Whether you're looking to overhaul your marketing, or are starting from a blank canvas, the first step is to get the right frameworks in place.
Ultimately, your objective is to have a set of systems and processes which reliably generate a stream of sales qualified leads. So, if that's the desired outcome, then you need a methodical plan to get there.
That was the focus of last week's session, where I walked through frameworks that help generate predictable performance while avoiding common marketing mistakes.
The full session recording is above, and below are the time markers for key points of discussion, links to resources that we mention and a copy of the transcript. Enjoy!
Start Marketing Again - Training Resources
Here are the resource links we mention in the video.
Book your marketing game plan session >
On-demand online workshop registration >
Marketing Gauge worksheet >
Start Marketing Again - Key Sections
If you've already seen a portion of this video on a separate training portal, here's the time markers so you can skip straight to a section of the footage you're looking for.
0:00 - Introduction: Why businesses get caught having a stop/start approach to marketing?
3:53 - The Marketing Gauge: Are you positioned for growth or decline?
10:14 - Don't Burn $30k: Avoiding the common marketing tipping point where businesses disengage
17:20 - Unreliable Wins: Aiming for clarity so we can replicate wins and avoid losses
29:29 - Build a Vending Machine: Buying future revenue (marketing investment vs expense)
*37:32 - Use My Framework: This wasn't planned - but here's my framework - The Marketing Compass
Start Marketing Again - Full Video Transcript
Kamahl Simon: [00:00:00] Alrighty, you are in for a treat today. It is my huge, huge privilege to get some time with James Rendell. James is the founder, the owner, the chief cook and bottle washer of Co-pilot Marketing. And, uh, James has agreed to come along, have a conversation with us today around marketing business, but not specifically just marketing in business.
Why we quite often stop our marketing and this is something that's really close to home. I've bumped my head up against a brick wall in building businesses for years, literally for decades where I've done a bit and it's worked for a little bit and then I've stopped. And then I haven't been able to get it going.
And this is just such a great timely conversation, James, for a ton of my clients as well. I can't even tell you how many people have experienced this welcome brother.
James Rendell: [00:00:54] Thanks Kamahl. Yeah. It's such a common problem. And I'm so glad, that we've got an opportunity today to, to really dig into it and make sure we give people, you know, a fix, you know, if you've been experiencing this, then let's get out of it.
Kamahl: [00:01:03] Let's get a solution, hundred percent first things first. Why the hell do we do it? What do people stop in? What do they stop and give up on their marketing and their business? When I know how important it really is. Yeah.
James: [00:01:18] I tend to find that. It's, it's a lack of systems and processes, to be honest, you know, I think for a lot of companies that don't have a depth of experience in marketing, or they don't have a senior marketing person on staff, things tend to be a bit of a make it up as you go process, you know, I will be saying good idea.
Or we say another company, that's doing something and we try and emulate it and we don't get traction. So we just move away. Maybe we have a few referrals that fills up the pipeline for a little while and we just, you know, we disengage in your marketing, and then we find Jesus. We really need to kick things into gear.
We try something again, but it's not a repeatable effort. It's just, you know, it's starting dots at dartboard, which is hope as a strategy. And you know, every business owner knows that that's not the solution, but I just don't have a great solution.
Kamahl: [00:01:58] Yeah. Okay. I know you do a lot of work with internal marketing teams do on, and I'm getting those to work on building a really profitable marketing plans is probably the best way to do it.
Uh, Sun Tzu in the art of war said they may, they may understand my tactics, but they will never understand my strategy. And I think as you describe the dart at the dartboard following what other people do, it's really copying other people's tactics without understanding the strategy is that sort of nailing where you at.
James: [00:02:28] That is exactly what it is. And that's, you know, it's explainable, it's obvious. We can understand why people do it. It's just an absence of an understanding of what do we need to actually put in place. And when you don't know what you don't know, you can repeat the same sorts of mistakes. They're just dressed up differently, but you can't with the sense of clarity, see that it wasn't going to work.
And that's where people get frustrated with marketing You know, there's lots of companies out there that profess that there's some form of magic dust. We just need a certain piece of software or all you need is one funnel or one campaign, you know, within five minutes, you'll have, you know, clients on a platter.
It doesn't happen that way. And people have just become disenfranchised with believing that I just need the magic dust.
Kamahl: [00:03:09] Well, I hear one funnel away. One more time. Seriously. Yeah. You are one funnel away. It just takes you a decade of experience to know what to put into one funnel before you deploy it. But yeah, spot on hundred percent.
A hundred percent. Okay. So let's, let's go really a much higher level. I want to give people a ton of value here, obviously. Uh, I can go and play a James and James is team to come in and coach the business and build a strategy with us before doing that. But even before doing that, it's like why and the, how is the, the macro structure?
Because bringing someone into the business, even when I go in and coach businesses, uh, it's not, I'm not the magic pill. either They don't give you that perspective and create, we create the framework and you have to have an understanding of what the big picture looks like. Can you and I have a conversation if you feel it's a value, um, to, to our people and to your people to have that high level wireframe conversation about how the macro fits in their business
James: [00:04:06] yeah.
Let's do it. And I've got a diagram that I thought would be helpful today because a lot of people feel like they know that they're stuck. They just don't know what that end goal is. That might be a great place to start. And I might actually zoom out um, let's start with tech set up. I have got everything ready to go.
Kamahl: [00:04:24] The clients at Ascension program over here, ladies and gentlemen, it's, uh, you got tech central over there and we're just, we're just a bit of a heck under statement They say that's really impressive Um,
James: [00:04:33] it's one of my favorite toys, this TV, and you'll see what I get to. I get to scribble a lot. I think with my hands, I like to think by writing and we'll sketch out a model.
in a moment But as I said, we'll start with the end in mind. And I think for every business they want a sense of predictability and I'm sure everyone's heard the adage of the business owner that says half of marketing budget goes to waste. I just don't know what half that's frustrating and it doesn't have to be that way.
You know, it's when, as we said before, people are trying to emulate the results of other businesses, reverse engineer, but find it was never destined to work because that company is not living their own zone of genius. They're not doing all the great things that their existing clients love them for. So I've got a framework, as I said, they don't want to dig into, um, it's called the Marketing Gauge and it's got, you know, a great platform to show people if you're stuck at a certain level, how do we then finally get past this?
And I always liked starting with a story if I can. And I might pose it as a question for you and Kamahl what was your first car.
Kamahl: [00:05:34] Well, my first car was a Holden Barina
James: [00:05:36] Mine was, Holden Kingswood. And I think everyone, you know, that I went to uni with and went to school with, we all had much the same sets of cars.
It was all, you know, that for some people, a Commodore or a Falcon or a Kingswood. And, you know, these were all running on really thirsty V8s or, you know, just all inefficient parts. And as uni students, everyone was just dirt poor, no one had any money. We were waiting till settling kicked in, or that we finally got a chance to, to going out working a part-time job and finally get enough of a paycheck to buy groceries and fuel and all that other stuff.
And what would typically happen as uni students is? We knew if we could get back to the holes of residence, it was a downhill run all the way through, into the petrol stations And it was like these just prying with the fuel gauge that we could finally get back to the car park. Cause we knew we could, if we took the roundabout at a quick enough speed, we could roll that way all the way into town and finally get to the petrol station
Kamahl: [00:06:30] we met at uni.
I did this, I literally did this on the weekend with the camper then at the top of the hill coasting all the way down to make it to the station. So yeah, you're on point brother keep going
James: [00:06:39] Yeah,
it's a scary feeling. And if you didn't take that roundabout quick enough, you wouldn't have enough speed just to get up that one little incline to the petrol station and it was a dangerous sort of thing to do.
And that's a really good analogy for where I tend to find a lot of businesses, sit you know, with their marketing and that I want people to keep that in mind as we work our way through this process, because it's a dangerous place to be when we're relying on hope and inertia and all these other things to get us going.
So, as I said, it's called the Marketing Gauge and really the objective of what we want to get to is make sure that the positions to grow positioned for growth. And obviously the opposite is if you're positioning for decline, you know, you're starting to head backwards. So really there's two key components to this.
The first is your performance.
That's how well your marketing is working for you and how much it's delivering a return on investment. The next contributing factor are your people. Now, maybe there's someone in the business that's helping you with marketing. Maybe it's the fact that you're doing marketing yourself. Maybe it's a broader sales and marketing team.
In all of these components, we need to make sure that we're balancing the performance that we get with how we're engaging your team to be the best version of ourselves in a marketing context.
Kamahl: [00:07:55] I want to back that step this one little bit, there mate, because you, you said something there that in your world, bro, is just, it's almost a flippant comment.
Um, but it just hit me like a ton of bricks in your words, where, and I'm paraphrasing, but something like, um, you plan for growth or your plan to decline. And that's really interesting because, um, no one sat down consciously and said, I haven't got a stuff up my marketing strategy right now and, and kill my business.
Uh, but failing to actually plan for growth is actually actively planning for decline.
James: [00:08:29] Absolutely. Now, I'm glad you drew it into this because you rightly pointed out no one sits out to do marketing poorly or consciously to start. And then stop. And it might be, you know, in a lot of cases, I tend to see people falling into two canes.
One COVID hit, it was enormously disruptive and they've tried to reserve cash for, they weren't getting any real results out of the marketing. So if I just pull the handbrake and said, let's just, let's just stop. We won't continue using this agency. We won't pay the retainer. Maybe we'll stop running ads.
And we just stopped because we need to preserve cash flow. But in a lot of cases, this stuff predates COVID and a lot of businesses saying I'm just not getting any traction. We've tried it. We've given it long enough. And, you know, typically it's things like SEO or Facebook ads, or they've just tried to throw money at a problem because they recognize they don't understand it.
Yeah.
Kamahl: [00:09:18] Enough. COVID actually got nothing to do with it has it. It's just, there's always an external environment that, uh, wants to test our metal. And sometimes it's little things like, um, you know, like Facebook algorithm might change, which stuffs up the way that we've done things before. Sometimes it's bigger things like COVID, but it, it actually, uh, is an excuse.
From in the external world, COVID happened to be a big one, but it still doesn't change the fundamental basics of business. Look, business fundamentals haven't changed since the Phoenician traders 5,000 years ago. So this marketing conversation that we're having, if your, um, you know, you know, I asked you a question, but I say this too.
I know my people, uh, listening to this interview, it's, it's COVID has nothing to do with what happened to your business, your response to that external influence has everything to do with it. So hundred percent predates what happened in COVID what's the big thing mate what's the what's that straw on the camel's back that would usually have a business owner say, screw it.
It's too hard. I'm not going to throw any more money at this.
James: [00:10:25] It's normally once they get to a point of working with an agency for a predefined period of time. And as I say, when people don't understand marketing, they haven't had any luck. The natural default position is I'm just going to hand the keys of the car over to an agency and it can work, but more often than not people come to me with the battle scars, the frustrations around we spent, uh, normally it's 30 grand, 40 grand, whatever the sum of money is.
And we just didn't get any traction. And the
Kamahl: [00:10:51] agencies that'd be great. It's about the number. I hear that number a lot in this space.
James: [00:10:55] Yeah. And the business owner knows I'm not going to spend money today and get a flood of new clients tomorrow. So that give it a period of time. The danger is if the foundation weren't right to begin with, you can give it four months.
You can give it five years. It's not going to change the fact that we need to have the right foundations, which needs to be right for the business. In a lot of cases, people will use an agency that may be an excellent fit for, you know, business to consumer e-commerce type products. But if you're business to business service-based company, you know, selling professional services, then you're not gonna be able to use the same tactics that someone uses to sell shoes or commodity type items.
So you've got to start with those right foundations, but if you don't know what they are, you can be blind to the fact that the strategies that you've started with, will never going to work. So to answer your question, I reckon it's normally about six months, you know, we've tried this for a period of time.
We feel like we've burnt that sum of money. So we're really hesitant to go again. And the trend that I have seen and a did predate COVID was a lot of sessions, I'd run workshops and training events. And typically I'd see people coming in teams of two and three, a business owner with a really, you know, junior positive marketing person or salesperson that they want to up-skill because they know the business, they know all of the core competencies of the company, then what they do well, they just want to make sure that I can leverage it and amplify it.
They just need some help and guidance And that's what, where are we going to get through today. The danger is, if you are too far at the bottom of the Marketing Gauge, then it can feel really hard and to flighting to get out of it. So what am I starting talking through the various levels and if people feel like they're stuck at any one of those points then, you know, at the end of our discussion, we'll talk about where you can go to, to get to the top of that gauge and drive predictable growth.
Kamahl: [00:12:40] Yeah. Where are we going to start at the, uh, we're going to start at the worst case scenario border, where you're going to status in the middle and step, step us back and step us up. Where do we start to understand this bro
James: [00:12:50] Yeah. So let's start at the bottom and it sort of talks to that analogy around, you know, the someone in the Kings would rolling down the hill, trying to find that they can finally get to the petrol station.
They've disengaged. You know, we've just decided that we're going to throw the car into neutral and we're going to hope for the best. And you might find that you can get some referrals or the business ticks along in the inertia of what you have been doing. But eventually you're going to get to a bit of an uphill incline and then things are going to start to go backwards.
So we can't disengage completely from marketing. I've never seen and be interested in as the way that you have. Cause in every business I've spoken with in every coach, consultant, agency, no business has ever been able to grow without marketing. You can get started and you might find that you get a bit of money coming in.
You get some referrals, but if you really want to grow this thing and as a business owner remove you from the equation. So you're not operationally involved, but you're generating a profit. We have to do marketing.
Kamahl: [00:13:43] Yeah, a hundred percent, even when you get started and you get a few referrals, well, that's, that is marketing.
Whether you plan it or whether it's happened organically, um, it is marketing and a lot of I'd look, I have a ton of clients in the service based sector. And when I asked those clients where, where your clients come from and they almost all say, well, it's pretty much all referral, which is great. It tells me that the people who buy your stuff are vibing with your stuff, and they want to tell their friends about it, but it's completely unscalable, completely unscalable.
And so, and then in 99.8% of cases of those businesses get, they don't have a strategy around referral campaigns anyway, and it's hope and pray, it really is knock it into neutral and coast down that hill and hope for hell. And when it works great, I made it to the petrol station. And when it doesn't, it's a big push uphill to, to get that, get that bottle of unleaded into the custody. Yeah.
James: [00:14:39] And that's exactly it. So everything about that analogy is exactly how we should be thinking about approaching the marketing. So we can't be disengaged
Kamahl: [00:14:46] Now, really getting mate the I'm really getting the, uh, the agency conundrum, something hit me while you were saying that.
Um, and cause I glanced off over to my left, which shows the name of your business. And it's like, yes, the agency will sell their product or their service to service-based businesses, B2C, bricks and mortar retail, uh, grandma, who's knitting, you know, beanies and selling them, but they'll sell the one cookie that they one service to everybody because that's easy for them to sell.
And the thing that's missing there is that's not what my business needs right now. And the thing that struck me about that was the whole energy around your business is really Co-pilot it's. Like we got to take your business with your unique needs and build the strategy around those needs not just cookie cutter.
I keep cutting you off bro, nah its good, without even thinking about it. And I can't step over them. We need more, keep going brother.
James: [00:15:45] I'll zoom out. Because, and the whole reason why I set the business up in, in the way that I did and, and, uh, focused on becoming someone's Co-pilot is I firmly believe that every business should be their on pilot, you know, you can outsource baggage handling.
You can outsource catering, you can access all the other things, but it's really dangerous when you outsource the flying of the plane, because you're giving someone the capability to crash the thing, to turn up at the wrong destination, you know, you don't have to do everything yourself, but you need to be able to set the foundations. Because if you then start using an agency and like you said, you know, someone that might be great in a particular discipline, what they're doing, and let's use Facebook ads
as an example. Facebook is one channel and advertising is one component of one component of marketing. So in that sense, you're getting really inshallah. You know, we're doing a very narrow component of marketing, but these referrals we've got demand generation. We've got all of these other components, which we need to work a sort of holistic plan together.
And it's not easy, but it can be really simple. You just need to have that framework. And a lot of the clients I work with, they get really junior marketers, graduates, people that don't have necessarily 10, 15, 20 years of experience, but they're positive. They're really energetic. And these people can actually start to drive that performance.
And that's really where we want to get to leveraging great people who can then give the business great performance, because then we've got a process that we can iteratively scale with. So we've agree We don't want to be disengaged. There's two levels that are, tend to see businesses that, and be interesting to see how people feel like it might resonate with them.
So their performance is often unreliable for all of the sorts of reasons that we've just mentioned. You know, we've tried some form of marketing. We've seen people doing a podcast, or maybe we decided we need to redesign the website or whatever tactic it is, but we tend to find it doesn't really give us what we're after. And we become nervous.
We've become hesitant to spend more money because we really don't know what we're going to get. And when results were unreliable that's as we said before, people stop marketing because they don't know what they're going to get and they're nervous.
Kamahl: [00:17:47] And is that the same mate, that is, when I do some marketing and I do get a win from that.
Um, a lot of people will know why something hasn't worked, but not many people know why something has worked. So even the lead that comes in is unreliable because I don't know how that actually, what, what component actually drew that person in. Therefore that in my mind becomes unreliable. Even the wind becomes unreliable because I can't replicate it.
Cause I don't know how it happend. Spot on.
James: [00:18:18] And everything we do in our Marketing Compass Accelerator Program with our clients is get them to aim for clarity. I personally prefer to know why something didn't work and the fact that it actually didn't because I can then avoid repeating those mistakes in various other forms.
So that's really where we want to get to. And that's when we get to the top of the gauge, talking about ultimately the place we want to leave in, we want to know why things are happening so that we can design for it. So if it hasn't worked, we have to know why it hasn't and if it has, we also need to know why it has so we can take those learnings and apply them to a broad spectrum of the marketing.
So we don't become one dimensional and we don't tap out a singular tactic that we find doesn't really scale with us. So the unreliable piece you know, there's a lot to it. And as you mentioned, it's not just unreliable in the sense we're not getting results. It's unreliable because we don't know why things are working and why they're not.
And that is the underlying sense of nervousness is what business owners just feel like, you know, what this, this is all becoming a bit too hard. I'm putting out spot buyers everywhere in other areas. So let's just show, but we'll pick it up again later.
Kamahl: [00:19:22] And business owners, you've got enough to be nervous about.
Let's not throw our marketing into it as well. So there you go, man.
James: [00:19:29] So when results are unreliable, typically what happens is your people aren't fulfilled?
Oh, nailed it. Yes, of course. Yeah, because typically, you know, the businesses I speak with, yeah. Look, everyone has got HR challenges, but I tend to find companies that have great services. Their clients love them. They've got great people and the danger is, people will only operate through the systems that they're given, you know, and they need guidance.
They need mentorship. They need to be given frameworks and methodologies to follow it because if results become unreliable and you start to turn away from marketing and you've got someone internally that really wants to grow and develop in this area, I start to feel really unfulfilled. Maybe they haven't disengaged and decided, look, I'm out.
I can't do this anymore, but we're starting to sort of tater too closely to that edge where they feel like they're not going to stay there.
Kamahl: [00:20:25] And then they will go to disengaged or they'll go up to the next level. No, one's going to stay stagnant there. So what, what happens next?
James: [00:20:33] Yeah. And before we drill into that, I'll sorta want to highlight that when I say unfulfilled, I don't mean unreliable people, but they have to have systems and processes and a, and a plan to follow.
We talk a bit at the end about what that all looks like, but we need to make sure that these people are really energetic. They're passionate, they're enthusiastic. I can see that they're growing because they're going to help the business to grow. So that really is the place we need to be in and businesses typically...
Kamahl: [00:21:00] It's got nothing to do with the person.
I get that, man. You know, in my model, when I'm working in larger organizations, we actually focus on focus on the people last. The model I run is ESIP we create the environment of excellence. Then, then the systems, then the implementation of the systems and the there's a system for how to implement. And after all that's in place, then we look at the people.
Cause if you take a really great competent person, who's excited and energetic and throw them into an area where there's no system to support them. It's a crappy environment. You know, they're sitting in a, in a gray desk with a blinking, fluorescent light, well, the best marketer on the planet, he's not going to perform inside of that environment.
So it's got nothing to do with a person, uh, it's everything to do with that system that is supporting them. Yeah.
James: [00:21:46] Yeah. So we can't let our staff stay there. You know, they're the most valuable asset that you have. And if we give them all the tools and everything that you've just mentioned, then we're setting them up for success and we can do tremendous things.
And I'll talk to that next level. But before we jump into the next level, the thing that business owners can take a lot of confidence from is if you're already doing the marketing, you've got people there that are performing actions, you're spending money, you're putting time and effort into writing content or whatever it is.
You've now got the foundations. It's not about doing more. It's about just having the right systems. So you actually get traction with the things that you are doing. So the answer to this isn't amplifying all of your efforts necessarily. It's tightening everything up. So it doesn't mean you need to add expense.
We just need to make sure we get traction with the time and effort and energy and everything that you're already throwing into it.
Kamahl: [00:22:35] Yeah. Fantastic. So, okay. So unreliable, uh, unreliable performance is going to lead to unfulfilled people. And then, ah, here we go. There's my question. So the next thing then.
We want from, we want to go from disengaged, escalate through unreliable and ascend up into serviceable.
James: [00:22:55] Yeah. And businesses, it's not necessarily a ladder or a hierarchy type system where we need to, to go from unfulfilled into serviceable. You know, what we try and teach with our clients is to give them the capacity to get really, to the top of the gauge, without having to sort of climb a ladder, so to speak.
Kamahl: [00:23:12] So I don't need to step, I don't need to step sequentially through the gauge, but okay. So as I understand this, um, I'm gonna, I'm gonna, I'm going to coach myself here out loud. This essentially is the map, and I can see where I land on the map. And then that will then show me what I need to do to get to where I want to be.
James: [00:23:31] Yeah. Spot on. So it's really the concept of it being a Marketing Gauge is let's identify where you are so that you've then got a sense of confidence that we can actually get out of this. And for a lot of businesses that we sit down and we try and diagnose where they are and, and this, you know, in a lot of ways as a diagnostic tool to then help us unpack.
And we've got a nine point framework that we use to help businesses really diagnose where are they stuck and what's the quickest path forward. And I'll talk a bit about that at the, at the end. Now it's trying to understand where am I? And in a lot of cases with businesses may recognize, geez, I've got a team of people that are starting to becoming unfulfilled.
It's because we've got unreliable performance and it tends to be quite linear in that fashion. So the, the serviceable pace, you know, typically sent, tend to see businesses hover for quite a long period of time because the pain point to grow tends to get masked with the fact that things are taking along okay. You know, you're not quite ready to really amplify that budget because you're not convinced that you're going to get, you know, scalable results, but things are serviceable. You spend money, you know, you get break even, in terms of a return, you get clients every now and then, it's sort of going okay, And I mean, when the performance is serviceable, you tend to find that the team, as a result, are stable, you know, they're not kicking the doors down.
They're not really freeing you up as the business owner to, to be able to, to really grow. They're not exploring their full potential. They're just taking along and the outtake with these is, we can stay, we can stop and be at that level. We just can't afford to stay at that level because we tend to get drawn back in our people that have stable will only stay stable for so long.
If they're the right people, they're going to be energetic. They're going to be motivated. They can be passionate about growing their career. That will be loyal to the business to a point, but they're not going to become stagnant so we can have serviceable results, which are okay in a period of time. But the danger is if we stay there too long, we start to drift backwards.
Kamahl: [00:25:27] Okay. Here's one thing I've noticed in companies where this is happening and this is really clarifying. Um, so. Predictable visual cues from teams. And what just struck me here. Let's imagine there's a business and it's a, it's a nine to five business and you've got your marketing team and they're at nine to five.
If they're unfulfilled, these are the people that are going to turn up at 10 past nine, put the stuff on the desk, go make a coffee, talk to their friends. 9:30, 9:45, maybe they're switching the computer, and then start the emails. It's 10 or 10:30 before they actually start any work. And then at, at 3:30, they've started their wind down for five o'clock.
The people in the stable, uh, turning up at 9:00 grabbing their coffee. They're at the desk by about 9:15, 9:30, and they're gonna, they're going to work until about 4:45, 4:30, and they'll start the wind down process. The unfulfilled people. If you go to the car park, they're the ones that get there in the morning.
Take the time to reverse the car into the car park, literally. So. Stable people are here and there, or I'm not sure what the next one is, but the next one is going to be the people who were there at 8:45, ready to start at 9:00, and that you don't have to write it in yet if you're not up to that. But, uh, there's a, this is, this is playing out.
Um, this happens with sales teams, with marketing teams and whether you've got a big team or there's just you and one other person, um, the same thing seems to flow. So I you've read a lot of that. Okay.
James: [00:26:52] Because I wanted to call with you're spot on that we can be at that, that serviceable and, and stable point, but we can't stay there, because those great people, you will end up having some form of negative culture that starts to creep in. They don't feel like they've, they've grown and developed, you know, and then the labor market is tightening right up. You know, I've been speaking with clients that have gotten to a point where they're getting great traction with their marketing.
They're finding it really hard. So they're going get, you know, senior marketers at the moment or experienced marketers or even positive people, you know, it's hard and, and I'm not sure whether any of your clients are out there and facing these same sorts of challenges, but finding great people at the moment is difficult...
And if you want to be a destination employer, then we need to be able to show these people that we've got a business that's growing. You know, that the business can then give them their own platform for growth. They can grow a team beneath them and that they can really chase their own ambitions. So we can't just sit there stagnant because in business you get the people you deserve.
And if you don't want that person, as we said, that reverses the car in that really only does two hours productive work a day. They're not, you're not going to attract the superstars. If they've, you know, they're engaging with marketing, that's just really unfulfilling. It's not growing the business, that's not developing them.
So we've got to get to this top level of the gauge.
Kamahl: [00:28:11] You know, I asked myself when I saw your red light, that is, is the red light, the unreliable, unfulfilled, and disengaged is serviceable or stable, uh, an orange light and is the top of the chart a green light. But then, um, there's a, there's a realization again with a little thing that you just happened to skip over, but, uh, I'm listening bro.
Listen, um, that's serviceable stable. It, it, it can breed complacency and complacency is the fastest pathway to going back down inside of that model. So hundred percent serviceable and stable that's okay. And you're in survival mode. Now, um, but it will breed complacency if you don't actually drive to the next level. So...
James: [00:28:51] We can be there. We can't stay there. And yes, we mentioned that the, at the outset of the session, we want to make sure that we have a system, a process in place. It's going to give us predictable growth. And in all work that I've done with businesses over the last 15 years, they resounding consistent theme is I want to be able to predict my future performance.
I want to be able to see that I've got a future pipeline of work coming in. I want to see predictability.
Kamahl: [00:29:16] Is predictability the top of the chain for performance. Then I'm reliable serviceable, predictable.
James: [00:29:25] That's where we want to get to. Yeah. And the benefit of having predictable performance is, and a lot of companies don't like marketing because it's seen as an expense.
You know, and it is in the truest sense of the word. If we, if the accountants coming to the room, they're going to tell us it's an expense, but the attitude has to be on buying future revenue. You know, I want to know that I'm going to invest $1 and then I'm going to get 3, 4, 5, $10 in future lifetime value from that client.
You know, really, we want to build a vending machine where I woke up and I know I've got a whole vending machine full of my ideal fit clients. They're sitting there. I put a dollar in and I pull out someone who's going to be with me for 6, 8, 12 years. And they're going to give me a really positive return on that.
Kamahl: [00:30:11] I love that. I love that analogy. Marketing is buying future revenue. Yes. Ask your accountant marketing is an expense. And if the accountant says you got to cut your expenses, definitely. Absolutely. Cut your marketing budget out. Enjoy having skinny kids and rejoice in six months time. A hundred percent.
James: [00:30:29] Yeah. So, we have to set up a framework for this and we want them... We'll talk about the how this is where we want to be. Predictable ongoing performance because when we do that...
Kamahl: [00:30:40] What are the people in this
James: [00:30:43] They're positive? You know, and I can, I could equally exchange positive out for passion these people then you've then got the people that turn up early. They checking, you know, analytics, they're dashboarding results. They're able to, you know, intuitively recognize opportunities or threats that are existing, or they read something over the weekend and they come in Monday morning excited to say, I'm seeing an opportunity.
And I know because we've got the data to support this, that we can actually scale in this area, by our positive, they're passionate. They enthusiastic. They want to help the company grow because they career is growing. They're using best practice software because they know what the business needs. They're putting, you know, more junior people on underneath them over time.
So they're growing their careers. That's what ultimately frees the business owner up, you know, no business owner got into business to spend Sunday nights freaking out aboutIT system upgrades, or how am I going to replace these staff members or handle going to learn marketing? You know, at some point we had a really simple process that we wanted to be able to implement and it just got complex.
And the system here is predictable performance with passionate people. We've now got a repeatable system,
Kamahl: [00:31:50] Every marketing agency on the planet at any other marketing agency, um, person on this conversation, they would all talk to their version of marketing performance. You're going to put $10 in here and you're gonna get $20 out there.
And it's all about performance, performance, performance. You really, really get a giant. You really get that the people play such an integral role. And I don't know how many business owners look at their marketing person and go, I wonder if that dude or do that is just vibing and positive and loving life right now because that's the person that's writing your copy.
That's the person that's checking the analytics on a weekend and on a Friday night and whatever, outside of work hours, that's the person to really plug into a really well integrated systems. So again, then you've got the saying, you're telling me the same stuff that every single agency owner would tell with one point of difference, which in your world is probably mine.
It's like a no brainer for you. Um, but let me tell you how much of a game changer that is when you're working with business owners and internal marketing teams on, on how to grab, how to get this real predictable, uh, return on your marketing spend.
James: [00:33:06] Yeah, spot on.
And you know, we spoke before about wanting to be the pilot.
You're building up your people. They're going to be the pilots, they're flying the plane. You know, you don't then have to decide we're running Facebook ads, or we're going to teach someone how to be a graphic designer and all these other components. We can outsource those. You know, I'm not suggesting that you need to do everything, but we want a really capable person that is then across everything.
They know the higher level goals of the business wants to achieve. Then we're filling roles. We're going to get an ads agency to do this specific function. We know how to measure them. We've got the frameworks, we know what we should be spending to acquire a lead. We know how many leads we need. We know what content we need.
So we'll get a copywriter, everything that is really purposeful. And we said at the beginning. If people are unfulfilled, they're unengaged it's because I don't have a system or a process everything's hope and guesswork and they just get the flight because deep down, I know it's really not going to give them the results they're after..
So we have to have a team of positive people because then sort of like a snowball rolling down the mountain, you know, we gather inertia and things can take on a life of their own. You know, we can then grow. It's a repeatable, scalable effort. And if we can see that, that vending machine is actually working, you know, there's no such thing as a crystal ball, but you know, history is a really great indicator of the future.
And when we can model performance, then the business owners much more willing to say, yeah, that 30 grand, no worries. I'll spend 50 or 60 because now it's an investment. It's not an expense because I can see that there's method to the, what was previously madness. Everything else was in hopes and luck and let's, it's a hail Mary.
We need these clients. So let's just throw 20 grand at it. This is now methodology. I'm going to spend 20 grand, but I'm going to get 4,000 leads and 25 customers or whatever the metrics are. You then know those numbers.
Kamahl: [00:34:52] All right, I'm going to ask you three questions and these questions are. Based on this brilliance, what would the very next step be based on one of three components of where people are?
So, um, and if it's let me know if there's a little bit premature for these questions, but I want to know if I'm running a micro-business it's me and two or three others, less than five people in the team. What's the first point of call. How do I start to get this information from you about how to set this up in my business.
James: [00:35:25] Yep. So what would I do, because I haven't got another slide where I'll talk a bit about where I want people to go. I'm just going to clear some space. So we have this, anyone watching this...
Kamahl: [00:35:34] While you are doing that, let me ask the 3 then. So I've got a micro team. The second one. What if I've got a team of sort of five to 10 or 12 people and I've got a marketing person in there.
Um, and then the third one will be, well now what if I'm running a business where I actually have a large team and a, and a full internal marketing sort of division within that business. So I'd love to know where those three people can then go, what their first step needs to be right now after this information.
James: [00:36:02] Great. So really every business doesn't matter if the business owner is the one doing marketing themselves, or they've got a team of three, four or five people, you know, the process that I use and I coached my clients through. I've got a client working with, at the moment that's got revenue in excess of a billion dollars.
I've got clients that are a startup that literally we're building this family business. We've decided that we don't want to work for someone else anymore. And wait, we're getting started complete ground up. The methodology and the process is fundamentally the same, you know, the amount of time and money that people have to then get amplified.
Their results will be different, but the methodology ultimately is, is a nine step framework that I've built called the Marketing Compass and really the objective with having, you know, the idea of a Marketing Compass is, you've got an unwavering level of confidence in what you need to do and the most direct path to get there.
Because the danger with marketing and this goes right back to our discussion at the beginning is businesses feel like they need to be doing more. The answer is in simple application, not in multiplication of effort. So it's about understanding what is going to take me from where I am now to ultimately where I want to be, not in one big grand slam, no revenue to a, an eight figure business, but the methodology that gives you something that you can confidently invest in.
So it's not about trying podcasts and building a new website and, you know, clubhouse as a strategy, all this other stuff it's about really knowing who is my ideal fit client, what are the problems that they they're trying to solve? What's my superpower in the process. And then how do we start wrapping all the right tactics in a way that generates demand for you. Warms up these leads so that they want to have a sales discussion with you.
And you've got the simplest process to turn strangers into leads and leads into clients.
Kamahl: [00:37:47] It sounds like it's a, it's a great story, bro. Kind of desperately want to see the compass. Can we have a look at it? Is it something that you share? I don't want to over step here, but I'm like, , I gotta get all that.
What's the thing.
James: [00:38:00] So let me do this. I didn't have it in this slide deck. I'm happy to share it. It's just going to take a little bit of magic into how I jump out of this screen and I'll tell you what to bring it up.
Kamahl: [00:38:11] How do I get access to the Marketing Compass then? Uh, don't have to, it doesn't have to be a component of this.
Um, but it's just, uh, it makes such logical sense. The next thing we need to do is plug into this compass and find out where that starting point is.
James: [00:38:27] Yeah. So let me talk about, and I'll bring it up so people can see it just so it doesn't look like we had deliberately hiding, hiding details and information with this stuff.
I'll bring up the Marketing Compass...
Kamahl: [00:38:38] Extremely jealous of your tech. They're your world's biggest iPad. It is very deliverable. I still have a roll of brown paper and some texts.
James: [00:38:49] So this is it mate, and really, I think that the takeaway for this for people is, is two areas that I can use to guide people through this process.
So I'll, I'll zoom out for a moment, two key ways that I can help people really start to get to that top of the gauge. So these nine sequential steps, it's what I've used to take businesses through building really systemized, repeatable marketing plans that give them scale and predictable profit. I've got an online workshop.
So what I'll be able to do wherever this video ends up landing, I'll give you the link. So we can drop a link to that online workshop, which guides people through what each of those nine steps are. So they can start to build the foundations. We've got workbooks, full information. You know, I want businesses to be able to not treat marketing as an expense and if I can do it themselves.
And I feel like using the frameworks that we have is enough. I'm happy to give it to them and hope that it gives them what they need.. Yeah, amazing.
Kamahl: [00:39:42] Let's make that the point of this comment and this conversation's been really good with the what. And, um, there is, um, I mean, my point is there is a next step. If I want to know the, how there's somewhere I can go and we'll make sure that's all linked up and stuff at the end of this year.
So let's have, let's get the, let's take a look then if it's thanks for sharing, bro. The, the high level, one of the, of the nine, the nine steps, it looks like a really cool plan. Okay. What do we got?
James: [00:40:07] So I suppose the headline version with this is, it's sequential. We need to make sure we're moving sequentially through each one of these nine foundations, if we want predictable profit.
And we said before at the end, people is the comes last and I couldn't agree more. You know, we want to make sure if we're outsourcing certain functions, we're adding people onto our team, let's resource the plan and implement it once we've got that.
Kamahl: [00:40:29] You've done that as the last thing, bro. I love that
James: [00:40:32] Yeah, we can do this in reverse, you know, they'll do it in reverse thinking.
I've just got to get this off my plate.
Kamahl: [00:40:38] Yeah. I want to wipe my hands. I just want to wash my hands of this, find a marketing dude. And then they go out and like, I wanted to seek and I looked for marketing people and like how much money do you want? Now that's too much. Can't afford that. They ended up with some uni graduate and you know, you pay peanuts, you get the chimps, wonderful people, huge potential.
Um, but they put it at number one, you put it at number nine. Um, in my process, it's the very, very last stepas well, so, to that point.
James: [00:41:07] Yeah. And if businesses have people already, we're not suggesting that you start waving the ax and get rid of your whole team and strip it back to basics. Let's start to give those people, these sorts of frameworks.
So if you've got an internal team they're passionate, they're energetic, let's give them each of those tools. And I've got resources and materials and templates for each of these nine steps so that you don't have to reinvent the wheel. We can start to accelerate the process and actually get these implemented faster.
Yeah. So that's the end point
Kamahl: [00:41:34] Someone in that position, if James, you mind, if I I'm going to pop on line, the performance leadership, coach, coaches, hat there, uh, if this is a process and you've got those people and you know, they've got the potential, but you want to step them back through the process, don't do it behind closed doors, tell them, bring them into the fold, let them know this is happening.
And then, you know, I get, look, honestly, got to be getting you and James and say, can you tell everyone what the nine steps are and bring the team through the journey together. If they're already there, otherwise they'll have no idea why you've made all these changes. I want to understand this strategy.
James: [00:42:07] Okay. Yeah, no, no, that's good. That's good. Because I was going to mention this point later, but you've touched on it now. Let's keep everyone aligned. Let's align the sales and marketing functions in the business. They don't necessarily need to be different people, but let's make sure there's a real sense of alignment so that everyone knows what we're aiming for.
And that's where we start. We're going to know what we're aiming for in these areas. We've got to have really clear targets and budgets. Otherwise we're always on track. If we don't know what we're aiming for, and we don't actually quantify how many leads, how many new customers, how much retained revenue, how much new revenue we're going to break all these things down and then there's processes and, and frameworks we can use to set the right budget.
So it's not hoping guesswork is actually systems that we teach our clients to use too. We'll tell them how much they actually need to spend. So if we want to buy future revenue, there's equations and formulas and sequencing to this once we've set the right targets. Yeah. Fantastic. So we then align all sales and marketing functions.
We look for opportunities to use software to then, you know, leverage automation, lead scoring. All of these frameworks are once we built it once we've got a repeatable ethic. So we have to start with these foundations. Otherwise they're putting the cart before the horse, because typically what I see is businesses start in two key areas without those foundations.
They start generating content, whether it is a podcast, a webinar, writing a blog, they generate content. They try and run ads to generate leads before they've really absolutely nailed the pain points, the frustrations, the goals and objectives of that ideal-fit client. So we're trying to reverse engineer what you sell and see who's interested in it rather than going the other way, which is demonstrating.
You can help them solve the problem. They already had.
It goes right back to the very first thing that we talked about right at the start of the conversation before the introduction, even, and that was the reason why they stopped marketing. And it's like, I've got my widget. I want to sell more widgets, put it on a Facebook ad for widgets, without having done any and any of the preamble.
Yeah.
Yep. So we, when we do that, we blend into the noise. So we're generating content, but we've got no engagement. Yeah. Cause we just want everyone else. Yeah.
So we then make sure...
Kamahl: [00:44:18] We jumped around a little bit. I want to make sure I'm really clear on this and we step it back because I know we're kind of going to where people do and where they make mistakes.
So let's get started on the process. Align sales and marketing, then build your buyer persona. And if you've done any sales training ever on the planet, it's got avatar work in it or niche work in it. And if you have, if you, if you haven't done it or look, there's a reason why it's in every bloody training, it's that important.
James: [00:44:45] So before I touch on number four, I want to just back up a little bit because you're absolutely right. There's no secrets to the fact that everyone else and whether it's called an avatar or the ideal fit client profile, whatever it is, we need to quantify this.
The danger is almost always, when I ask people, have you done this? They say, yes, what they actually did is they went to a seminar. Someone gave them a sheet of paper, which means throwing some anecdotal insights over the lunch break of this half day session. And they just jot down a few ideas of what instinctively comes to mind to them about who that ideal fit client is.
But we miss the opportunity to see it from the client's perspective. Yeah. Otherwise,
Kamahl: [00:45:23] Your clients, your clients grow and change anyway, over time. And in my world, we call them exemplars, the ideal fit clients. It's the same look, it's the same thing. It's just got a little bit of different spin on it for me.
But, uh, in, in our live call this morning, I've got a client in that group training program who's redone her exemplar, I think four or five times, but my coaching is always the same. In the 10 years I've been doing this business as a coach. I've reworked my avatar, at least 30 or 40 times. I will do it at least twice or three times a year.
Go back. It's that important? And you wrote so many people. I did this seminar where they read avatar in a book and they think they've written down a couple of things about it. And that's it. That's not even scratching the surface.
James: [00:46:08] Spot on. So what we do is we dig in and the tick box is you need to be able to quantify fears, frustrations, wants, goals, trigger, events. So what was the trigger event that caused them to look for someone like you, but we're going to be able to go so deep that everyone in the whole team is aligned on understanding who they are so that their marketing speaks to them. And that's, that's essentially what rolls over into module four, because if you fight right, when someone's ready to make a buying decision, then you have to sell in every sense of the word where if we start to think about our own experiences as a consumer, when we start the research process, we don't know what we need.
We're starting with the symptoms of a problem walk the same way when you're going, you know, you get a call and we're not sure if it's COVID or whatever's going on. We've got a sore throat, we've got a headache, we've got symptoms. We don't actually know what the underlying problem is. And every business naturally start spotting right at that final stage, the decision stage, when someone's decided they want to buy your stuff, but that's where everyone else is fighting.
You haven't been able to build any thought leadership or expertise or you haven't built a relationship or any form of trust in that process. And the real magic happens is when we can map what that process looks like all the way up to making a purchase from symptoms all the way through to their considerations and their, their evaluation process.
Then we start positioning all of our content for each stage of the process. So it's not guesswork into what content we should produce. We know because that buying process map, it gives us the thoughts, the questions, the emotions that happen at each stage. And we've got templates that map at each one of these components, your contents pre-written. You know, the title of your blog post, you know that subject matter of a webinar, all of this stuff is predefined because we put the time and effort up front to do that research. And to your point, we iterate it, you know, literally three weeks ago I went back and I did my annual, um, buyer persona client surveys, just to see what's changing, shifting, you know, how people source information online.
This is essentially what we need to have as a foundation.
Kamahl: [00:48:18] Yeah. Well, I had looked to two weeks ago made I bought a vacuum and I'm going through this process in my own mind as a buyer. And there's a, there's a buying strategy, but I went right back to the pre-contemplation when the symptoms started arising, the symptoms were, um, vacuuming the floor, but it just feels like it's not picking up enough and it's just like, stuff's happening there.
Um, if, if you tried to sell me a new vacuum in that moment, I was a hard night, so it was symptomatic. But then, you know, I ended up, we'll go to the end of it by saying, I ended up going to Dyson and just buying whatever their latest whiz bang thing V 15, or, you know, I don't know what order I bought 2001.
Um, but the thing is that even that pre-contemplation stage. In that, in that symptomatic stage, I'm like, oh, something's wrong. And if he tried to sell me vacuums there, it's not gonna, it's not gonna resonate. But then there comes a time where it's like, I've got to do something about this and I'm starting to ramp up a little bit in my urgency and want to buy.
And then it gets the sidewall start to do a bit of research. Now Dyson happens to be a little voice in the back of my mind. Cause you'll see they're innovative fans and you know, all those little products that they have. Uh, but then when I go to the research phase on going, okay, so what's the latest and I do a little bit of research in vacuums.
Here's what I noticed mate, every single person that's doing Facebook ads trying to sell vacuums is hitting me with that price point, vacuum price point, vacuum price point, the Dyson ads that came back were educational. I didn't try and sell me a vacuum that helped me right at that moment. I feel like, I feel like they've been under the Co-pilot strategy.
Didn't try to. Yeah. And so,
James: [00:50:03] As you said, everyone's hitting you at that point. So day for decision when you're at a point where you're ready to make a buying decision, all of these, you know, Facebook algorithms and learning profiles have identified you're now in the market, it's noisy. Where if someone was brought with you at that point of awareness, when you've recognized, you know, my asthmatic son is just really finding it difficult, you know, this season or whatever, the symptom of needing a vacuum cleaner was, if you then found that there was some level of insight that helped you with different techniques or cleaning or whatever it happens to be, we've built trust, we've built rapport, we've built thought leaders. All we're doing is moving people along this whole process. So when everyone else is trying to discount and throw off as at you and everything else, you are going to trust the person that helped you quantify the problem and pulled you through the process without selling it.
Kamahl: [00:50:50] Yeah. The Dyson ads are literally, hey, we've just taken out 0.3, micron HEPA filter, and we've managed to work a 0.1 micron, and we didn't lose suction. We actually managed to increase suction by giving you better performance. I'm like, that's really interesting stuff. I kind of nerd out over that weird stuff and everyone else is just going $50 off if you buy it now I'm not even dude, I'm not even thinking, I'm not a bargain buyer. I want the best. You don't get me. You don't understand me. Dyson are coming in saying, Hey, this is the best. And, and there's no question about it. Then when it comes time to buy it's, I compare every other vacuum on the market to that vacuum. And it's a no brainer.
And I know that I've paid two or three times more than the top vacuum from any other supplier. Not it's a no brainer. They were my Co-pilots on the decision process. Yeah.
James: [00:51:43] And what we just unpacked there just demonstrated the need for this process, but that's with a tangible product that we can say, we can go and look at it.
We can understand the mechanics. If you're selling professional services, it is it's completely intangible. So we're relying on all of these other trust indicators to then help quantify this person can help me. So if you haven't built any of those, um, and that sort of to our next point here, if you haven't built a clear value proposition that speaks to their previous stages of the buying process, and those needs wants, and objectives, we're starting way behind....
And that's what this comes before the content strategy. We need to demonstrate that we can specifically help them solve those problems and objectives in a way that's valuable to them. And you pointed it out there before. You're a valued based shopper, everyone is. Because value is just an equation. You know, value is benefits minus costs and fear.
Money's not the key driver, the benefits are. So you're happy to spend more because as you said, you're going to geek out over this stuff. You love it. It's important to you. They've clearly identified that you are there by persona. They're not interested in someone that wants a $29 vacuum cleaner from the, you know..., 100%.
Kamahl: [00:52:57] What I love most about this dude is your, you know, I'm giving the example from the billion dollar company. That's been nailing it for decades in the marketplace and your taking the thing that I love about how they got me to buy their product and making it accessible to Jenny. Who's just launching her coaching business.
It's just beautiful. Thank you. Thank you. Excellent mate, what's next? So developing the content,
James: [00:53:20] So we nailed that value proposition be really, really clear on the value you provide because every business has a super power. We've got to unpack what that superpower is and make sure we then live it through all of our content. As we said before, we don't want to blend into the noise.
We've got to be able to demonstrate to the Jenny. We can help Jenny. We are specifically for her. We're not selling all things to all people. We help a particular sort of person solve a particular problem because we have processes and systems and methodologies that are designed just for her. And when we do that, we can strip away all of the other distraction.
As we said, in the Marketing Gauge, we don't need to add more. Often, we're taking things away because when we know our real value and we know what our superpowers is and we know those problems, it's super crystal. And that's why I use the term Marketing Compass. You can then see all the deficiencies in what we've been doing.
Why are we advertising on Tik TOK? Why are we drawn to do the thing? Why are we sponsoring an event? Why are we doing all this other stuff? It's just not important anymore. And we can see it with absolute clarity once we've actually put these foundation in place.
Kamahl: [00:54:21] So great. It's not just what to do. It's all the crap I can stop doing.
That's what I love about the hearing this.
James: [00:54:28] So we can develop the content. As we said before, we've already got a map. We've mapped out these process. We know what content to use and how to actually leverage the content as a lead generator. So we got processed and show people what content format, what content taught is actually going to take a stranger and have them engage in a value experience.
You're giving them a high value piece of content. They're going to give you some contact information. Now we can start nurturing them over time until a point when they've reached this decision stage. So we're not trying to sell to someone before they're ready. We're providing helpful content to move them through that pre purchase process.
We're nurturing them. So then as we set up front, we've aligned ourselves a marketing process. So we know exactly the right time to start the sales discussion. So it's not, it's not sales and marketing as distinct, separate areas. It's a, just a fluent consistency of helping that person to solve the problem. So that way you're protecting your margin.
We're not having to sell on price. We just continually delivering that value.
Kamahl: [00:55:27] So simple mate, so simple, not easy. I get it, but it's so simple and a rock solid structure for businesses to follow. Yeah.
James: [00:55:35] So we've talked that at sort of a nine step in the process, then once we know exactly what we need to have, we know what content we're producing.
We know how we want it to look. We've got all these mechanics in place, then we can purposely find the experts in that area. We're still flying the plane. We're going to get the videographer, the copywriter or the graphic designer. We are then outsourcing roles. We're not just trying to give everything to one agency.
Everything is very, very deliberate. So we spoke about marketing is the process of buying future revenue. The biggest area where people leave money on the table. And often they overlook the fact that it's happening, is we to make sure we're retaining these clients for the long term, you know, we don't want to a revolving door of people coming in and moving back out.
The best thing that you can do to scale your business is to spend that money, to acquire a customer and keep them for the long term. So we need to put the right tactics in place to make sure once we've got them, they love being with us. They're a source of the referrals. As we said before, referrals is a form of marketing.
It's about making sure that we've got systems to maximize them, but let's make sure we've got plans in place to keep these people for the longterm.
Kamahl: [00:56:40] 17 times the effort to find a new client than it does to retain an existing one. That's happy, spot on, your process is how to put that in place.
James: [00:56:49] Yeah. And it doesn't come up upfront.
We make sure that we just, we start now. So we don't find when someone new comes into the market or there's some other form of offer or we've got a challenge we've actually embedded these strong value drivers. So people hanging around for the longterm and they're ultra sticky. So each one of those is a sequential process, as we said, we move through.
So it's 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and then nine. And once we've got this nailed, then we've actually got a platform that we can then iterate. Once we've got the plan in place, that's marketing plan version 1.1, we take the learnings. We re we narrow everything down. We tightened things up. We tighten up our targets and budgets.
We take all of the learning speet it back into the system, we turn on automation for doing the things that we've built once automate forever. That's how we actually have predictable performance with a positive team. That's you know, as you said, checking analytics at night and looking at all the data, what we've actually built is a machining, a system that can help give us predictable performance.
Kamahl: [00:57:50] That's amazing. You know, when I think about that, because it is not something that you set up and forget it, you, you have to continually work at it, but it's, it's I think about the space shuttle, it takes 70% of the fuel to, lift the space shuttle one meter off the platform, 90% of the fuel has gone to get down to the atmosphere.
So it takes all of that energy. Is simple, but not easy. Uh, but then once it's actually an orbit, you can, you can literally move it with your little finger and you can tweak it. Is that kind of what the hell the process feels?
James: [00:58:18] Yeah. And I love that analogy because if we imagine then the deficiency in outsourcing this upfront is all of those learnings.
When you've put all the fueling to get this thing off the ground, you don't have them. You've given the keys to the car, to someone else. They've tried to find their way through a learning curve. They've been insure about how they sell this service to you. You know, they're running a business, just like you are.
They're just going to run the ads. They're going to do what they're told. They'll fulfill the obligations in the agreement and the contract. They'll just do that. There'll be so many learnings along that path. If you haven't been in the driving seat, you haven't had any of those learnings.
Kamahl: [00:58:53] Yeah. And like I say to all my business owners, the last thing you hand over in your businesses is the marketing, the last thing, even if you've got a marketing team, it's the last thing you hand over 100%, because suppose it is a question if it takes 70% of the fuel to lift one meter off the platform, what are they just make the platform one meter higher. I can't have an interview like this without a dad joke.
James, I'm sorry.
James: [00:59:16] I'm a big fan of dad jokes, mate.
Kamahl: [00:59:18] Mate, this has been rock solid and just gold nugget after gold nugget. Um, I think what we're going to have to create a way for people to reach out to you. So hook me up with some links. Let's get some people who might be interested in to do some work with you mate, um, connected, you'll have links.
We'll make them available with this video, unless there's something specific, uh, that you want people to do right now. But we have to finish, uh, we have to finish any conversation with what's the action. Cause they have the knowledge and not use it is the same as not having it. So what's the, what's the one action step, right now?
James: [00:59:53] So the action step is let's put a plan in place. And I'm not insulted if it's not my plan if you've heard me talk through this framework and it doesn't resonate with you, then speak to Kamahl. You know, you've got programs, systems, processes that help people achieve the same sorts of outcomes. So if it's not me speak to Kamahl, it's neither of us just get a system that you can use and follow and implement in your business.
That gives you control. So if it is one of the frameworks that we have, I know everyone in your community, you know, they're rusted onto all the systems and processes that you have use Kamahl systems. If you want to then use any of the frameworks that I have, we'll drop a link below there's three key ways that I can help.
One is do the online workshop, which will guide you through essentially a bit more of a deeper discussion on these nine areas. I've got a workbooks, so people can traffic light, what or where they're at in each of those nine areas, and then be able to implement the plan. But if you want to move quicker, if you want to have some help, each one of these nine components is part of a program called the marketing compass accelerator, where we give people, the templates, the resources, and the capacity to, to work with me as your coach, to then guide you through that process.
So we build it, we implement it and then we, we optimize it over time.
Kamahl: [01:01:02] So, how incidentally you have a program that follows the nine steps, put a thought, um, and if you want to follow my stuff, you're welcome to follow my stuff. But after this conversation, I'm doing some tweakings and my stuff's going to look like your stuff.
Anyway, dude. That's fantastic. Thank you so much. And it's just been a really it's, it's a great, eye-opener, it's a great reminder of things that I knew that were in place. I know people watching this, it's going to be like the moon to them. It's all brand new information. Uh, and what I love is that it's, I've been doing this for literally over a decade and got the golden nuggets and had some great reminders and, and will change things as a result of it.
And then I also know that someone who's about to, you know, Jenny who's about to sell her first-hand knitted beanie. Uh, we'll get some really solid first steps out of this as well. So, mate, thank you so much. And what an epic, epic conversation, bro.
James: [01:02:00] Thanks mate. Now I've really enjoyed it. I'm glad we took the time to go through the models.
So that way anyone that's watching this. Yeah, you've got, you've got a framework that you can use. Mate, you know me, I'm a marketing nerd. I love talking through this theory. We've probably moved, you know, a million miles an hour and people have been drinking from a fire hose, but you know, I hope it's been usefull.
Kamahl: [01:02:16] Yeah, it doesn't matter. Watch it three times. Watch it 10 times. It most importantly, uh, reach out to James and even more important than that, get a plan in place. James, thank you, brother. I really, really appreciate you, man. And this has been great. Thank you so much.
James: [01:02:30] My pleasure. Thanks.
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