Wish to keep forward of your competitors and hold your corporation rising? A strong advertising and marketing technique and understanding the Advertising Technique Pyramid are key.
With AI evolving quick, consideration spans shrinking, social media algorithms always altering, unpredictable advert prices, and tighter privateness guidelines, it’s straightforward to get caught up within the newest “fast fixes.”
However what your corporation—or your shoppers’ companies—actually wants is a gentle guiding mild to remain on monitor. That’s the place the Advertising Technique Pyramid is available in.
You may catch the podcast episode right here if you happen to would slightly hearken to me speak in regards to the Advertising Technique Pyramid.
What’s Advertising Technique?
It’s straightforward to get tangled within the jargon of selling ways, however at its core, a advertising and marketing technique is the grasp plan that units the course for the way your corporation will compete and stand out within the market.
For fCMOs and enterprise house owners, it is important to not simply know however to grasp the artwork of aligning these methods with broader enterprise targets.
For companies, it’s essential to prioritize strategic planning over fast fixes. Strategic planning supplies the framework to make choices that improve long-term sustainability slightly than simply speedy features.
If I have been to offer advertising and marketing technique an emotional definition, it is how you’ll place the flag within the sand to say, “Here is how we will dominate.” However that in all probability isn’t useful in understanding the best way to create a profitable advertising and marketing technique. That’s the reason I constructed the Advertising Technique Pyramid.
The Advertising Technique Pyramid
Consider the Advertising Technique Pyramid as your roadmap for integrating complete methods with your corporation’s key objectives. The Advertising Technique Pyramid reveals that there is no such thing as a one magic advertising and marketing technique or advertising and marketing tactic. It is actually about integration, and that is what we do for shoppers, one thing we name Technique First.
The Advertising Technique Pyramid has 5 layers to it, and the center three layers are actually the advertising and marketing technique element and all the things rests on the overarching enterprise technique.
3 Core Elements of the Advertising Technique Pyramid:
- Enterprise Technique: That is the bedrock that focuses on development, dominating your market, and retaining shoppers.
- Advertising Technique: This layer is the center of the operation, together with model, development, and buyer methods.
- Workforce Technique: The capstone that ensures your methods are executed flawlessly by your staff.
Once we are available to work with a shopper, the principle factor we’re there to do is develop the advertising and marketing technique after which the record of ways to make use of that technique, however all the things is predicated on the overarching enterprise targets. So if development is a enterprise goal, if dominance in a market is a enterprise goal if retention of shoppers is a enterprise goal, then the advertising and marketing technique is constructed round that and solely that to start with.
Enterprise Technique
The inspiration of all of that is the enterprise technique, which units the stage for each tactical resolution.
For instance, the very very first thing we do in working with a shopper is attempt to perceive the place they are going, attempt to perceive the revenue that they need to make on this enterprise, attempt to perceive the market share that they need to take pleasure in earlier than we ever begin actually suggesting something.
And sadly, only a few entrepreneurs truly take that strategy. Only a few enterprise house owners truly take that strategy. They need to rent a marketer to generate some leads, and that normally leads them to doing a complete bunch of various ways that they should not be doing and takes them away from specializing in the issues which are truly going to permit them to satisfy their advertising and marketing targets and drive actual development.
Growing a Advertising Technique
The advertising and marketing technique is the meat of the Advertising Technique Pyramid and consists of brand name, development, and buyer methods. These three parts mirror the great journey a buyer takes with your corporation.
At Duct Tape Advertising, we consider that is how a buyer or a lead successfully strikes by way of a enterprise. These three parts mirror the advertising and marketing journey within the advertising and marketing technique.
Typically, individuals finish their advertising and marketing technique with a intelligent tagline, colours, and logos, and so they name it a day. However what I need to counsel is a advertising and marketing technique truly runs by way of your complete buyer journey.
We use one thing known as the Advertising Hourglass. It’s a software we use to bolster this concept of the client journey.
The Actual Model Technique
Model technique is the place we are going to assist establish who makes a really perfect buyer, slim the main target, and outline the services and products the client is on the lookout for.
We are also going to focus an excessive amount of consideration on messaging. Are we promising to unravel that excellent buyer’s largest downside versus, here is what we promote, so no one cares what we promote; they need their issues solved.
Narrowing Focus: Pinpoint your excellent buyer to tailor your advertising and marketing efforts on to them.
Defining Choices: Make clear what you present that particularly solves your clients’ issues.
Messaging: Shift the dialog from what you promote to the way you resolve their largest complications.
For instance, take into account Cedar Ridge Retreat Houses, who got here to us dealing with important challenges in advertising and marketing their luxurious home-building providers. Their earlier advertising and marketing efforts did not resonate, leaving their model message unclear and poorly aligned with their enterprise targets.
By way of our “Technique First” course of, we pinpointed their excellent buyer and crafted a resonant model identification that emphasised retreat areas over generic leases. This strategic pivot not solely clarified their choices however positioned Cedar Ridge for substantial development of their area of interest market.
Model technique growth additionally contains issues like how we need to be perceived. Are we enjoyable? Are we very severe? Are we analytical? This drives your whole content material. Lastly, many individuals put this primary, we need to guarantee that the names, colours, graphics, logos and issues all assist the message and the model promise are aligned. That’s all the primary a part of advertising and marketing technique.
Formulating a Development Technique
The second half is the expansion technique. What are the ways we will use to draw, construct belief, get individuals to try to purchase from us?
The expansion technique contains the entire communication and content material designed to maneuver individuals by way of the Advertising Hourglass phases. Definitely, it is promoting and all of the issues that create consciousness. It also needs to be about constructing belief and facilitating a seamless shopping for expertise.
By staying attuned to the present panorama, we, as fractional CMOs, can pinpoint the alternatives and challenges that may form the success of our methods. For example, if we observe a rising development in video content material consumption and it aligns with the enterprise technique, it’s important to weave video advertising and marketing into our development plans to successfully seize and have interaction our shopper’s audience.
Constructing a Buyer Technique
After the sale, the actual work begins. Your buyer technique ought to purpose to show first-time consumers into lifelong followers and advocates. This contains:
Onboarding: Make their first expertise together with your model unforgettable.
Buyer Engagement: Maintain the dialogue going and the connection rising.
Referral Applications: Use happy clients to herald new ones. I wrote a complete e-book on referrals known as “The Referral Engine: Educating Your Enterprise to Market Itself” that covers this matter extensively.
Our previous clients are sometimes our greatest clients. Do you know 80% of an organization’s income comes from simply 20% of its present clients?
By investing in these buyer loyalty methods, you may construct a base of devoted clients who drive sustainable development for your corporation.
Implementing a Workforce Technique
So their overarching enterprise builds on this enterprise technique, has advertising and marketing technique within the center, and the cherry on prime is the staff technique.
The staff is there for the execution. You construct it (enterprise technique), talk it (advertising and marketing technique), and execute on it (staff technique).
Workforce technique contains:
Workforce Alignment: Guarantee everyone seems to be on the identical web page and absolutely geared up to ship.
Coaching and Improvement: Maintain your staff sharp and knowledgeable with common coaching.
Tradition: Domesticate a staff tradition that pulls and retains prime expertise, emphasizing values that elevate each the corporate and its shoppers.
As a enterprise proprietor, the staff additionally permits you to scale effectively and successfully.
“If you wish to go quick, go alone. If you wish to go far, go collectively.”
For fCMOs and enterprise house owners, a well-crafted advertising and marketing technique is greater than a set of ways. It’s a complete system that threads by way of each layer of your corporation. By leveraging a structured strategy just like the advertising and marketing technique pyramid, you may align your corporation objectives together with your advertising and marketing efforts to drive actual, sustainable development.
Go to dtm.world/development for insights and instruments to know your or your shoppers’ advertising and marketing technique and finally develop your corporation.
Navigating this journey isn’t nearly figuring out what to do; it’s about making strategic strikes that make sense for your corporation.