CEO, marketing consultant, speaker, and author Patrick McFadden, founded the Indispensable Marketing Process to help owner and CEOs of small businesses have a logical or process way to understand, buy, and implement small business marketing services. McFadden acknowledges that marketing can be challenging for small to mid size organizations, who are often working with limited time, money, attention-spans and resources. In 2023 - 2024 McFadden started engaging with LinkedIn Collaborative Articles. A place for unlocking community knowledge in an all new way. It starts with an article on a professional topic or skill, written with the help of AI — but it’s not complete without insights and advice from people with real-life experiences. They invited experts to contribute and here are his insights and advice: How can you build strong relationships with clients and partners virtually? What also needs consideration for building strong relationships with clients and partners virtually is an obsession or strategic focus on touchpoints that often go ignored. At my marketing firm, we believe value has to be intentionally delivered throughout every touchpoint: Email updates Calendar invites Video calls Agendas Reporting structures Newsletters ️ Announcements Billing How can you show customers that you are committed to delivering on your promises? One approach I've found effective and successful for showing customers that your company is committed to delivering on your promises is to make actions the voice of your brand promise. Today, the common thread in almost every element of delivering a promise message is actions. Actions are how you prove the business does what it says it will do. They are how you give your brand promise a voice, and because of that, you must take a strategic and process-oriented approach to how your actions are developed. Look at the way you deliver your service, the experience your client has, the way billing is completed, the cleanup process after the job, and all the ways your firm comes into contact with a prospect and customer. What is the importance of a unique selling proposition for small business branding? Based on my hands-on experience advising local small businesses, let me tell you, having a unique selling proposition (USP) is as crucial for your brand as nailing down other identity essentials—like your company name, logo, colors, and all the vibes that make your business uniquely yours.  It's not just about standing out; it's about becoming that brand everyone knows, likes, and trusts.  Think of your USP as one of these assets that sets your business apart, making it relatable, lovable, and trustworthy in the eyes of your customers. What is the best way to assess competition in the digital space? Still don't see anyone taking this approach. From my experience being a strategic small business marketing consultant, the best way to assess competition in the digital space is by deconstructing their customer journey.  Research every touchpoint a competitor uses to interact with and move its prospects and customers. Move on to audit the elements of their online presence. Put together a grid of content types – awareness, nurturing, education & conversion. Do they blog, create eBooks, newsletters or webinars? What can you learn about their culture? Do they publicly display their beliefs, can you monitor what’s being said about them online? Do they have a set methodology for conducting business? What do they stand for? How can feedback be used to develop a digital strategy? "I've been emphasizing to every owner and CEO who would listen: 'You must develop a strategy before you even think about tactics. This is the key element to make marketing effective.' Essentially, you must conduct a diagnosis before determining the prescription. Part of a marketing diagnosis is seeking the feedback of ideal customers regarding their content consumption preferences, decision-making process, digital channels, and understanding what instills confidence in buying. This insight leads you to developing your digital strategy.  If a client mentions your past awarded contract size as a decision-making element, then you would include that in your digital strategy. What are the most common issues that can affect your website's performance? In my experience working with small businesses, the most common issue affecting their website's performance is on-page SEO optimization. If your website doesn't appear on the first page of search results on Google, Bing, or Yahoo, potential customers might not even know you exist. A robust SEO strategy focuses on getting your entire website to rank well. Instead of using generic keywords across all pages, tailor your SEO page-by-page, giving each webpage the best shot at ranking. What's often overlooked is the link between your website's SEO and your Google Business Profile. Your website serves as the gateway to improved local rankings on Google's local pack.  How can you use user research to create a content strategy framework? One effective method is leveraging customer reviews on platforms like Google, Facebook, Yelp, etc. This strengthens content, messaging and boosts marketing effectiveness. By examining the actual words used in reviews, beyond star ratings, you can make informed decisions, tailoring content, messaging, and services to meet customer needs. Pay attention to recurring themes in reviews, noting topics like pricing clarity, prompt response times, or efficient installation processes. These patterns indicate areas where customers often seek clarification or additional information, providing valuable cues for content strategy. How can you use video storytelling to target buyer personas and sales funnel stages? To utilize video storytelling for targeting buyer personas and sales funnel stages, broaden your perspective. When you think of your business’s sales strategy, you may be tempted to think of it as only relating to the actual transaction where a customer pays for the good or service you offer. In today's business landscape, the relationship with customers is far from linear. Interactions occur through various channels: on your website, in-person, over the phone, via email, in Google search, or on social media. Given the non-linear nature of this journey, your video storytelling can influence each phase.  As you construct a model catering to needs at every stage, consider the integral role your video storytelling plays in this model. How can video content improve your publishing strategy? Instead of asking, "How can video content improve your publishing strategy?" it's better to address, "How can video be used at every stage of the customer journey?" From their initial Google search to their most recent purchase, every touchpoint adds up to a total customer journey. In today's digital world, numerous touchpoints need consideration. Adding video to the path your customer takes with your business is crucial to creating loyalty, repeat business, and generating numerous referrals. You must consider your video content as a means to achieve a strategic business goal/objective. For most small businesses, the secret to creating video content isn’t quantity but intention.  View its production from a strategic point of view. How can you ensure that your digital strategy team targets your ideal audience effectively? When my marketing firm collaborates with the digital/branding team of a small business, we've discovered to effectively target your ideal audience, you must create a sketch of this ideal client.  This sketch should include demographics, needs, goals, & central behaviors, enabling you to pinpoint the hottest prospect. Since most businesses won't have just one ideal client, it is helpful to create personas representing a handful of clients: These personas should address these questions: What does this persona look like in terms of demo and psycho? What problems are they attempting to solve? What behaviors can help you identify them? What objections must you overcome? Where do they obtain information—books, websites, social, mags, etc.? How can branding help you establish your expertise? From my perspective, leveraging branding for expertise involves embodying that "branding is the art of becoming knowable, likable, and trustable." In this context, content is crucial for individuals and organizations. It educates, fostering an environment where people know, like, and trust you enough for business. Effective content imparts knowledge and builds a positive perception, acting as a bridge beyond transactions. Strategically, content contributes significantly to personal or organizational branding. Consistent delivery of valuable content positions you as an authority, reinforcing knowability, likability, and trustworthiness. Thus, content creation becomes a powerful tool for shaping and reinforcing expertise. What are the steps to identify the most profitable market segments for your brand? In my role as a small business marketing consultant, identifying the most profitable market segments for your brand can be achieved in 5 concise steps. Applying these steps systematically to your current client base reveals profound insights about your ideal client—insights surpassing traditional marketing teachings. Identify Profitable Clients: Recognize your profitability Isolate Referrers: Spotlight clients consistently referring your services within this group Uncover Demographics: Pinpoint shared demographic traits among this select group Understand Ideal Behavior: Delve into behaviors making these clients ideal for your business Craft a Profile: Compile findings into a detailed profile for actionable insights How can you use competitive analysis tools to evaluate your distribution channels? One thing I've found helpful in using competitive analysis tools to evaluate distribution channels is to dissect the customer journey. By researching every stage of the customer journey an organization uses to interact with and move its prospects to customers, you can know: What do they do to create awareness? What do they do to educate prospects and customers? How do they build trust? How does someone sample their solution, expertise, or offering? How do they convert prospects to paying clients and generate referrals? How do you create a content marketing plan that avoids fatigue and emphasizes quality? Drawing from my experience as a small business marketing consultant, crafting a content marketing plan that sidesteps fatigue and prioritizes quality is straightforward: Approach content production strategically. Emphasize intention over quantity.  The objective is to create content with a purpose that aligns with business goals—creating awareness, educating, building trust, converting, and fostering referrals. By doing so, you're likely to develop an asset that yields a substantial return. In simpler terms, you need content tailored for every facet of the customer journey,  and the most effective approach is to align various types of content with each stage.

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