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Is Your Marketing Connected?

Reading Time: 5 minutes
blackboard with different ideas

This is from the January 2025 Mighty Messenger newsletter. If you enjoy it, consider subscribing here.

I use the same planning process for myself that I do for clients. Because I know it well, it takes me less time to get through it than if I were walking a client through it. It’s not a bad thing, but over the last couple of years, I rushed through it faster than I should have.

I’ve advised that each piece of your marketing should have a specific purpose and if you don’t know what it is, you shouldn’t do it.

Taking it further, everything should be connected from the business goals at the top to the marketing tactics at the bottom. There should be clear connections and I felt like I hadn’t attacked this opportunity like I should have.

I did a structured brainstorming session to aid me while I was planning and it was highly productive.

It turned out to be a great way to think through things while still being focused.

At the end of it all, I realized it was something that might help you so, I’m going to share what I did.

There are six steps:

  1. Gather Your Data
  2. Identify the Business Goals
  3. Identify which Business Goals can be Supported by Marketing
  4. The Structured Brainstorm
  5. Analysis
  6. Edit

Let’s get going.

Step 1: Gather Your Data

You want to have all the information you need to make decisions in hand because you don’t stop in the middle of your brainstorming to do research.

Your marketing data needs to be in a form that gives you insights.

Raw data is like you asking for cake and somebody bringing the cake ingredients.

Analyzed data is the cake.

You also need to understand how your company does business.

There are many goals that a company can have but the one goal all businesses can agree on is that they need to make money and you do this by selling products and/or services.

This means you need to understand where people buy from your company.

Is it on a website? In a physical store? On social media? Maybe a mix of some or all of these?

You also need to know who your audience is. Most businesses know this but it needs to be clear in your mind as you go through this exercise.

Step 2: Identify the Business Goals

Your marketing goals should always be connected to your business goals so, it’s important to know what they are.

I know this sounds silly but you’d be surprised how often I’ve been in meetings where clients couldn’t tell me their business goals.

Without knowing the business goals, building a marketing program that produces the desired results will be difficult and it’s a recipe for failure.

Once you’re clear on the business goals you’re ready for the next step.

Step 3: Identify which Business Goals can be Supported by Marketing

Businesses have many different goals but not all of them can be supported by marketing.

For example, if there is a business goal to build a new factory, there is nothing marketing can do to help.

However, if a business goal is to hire for a newly opened factory, there is a role marketing can play.

Marketing doesn’t exist in a vacuum, which is to say, it doesn’t serve itself. It serves the business.

With that in mind, identify the business goals that marketing could support.

Step 4: The Structured Brainstorm

I did the brainstorming because I was struggling to connect everything.

I needed a way to think everything through, but I also needed it in a format that allowed me to easily jump around and see my thoughts. This meant writing everything down.

I’m calling this a structured brainstorm because I used some simple prompts to guide me.

You need to think freely but it needs to be within certain confines.

Before I get into the prompts, I want to talk quickly about the four areas that marketing is broken into.

The first is owned media. These are the channels you own such as your website and your email list.

The second is social media. You know this well: Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, Bluesky,

Snapchat, Pinterest, X, etc. I also lump YouTube into social media because it doesn’t fit anywhere else.

The third is earned media which is partnering with media to gain exposure through articles and interviews. This could involve traditional media such as TV, newspapers, radio, and magazines, as well as new media such as podcasts, videos, and blogs.

The last is paid media. These are ads. They can be on social media, in search results, banners on websites, TV, radio, newspapers, magazines, or billboards. Anyplace you can place an ad would be considered paid media.

Now we’re ready for the first prompt but keep in mind the business goals your marketing will support.

What do you need from each area of marketing?

Put another way, how can each marketing area help you meet a business goal?

Keep it at a high level for now.

For instance, my answer to this question about owned media was:

  • People to visit the website
  • People to navigate through the website
  • People to subscribe to the newsletter
  • People to contact me about my services

The next prompt is to take your answers and start digging into them by asking who, what, when, why, where, and how questions.

For example:

  • Who do I want to visit the website?
  • Why would they visit the website?
  • What kind of information would they want to see on the website?
  • What would prompt them to navigate through the website?
  • What kind of content would they want to see?

You’ll notice I framed the questions from the customer’s point of view.

The simple truth is we need customers to survive and they don’t care what we need. They are looking out for themselves so you need to provide things that interest them and solve their problems.

You might be wondering how long you should spend on your brainstorming.

I spent over an hour on it. Not on purpose, I just got into what I was doing and lost track of time. Plus, I’m the classic overthinker.

I would say to give yourself 20 – 30 minutes.

The more you know about the business, its goals, and how marketing can support them, the easier it will be.

Step 5: Analysis

What you’re going to do is pull out the pieces that can be used.

You’re looking for three things:

  1. Marketing goals
  2. Strategic ideas
  3. Potential tactics

Marketing goals are high-level and state where you want to be.

Strategy tells you how you’re going to meet the marketing goal.

Tactics are the action.

However, you need to make sure the ideas you are pulling out support why you did this in the first place.

Make sure that the marketing goals you’ve identified support business goals.

Will the strategic ideas help you meet the marketing goals?

Do the tactical ideas align with the strategy?

The ideas you pull out do not have to be perfectly formed. You’ll flesh them out if needed in the next step.

Step 6: Edit

There are two things that you are going to do in this step.

The first, I’ve already mentioned. Not every idea is going to be completely fleshed out.

This is where you will do this.

The second is arguably the most important. Editing isn’t just about fleshing ideas out. It’s about “deleting” them as well.

This will apply to tactics more to marketing goals and strategy.

Do you have the budget and resources to do these things?

This isn’t one of those “grey” area questions.

The answer is either yes or no.

If it’s yes, then your idea(s) can cross the bridge and move forward.

If the answer is no, they don’t move forward but don’t actually delete them. Put them in a document or a folder of ideas because, at some point in the future, you might be able to pursue them.

Once you’ve done this this exercise is over.

I found this exercise to be extremely helpful. I can look at my marketing goals, strategy, and tactics and see how they connect and how they will help me meet business goals.

I hope you found this helpful and if you go through this exercise let me know how it worked for you. I want to hear the good bad and ugly.

Shane Carpenter
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