The closest thing to a “Sure Thing” in creating successful sales and marketing communications is the following 7- step protocol:
- Clarify Company Objective(s). “Growth” isn’t enough of an answer. I want to know if the objective is: Margins, market share, sales revenues, brand awareness, etc.
- Review Past Communications. And, if available, the results of those communications. I do this even if, especially if, Management wants something “out of the box.”
- Acquire and/or review the target market’s psyche. As in “What is it they need, want, fear? What obstacles do they face and who are the other possible sources can they turn to in order to fulfill their requirements
- I find the company’s best performing communication and create a benchmark out of it. Including all of the associated details such as resources used (time, money, personnel, equipment, vendors, etc.) as well as the performance achieved (feedback, inquiries, sales made, number of potential buyers reached, etc.)
- I then take all of the above and add to it my own experience, insights, and mental capacity to create a new communication.
- I then test my new communicatoin against the benchmark taking care to note all the variables that keep an “apples to apples” comparison at bay.
- Finally, I plot the results of the new communication
- resources used
- number of buyers exposed to the message
- the type of message vehicle used (email, advertising, direct mail, video, etc.)
- Time (of year, day, where buyers are in their buying cycle)
- Results (inquiries, trials, purchases, demos, meetings, are ROI)