Everyone Hates Marketers | No-BS Marketing & Brand Strategy Podcast

I've just launched a new YouTube channel!! The concept? I take real businesses struggling to stand the f*ck out, provide my positioning/branding/lead gen help, and record it all for YouTube. The first mini-series features three freelance marketers (copywriter Rob, ecommerce designer Laura, and non-fiction book coach Vicky).

I hope you'll set aside half an hour to watch it through. Maybe with your morning coffee? Or lunch break? Or evening onion soup? And then, the usual "Subscribe, Like, Share" would go a long, long way too.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCdNXaHHVnVntg5gpveB-5_Q

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Businesses try to squeeze every lead through the funnel, get you hooked on their products, and produce garbage content to capture your interest.

Don’t feed the bears!

And by that, we mean, as consumers, don’t give away your email address. And don’t pollute the Internet with unoriginal content.

Today, I’m talking to Alexandra Samuel, a freelance writer, research, speaker, and author of Work Smarter with Social Media. She helps companies cope with the transition to a digital world. Break through the noise, and get people’s attention using the Internet.

Topics covered:

• Changes and competition regarding the creation of content
• Process of telling stories with data
• Provide original data or repurpose it to stand out from the crowd and gain attention
• Telling a good story is not a guarantee of anything; get your story out and about
• Step 1: Pick a topic/objective and map out a message that you are trying to deliver
• Step 2: Start with a headline and develop questions
• Two camps come with data storytelling: One camp just wants an interesting headline, and the other camp needs a specific type of headline
• Vast majority of social media content comes from less than ⅓ of companies’ customers
• Frame questions in a concrete way to get accurate and specific results
• Data-driven projects are more of an investment than other kinds of content
• Step 3: Sourcing the data and evaluating the angle
• Perform Google searches to determine if topic/theme is worthwhile or overdone
• Single best cure for marketing is to think of marketing as a service
• Is the data useful and interesting?
• Step 4: Collecting good data, if available
• Fastest and cheapest way to get good data depends on levels/standards that you want
• Search for open data, publicly available data, and other phrases to find data
• With surveys, take it yourself and ask others to take it before deploying it
• Finding angles/topics using your own data (Web traffic, purchase history, etc.)
• Meaningful influencers and indicators
• How to present data even if you are not good with graphics or mathematics
• When it comes to design, give necessary data to designer, and determine what’s your most important takeaway
• Dumbing down online conversations as dollars flow in that have no purpose other than driving purchases and competing for attention; the result is an explosion of crappy content
• Alexandra hopes the Internet turns into an asset; displace toxic and terminal levels of material consumption with sustainable forms of online experience and consumption
• Create digital experiences that create meaning
• As a marketer, what are you trying to accomplish with your talents for marketing?

Resources mentioned:

• Alexandra Samuel
• Alexlov.es
• Alexandra Samuel on Twitter
• Alexandra Samuel on Facebook
• The Social Cost of Bad Online Marketing
• Work Smarter with Social Media
• Vision Critical
• HomeAdvisor infographic about home improvement fraud
• How to Create & Launch Your First Digital PR Campaign with Lexi Mills
• Amazon Mechanical Turk
• Sprinklr
• Tableau
• Infogram
• Creative Market
• Bowling Alone by Robert Putnam
• Social Signal
• Canva
• Streak
• Yourls
• Bitly
• Break Through the Noise in Marketing by Doing Less

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→ Buy my book: book.stfo.io
→ Watch my YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCdNXaHHVnVntg5gpveB-5_Q
→ Take my 60-second quiz: stfo.io/q
→ See my pretty face on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/louisgrenier/
→ Leave a review on Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/3p4wL4r
→ Leave a review on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/7iEF1qovZZiaP1iRtxGARo

🐔

I've just launched a new YouTube channel!! The concept? I take real businesses struggling to stand the f*ck out, provide my positioning/branding/lead gen help, and record it all for YouTube. The first mini-series features three freelance marketers (copywriter Rob, ecommerce designer Laura, and non-fiction book coach Vicky).

I hope you'll set aside half an hour to watch it through. Maybe with your morning coffee? Or lunch break? Or evening onion soup? And then, the usual "Subscribe, Like, Share" would go a long, long way too.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCdNXaHHVnVntg5gpveB-5_Q

***

If you’ve ever struggled with a lack of focus in your business, you’re not alone. In this episode, we’ll uncover how you can beat Shiny Object Syndrome once and for all with a simple, practical system for marketing: The 1-Page Marketing Plan.

Who is Allan Dib?

Today we’re talking to Allan Dib from Successwise.com. He’s a serial entrepreneur and marketing expert who wrote the Amazon bestseller, The 1-Page Marketing Plan. Allan has come up with a breakthrough method for marketing your business in an easy, 9-step process that he reveals in the interview.

Topics covered:

How to Write a One-Page Marketing Plan

It’s called the 1-Page Marketing Plan because you can fit your direct response marketing plan for your small business on a single page. 

Source

It covers three marketing phases: before lead generation, during lead generation, and after the prospect becomes a customer.

Each phase has three steps, totaling 9 steps on the page.

The beauty of the 1-Page Marketing Plan is in its simplicity.

If you can’t fit your plan on a single page, it’s too complicated.

While you don’t have to fit every detail of your plan on the page, you can outline each step of the plan in simple fashion so that you, your team, and your clients can understand your marketing plan clearly. 

Phase 1: Before lead generation

1. Select your ultra-specific niche target market

This is probably the most crucial step in your marketing plan because it sets you up for success without marketing bullshit.

Marketing doesn’t mean you create a product you think will work and then “market it.” It means understanding your audience first so that you can make a remarkable product tailored to them.

It begins with this step.

The key is to find a target market that’s in pain. 

If you think about the last time you had a bad headache, the pharmacist didn’t have to hard sell you on pain relief medicine. You probably picked something up from the corner store without even looking at the price because you’d do whatever it took to relieve that pain.

Likewise, you want to pick a target market that’s in pain, and if you can solve that pain, you’re in business… without sleazy marketing.

It’s also important that your target market is narrow and deep. 

As Howard Gossage says, “People don’t read ads. They read what interests them. Sometimes it’s an ad.”

If people feel like they’re reading something that was written for them, they’ll be more likely to continue reading, which is a lot easier to do if your target market is very narrow.

In short, specialists eat generalists’ lunch.

So, how do you come up with your target market?

There are two ways to start.

First, if you’ve been one of your target market, then you intuitively understand their challenges and worries, so you can start there.

Otherwise, you’ll need to start with an educated guess and do some market research. Find books they read and forums where they ask questions to get a feel for their pain points. Next, evaluate the PVP, which stands for personal fulfillment, value to the marketplace, profitability. Does this target market bring you joy, money, and have a deep pain? Finally, test your idea on the target market by seeing if they actually pay money for it.

2. Craft a message your target market responds to

To craft your message, start with an offer that converts.

For example, Allan Dib knew that the 1-Page Marketing Plan converted from his experience as a keynote speaker at events, so he repackaged it as a book and sold it.

Source

Then it’s just about getting into the conversation that’s already happening in your target market’s mind.

To get into their mind you’ll need to interview them, preferably via Zoom so you can record the call and transcribe it.

Get to know what’s happening in their lives/industry.

Find out what keeps them awake at night. 

Then use their exact words from the transcript in your messaging.

When the person reads your message, they should say, “Hey, that’s for me.”

3. Reach your prospects with advertising media

First of all, don’t think of yourself as a digital marketer, because “digital” often equates to lazy.

Digital doesn’t mean magic.

Digital is just a medium.

I've just launched a new YouTube channel!! The concept? I take real businesses struggling to stand the f*ck out, provide my positioning/branding/lead gen help, and record it all for YouTube. The first mini-series features three freelance marketers (copywriter Rob, ecommerce designer Laura, and non-fiction book coach Vicky).

I hope you'll set aside half an hour to watch it through. Maybe with your morning coffee? Or lunch break? Or evening onion soup? And then, the usual "Subscribe, Like, Share" would go a long, long way too.

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCdNXaHHVnVntg5gpveB-5_Q

***

How often do you look at Facebook?

Facebook is the largest media company in the world, and it has generated more than $27 billion in revenue.

In this episode, you will learn long-term principles to create effective Facebook ads. Today, I’m talking to Karola Karlson, a freelance performance marketing manager specializing in Facebook advertising.

Topics covered:

• Performance Marketing: Tracking results, measuring real-time performance, tweaking ad campaigns, and changing marketing strategies
• Performance marketing is a mindset where you make decisions based on data
• How to generate new leads and customers using Facebook advertising
• Step 1: Messaging - Find unique value proposition that makes your brand shine and stand out
• Step 2: Ad Designs - Do not use stock photos, find unique design angle
• Unique imagery catches people’s attention and generates higher click-through rates
• Utilize ready made icons, videos, and backgrounds with simple text for imagery
• Step 3: Create Facebook Ad Account to set up campaign, objective, goal, budget, audience
• Utilize tools in Facebook Ad Manager to gauge audience and effectiveness of your ads
• Understand your audience by asking questions and targeting customers using similar brands and products
• Conversions and results are necessary to determine if ads are working
• Avoid creating too many ads for one campaign
• Start with one message and then try different messages; keep the same call to action
• Use step-building approach to create trust with your audience
• Reasons why Facebook ad campaigns fail and mistakes that are made
• Facebook is the most effective advertising platform available
• Recent News: Facebook manipulated people to get and use personal and private data
• Data is the reason why marketing ads on Facebook are successful
• Good products and good marketing mean no sleaziness needed
• Aggregate Blog: 1 great article per 2 weeks is worth more than 2 bad articles per week
• Writing posts and promoting the blog generates new offers of partnerships
• Communication and Understanding: Learn about consumer behavior and human psychology to identify what makes them tick and buy

Resources mentioned:

• Aggregate Blog
• Facebook Ad Account
• Value Proposition: What Is It & How to Create One with Momoko Price
• Rand Fishkin’s Step-by-Step Guide to Inbound Marketing
• Daniel Kahneman
• Seth Godin
• 18 Golden Advertising Rules by Legendary D. Ogilvy
• [email protected]

***

→ Buy my book: book.stfo.io
→ Watch my YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCdNXaHHVnVntg5gpveB-5_Q
→ Take my 60-second quiz: stfo.io/q
→ See my pretty face on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/louisgrenier/
→ Leave a review on Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/3p4wL4r
→ Leave a review on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/7iEF1qovZZiaP1iRtxGARo

🐔