The 3 Phases for Marketing Any Business

In our digital world, the line between marketing, advertising, and sales has been blurred. As a result, people have started to create their own definition of marketing. To some, it means social media. To others, it's email marketing, and to another, it's digital advertising.

But if you're trying to grow a small business, what does this mean for you?

Mostly confusion.

When I'm confused, I tend to do nothing and focus on busy work. But the reality is that to thrive, you need to prioritize growing your business.

That's where marketing comes in.

I define marketing as using strategy, creativity, and technology to drive results for your business.

When you're in the early stages of growing your business, you must focus on the fundamentals. We've been helping small business owners grow for over a decade. During our work, we discovered three critical phases of successful marketing.

The three phases for marketing any business are:

Investment
Growth
Management

If you want to see traction on your marketing efforts, put these concepts into practice and watch the results happen.

The Investment Phase

Let's talk about the Investment phase.

What are the elements of the Investment Phase?

Messaging + Positioning
Brand Identity
Website Development
Marketing Planning (getting prepared to run campaigns online)

This is the part of the marketing process where you lay the foundation for future growth.

You can expect to spend a good amount of money during this phase. While you won't see immediate returns, the long-term payoff is exponential!

I can't stress this enough, DO NOT skip this phase! It will lead to incredible frustration down the road for you.

Many people try to bypass this phase and start running search ads and placing ads in local magazines.

And when they don't see any traction from their ad spend, they will inevitably say "digital ads" don't work.

Would you invite people over to your house for a party when it's under construction?

Don't do the same with your marketing.

Make sure your foundational elements are in place, and this will set you up for long-term success.

The Growth Phase

Remember, the foundation for business growth starts with clear messaging, solid branding, a website designed to convert, and a marketing plan. Once you have that in place, you're ready to grow.

Many people never take the time to lay the foundation for their marketing future.

It's easy to want to start trying things to see what sticks. While this may be perceived as "entrepreneurial" or as "failing fast." It's more like trying to run a marathon without any training.

Phase one is where you decide your goals and set the strategy. Phase two is when you put these tactics in place to start seeing results.

Here are a few key tactics to implement during the Growth Phase:

Implement an SEO + Blogging Strategy to grow organic reach.
Digital Advertising (Search Engine Marketing, Display Ads, IP Targeting, Social Ads)
Cross-Marketing, Sponsorships
Traditional Advertising
Create Sales Funnels to onramp new clients
Creating fresh content to educate your audience about your business and how you can solve their problems
Email Marketing
Social Media Planning + Engagement
Essentially, any activity that will push people to your website, store, or services.

Many companies continue to stay in the growth phase. It's in this phase of the marketing journey where you begin to see traction on your efforts. For many, this is when you become a true believer in the power of marketing/advertising.

The Maintenance Phase

So, you've built a solid foundation in the investment phase. And you’ve been working with a team to grow your reach by pushing people to your website, store, and services. Now it's time to learn how to optimize this process.

As interest in your business begins to grow, you want to start to manage these activities. It's time to set up goals, metrics, and systems to help you maximize your efforts.

The objective here is to put your marketing efforts into a system where you can plan, track, and manage all at once. Here are few examples of the methods you want to instill during this phase, a system for:

Create a digital dashboard with key metrics
(Website Traffic, Social Following, Conversions, Revenue, Ad spend, etc.)
Managing domains, hosting, and website security
Google My Business, Gmail (or any email provider), and Google Reviews
It's important to respond to reviews of your product actively
Content Planning and Implementation
Key partnerships with an internal marketing team and external agency to help you plan, manage, and track growth.

There are countless systems and tools to implement in the management phase of marketing. But to put it simply, think of this phase as any activity that measures your marketing efforts and keeps you on track.

Conclusion

Look, marketing is a nuanced field of study. The industry is filled with countless experts and people with different areas of experience. However, these three phases are the fundamentals. Of course, as you progress in growing your business, other opportunities will present themselves. However, in our experience, we've found that these three phases continually get results.

Questions?

Shoot me an email, and I'd love to discuss chase@buildwithbolt.com.

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