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Ben talks to Claire Doré, a life coach about her tips on reprogramming your mindset and achieving your goals.

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Forrester’s report emerges alongside the ongoing debate on balancing the role of short-term direct response activity and long-term brand-building. Increasingly, the tendency to use short-term online metrics as primary performance measures will have implications for long-term brand success, as Mark Ritson’s recent article warns, with brand building techniques historically more intangible to measure and challenging to link to conversion.

‘If you look for returns from your marketing on a 12 month or shorter time scale, you will inevitably undervalue long-term brand building and move too much of your marketing investment into shorter-term tactical fare. This will result in superior ROI initially, but two very different stories will emerge over the next five years.’

Marketing Week, How the value of marketing has taken centre stage

The next 12 months is going to be interesting as marketers will held more accountable to justify and prove short and long-term effects of their campaigns.

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Ben speaks with Rod Hande, an up and coming magician on what marketing methods he uses to promote his business. Rod also does his first video conference magic trick!

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Ben share’s his ultimate guide to proof reading marketing content in ten achieveable steps.

👋 If you found this podcast interesting you might like my Marketing Club. Join to receive regular tips and advice on marketing, video and the web and Pro Members get access to my live marketing webinars every month, exclusive discounts and other perks. Find out more here ratherinventive.com/club/

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I am joined by Shayna Rattler a leading expert in corporate sponsorship and influencer marketing to discuss how this could benefit your business.

👋 If you found this podcast interesting you might like my Marketing Club. Join to receive regular tips and advice on marketing, video and the web and Pro Members get access to my live marketing webinars every month, exclusive discounts and other perks. Find out more here ratherinventive.com/club/

Roger Britton from Community First shares his thoughts and feedback on how Rather Inventive helped and delivered in making his new website.

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I am joined by Clare to discuss the reasons why you should be making video testimonials and how your business will benefit by them.

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Republished from a short feature in an email newsletter for Start and Grow Enterprise.

Over the last 12 months, people have shifted dramatically to buying online. According to McKinsey, ‘more than three quarters of buyers and sellers say they now prefer digital self-serve and remote human engagement over face-to-face interactions – a sentiment that has steadily intensified even after lockdowns have ended.’

So it’s more important than ever to understand who your best customers are and appeal directly to them, especially if you cannot see them face to face or speak over the phone. When you know your customer, it helps you find more people like them, find better customers, and make your marketing more manageable by focusing on what matters.

A great way to make sure you are talking your customer language is to write out how your product or service fits your customers’ needs. It’s a simple process but it can highlight what’s important to your customer and helps you to focus on what to write.

To start, note down at least three goals or needs your customer has. For example, if you were a food box delivery service, these could be to: Save time cooking, Save money or Save stress. If you aren’t sure what your customer’s needs are, it won’t hurt to ask them why they buy from you. Send out a survey or ask them next time you are on the phone or chatting in Facebook Messenger.

Once you have your customer needs, you should match how your product or service addresses these needs. For our food box example, you may help them save time by pre-measuring the food. Your boxes could have a fixed weekly cost to save money. And to reduce the stress of cooking a healthy meal, you can provide free tasty recipes.

Focusing on your customer needs and how your product benefits them will show your customer that you understand them and help your product stand out from the crowd. I find it also makes writing copy easier for social posts or your website as you’ll know what to focus on.

Ben chairs a discussion with Nicky Ayers (Ecl-ips CCTV), Catherine Every (Pippin Copywriting) and Jon Johnson (Mountain Perspective) looking at how future trends and challenges could impact on our strategies for lead generation.

Notes

What could the future of marketing look like?

You don’t own the platform

• Rely on social and ads for new customers
• The sales funnel is out of your control
• No direct access to audience
• What happens if their policies change?

People prefer to buy/work online

• People prefer digital experiences – Easier, quicker.
• Remote working reduces town centre visitors
• How do they find out about you?

Search is voice only

• In the car, jogging, cooking
• Voice assistants only surface the first few results
• How do you get found in a sea of a thousand results?

Tracking is dead

• Browser tracking cookies are being blocked
• Email is hiding your opens and clicks
• How can we target them on other platforms?
• Do we need to collect so much data?

What you can do about it

Build a strong brand

• Trusted and consistent
• Meet people where they are then invite them back to your place – your website

Tribe Marketing

• Work with partners or as a group
• Make use of their audience
• Refer often

Use Video

• Focus on personality (brand)
• Make it useful, share something of value, have fun
• Great audio/lighting

Use structured data

• Answer questions, add FAQ schema
• Be the ultimate answer on Google 
• https://soundcloud.com/rather-inventive/interview-duane-forrester-yexts-vp-industry-insights

Be remarkable
Create email and social posts people really want to read, watch or be part of

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I share our process for reviewing your blog posts to find out which articles are getting the most visits and cause people to take action, and which ones are deadwood that needs cutting away.

👋 If you found this podcast interesting you might like my Marketing Club. Join to receive regular tips and advice on marketing, video and the web and Pro Members get access to my live marketing webinars every month, exclusive discounts and other perks. Find out more here ratherinventive.com/club/

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In this episode I share an extract from my conversation with Michelle Evans onhow developing a marketing funnel can take your from simply surviving, to SOLD OUT. Michelle takes us through the steps of developing a funnel from understanding your audience before jumping in to develop a funnel that will nurture more customers into working with you.

👋 If you found this podcast interesting you might like my Marketing Club. Join to receive regular tips and advice on marketing, video and the web and Pro Members get access to my live marketing webinars every month, exclusive discounts and other perks. Find out more here ratherinventive.com/club/

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In this episode I share an extract from my club webinar where I look at the uses of email marketing and what clicks and views to expect.

👋 If you found this podcast interesting you might like my Marketing Club. Join to receive regular tips and advice on marketing, video and the web and Pro Members get access to my live marketing webinars every month, exclusive discounts and other perks. Find out more here ratherinventive.com/club/

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A lot of people’s go-to in marketing is social media but I’ve noticed a reinsurance in email newsletters. I speak with Nikki Elbaz an email marketer about the benefits.

👋 If you found this podcast interesting you might like my Marketing Club. Join to receive regular tips and advice on marketing, video and the web and Pro Members get access to my live marketing webinars every month, exclusive discounts and other perks. Find out more here ratherinventive.com/club/

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For this episode I’d like to share an extract from my Marketing Boost webinar where I look at why feedback is important and how to get more of it. Spoiler, you just need to ask.

👋 If you found this podcast interesting you might like my Marketing Club. Join to receive regular tips and advice on marketing, video and the web and Pro Members get access to my live marketing webinars every month, exclusive discounts and other perks. Find out more here ratherinventive.com/club/

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For this episode I’d like to share an extract from my Marketing Boost webinar where I share how you can be remarkable in your business and why that matters. Credit goes to Seth Godin for the idea.

👋 If you found this podcast interesting you might like my Marketing Club. Join to receive regular tips and advice on marketing, video and the web and Pro Members get access to my live marketing webinars every month, exclusive discounts and other perks. Find out more here ratherinventive.com/club/

My recommendations and advice for a startup or business new to marketing.

Notes

Marketing Fundamentals walkthrough (Foundation)

https://ratherinventive.com/blog/marketing-strategy-foundation/
My recommendations and advice that I have gained from working with over 500 companies in the last 10years. This is the Foundation level out of the series which is targeted at startups and businesses that are new to marketing.

Planning Section Highlights

• Write down three things you’d like your business to achieve over the next 12 months
• Take each objective and note down how you’ll achieve them
• Try writing your company strap line in 20 words
• Describe your ideal customer in 5 words
• Listen to how Gina Geoghegan started her drinks business Wild Fizz Kombucha
  https://soundcloud.com/rather-inventive/wild-fizz-kombucha-interview 

Top Tip: Spend more time on your planning than anything else as every hour you spend planning will save you so much time in the long run.

Analytics Section Highlights

Start setting things up as when you advance to the other marketing levels you will have something useful to work with.

• Set up a Google Analytics profile for your website
• Read beginners guide to Google analytics
• Set up a monthly Google Analytics email report
  

Website Section Highlights

I am assuming you have sort of website, if you don’t skip this section but for now we want to see where you are:

• Grade your website performance
• Make a backup of your website
• Check your website has no page errors
• Update your website content manager and any plugins to the latest version
• Add a cookie policy to your website to be GDPR compliant

Helpful Links:
https://ratherinventive.com/blog/imc-podcast-10-what-your-website-needs-to-be-legal/
https://ratherinventive.com/blog/boiling-essentials-gdpr-first-step-navigating-new-regulation/

SEO Section Highlights

• Check you have a Google friendly site
• Localise your primary keyword
• Research your primary keyword
• Find out the Google position for your primary keyword
• Check home page title and description are eye catching and interesting

Helpful Links:

https://ratherinventive.com/blog/imc-podcast-1-creating-an-seo-strategy/
https://ratherinventive.com/blog/imc-podcast-2-building-on-your-seo-strategy/

Social Section Highlights

A couple of simple things to cover but we go into more depth on the Pro Level:

• Set up a personal LinkedIn profile
• Set up a Google My Business page
• Get Local with Facebook and Google My Business
  

Helpful Links:

https://support.google.com/business/answer/2911778?hl=en-GB
https://public.3.basecamp.com/p/tTQrpkkRZjz1K98PiAvjtiEj

Business Section Highlights

This is everything else, all the admin but all useful stuff

• Understand basic marketing and accounting terms
• Set up a spreadsheet to log your business numbers

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For this episode I’d like to share an extract from my Marketing Boost webinar where I show a technique to better understand how you can marry what you offer to your customers needs.

👋 If you found this podcast interesting you might like my Marketing Club. Join to receive regular tips and advice on marketing, video and the web and Pro Members get access to my live marketing webinars every month, exclusive discounts and other perks. Find out more here ratherinventive.com/club/

Jason Fried on product validation.

‘How do you know if what you’re doing is right while you’re doing it? You can’t be. You can only have a hunch, a feeling, a belief. And if the only way to tell if you’ve completely missed the mark is to ask other people and wait for them to tell you, then you’re likely too far lost from the start. If you make products, you better have a sense of where you’re heading without having to ask for directions.’

I often get asked if a certain page design or ad is going to work before it’s even off the drawing board and Jason’s post echos my thoughts. You just can’t.

Sure something may have worked before, for another company, in another medium but will it work now? I don’t know. But I do know that we can try it out, tweaking the idea until it does or doesn’t. Either way we’ll know for sure.

IMC Club Member Jenny Jarvis from PortlandHouse shares her thoughts and feedback on how the Inventive Marketing Club has impacted and helped improve their business marketing.

👋 If you found this testimonial inspiring join my Marketing Club to receive regular tips and advice on marketing, video and the web. Pro Members get access to my live marketing webinars every month, exclusive discounts and other perks. Find out more here https://ratherinventive.com/club/

My foundation business marketing strategy will provide you with marketing resources, advice and guidelines in a simple, step by step process. The advice and tips are for any startup or small business owner new to marketing.

Most tasks include examples, downloads or the steps needed to complete them as well as insightful interviews with leading entrepreneurs and fascinating blog articles to expand your knowledge.

Jump to a specific category:

• Planning
• Analytics
• Website
• SEO & Content
• Social Media
• Business

Ben shares his thoughts on how to make better use of your time so that you feel more in control of your workload.

Notes

Productivity books / Concepts / Workflows etc

So much info out there but much of it is fluff

Getting Things Done (GTD)

• Ben’s first productivity book
• Capture actions in a trusted system
• Do the small things first

Capture everything

• Note down ideas, actions and thoughts in a trusted place.
• Use Apple Notes, small memo book
• Helps stop your mind racing

Process your inbox(s)

• Clear to zero – Paper inbox, capture system, email Do, Delegate, Delete – Don’t skip anything
• Process your inbox each day
• Set aside time in the calendar

Is it actionable?
Yes: Do, Delegate or Defer
No: Delete, Incubate, Reference

Weekly review

• Collect your thoughts
• Note down in trusted capture system

GTD Podcast

Really interesting podcast, even if you don’t do GTD https://gettingthingsdone.com/category/podcast-2/

Working with email

• Archive emails, don’t file them
• Search when you need them
• Use a clear subject line, so you can find it later
• Only include people that need to see it Filter email (if you can)

Default diary

• Block out regular time
• Share with your team / partner

Don’t let time be stolen from you

• Keep meetings short / request short meetings
• Turn off notifications
• Plan time for social media etc

Don’t write it twice

• Think like a lazy programmer
• Save time
• Reduce mistakes

No excuses

• Get on with it
• Take responsibility
• Just start

Be above the line. Accountability not Blame
Idea from ActionCoach
Helps to prevent procrastination

Exercise

30-60 minutes a day. Walking is fine
Get access to light
Get 7-8 hours sleep (or as much as you need)

Free audio books

Free copies of my fav
Audible books Ping me if you want me to gift you a copy

IMC Club Member Camilla Bengough from Bengough Properties shares her thoughts and feedback on how the Inventive Marketing Club has impacted and helped improve their business marketing.

👋 If you found this testimonial inspiring join my Marketing Club to receive regular tips and advice on marketing, video and the web. Pro Members get access to my live marketing webinars every month, exclusive discounts and other perks. Find out more here https://ratherinventive.com/club/

Learn how to better understand your customer and fulfil your customers needs with more targeted products

Notes

Two ways to address a customer need

• Solve a problem
• Support the life goal

Solve a problem

• Hungry – Need food
• Back pain – Take medication
• 10mm hole – Need a drill / laser cutter / punch
• More social engagement – Need interesting posts / followers / video

Support a life goal

Move someone from where they are to where they want to be

Jobs To Be Done
‘…your efforts should focus on helping them make that change. Ideally the consumers wouldn’t have to do any work.’

• Not to be hungry – Food
• Be fit and health – Medication / Diet / Exercise / Physio
• Sell more widgets with holes Tools / Contractor / Automation
• More leads – Focused sales strategy / Sales team / Outsource

‘When we buy a product, we essentially “hire” it to help us do a job. If it does the job well, the next time we’re confronted with the same job, we tend to hire that product again. And if it does a crummy job, we “fire” it and look for an alternative.’

Question: Why do customers hire you?
Why do people hire the IMC?

Build a customer profile

Start simply, add detail as you learn more

Describe your customer in five words Good place to start
Here’s Ben’s: Passionate Professional, Mac user, 40

Download Persona sheet blank.pdf to help build you customer profile

Customer / product fit

What are your customers goals?
How your product helps achieve these goals?

Customer Goal / Product Aim

• Lose weight / Simple diet
• Feel healthier / Exercise plan 
• Meet new friends / Group meet-ups

Other considerations

Awareness

• How do customers describe the product?
• Where do they look for recommendation?
• How can we reach them?
• What’s your backstory?
• Why should they care?

Consideration

• What do they know already?
• How will they compare us?
• How long will this process take?
• What questions can you help answer?

Decision

• What do they need to know to make a decision? Price, delivery, returns…
• Who will make the decision?
• How do they buy from us?
• And how can we make this easy?

Paradox of choice

We’re addicted to choice
Broadly seen as a good thing
Taken to extremes

Search waitrose.com for “cheese”
564 results found
136 Cheddar products (was 108!)
Choose from Mild, Medium, Farmhouse, Mature, Extra Mature & Vintage (10 products)
Most expensive, No.1 Rollright £29.50/kg

What if I made the wrong choice
Missed a better option
Able to research options endlessly, the internet makes things harder

How do we cope with choice?
Dozens of sizes, prices and features
Opinions from friends, magazines, podcasts
Mental energy to make informed decision
Decision overload

End up differentiating on price
Why we think choice is a good but actually it paralyses us

Restaurants are the worst
Large menu plus specials board
First 10 minutes not deciding
After meal – unlimited coffee choices!
Decisions left un-made by the designer (chef)
We need to make decisions for our customers
Reduce choice and anxiety Increase the throughput

Thali Restaurant
Vegetarian curry house – Bristol
2 set meal times, 2 set menus, one fixed price
Make it easy for me, keep it simple

Use choice to your advantage
Experiment with 2 beers, 80% chose most expensive, 20% least expensive
Add 3rd option, 80% chose middle, 20% choose expensive
No one bought the cheapest – Have 3 options

“seeking the perfect choice is not only a recipe for misery but more than likely does not actually exist.” – Barry Schwartz from book “Paradox of choice”

There is no perfect choice. Don’t beat yourself up about it

No decision is the worst decision
Why we think choice is a good thing but actually it paralyses us

Getting feedback

Helps to understand the customer better and deepens customer relationship

Learn to talk you customers language

Use testimonial text in your copy
Reflect language back in conversation
Use to improve customer persona

Bring your customers closer

A positive review reinforces your opinion of a company
More likely to refer to others

Sign up for a free SayHola account https://sayhola.co

Resources

• What is Jobs To Be Done (JTBD) https://jtbd.info/2-what-is-jobs-to-be-done-jtbd-796b82081cca
• Know Your Customers’ “Jobs to Be Done” https://hbr.org/2016/09/know-your-customers-jobs-to-be– done
• The Critical Path EP156, A JTBD interview http://5by5.tv/criticalpath/146