The hidden code behind behind business growth - make the most of your creative providers

For many of us, that have been procuring creative services and marketing services for decades; how far and how deep we can see into what we do is like looking at hidden code. We can see the code within the matrix - when others can't. I'll share some of the code to help grow your business, whether that is a brand or a creative business.

I've been surveying how people choose the suppliers they use. The majority of people actually use friend referrals to connect with suppliers. That can work well, if you ask the right person and the supplier is properly evaluated... but I would be so bold to say that mostly they are not. Convenience wins out against good sense.

Define the strategy first

A lot of marketers and business owners, including creative business owners themselves all jump straight into execution. Sometimes the executions work, but the risk is that they are not as effective as they could be simply because the strategy isn't sound before action. They just don't look deep enough.

Many people don't actually know what 'good' looks like here, and can mistake brand guidelines, brand personality and past creative executions as a strategy. With a good brand strategy and creative strategy in place you should be able to communicate your unique position in the market, to the right customer segments (and not one universal 'one size fits all' approach') and to be able to validate and rank the customer value points by segment. You will also be sure that this is actually what your customers want and it will be expressed in a way that you know resonates with them enough to take action.

With sound strategic positioning work, the actual creative messaging you create would then just roll off easily, stay consistent no matter who is executing what material for you. You should be able to get better results and spend less doing so too.

To get the right strategy in place, there are some important questions to ask:

• What will make them act? Why?
• What are the worries and concerns they have and how do you overcome them?
• What is the consistent brand personality? (Not just your own personal style, but what does the brand need to be in order to best deliver to your customers)
• What is the unique combination of benefits, position in the market, values, service delivery, style of working that makes up your magic formula? Express that in terms of what your customer gets to define your unique space.

Most of all I challenge business owners to get past their own blinkered view of what they think customers want and prove it. Take out the subjectivity and get actual feedback or data to make decisions to take out the guess work.

Share existing strategic findings

One of the most common issues we see is that the strategic work that has been done is filed away and forgotten. The marketing team or business owners mistakenly think they are the only ones that need to see this documentation in order for the marketing to be sound. This is far from effective - everyone on your creative and production team needs to read it and be accountable to it.

Every decision that your creative providers impacts your brand. Don't think they can read your mind. Don't think that you are the only gatekeeper to the brand values and strategy either. You will also be wasting everyone's time and incurring additional revisions at a cost to either your or the suppliers' businesses in order to get things right.

Spend your time making things amazing, rather than simply wasting time and costs getting it to base level.

If you are worried about sharing IP from past providers then at least have a group briefing session to communicate the key issues in the reports.

Strategic findings that are essential to share (at least the highlights) include:

• Customer research
• Brand & product strategy - be sure you have unique positioning
• Target marketing segments and a profile of each
• Customer value points by segment (ranked)
• Marketing plans (how each communication fits within the bigger picture)
• Digital strategy (really this is part of the marketing plans but often treated as a separate activity - but shouldn't be)

Sharing your strategy effectively will allow each of your creative suppliers to see the code for themselves, even if you can't.

Review all advice objectively

Not everyone considered a marketer or creative is right for you and their advice may well be formed with a vested interest in mind. Not all suppliers do this with any malice at all, however they taint their advice based on their skillset and expertise rather than what the business actually needs. We all only know what we know. Seek advice from someone with an all round skillset and who is on your side without a vested interest in any outcome.

Ask someone who can see the hidden code, but who works on your behalf - with independence.

Don't make decisions adhoc

Some activity in marketing can seem attractive for solving certain issues, however with sound advice from experts you may find even simpler solutions by looking deeper or wider into the problem. This could save you a lot of time and money, or missed opportunity.

This also relates to a common problem where brands and businesses think they need to be active for the sake of it, yet they may not really need to spread themselves so thinly to get the results they need. Social media is a prime example of that. Many businesses think they need to be active in all of the platforms in order to engage with the widest audience, however being more selective and targeted and doing one channel really well may be the most effective of all. I, myself, am considered a top 20% social media user but I never use Facebook, Instagram or Snapchat for business in order to achieve that ranking. I just use a few platforms well. Think about why you would use any of these channels and what you need to achieve rather than just flying off with adhoc activity.

Think about your total marketing plan and how they all interrelate with each other to get the most out of your time, money and how effectively that converts to a sale.

Be sure your operations can handle the marketing

Many businesses forget that there is an impact to the operation of the business with increased marketing. The question is - can you actually handle it?

Test the market first and ensure that your operations funnel is correctly working so that any leads generated through marketing can be captured effectively and converted to sales. Don't rush into big expenditure until you know your business works.

Set up a basic report that captures the number of leads at each step of the customer journey and account for the drop offs at each level. You will see where the flaws are in your marketing pipeline and can focus on improvements throughout the funnel. It may be that there is no cost to focus on improving conversion rates before spending more in marketing. This reduces wastage and improves performance at all levels.

Be careful not to spend too little either and worrying that there is too low a conversion rate (you really wont get every person that visits your website or makes an enquiry to convert - some businesses consider a 1% conversion a positive result). Those channels that are performing well can become a positively geared income generator so that any additional costs equate to a profit through added sales. The trick in getting the balance right is when your marketing spend (overall at least) combined with sales overheads is less than the income it generates for the business. This isn't an exact science either, and the way sales are made as well as last click attribution will impact the best way to calculate this.

The hidden operational tasks can also be improved with marketing support eg. email communications, outbound call timing, text campaigns, appointment setting, website functionality and sales calls.

Testing and measuring each step of your customer journey will ensure you don't waste money, and you maximise your opportunity throughout the operations of your business. Frankly - there is no point spending money on marketing if your business isn't set up to make the most of the lead generation. Many see the two as separate activities and you simply waste money at the top of the funnel and it will fall out the bottom if operations are not in order.

For a free worksheet to help you define your unique position in the market contact Anne Miles, Managing Director of International Creative Services here.

Anne Miles is Managing Director of International Creative Services (ICS). The world's creative services at your fingertips. ICS offers free supplier matching and referrals, and also acts as an independent advisor to brands, businesses and creative service companies. To see how we can help connect you, coach or train, or project manage for you contact Anne here.