Getting sh^t done is a vital component of a great marketing system. Results can only come when you complete the right work, launch great marketing campaigns and create first-rate messages. And this all boils down to one thing:
Having a first-rate marketing team!
The solution to all business problems is having the right people on the bus doing what they are bloody good at. Your mission as an owner/manager isn’t to be the quarterback, doing all the doing. Your job is to be the coach who finds the right people and builds the right culture/work environment so they can do what they are great at!
Both Internal and External!
This involves engaging both internal and external people, who, when combined, ensure that you have all the gaps covered. They have the grey hairs of having been there and done that and learnt the hard way.
The beauty of external: There are a couple of things we love about using external people
- You can scale as you need them
- It’s quicker and easier (and actually saves you a lot of time and money)
- No staffing headaches (no recruitment, no sacking, no wrongful dismissal cases, no sick leave, no ‘my dog ate my homework’, ‘my girlfriend left me’ stories)
- Life is too short to try and do everything yourself
Start external, then transition internally as the business needs dictates
It is our belief, that it’s best to start using external partners and freelancers and then shift to internal people over time as the business case and core competency/competitive advantages dictate. For example, you’ll start running Google Ads with an external agency, and if it becomes a vital part of your business and you start spending a lot of money (like $100K per month), you are going to want to bring this in house, as it has become a core part of your business that you need to own. If you’re only ever going to spend $5K on Google Ads, there is no point in bringing it in-house, as it will cost you too much with too many HR headaches to warrant it.
They become your battle-hardened army
…who will do what’s necessary to get the job done well, on time, on budget and to the quality required. They have your back when things don’t go right, and are always 2 steps ahead of you, letting you know why things haven’t gone right and what we need to do to right the ship and correct course.
Don’t be cheap!
Good people are worth their weight in gold. Don’t try and save 10, 20 even 50% just to save money. This will cause you nothing but heartache. Find good people, pay them well (and what they ask for) because they’ll provide much better value. It will be done faster, better and will provide your business and customers with improved outcomes.
Today’s Marketing Team
In this ever-changing world (especially in technology) that we currently live, it’s vital to have a diverse and varied marketing team working for you. No matter the size of your business, you need somebody working in all these areas to ensure your marketing system delivers the growth in new customers that you are looking for:
- Marketing Manager: Somebody to oversee and steer the ship with lots of experience
- Marketing Co-ordinator: Get lots of general and diverse tasks done (you’ll be really surprised at how much there is)
- Digital Ads: It’s our opinion that all businesses need to be doing digital ads (google, facebook etc) and you need somebody that has the technical skills to do it well
- Web development and design: You need a great website and that comes with having a great web dev and designer on call
- Analytics and BI: technical nature of software means you need to be able to pull all data points together in cohesive and easy to read reports and dashboards
- Creatives: good designers who can craft outstanding material
- Content: Is the lifeblood of the digital economy, so you need to be producing great content that engages your target audience
- Social: Time to get social and engage with target audiences
- Email: Every business needs to be running email campaigns. It provides the best return on marketing spend bar none!
The two core facets you need to execute
- Get more of your target audience to find out about you
- Build a lasting relationship with them that adds real value over time (and addresses a real need and pain point)
You need to own search!
Your first and foremost priority is to own search. Ie to own the real estate that is Google. Every day hundreds and thousands of potential customers are searching for your products and services. And we need them to find you over your competitors.
When they search, they find you
Getting more of your target audience to find out about you is what ‘owning’ search is all about. But there is a lot more to owning search than just doing SEO or doing Google Ads. Owning search requires your whole marketing system to be working a treat:
- Your Marketing strategy needs to be spot on the mark so the right people find out about your business through search. If you get 10,000 visitors per month to your website, but those 10,000 people aren’t your target audience, its pointless
- Analytics: you need to know exactly what is and isn’t work in search, which keywords are generating enquiries, and which keywords are a waste of money
- You need a great website: you’re never going to perform well with a poor or mediocre website. Conversion rates go up with a better site, more leads are generated, google likes you more and will bring more visitors to the site, which in turn converts better, so leads & sales skyrocket
- You need great content: Content that engages your target audience, content they want to share with family and friends. Content that online media pick up and run on their sites because it is so good. And this fuels SEO which grows organic visitors
- You need to run a great business. You need to win awards (Google loves them, so does your target audience), you need to be socially responsible and support the causes that you are passionate about (Google loves them too, so does your target audience), you need to sponsor and engage with your local community (who would have thought that Google and your target audience love that too!)
Owning Google Search Engine Results Page
1. Google Ad 2. Google Shopping Ad 3. Google My Business Listing 4. Google Organic Results
It’s time to build a long, lasting and value-adding relationship with your target audience for life
Once we’ve captured our target audiences attention, we then need to build relationships with them for life! We want to make sure that we are always on top of mind whenever they think about a possible topic that you’re an expert in. We want them to continually refer customers to you because they love who you are and what you do.
And we want to do this on different levels:
- Give me VALUE free!
We need to continually give things away for free that show “we are the best at what we do”. You need to continually entice me to want to use your services, and continually entice me to share what you give me with others that I know. This comes in the form of ebooks, videos, case studies and education. And this is where getting clear on your value proposition is very very important!
- The Trojan Horse
It’s time to go on the second date. You’ve won me over enough, I’m happy to test and trial your services for a small fee. We need to build a $50 – $5K trial product/service that allows me to sample the wine before I buy a dozen cases off it. It’s the trojan horse to a long and last relationship. Once again needs to add more value than what I am paying for.
- The Full Monty
Over time we want to work on getting a 100% share of their wallet for the products and services that we offer. We continually impress, engage and deliver on what we promise and our customers keep coming back for me
- The Cream on Top!
Now it’s time to go above and beyond to ram home the value we provide such that the customer never leaves! We introduce amazing partners that they can work with, we educate on all related topics, we build a lasting, intimate and personalised relationship that they can’t get from a competitor.
And we want to use all marketing channels that hit our target audience
- Search
- Social
- Direct
- Pop-Ups, Events, and more
