Our Strategy Creation Process
Our Strategy Creation Process
What makes a good strategy – good?
Well, that’s for the customers to decide whether to react to what they see or not. That is, by far, the most important metric we follow. But, there are specific steps we can take to increase our chances of producing that kind of reaction with customers.
The Learning Phase
Before creating a brand strategy, we first seek to understand as much as possible about our client, their competitors, their industry, and their customers. We look into past successful campaigns, trying to figure out what the customer did to bring customers and how their market was performing then. By looking at historical data, bringing customers in has always been more straightforward when the markets were performing well. But what about when an industry downturn happens?
So, we always start by exploring three things:
Our Client's Industry
The Buying Persona
The Competition
Analyze the Industry – How it Matters Strategically
This market research provides us with an understanding of what makes this industry appealing to other brands, who the established professionals are, and who the ideal persona that needs the product or service is. We can see how customers behave under different market influences by analyzing historical data.
We start by exposing ourselves to the industry first. Some of the questions we explore are:
We gather what worked in the past for the whole industry – how it began, how it grew, who the top companies were, etc.
Afterward, we explore our client’s past marketing efforts, which helps us understand what has worked. Only then will we start creating a customer-centric strategy that can clearly communicate brand values and consistently deliver value across the board. We align the brand’s values with the ideal persona, paying attention to how the customer base reacts and adjusting as we go. We think the brand strategy needs to flow through several channels – marketing, sales, and communication. As such, the brand strategy needs to be understood by the stakeholders – employees, investors, suppliers, and partners – so that the emotion behind the brand remains consistent.
Who Are We Selling to – Building the Persona
Once we understand the industry, we switch to understanding the client’s ideal customer – who we are selling to. When we create the strategy, our most important key performance indicator (KPI) is whether it sells the brand, the service, and the product. But we don’t stop there. Why does it sell? What did we do?
At this point, the questions begin to pile up. We seek to understand the person that makes such business decisions.
So, we try to put ourselves in your customer’s shoes, saying that we need this kind of product or service. What do we do then? Do we browse the website, or do we go somewhere else? What are we looking for? How long does it take us to make a business decision?
We also look at opinions and biases to pinpoint the ideal customer’s position regarding the product, service, and brand. Brand perception also impacts buying decisions.
These questions are important to discuss because they help us fully understand how a customer behaves. If it’s a bit more information they are looking for – where should we place this information? If they need a long time to decide to buy, how can they keep our client’s brand in mind once the time comes to make this decision?
What about the ideal customer’s background? What do they know? What kind of sentiment do they have toward the industry? What have they been doing so far up to this moment?
We have several scenarios that we go through as if we are meeting this persona and uncovering some interesting facts about their life and their decision-making.
The Strategy Creation Begins Here
Now that we clearly understand the industry, the customer’s past efforts, and the personality that buys products or services, we set to create a compelling marketing strategy.
We aim to place the product or service in front of as many potential customers as possible. Then, we want to propel these customers to a decision. And finally, we want them to be satisfied with the product or service so that they keep buying.
With this goal, we try different things that are aligned with the brand and serve the customer in their journey. How they experience the brand is important, so we consider this when creating the strategy.
Some of the most important questions here are:
Sometimes, the best medium is the website; other times, social media and discussions are phenomenal grounds for building a brand.
We also experiment with different tones of voice to find the best match between the brand and the customer. At the end of the day, the words need to resonate with the customer, so we try to find just the right balance.
This is also when we begin to create some marketing lo-fi marketing collateral – billboards with headlines, storyboards, communications, etc. Anything goes here, that is, anything that can help us convey the message we want.
Remove the Redundant – Stick with the Fundamentals
Once we express our creative understanding of the brand, we begin to cull redundant concepts. We stick with the fundamentals – what is going to make the sale? The best and most important metric is how much our strategy sells.
We refine the message several times at this step, ensuring it is conveyed properly. This is where the most reiteration and testing happens. We test our assumptions, find the data that supports and refutes our assumptions, and remove all redundant messaging that we can so that it is clearly understood.
Putting it All Together
After several iterations, we bring what we found is the best to our client. Sometimes, our approach encompasses many channels; other times, we only focus on one. It all depends where their customers are, and what we have set out to achieve.
Here is our reasoning. Perhaps our client wants to show they are the most knowledgeable at what they do. So, we focus on presenting their expertise through case studies, discussions, applying to panels, organizing webinars, etc.
Or, maybe the client wants to penetrate a new market. Then, we focus on refining their message so that it is easily understandable to the new markets, we position their brand as a newcomer and inspire trust in the customer base.
It all depends on the goals we set and how the customer base reacts to what we do. So, we align and realign our efforts to what is most impactful.
What a Strategy Must Do
A strategy must align with the client’s identity. At the same time, the strategy has to distinguish the client from their competitors. It has to use a language that is very familiar to the customer, respect the customer, and inspire brand loyalty.
We at Aeternus achieve this alignment between the customer and the brand by devoting enough time to really understand the intricate interactions between the business and the customer. We talk with the marketing department, the sales department, the C-level executives, and usually with anyone who has or has had interactions with customers.
A good strategy also invites employees to support it, making them proud to talk about what they do. It inspires the employees by promoting shared values. If employees want to use the product or service – that is an excellent gauge of what we need to discuss.
Our marketing strategy also aims to build brand equity in the long term.
So, integrity, value, just enough predictability, and good storytelling. These are the ingredients we put in our strategy creation.