Category: Planning

We shine the spotlight on websites for major brands to review the good, the bad and the ugly. This month we turn our gaze to contact forms, dissecting their strengths and weaknesses. Reviewing how easy they are to find, access and navigate and whether they are visually interesting.

Ben takes the hot seat as Granger Forson interviews him on BizSmart Gloucestershire, the radio station dedicated to providing businesses with expert advice for shaping their success. Listen to gain insights from Ben’s professional perspective.

We shine the spotlight on websites for major brands and review the good, the bad and the ugly. This month we focus on buttons. How they are used, the colour, size, text how effectively we think they are being used.

Join Ben & Jack McCaughtrie as they discuss the benefits and the often overlooked disadvantages of using tracking codes on your website.

We openned the club and invited Trevor Ray Hart (Trevor Ray Hart Photography) to have a website & marketing review. Ben shares SEO tips, content ideas and different ways they can draw more traffic to his website.

We open the club and invited Aaron Carrington (Carrington Guitar Academy) to have a website & marketing review. Ben shares SEO tips, content ideas and different ways they can draw more traffic to their website.

Ben is joined by Paul Watson who helps companies ignite their potential by transforming processes & systems to empower people and enhance business performance.

Ben is joined by Kate (Journey in Style) and Dan (Dan Barker Studios) to discuss how these two businesses have negociated the challenges of product pricing.

We invited club member Nancy Bell (Campagna Collections) to have a website & marketing review where Ben shared SEO tips, content ideas and different ways they can draw more traffic to their website.

Having a website for your business or personal use has specific legal responsibilities. To ensure that your website complies with the law, here’s a step-by-step guide on what your website needs to be legal.

Ben shares tips and ideas on how to feel more in control of your work, emails and tasks. From apps and systems, to changing your mindset, Ben covers the core concepts he uses every day.

We open the club and invite two guest members to have a website & marketing review where we will share SEO tips, content ideas and different ways they can draw more traffic to their website.

This is a fantastic session where you can sit in the wings and glean ideas for your own website! This month we are joined by Jo Biggadike (The Ambling Press Printmaker) and Ruth Twiggs & Jon Parsons (The Cotswold Cabin Company)

We were joined by Paige NeJame who shared the journey behind, The Carbon Almanac. This book provides a powerful tool to help us create change, right here and right now and be greener with our marketing. When it comes to the climate, we don’t need more marketing or anxiety. We need established facts and a plan for collective action.

Ben was joined by Alex Coppock (Communion Architects) to discuss the path back to sanity in which Cal Newport’s book: A world Without Email offers a variety of road-tested practices to help us escape the tyranny of our inboxes in order to achieve a calmer, more intentional, and productive working life.

PR marketing is a great way to increase brand visibility, website traffic and is also a key element for SEO. In this webinar Heidi Chamberlain-Jones shares her method on how to perfect your PR marketing strategy including how to build relationships with key journalists.

Catherine Every shares her step-by-step process on how to write good web copy. Her presentation touches on how to decide on the structure of your website, how to research keywords and guidance on how to write great copy for your website.

We like working with Catherine on web projects as she understands how good copy can engage a reader and stimulate them into action.

Ben shares his method for developing a blog and content strategy which will help get your business found online.

In this episode we take stock of our marketing, discussing the importance of evaluating the year before and why you should set goals for the year ahead.

Ben is joined by Club Member Nicky Ayers from Ecl-ips as they both dive into their marketing strategies and share what went well, what is still a work in progress, what goals we’re working towards and how we’re going to tackle them.

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.

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For the next six episodes I’ll be walking you through the foundation level of my Business Marketing Strategy. I’m going give you ideas, advice and guidelines in a simple, step by step process that will work for any startup or business new to marketing.

The episodes cover Planning, Stats and Analytics, Website Development, Search Engine Optimisation, Social Media and Business tasks that you need to do to give you marketing strategy a great foundation.

If you want to jump ahead, everything I’m talking about is available online now at ratherinventive.com/marketing-strategy

For now here’s part one and it’s about planning. Enjoy

👋 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 https://ratherinventive.com/club/