I am now taking registrations for my new Marketing Strategy Course.
The course will be presented over eight weeks, and because it will be an Open Source Marketing project you can follow for free (although there will also be an intensive group premium option).
What it is
A course to teach you the principles and process of marketing strategy. Although people have been doing marketing strategy for decades, nobody (to my knowledge) has ever formalized the process in a way that others could learn easily. That’s what I’m attempting to do.
Marketing strategy is the process of figuring out a plan for selling something. The thing you’re selling may be a product, a service, an idea, or any combination of those.
Your strategy sets out…
—— what you want to achieve,
—— what you’re going to sell in order to achieve it,
—— and how you plan to sell it effectively.
Far too many people today proceed to market without a strategy. We are swayed by the promise of simplified shortcut marketing.
Google and Facebook will happily keep feeding you all the clicks you need (at a price), and an ever-growing army of information marketers will charge you four figures for a course in how to set up a sales funnel (which is not a strategy in itself), or even software to write your copy for you. Too often, the result is financial failure and frustration.
But these are all just pieces of the puzzle. They’re tactics, not strategy. And I hope you know that keeping you hooked on shortcuts and easy ways ultimately only benefits the vendors.
When you proceed with a clear strategy, you can really feel the difference.
Because you know exactly where you want to go, you know before you take it if each step could take you in the right direction.
You know what your strengths and weaknesses are.
You even know what you don’t know (and need to find out along the way).
It’s literally the difference between setting out on a journey knowing you have all the equipment you need, a map of the route, and all your stops planned out… or just wandering unprepared into the wilderness.
Heading out unprepared can be exciting, and you may get lucky, but it’s also risky. You will almost certainly waste resources, and could experience total failure. Even a little planning can make a dramatic difference to your chance of success (or survival).
Who should take this course
1) Future Strategists
I believe the world needs a new marketing discipline: the marketing strategist. So if you already know you love the processes of high-level creative thinking, exploring new scenarios, and planning, this may be a direction you should consider. (I am also working on developing a real business model for this, which will be available to course graduates.)
2) Web designers and other marketers
Strategy applies to every single marketing discipline. Whether you are a generalist (e.g. web designer) or a specialist (e.g. InfusionSoft or PPC consultant), every client can benefit from strategic guidance, so you should offer that as part of your service. (In fact, in many cases it should make your own job easier and more effective, because you’ll be working to a plan with clear objectives.)
3) Business Owners
Yes, you can absolutely use the material this course to define your own strategy.
However, a word of warning. In my experience, not everybody has the discipline to stick to their defined strategy. A plan can quickly become derailed as new ideas and options crowd in.
That’s one of the main reasons why I think we need marketing strategists on our teams: we need someone who is not involved in the day-to-day tactical decision making, who can remind us of the big picture and keep us on a steady course (for the same reason that even the best coaches have coaches).
That said, it’s far better to have a strategy and not to stick to it, than to proceed with no strategy at all. So if you want to do this DIY for your own business, I definitely invite you to take part.
Syllabus
The course is broken down into eight modules, each approximately sixty minutes (but could be longer), published on YouTube and Open Source Marketing.
Each module will be build on the previous sessions, so you’ll need to work through in order, and will be illustrated with numerous real-world case studies.
- The Essentials of Marketing Strategy
- Strategic Objectives: How we’ll achieve our goal.
- Sales Tactics: The Circuit II
- Planning Offers: The Awareness Ladder II
- Review: Do we have an offer?
- Magnification: Think bigger
- Launch Pad Checks
- Implementation!
Next steps
If you want to follow along, the first presentation will go public on Sunday April 9th, 2017. You don’t need to do anything, because I’ll send out emails to my list telling you when each module is ready.
Intensive Option
If you know the time is right for you to take it further, I’m also hosting a small intensive group.
- Each week, I’ll run an extra two or three live 60-minute hangouts so that intensive group members can ask questions, share and discuss ideas, and even get direct input and direction on their own (or clients’ strategies).
- These sessions will be booked at different times of day to enable everyone to take part in at least one — whatever timezone you’re on.
- I’ll be using Google Hangouts for the sessions, and I’ll send members links in good time before each one.
- As a G-Suite user, I can get an extended 25 places on each hangout, which means places in this group are limited, but I’ll accommodate as many as I can.
- I’m charging a small fee of only $25 per week (x8 weeks = $200 total), for total access to the intensive group.
- At the end of the series, I will be revealing real business/career opportunities for those who want to go further with marketing strategy. (No more information now, as we’re still working out the finer details, but this is going to be part of something momentous.)
Reserve Your Place Now!
If this is right for you, you can secure your place in the intensive strategy group now simply by clicking this button and making your first $25 payment. Then I’ll see you in a week!
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Any questions, comment below
I’ll try to answer all your questions promptly.
Thanks,
Ben