Developing effective, practical marketing strategy
Providing a clear direction and business-driven goals for your marketing activities
I am often approached by clients who know they need to do more marketing, but don’t want to dive into expensive promotions, events or social media, without having a clear strategy and confidence that they are saying all the right things to target audiences who really want and need their products.
Strategic focus on customers and markets
Before you start investing in marketing campaigns, websites or events you need to be clear about your target customers. Who exactly are they? What are their most compelling needs? What are the implications of not addressing those needs?
I will work with you to draw out the key features and capabilities of your products and services and map those onto customers’ most pressing challenges. At the same time we consider the strengths and weaknesses of competing products and services, so we can identify where you have a strong competitive advantage and where others have the edge.
From this point it is usually clear which market segments or niches are going to be most receptive and profitable. I will support your strategic decisions, balancing short-term revenue against goals such as developing key markets and protecting margins.
All successful marketing is built on clear, compelling propositions – specific reasons why a customer would buy what you are offering. When the benefits of your products or services come from subtle technical advantages, you need to be sure that your marketing balances clear messages with technical insight and accuracy.
By drawing out the true market strengths of your products and services, I create very powerful, easily understood marketing and sales messages. These form the basis of all your awareness-building and lead-generation; they should also be at the heart of many sales conversations.
Marketing messaging and sales propositions
Your marketing really captures the value of our precision machines and software for a specialised and demanding audience. The product literature, articles and web pages you have written have been key in our lead generation and sales campaigns.
Phillip Ruda, Director of Sales, CI Precision
Planning the journey
to a sale
A strong proposition still has to find its audience and stay with them all the way to a decision. So the questions that matter are where your budget will do the most good, and how to stop leads going quiet in the gap between first interest and a closed sale.
Together we trace the route your customers tend to take, and decide how to reach them and keep them moving at each stage. Part of that is weighing which channels are worth backing and which to leave out, so your budget goes where it has the best chance, not where it is likely to be wasted. We also put in place the practical follow-ups that stop opportunities slipping away. You come away with a clear plan that the right people, each suited to their part of it, can pick up and carry forward.
Once you have a strong strategy, compelling propositions and a clear route to market, I will help you create the core marketing materials. This often includes new website texts, product literature and other content for the customer journey.
From 25 years of marketing experience, I can also help you select and brief a marketing agency, or mentor an in-house marketing person to provide your day to day marketing activity.
Turning strategy into action
Next steps
If you’d like to discuss how we could help with your marketing, please get in touch.
Customer case studies
See how other businesses like yours are working with me to make marketing more targeted and effective:
Rugosus
Helping a cyber security specialist find the sharp focus and strategic marketing foundations that gave them the confidence to grow. Clear positioning, a new website and a pragmatic marketing plan they can carry out themselves.
Sweetfish
Getting to the heart of what makes a new niche software product compelling, clarifying the proposition and creating the core content to support direct sales and partners internationally.
CI Precision
Cutting through the complexity of advanced machinery and software to create propositions that are clear and persuasive to diverse and demanding audiences. Strategic foundations and high-value content that their agency and salespeople build on.