Strategy is what we start with at Underpin Marketing. We believe that without a good strategy you won’t be able to maximise your budgets and effectively grow your business.
So many people think they can ‘do’ marketing, and do you know what? They are probably right. Passion, knowledge and determination can help you achieve almost anything in life. But it’s much easier if you have a strategy.
Never ‘wing’ a marketing strategy
The art of not having a strategy is a useful one to master, but winging it – just doing something because it feels right – is only a good approach in a crisis. When there are no other options and the situation truly calls for it.
Marketing and business strategy is rarely a crisis, even if it feels like one.
A good strategy costs money. It costs time. It costs effort. A strategy can reveal some uncomfortable truths.
Underpin your marketing
That’s why so much marketing is done without firm foundations, without an understanding of the audience and their needs. I chose the name of our company – Underpin Marketing – because strategyning and strategy are core parts of what we do, and it sets the tone and direction of everything from branding exercises to social media posts.
An effective marketing strategy begins with understanding your audience. You may already have a good idea of who they are and why they would want to do business with you, but creating a strategy is an opportunity to dig into this further.
It is also an opportunity to save yourself some money. When we go into consultation meetings with our prospective customers the biggest objection we get is that there isn’t any budget for strategic reports.
Marketing Budgeting 101
Our response is that we create the budget for them by reducing long-term costs, because everything becomes more effective. No business, including yours, wants an expensive marketing strategy. You want an effective marketing strategy.
Besides, the notion of ‘expensive’ is subjective, determined by the person spending the money. A £1 million marketing strategy is very expensive to a small business if it produces no leads. But what if it helps generate ten times that amount in new business revenue?
A solid marketing strategy
A solid strategy prevents duplication, marketing that doesn’t resonate with your customers, and time spent on tactics that deliver little return.
Instead of focusing on expensive, focus on effective:. Before you create a website, leaflets, brochures, or anything else, you need to think about your customers, who they are, what they need from you and the best ways to communicate your message to them.
Answering these questions will allow you to begin your branding and marketing work and set the tone for your content, and is one of the most important things we do.
