Articles

How Marketing Can Break the Feast and Famine Cycle in Business

Someone I know recently posted on LinkedIn asking whether anyone had any work available because a couple of projects fell through and they didn’t have much in their pipeline. It was an honest post and one that will resonate with many small business owners (including me). It’s so easy to get busy doing the doing […]

What Businesses Should Understand Before Hiring a Marketing Agency

Hiring a marketing agency should be an exciting step for your business. You've reached a point where you want more leads, more customers, stronger brand awareness, or simply better results from your marketing efforts. Naturally, you start looking for experts who can help make that happen. Unfortunately, for many business owners, the experience doesn't live […]

Is Your Point of Difference… Actually Unique?

“Unique” is one of the most overused, cliché words in marketing. Most businesses say they are but very few actually are. The problem is that businesses confuse their point of difference with what they are good at, their strengths. Here’s what we hear all the time: These may all be strengths of the business but […]

Strategy vs Tactics: A 5-Minute Explanation

One of the biggest mistakes businesses make in marketing is confusing strategy with tactics. They jump straight into doing things - running Google Ads, posting on social media, building a new website - without ever stepping back and asking “What’s the plan?”. It’s natural that we think that way. Tactics are the visible part of […]

Marketing workshop with Marketing Architect

Why Marketing Starts With Your Internal Team

When you think about marketing, you usually think about what you communicate externally- advertising, social media, campaigns, and messaging designed to attract customers. But the most powerful marketing doesn’t start outside your business. It starts inside it. Your internal team is the first audience for your brand. If they don’t understand your values, your positioning, […]

Anyone Can Buy Sales - Price vs Value

There’s a brutal truth in business that most owners don’t want to admit. Anyone can buy sales. All you have to do is drop your price low enough. We see it all the time in retail – discounts, bundles, a free giveaway, matching competitors pricing and even beating competitors pricing. You know that large retailer […]

Marketing vs Sales: Different Roles, Same Goal

So often I see my clients’ treating sales and marketing like they are different departments with different responsibilities. Marketing exists to generate leads and hand them to sales for them to convert. That might be the traditional approach to sales and marketing but it’s also one of the biggest causes of misalignment, wasted budget, and […]

How Much Should We Spend on Marketing?

It’s one of the most common questions I get asked. It a simple question to ask but it’s not a simple one to answer. There are many layers we need to peel away in order to be able to answer it effectively. Largely, it depends on your business, your goals, your industry, and your appetite […]

Brand Awareness vs Lead Generation: Which One Matters More?

If you’ve ever asked yourself: “Should I focus my marketing on brand awareness or lead generation?” You’re not alone. It’s one of the most common questions business owners and marketers wrestle with. There are endless platforms, tools, and tactics, and unless you’ve got an unlimited time and budget (and let’s face it, very few do), […]

You Can’t Solve A Problem You Don’t Understand

Let me ask you a question:Are you building your marketing on real insight? It’s easy to think we “know” our customers. We work with them every day. And it’s tempting to believe we “get” our market. After all, there’s no shortage of data out there, right? There is no doubt that your daily customer interactions […]

Why Your Brand Must Start With A Purpose

Do you ever have the feeling that your marketing message isn’t quite right? Perhaps deep down you don’t feel a real connection with it or you aren’t getting much engagement from your customers? You’ve got the professional looking logo, the polished website, clever taglines, and a strong product but your brand feels a little generic […]

Why a marketing junior doesn't solve your marketing problems

Why a Junior Marketer Isn’t the Answer to Your Marketing Problems

When small and medium-sized businesses start their marketing journey, one of the first moves they often make is hiring a junior marketer. It makes sense on the surface: someone young, enthusiastic, digitally savvy, dedicated to marketing and affordable. Perfect, right? Not quite. Hiring a junior marketer is not the silver bullet you might think it […]

What is AEO (Answer Engine Optimization) or GEO (Generative Engine Optimisation) and Why Should You Care?

The term "SEO" is thrown around a lot as a core marketing activity for many businesses. It’s been one of the backbones of digital marketing for years, helping businesses get found on Google by optimising keywords. But there’s a couple of new terms gaining traction. AEO - Answer Engine Optimisation and GEO – Generative Engine […]

How to Establish Who Your Target Audience Is

When it comes to marketing, one of the most common mistakes businesses make is trying to speak to everyone. But if you’re talking to everyone, you’re connecting with no one. Your product or service might help all kinds of people. But if you try to appeal to them all at once, your message gets watered […]

Marketing Doesn’t Work

At least, not the way most people do it. You might think that sounds strange coming from a marketer. But stay with me and I’ll explain what I mean, why it's a common trap, and how to turn things around so your marketing finally starts doing what it’s supposed to do: grow your business. The […]