5 questions your Marketing Consultant should ask (or at least I would):
I started juneaye so that I can do what I love and contribute to a bigger picture with businesses that I believe in. But when businesses are looking for a Marketing Consultant, it's not about who has X years of experience it's about the right fit for your brand. Heres 5 questions your Marketing Consultant should be asking you:
"What is your business goals and values?" - Ultimately if you understand what and why you are delivering to your end user, then translating your branding to your audience will work, otherwise, you need to have a think before expecting a consultant to decide on your branding. We guide and advise, we can't decide on values.
"What is the story behind your brand?" - A story is the true basis of a brand's identity which is embodied in any copy/content published. It defines the voice and tone of a business also. This also opens up ideas and creative approaches to campaigns.
"How was your digital assets set up initially?" - The technical side is difficult and not to worry, most brands don't know the answer to this. But it is important as it is one of the biggest bottlenecks for a project, where a website has not been set up for optimised analytics. At the end of the day, with access to this it enables measuring the return on investment into marketing. Why offer marketing strategies if you can't tell what is working and what is not? I wouldn't.
"What kind of marketing have you done in the past?" - Data is great. Past campaigns that show the numbers are useful in strategy curation. It can help with approach, or just to know what to avoid in the future. As a brand, you would have an idea of what drove results in the past, and if not why?
"Tell me what you are expecting by working together?" - Managing expectations needs to be done early. If you expect a magical number of X sales/conversions/leads by end of a month - I would suggest you don't believe anyone that promises that. Innovative ideas executed in partner with the business is what I am about. In an agile manner, we observe the results from campaigns and re-evaluate whether or not they serve the business goals, if not, let's change that.
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And let's face it, every second person you may talk to is a marketing specialist with years of experience and yada yada yada. How do you even pick these days with the amount of specialists anyway? I say you go with someone who you feel can make it happen and bring your business values to life. They should be able to spark up when you talk about your brand. And of course a background check into experience. ;)
Full article on my blog: goo.gl/5ls1P6
Cheers,
June.