thinking: "Yes, but what does the company actually do?" Exhibition stands where the sales person look miserable and bored. Internet advertising which just sends people to the home page of a website and dumps them there. Websites with no way of making an enquiry other than filling in a daunting, page long form where every field shouts "Required Field". Direct mail with no personality or call to action. The list goes on.

Nobody knows your business better than you. Strip your marketing back to the things that work, and make them work harder.