Strategy Made Simple

Marketing sometimes gets a bad reputation. It can be seen as a necessary evil of being in business. A dirty part of earning revenue.

But it doesn't have to be.

Marketing is just the practice of being clear about the value you can offer to potential customers, and presenting it to them in a way that matches your company's brand.

If you truly believe in the products and services that your social enterprise is producing, and you want to continue making the social change related to your business, you need to be marketing.

In this episode, we cover the basic sections of marketing: brand, and the customer journey.

I also extend a challenge to all social enterprise managers. Over the next week, take 15 minutes and sketch out the elements of your customer journey. The sections of your marketing funnel. Find out what areas make you uncomfortable and where you need to develop more resources. Please tweet your results to @MatthewRempel

Always remember: Keep it simple.

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Do you have questions about marketing social enterprise? Please tweet @MatthewRempel or email [email protected].

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Strategy Made Simple: Keep it simple.

If you don't have a clear business model you can't grow or market effectively. That is why you must know the 4 key elements of a business model:

1. What you do
2. What you sell
3. Who you sell to
4. How you get paid

By being able to clearly define these four elements, you will be able to tell if an opportunity will strengthen or weaken your social enterprise.

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Does trying to grow and market your social enterprise overwhelm you? Does your social enterprise have too many ideas but not enough direction? Strategy Made Simple offers coaching to help social entrepreneurs develop marketing systems so they can expand with confidence and grow their impact. For more information, please email [email protected]

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Do you have any comments about this episode? Please tweet @MatthewRempel and I will respond as soon as possible.

Listen/read on StrategyMadeSimple.ca

Strategy Made Simple: Keep it Simple

Ian Rountree is the project manager in charge of Buy Social Praries. Buy Social Praries is a project of LITE, and is a part of the wider network in Buy Social Canada.

Ian and I talk about the importance of explaining what your social enterprise is about, and how to tailor that message to specific audiences. We also talk about the importance of networking as an industry to attempt to hit the scale needed to provide products and services for the large purchasing needs of businesses and governments.

If you are a social enterprise that needs certification, or are interested in purchasing products from social enterprises, please contact Ian to learn more.

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Does trying to grow and market your social enterprise overwhelm you? Does your social enterprise have too many ideas but not enough direction? Strategy Made Simple offers coaching to help social entrepreneurs develop marketing systems so they can expand with confidence and grow their impact. For more information, please email [email protected]

Get Podcast and Blog updates

Do you have any comments about this episode? Please tweet @MatthewRempel and I will respond as soon as possible.

Listen on StrategyMadeSimple.ca

Strategy Made Simple: Keep it Simple

How do you communicate as a social enterprise?

There are three styles of communication that we explore in this episode of the Strategy Made Simple podcast.

• Informational - sharing information
• Transactional - requesting action
• Interactional - building relationships

The mix of styles that you use in communicating with your customers, clients, partners and suppliers will change the way your brand is perceived. Each style will also have a different effect on each of your audiences. Be aware of how you are using them, and what they imply about your social enterprise.

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Does trying to grow and market your social enterprise overwhelm you? Does your social enterprise have too many ideas but not enough direction? Strategy Made Simple offers coaching to help social entrepreneurs develop marketing systems so they can expand with confidence and grow their impact. For more information, please email [email protected]

Get Podcast and Blog updates

Do you have any comments about this episode? Please tweet @MatthewRempel and I will respond as soon as possible.

Listen on StrategyMadeSimple.ca

Strategy Made Simple: Keep it Simple

Amanda Bernardo is half of Little Voice Books, an independent children's book publishing company. She is the author behind Little Voice and The Lighthouse. Along with her illustrator Samantha, they have built up the company around these two books.

We talk about the challenges of marketing books and growing a business with small roots. We also talk about how to organize a company to be able to have the capacity to grow into new areas.

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Does trying to grow and market your social enterprise overwhelm you? Does your social enterprise have too many ideas but not enough direction? Strategy Made Simple offers coaching to help social entrepreneurs develop marketing systems so they can expand with confidence and grow their impact. For more information, please email [email protected]

Get Podcast and Blog updates

Do you have any comments about this episode? Please tweet @MatthewRempel and I will respond as soon as possible.

Listen on StrategyMadeSimple.ca

Strategy Made Simple: Keep it Simple

Anne Kresta is the President and CEO of Level IT Up, a social enterprise that helps people with autism with job training, while providing quality IT workers for Winnipeg tech companies.

Throughout our conversation, Anne would always mention how what they're doing would not be possible without the support of various groups of people. From her board, to the network of similar organizations, to the autism community. Networks are powerful for social enterprise, and it's important to be connected to both other social impact organizations, as well as the customers you hope to serve.

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Does trying to grow and market your social enterprise overwhelm you? Does your social enterprise have too many ideas but not enough direction? Strategy Made Simple offers coaching to help social entrepreneurs develop marketing systems so they can expand with confidence and grow their impact. For more information, please email [email protected]

Get Podcast and Blog updates

Do you have any comments about this episode? Please tweet @MatthewRempel and I will respond as soon as possible.

Listen on StrategyMadeSimple.ca

Strategy Made Simple: Keep it Simple

This episode is available in blog format as well. You can Listen to/Read it on StrategyMadeSimple.ca

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How Small Can A Product Be?

One of the biggest parts of business is providing a product or service. Once you've decided what problem you would like to try to solve, the next step is developing the solution. Whether your solution is delivered as a product or a service, there will come a point where you have to release your product or service into the market. So, how long should you develop your product before you release? How small can your service be before you start selling? These are important questions, but there is a single key question that underlies all questions of this type.

Where and how is value created?

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Does trying to grow and market your social enterprise overwhelm you? Does your social enterprise have too many ideas but not enough direction? Strategy Made Simple offers coaching to help social entrepreneurs develop marketing systems so they can expand with confidence and grow their impact. For more information, please email [email protected]

Get Podcast and Blog updates

Do you have any comments about this episode? Please tweet @MatthewRempel and I will respond as soon as possible.

Listen on StrategyMadeSimple.ca

Strategy Made Simple: Keep it Simple

Kalen Taylor stepped into the role of Executive Director at Purpose Construction and Purpose Pest Management in 2018. Since they started, the team at Purpose has been working at re-branding and separating out the two areas of their expertise, residential retrofits and pest management.

As a part of this process, Kalen has been leading Purpose to expand their offerings to better serve their community, and their staff.

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Does trying to grow and market your social enterprise overwhelm you? Does your social enterprise have too many ideas but not enough direction? Strategy Made Simple offers coaching to help social entrepreneurs develop marketing systems so they can expand with confidence and grow their impact. For more information, please email [email protected]

Get Podcast and Blog updates

Do you have any comments about this episode? Please tweet @MatthewRempel and I will respond as soon as possible.

Listen on StrategyMadeSimple.ca

Strategy Made Simple: Keep it Simple

This episode is available in blog format as well. You can Listen to/Read it on StrategyMadeSimple.ca

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Who is your competition?

In some areas of life, there is an easy answer. If you play on a football team, clearly the other teams are your competition. If you are a football league commissioner, then it's a little more complicated. You could see other team sports as your competition, from rugby to soccer to baseball. Beyond even that, if you're a coach of a community team for 15-year olds, you're trying to compete for the attention and focus of your players. You're competing with school, music teachers, video games, and raging teenage hormones.

Competition is not as clear cut as we might like it to be. The same applies to marketing.

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Does trying to grow and market your social enterprise overwhelm you? Strategy Made Simple offers coaching to help social entrepreneurs develop marketing systems so they can market with confidence and grow their impact. For more information, please email [email protected]

Get Podcast and Blog updates

Do you have any comments about this episode? Please tweet @MatthewRempel. I appreciate every comment I receive.

Strategy Made Simple: Keep it Simple

Kristy Muckosky uses the relationships with volunteers at the Thrive Thrift Shop to help them build their confidence and grow to see new possibilities. She does this by providing them with a space where they can take chances, learn how to keep trying after failures, and do so in a non-judgemental environment.

The Thrive Thrift Shop is a community based thrift shop offering household goods from diapers to bedsheets to the West End community of Winnipeg. They also provide training to volunteers to help them learn how to handle customers and retail customer service.

Disclosure: At the time of recording I am serving a term on the board of Thrive Community Support Circle.

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Does trying to grow and market your social enterprise overwhelm you? Does your social enterprise have too many ideas but not enough direction? Strategy Made Simple offers coaching to help social entrepreneurs develop marketing systems so they can market with confidence and grow their impact. For more information, please email [email protected]

Get Podcast and Blog updates

Do you have any comments about this episode? Please tweet @MatthewRempel and I will respond as soon as possible.

Listen on StrategyMadeSimple.ca

Strategy Made Simple: Keep it Simple