An interesting challenge for you
Challenge yourself to find three businesses that are successful without marketing themselves. 
A good prediction is that you can’t come up with even one company.  Even though marketing goes to far at some point, you can’t thrive without it.

The KISS syndrome
KISS – Keep It Simple, Stupid, is a well-known way of life in the marketing industry.  This helps to keep programs from getting too complex, as they all do at some point.
Here are five questions you should answer to keep your marketing approach simple:

• What is your intention?
• Who are your listeners?
• What kind of budget do you have?
• What frame of time do you have?
• What makes you different from the rest?

What's your intention? 
The first question potential clients get asked is what their intention is when they want to do a marketing program.  Without knowing their intentions, they’re wasting their time.  They need to know what their goal is and what they will be selling.  If you have strong intentions, everything will flow smoothly and quickly.
Remember to keep it simple
Your intention needs to be written down in under 25 words.  The roads you take to meet your target may fluctuate, but the target itself should not change until next year when you adjust your marketing plan.

Your intention must be realistic, so it needs to be an incremental part of your corporate mission.  Do you want your company to be the largest in the business?  Are you happy with being the largest in the area?  What about only being the best in town?

It is definitely okay to dream – that’s what got you where you are today.  But, from now on, everything needs to be practical.  Practical, that’s the key word here, wishing won’t make anything happen.