The 5-Step Marketing Plan That Works

Most people waste a ton of money on marketing. This five-step marketing plan will help you survive the next couple of years and doesn’t involve spending thousands of dollars on advertising and marketing. Yep, you read that right. Marketing doesn’t have to be crazy expensive.

Create a Clear Message

Many businesses actually confuse people with marketing 🤯. In order to have increase sales and improve your marketing, you’ve got to know what problem your product or service solves, invite your customer into a story, and tell them how to do business with you. If your potential customer can’t figure out how you can solve their problem, they’ll look for someone who can. Use the seven-part StoryBrand framework to create that clear messaging.

Create an Elevator Pitch

Marketing confusion doesn’t just happen when people visit your website or scroll through your social media feed. It also happens when they talk to you in person.

The elevator pitch has three parts:
The problem – What’s the pain point you help customers solve?
The solution – What’s your unique solution to that pain point?
The result – How does your customer’s life look after their pain is resolved?

People should leave any interaction with your business (website, social media, conversation with you or your team) knowing exactly what you can do to solve their problem, and how they can follow up with you.

Apply Your Clear Message to Your Website

This new elevator pitch and clear message will direct what you say on your website. Most people visit a company’s website before they decide to do business with them. If your website is confusing and doesn’t have frequent call-to-action buttons telling people how to get started with you, they’ll leave your site and find one that is easier to do business with.

Create a Lead Generating PDF

Let’s face it, not everyone is ready to do business with you the moment you connect with them. You need a plan for capturing their contact information in order to regularly stay in touch with them so that when they DO need your product or service, you’ve already established trust with them, built your authority, and given them the reasons to choose you over your competitors. With a lead generator, you provide your potential customers with valuable information that they can’t access until they’ve given you their email address. This could be a downloadable checklist, a quiz matching them to your products, or a tip sheet for getting something done.

Create a Nurture Campaign

Here’s where that regular contact with potential customers comes in. You want to send regular communications to your potential customers so you are always top-of-mind when they are ready to do business with your industry. This is not intended to just get your name in their inbox every week, but as a way for you to share helpful information, establish your authority in your industry, and develop a relationship with your customers so that there is no doubt in their mind that you will solve their problem. Ideally, a nurture campaign would be a weekly email but if that’s more than you can handle right now, monthly is just fine. The key is to be consistent.

Get Started on Your Marketing Plan Now

There you have it. The five steps you need to take in order to help your business survive (and thrive!) during the next few years.

Do you want to know the number one way this marketing plan fails for people? In the execution. It’s not that the process doesn’t work. It’s that people don’t complete the plan.

They say time is money, and you have little time as an entrepreneur. I see you. When you’re trying to run a business, have a personal life, and stay sane, time is the last thing you feel like you have an abundance of. But this marketing plan is all you need to succeed.

So, grab a coffee, take a deep breath, and commit here and now to following through on this. It might take you a few months. Maybe you can lock yourself in your office for a week with no distractions to get it all done. Whatever your pace is, set your intention, manage your expectations, and kick the process off.

You can do this. I’m here if you get stuck or need some accountability.