More Perfect Marketing

There's a reputation that big Madison Avenue creative advertising agencies care more about winning awards than they care about growing their clients' revenue. This isn't always true, of course.

As you'll discover in this episode, creative agencies can offer a powerful and impactful way of connecting with prospective customers and starting a relationship between them and a brand. This often starts by humanizing the brand.

Chris Ritter is the Creative Director and Co-Founder of C-90, a creative design agency moving at the speed of culture and refusing the status quo.

Learn more at c-90.com

When you've been in business for more than a quarter of a century, hopes are you've learned a thing or two. Things like where opportunities exist, how and why to enter into new market, and how to attract new customers.

Stephen Halasnik has learned these things and more. A serial entrepreneur he has built 7 companies in the $5 million-$25 million revenue per year mark. One of his companies was on the Inc 500 fast growing and another was #1,031 on the Inc 5000 fast-growing list.

Stephen is also a co-author of a best-selling business book called Crash and Learn. 

He is currently the Managing Partner/Co-founder at Financing Solutions, Elite Funeral Funding, and Al Di La, LLC. 

Stephen is also the host of two very popular podcasts – The Entrepreneur MBA and The Nonprofit MBA Podcasts.

He is highly followed by 1,000’s of people and is a dynamic speaker about being a?business owner, building companies & wealth, and life as an entrepreneur.

Learn more about Stephen's company at financingsolutionsnow.com

You never know when you might need to teach yourself a new skill. For example, how to become found by a target audience of parents looking for great educational content... or to get your band in front of potential audiences and booking agents.

Jason Barnard (akaThe Brand SERP Guy) did both of these things and more.

With over 2 decades of experience in digital marketing, he got started started in the year Google was incorporated with a website for kids based on the characters Boowa & Kwala that he built up to become one of the 10,000 most visited sites in the world.

Before that, he was a professional musician with the Punk-Folk group The Barking Dogs. And before that he studied Economics and Statistical Analysis at Liverpool John Moores University.

Visit jasonbarnard.com or...

...run a search for "liverpool john moores university notable alumni" on Google to see if Jason's photo is still in good company

Search Engine Optimization is a mystery to most small businesses. The goal, of course, is that your business becomes easy to find by prospective customers when they run a search online for the thing you sell (or something related to it).

The problem, however, is there are many different approaches to ensuring your business is the one they discover among the few top results. Some approaches are less ethical than others.

And yet there are service providers willing and able to perform the necessary tasks to get your business to show up - regardless of those ethical concerns.

In today's episode, we talk with an SEO marketer who takes a highly-ethical relationship-based approached to how he serves his clients/

Shaurya Jain is the founder of Samurai Marketers, a Digital PR and link building agency specializing in B2B brands.

Shaurya's website: samuraimarketers.com

Shaurya's blog: attentionalways.com

Marketing can often occur in a vacuum, separated from all the other activities and functions of a business. However, when marketing is deeply embedded in the day-to-day operations of a business, true magic can happen. Magic like an increase in customer retention, larger amounts of money being spent per transaction, and predictable referrals.

Sara Nay knows this territory well. She is the COO at Duct Tape Marketing, Founder of Spark Lab Consulting, Scalable Business Advisor and host of the Agency Spark Podcast. With 12+ years working in the small business space, it is her passion to install marketing and operating systems for small business owners so they can get more clarity and freedom in their lives.

Outside of work, Sara tries to spend as much time as possible outdoors with her daughters and husband - from skiing to hiking to biking to camping.

Links mentioned in this episode:

ducttapemarketing.com

sparklabconsulting.com

linkedin.com/in/saranay

Innovative leaders can be found in the most unlikely of places. Such is the case for Jeff Giagnocavo, co-owner of Gardner’s Mattress & More, one of the nation's premier better sleep store. For 13 years in a row they have been named a Reader’s Choice Winner - favorite place to buy a mattress.

Jeff is fanatical about the 5-star experience and has gathered thousands of online and in store 5-star reviews. His book Sleep Better has helped thousands of people wake up happy too.

As a driven entrepreneur he has licensed both his own custom software and educational marketing materials to others in his industry and in other industries. On any given day his marketing ideas, tools and software are in use across more than 500 retail door fronts.

Jeff’s marketing skills and knowledge have been featured regular in Forbes, Target Marketing, Dan Kennedy’s NO BS series of books & newsletters, Furniture Today, Sleep Savvy Magazine, Marketing Miracles, Predictable Profits Playbook, Lead the Field, Fox Business News, WGAL and Success Magazine.

The site discussed on this episode: lesssnoremorecuddle.com

Find Jeff (and all of his activities) at thejeffg.com

When does a business need to invest in growing revenues the most? The answer may sound counterintuitive... but it's when times are good.

That's because when times are bad, they'll be starting off in a better position. Of course, when there's an economic downturn, marketing shouldn't stop either. But it could benefit from being pointed in a different direction.

In this episode, Veena Gandhi shares her insights into how businesses can market in tough times. Veena is the founder/CEO of Melbourne based digital marketing agency, Digital Street. She has over 15 years of advertising experience and has led million dollar campaigns for companies like Leo Burnett, McCann and FCB.

A data-driven marketer, she helps eCommerce brands in the fashion, beauty, lifestyle & fitness niches to scale and grow to 7+figures. As a digital consultant and performance media specialist, she works closely with businesses, advertising agencies providing digital strategy, CRO solutions, full funnel builds and digital advertising solutions.

Find Veena at digitalstreetau.com and on LinkedIn

If, as the saying goes, "marketing is everything..." and as today's guest will demonstrate, "great marketing is based on great relationships," it stands to reason that we should believe "relationships are everything.

Rena Chiovelli doesn't market like the old boys - nor should you! As a seasoned writer, certified content marketer, and founder of Mindful Marketing Co., Rena has grown an agency dedicated to helping entrepreneurs cultivate a deeper connection to their audience to create more leads and sales using a mindful approach to their content.

She is passionate about uncovering the soul of a business, creating its unique brand voice, and helping entrepreneurs and businesses change the world with their words.

Find Rena and her team at mindfulmarketing.ca

When it comes to marketing, it's crucial that your message matches the expectations of your audience. If they're expecting a one-sided sales pitch, and you give them information instead, you'll likely lose their attention. On the other hand, if you give them the information they need without pushing them to buy anything, you may win their business in the long run.

So how can you ensure that your message is matched with your audience's expectations? One way is to study your audience and learn what they want. You can also use marketing research to find out what people are looking for online. Once you have a good idea of what your audience wants, you can craft your marketing messages to meet those desires.

That's just one aspect of the principle known as "message market match." And the starting point for our conversation with Alyson Lex in today's episode.

Alyson Lex has been writing high-converting direct response sales copy since 2007. From her start as the Director of Marketing at Glazer-Kennedy Insider's Circle (working and writing for Dan Kennedy and Bill Glazer) to her private business helping hundreds of coaches, authors and speakers, to her podcast helping you market your business AND put good into the world - she lives and breathes effective marketing that works withOUT selling your soul.

Learn more about Alyson at alysonlex.com

Google Alyson here

Content marketing is a tricky concept for most businesses. Creating content is one thing - but doing so strategically, intentionally, and systematically is another.

In this episode we talk with Angela Pointon, president of the content marketing agency, 11outof11. Angela worked for numerous startup companies and marketing agencies her whole career. Then she decided she could do it better on her own and set up the 11outof11 shop.

The 11outof11 marketing agency is a HubSpot agency partner and they utilize that tool for both marketing and sales for clients. She and the team work with B2B clients that are focused on growth. The 11outof11 team works on content strategy and content creation for websites, blog articles, email campaigns, e-books, whitepapers and more.

11outof11's team consists of over thirty experienced inbound and content marketing experts, copywriters, graphic designers, website developers, email marketers, and marketing coordinators.

To learn more or for help with content marketing or HubSpot-related needs, visit 11outof11com.