Want to sell? Start with a Marketing Plan!

Without exception, every company I’ve ever worked with has expressed the same sentiment, ‘we want to sell more stuff’. ‘Stuff’ has meant: products, services, solutions, widgets, subscriptions and even businesses. But they don’t always have a marketing plan.

The next thing clients say, even the large ones is, ‘we don’t have a big budget, what can we do? A sales-campaign? But if we go ‘outbound’, the first thing a prospect will do is visit the website.’

But the website’s out-of-date/rubbish/says-the-wrong-things/doesn’t-work/has-no-content/won’t-collect-visitor-details/hasn’t-got-eCommerce-capability or analytics. And it makes us look like muppets!

‘So, lets do a new website!’ ‘But there’s no one in-house can do it, and what will we say – what do we actually do now, and for whom? And our logo & branding are pants’. Well it was done ten or twenty years ago!

But before we needlessly make problems, lets understand that there is a solution and it should always starts with a plan. The other stuff:

• Positioning & Branding
• Website Development & SEO
• Content & Collateral
• Digital & Multi-platform marketing
• Business Development/Lead Generation/Sales Campaigns
• Marketing Automation
• Public Relations & Social Media

… get worked into the plan in the way that best suit the business’s objectives and cashflow realities.