February 12, 2021

By Zoey Taylor

Have you ever hired someone to solve a problem on your behalf only for them to turn around and ask you what they should do? 

If you’ve run your own company for a number of years, you probably got here by hiring the right people to do the jobs you needed to stop doing in order to reach the next level in your business.

Hiring a marketing company can be a challenging decision because there are many options out there. If you have gone through this process before, dedicating hours to researching and meeting with various marketing companies only to find they aren’t the right fit can be very frustrating. Their proposals can feel more like a cookie cutter template than a custom marketing solution designed specifically for you. Perhaps you’ve been left thinking that this is the only option that exists. 

After working with thousands of clients, being on the Growth 500 list 4 years in a row, and getting a minimum 5:1 ROI, I’d like to introduce you to the Marketing Action Plan® that has been challenging this very assumption for over a decade now. 

Introducing the MAP® 

At Intrigue, our vision is to create the gold standard for marketing that entrepreneurs can trust. Trust starts with open, honest communication, and in setting clear expectations upfront.  The trademarked MAP® is a process we go through with all new and existing clients where they come out with a plan designed specifically for them to meet their goals. It all starts with goal setting. 

Goal Setting 

If you’ve been able to grow your business to over a million dollars, I can bet that you have set some very specific goals. If you have set a goal recently and managed to accomplish it, odds are you made sure it was a S.M.A.R.T. goal. 

When we first meet with entrepreneurs, we focus the conversation on their business and personal goals. If you’re considering working with a marketing partner, it’s because you want to get to a specific point in your business and in turn, your life. We want to help you grow your business so you can ultimately focus more time doing what you love outside of work!

Some common goals we come across are: 

  • To go from X leads per month currently to Y leads per month in 12 months or less.
  • To increase the conversion rate on leads by 10% 
  • To increase average project size by 10% in the next 12 months 

Once we have laid out the goals of working together, we determine who this marketing is targeting. After all, you can’t convince somebody of anything ever. The goal is to find those who already love your stuff, so we start by understanding your best clients in an effort to attract more people like them.

Your Business Chassis

In order to document the starting point of a company, and measure the impact an increase on leads being generated would have, we fill out the Growth Engine with every client. 

The Growth Engine is a business chassis calculation. A business chassis is made up of the 5 things that all businesses have metrics on; number of incoming leads, conversion rate on those leads, conversion rate on leads, average sale, and profit margins. By inputting these 5 components into the Growth Engine and then increasing sections such as volume of leads and conversion rate, we can see the impact a marketing campaign can have on the bottom line of an organization. 

This is how Intrigue can begin to calculate the volume of leads that needs to be generated in order for us to meet our minimum 5:1 ROI with clients. 

Identify Your ‘A-Clients’ 

Once the goals have been established, and we can understand the financial impact of the goals of the marketing campaign, we walk through the A-client profile where we identify buyer personas of your best customers. By identifying some of the characteristics of your most awesome clients, we can focus a strategy around attracting more people like them. This is one small step to help with improving the quality of leads and the efficiency of the marketing strategy. 

Some of the questions we walk through to identify these ‘A-clients’ include: 

  • What was the catalyst that led them to buying from you? 
  • Where do they live?
  • What do they enjoy doing for hobbies? 
  • What is their occupation?

When the A-client’s have been identified, and the goals have been set, it is time to audit what marketing assets are already in place. 

Audits 

As the saying goes: “Prescription without diagnosis is malpractice”. We are true believers that we cannot provide you recommendations or strategies before we look under the hood of your current marketing. We want to understand what has been implemented already, what is working, what isn’t, and use that as a starting point. In some cases, there is more for us to work with than others. But we do not know this until we take a look at the: 

  • Google Analytics
  • Google Search Console 
  • Google Ads 
  • Website Content Management System
  • Email Marketing Campaigns 
  • Social Media Channels
  • Search Engine Rankings

The process of each audit has been formalized to be as objective as possible. We use a combination of industry standards and winning strategies we have experienced with our existing clients to complete these audits.

Examples of this approach would be going through a website audit. In a website audit we will examine the quality of the user experience, mobile responsiveness, load time, onsite and offsite search engine optimization (SEO) to ensure best practices are being met, your content management system backend setup, and more.

A step in every audit is answering the question of whether or not the contact form submits and sends a user to a Thank You page. This is a best practice set up on a website to create a clear user experience. It is a simple Yes or No and creates a clear next step. 

Below is an example of a robust Thank You page that someone would arrive at once they filled out a contact form: 

This single question in an audit is an example of how audits help us uncover the current buyer journey and identify opportunities to optimize conversions not only from visitors into leads, but from leads into customers. 

Once all of the audits have been completed and the data has been gathered, the Intrigue team comes together for discussion. 

Case Study

One thing that has become clear over the last decade producing MAPs®, is that in order for a client to feel the impact of working with a full team of marketers, those marketers need to collaborate and bounce ideas and perspectives off each other from the very beginning. At Intrigue we set aside time we refer to as Case Study time where anywhere from 4 to 8 team members will meet to formulate a plan. 

In the Case Study, our team of experts will start by discussing the results from the audits to determine the best course of action. Our goal is to build a MAP® that will first and foremost accomplish the goal laid out, and set up the business for their future success, all while sticking to the budget that we have been given. 

Building the MAP®

When it comes time to formulate the MAP®, the A-clients and audits are referenced, industry related experience is discussed in Case Study, and then a plan comes to life. A well-rounded MAP® would include services such as email marketing, Google Ad campaign, social media marketing, blog writing, and web development. 

One of the greatest benefits of working with Intrigue is that the entire team works collaboratively, bringing the many pieces of the puzzle together to achieve a common goal. Indeed, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. 

Here is an example of an integrated marketing plan laid out that showcases where ads are being shown, the type of ad (image or video), where someone is sent once they click on an ad, and what happens once they have inquired. This is a high level overview of a strategy that’s goal is to generate leads across two markets. 

wireframe of online marketing plan

Once the plan is built, we will present you everything in detail. Month by month, initiative by initiative, investment by investment. Offering full transparency. You will receive complete clarity on how much it costs, how it will work and when everything will happen.

Phew! At this point you might be saying to yourself, there’s no way something like this exists. Well, it does and we’re here to help you grow. If you want to see for yourself what the experience of getting a Marketing Action Plan built out for your company is like, see what our current client Kristine thought of the experience recently: 

 

 

We formulated the Marketing Action Plan because we care about you and your business. Because when you grow your business you can hire more people, positively impact more clients, spend more time in your community, and make a bigger economic impact. That’s why we do what we do — empowering leaders like you to strengthen communities.

If you’re interested in learning more about our Marketing Action Plan and how it can impact  your business, book a free demo today

As a Marketing graduate from the University of Guelph, Zoey is an Intrigue team member who was thrilled to find an organization she aligned well with out of university. Zoey is a marketer who loves helping businesses get noticed and found by their ideal clients. In the community, she is on the Board of Directors for the Young Professionals Network of Guelph and is on the fundraising committee for the Big Brother’s Big Sister’s of Guelph Wellington and Lakeside HOPE House Annual JOY Home Tour. In her spare time, she enjoys getting fit, being around dogs, the occasional shopping spree, and spending quality time with her friends and family.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *