An uncomfortable gap often exists between marketing activity and commercial performance. Businesses publish content, run campaigns, attend exhibitions, invest in SEO, pay agencies, send emails and buy advertising. “We’ve had a good month on LinkedIn.” Excellent. What did it do for the business? “Well, we had 47,000 impressions.” Right. What did it do for the…
For years, businesses have been told that professional networking is becoming increasingly digital. Build your personal brand. Grow your LinkedIn network. Post regularly. Engage with other people’s posts. Become a thought leader, ideally before breakfast. But what if some younger professionals are quietly heading in the opposite direction? Recently, I was on a call with…
Your business has changed. Perhaps you’ve grown, entered new markets, developed new products or started attracting different customers. But something about the brand no longer feels right. So somebody says: “Maybe we need a rebrand.” Possibly. But you might have a more fundamental problem. You might need to reposition the business. The two are closely…
Ask a marketing team how things are going and there’s a reasonable chance you’ll hear one word: “Busy.” Very busy. Incredibly busy. Campaigns are launching. Content is being written. LinkedIn is being updated. Emails are being built. Reports are being produced. The CRM needs attention. There’s an exhibition coming up. And somebody has scheduled another…
Scotland has no shortage of engineering expertise. We design things, manufacture things, solve complicated technical problems, and occasionally explain them using diagrams that require an engineering degree to find the beginning. The problem is rarely the engineering. It’s often the marketing system around it. Many engineering businesses have grown through reputation, referrals, relationships and technical…
“We need someone to sort out the marketing.” It sounds simple enough. The business is growing. Marketing is becoming more complicated. Sales wants more leads. There are several agencies doing vaguely related things. And somebody has finally admitted that the CRM isn’t going to manage itself. So, you need a marketing person. But do…
“We need a rebrand.” It’s an exciting sentence. It suggests change, progress, new beginnings and, almost inevitably, several meetings devoted to discussing slightly different shades of blue. But what if the brand isn’t actually the problem? In this episode of Marketing, Properly!, Sean Makin looks at one of the most common assumptions growing businesses…
Have you ever looked at a competitor and wondered how they manage to look so much bigger, more established and more successful than you? Their website looks impressive. They’re constantly appearing on LinkedIn. Their branding is polished. Their case studies look fantastic. They seem to be everywhere. And yet you know the reality. You may…
Should marketing generate revenue? Yes. There we are. Shortest episode we’ve ever done. Unfortunately, it’s a little more complicated than that. In Episode 6 of Marketing, Properly!, strategic marketing consultant Sean Makin looks at the relationship between marketing and revenue, and why it isn’t always as neat as the dashboards would have us believe. Customers…
Most businesses start by doing their own marketing. The founder writes the posts. Someone builds the website. A friend designs the logo. Someone’s nephew apparently “knows SEO”. And somehow, amongst all of this, a business starts to emerge. There’s absolutely nothing wrong with DIY marketing. In the early days, it can be remarkably effective. But…