Why do we call marketing activities ‘soft’ when they have the highest ROI

Описание: Why do we call marketing activities ‘soft’ when they have the highest ROI:

Brand marketing
Content marketing
Thought leadership
Demand Gen

I believe because of 2 reasons:

1. They’re are harder to measure
2. They take longer to generate results.

On the other hand, we have marketing activities that are considered ‘hard’. These are mostly the activities focussed on acquisition.

Google Ads
Email Blasts
Lead gen with paid ads

The ‘hard’ marketing activities are seemingly easier to measure and might get you results in the short term. However, the ROI is usually not nearly as good as that of ‘soft’ marketing activities.

But since the CEO always wants leads yesterday and wants clear attribution reports, companies end up spending 70% of their budget on ‘hard’ marketing and 30% on ‘soft’ marketing.

My tip for 2025: Turn it around. Spend the biggest portion of your resources in ‘soft’ marketing. Thank me in 2026 :).