Would you make a dress (let’s assume you’ve never made a dress before) without creating a pattern, sampling fabric, using a mannequin for sizing or even knowing who might wear it? There are a handful of designers in the world who can do just this and be booked out for years ahead. Is it luck? Is it talent? A bit of both? It’s wonderful. But they are exactly that - a very select handful. In the world.
But for the rest of us…
The majority of small businesses and entrepreneurs, with burning ideas and a huge drive to test these ideas, want a sure thing. That secret formula to a mass audience, sky high conversions and endless web traffic. Unfortunately, there is no such thing. I am against telling any of my friends or clients that there is a hard and fast route to where they want to get to, because the there just isn’t. There is only one that works, and it is going to be unique to them and their business.
A Marketing Strategy is not some fancy bit of imaginary ‘work’ (let’s face it, everyone thinks Marketers don’t really ‘work’) to validate what you’re creating as a business or brand. It’s actually not very sexy at all. It’s a very unsexy but very crucial thing to have. Why? Risk minimisation, of course. Very, very unsexy.
One day my mother asked me what I actually did (See. Even the mother of a Marketer doesn’t believe her daughter really works) She said “So do you add the finishing touches to make everything look and sound good?” I laughed, unoffended, but startled because I’d never really broken it down to anyone in simple terms. I replied “No mum, I write a blueprint for them.” When I heard myself say that everything came together for me as well - why that blueprint is so important to have, and ideally, to start with before anything else.
Blueprint? You’re kidding.
That’s right. That’s exactly what it is. A roadmap if you wish, about how your marketing activities should pan out. As well as not doing any ‘work’ Marketers are also known to spend a lot of money. In fact, marketing is essentially one massive money bag hemorrhage. The point is, marketing takes a giant bite of your startup expenses, and if you’re going to fork out the $$ you better know what you’re doing if you want to see the ROI roll in.
I have worked with clients who have come to me, after taking shortcuts and realising they have to start from scratch again. Not all was lost, it just took a bit longer to get to their goal, and they learnt a few things along the way.
No Marketing Strategy early in business planning =
Potentially higher costs down the track. A common assumption is that fueling ad campaigns is the only cost that will give a guaranteed return. Wrong. Real return happens over time and this means laying down some ground work (which is 80% effort, 20% dollars) in establishing a dialogue with your audience, not solely bombarding them with ads. A Marketing Strategy does NOT consist only of some artwork and ad budget. NO. Hate to break this news to the short-cutters but this just isn’t enough. I’ll be discussing this in my next post, so stay tuned.
Undoing mistakes which means backtracking which means… uh oh. More money. One mistake I recently helped a client unravel was incorrect targeting. Before I started working with the client they were so keen to boost their audience that it didn’t matter to them who they captured as leads so long as they had big numbers to show. Unfortunately about 90% of the leads were dud and so lead generation had to start again.
Repositioning or rebranding. Without having clarity on what you’re trying to achieve, or fundamentally, your brand’s sense of identity, how can you possibly convince your audience that you’re legit? Get your branding and messaging right the first time. Spend the time to create a precise message and stance, otherwise your market presence is worthless. Positioning and targeting will happen naturally once you do this and get it right.
Tell you what though, it gets pretty exciting when the pieces come together.
A well-crafted Marketing Strategy specifically addresses all the key areas you need to assess, being:
Your target audience
Your competitors
Your brand messaging
Your channels
Your execution strategy
Your timeline
How you’re going to measure results
Key areas for growth
Told you it wasn’t sexy. No two companies will have the exact same combination of factors to consider at any point in time, therefore, there is no one plan that fits everybody. Another thing to consider is that you could be early, mid or late into your marketing game and depending on which stage you are in will affect all these areas. The point is having a clear and well considered set of guidelines of how to execute cuts out a whole lot of maybe’s and can save you pain, time, and money. A Marketing Strategy increases your chances of success the first time ‘round and reduces the risks of misallocating resources. It’s fairly easy to become acquainted with some basics, and here are 5 Key Online Marketing Strategies that can be executed by any small business.
The great thing about a Marketing Strategy is that it is malleable - you can adjust it as you go and you’ll only get better at getting to know your audience and their relationship with your brand. Trust me, these are exciting things to learn, when you’re a marketing nerd.
So maybe you’ve made a dress before, that’s great. But if you haven’t, and you want to create the most gorgeous dress with the most beautiful (and ouch - most pricey) material there is you don’t really want to start cutting it wrong, because you know where that ends up.