What is marketing?
Marketing can feel confusing! It’s often explained as a long list of things you should be doing: social media, email, networking, blogging, building a brand, creating funnels, selling etc. But if you want to understand what marketing actually is, it helps to separate marketing itself from the activities you use to do it.
So what is marketing?
Marketing is not one thing. It has five roles to play:
Getting in front of your ideal clients and helping them find you
Being seen as an expert in what you do - someone who understands what they are dealing with and can genuinely help
Giving people the chance to get to know you, trust you and feel confident you're the right person for them
Making it clear how they can work with you and inviting them to take that next step
Looking after your clients and continuing the relationship
That's it. Marketing in itself is a fairly simple process - the nuance lies in how you approach these five roles in a way that works for your business, your clients and your personality, style and approach.
The five roles of marketing
1. Get in front of your ideal clients and help them find you
Before someone can work with you, they need to know you exist. This is what we mean when we talk about visibility (but I also like to think of it as discoverability). You might meet people through networking, speaking or collaborations, share your ideas through your content or help people who are already looking for support find you through Google or your website.
You don't need to be everywhere - you need to be in enough of the right places to be seen and found by the right people.
But visibility isn't automatically the answer to every marketing problem. Being seen by more people won't necessarily help if they don't understand what you do, can't see why it matters to them or aren’t clear about how you can help.
2. Be seen as an expert and someone who ‘get’s them’
Being found is only the start. Once someone comes across you they need to understand what you do, who you help and why you might be the one to help them.
They also need a reason to pay attention to you. That doesn't mean you need to invent a new persona or be louder than everyone else - it means making your expertise, perspective, experience and approach easier for people to see.
This is where your message, positioning and brand matter. They help someone recognise themselves in what you're saying and begin to see why you could be the right person for them.
So if people are seeing your content or visiting your website but not engaging, your marketing might need to focus more on the value and relevance of what you do.
3. Give people the chance to get to know, like and trust you
Most people won't be ready to buy the first time they come across you. They might be interested without being ready and need more information, more time or a few more opportunities to hear from you before they feel confident enough to start a conversation.
Your marketing needs to give that relationship somewhere to go in the meantime.
That might happen through your emails, content, conversations, events or just by seeing you show up consistently and share useful ideas over time. This isn't about chasing people or trying to manufacture a relationship - it's about staying connected, sharing insight and helping people get a sense of what it might be like to work with you.
If you put a lot of energy into getting people's attention but have no real way to stay in touch with them, this might be the missing part for you.
4. Make it clear how people can work with you…and invite them in
At some point, you have to talk about your specific offers or services (you need to sell the thing you want to sell). This is where marketing and sales meet. Your marketing can create awareness, interest and build trust, but somebody still needs to know how they can work with you or what they can buy, why they might want it and how to take the next step.
You don’t have to become pushy or turn every post into a sales pitch. Ideally, the invitation won't suddenly appear from nowhere - it will feel like a natural continuation of everything you've already helped them understand about their situation, what you do and the ways you could help.
If people seem to like you and regularly engage with you but don’t become clients, take a look at how often and how clearly you talk about your offers and services. Do people know what you’re offering? Can they see how it would help them? Is the next step obvious?
5. Look after your clients and continue the relationship
Marketing doesn't stop as soon as someone becomes a client. The experience you create affects whether they want to continue working with you, return later or recommend you to other people.
This should be part of how you work - good communication, doing what you said you would do, making people feel supported and checking in rather than allowing the relationship to disappear as soon as the work ends.
Your existing clients already know the value of your work and can become your biggest supporters. Spend time nurturing these relationships.
Simple doesn't mean one-size-fits-all
These five roles of marketing apply to almost every business, but how you do them is where the nuance comes in.
A networking event might help one person meet potential clients and another deepen existing relationships. An email could share an idea or invite someone to work with you. A blog might help someone discover you through Google, demonstrate your expertise and give existing contacts a reason to return.
The activity matters less than the job it is there to do. This is why copying somebody else's marketing doesn't really work. You can copy the format, frequency or platform, but you can't assume your business needs exactly what theirs does. Your audience might make decisions differently, your offers might need more explanation, your strengths, energy and availability may be completely different.
Good marketing isn't about doing more. It's about doing what matters most for your business and fits who you are.
Thinking before doing
This is where my FITS approach to marketing comes in - it helps you decide where to focus your time, energy and effort by looking at four connected areas:
Foundations: What does your business need from your marketing, who are you trying to reach and which offers or services are you focusing on?
Identity: What do you want people to understand and remember about you, what you do and the way you help?
Tactics: Which activities will help you fulfil these five roles effectively, and not just add more to your list?
Structure: How will you plan, organise and manage your marketing so you’re proactive, consistent and in control?
Running underneath all of this is your Mindset, because knowing what to do and having the confidence, resilience and self-belief to do it aren’t always the same thing. And that could actually be the thing holding you back.
What does this mean for you?
If you're constantly changing direction, you might need to revisit your Foundations. If you struggle to explain what you do, your Identity might need some attention. If you're doing lots of marketing but don't know what’s working, it may be time to review your Tactics. If your marketing disappears whenever you get busy, you might need more Structure. And if self-doubt is causing you to hide your expertise, avoid selling or question every decision, your underlying Mindset might me making all of it a lot harder than it needs to be.
What does your marketing need?
Marketing gets a lot calmer when you stop treating it as an endless list of things you should be doing and start asking what your business actually needs from your marketing.
In my free Marketing 101: Back to Basics masterclass at 1pm on Thursday 24th September, I’ll help you answer that question, spot where your gaps and opportunities may lie and decide what deserves your attention next.
You won’t leave with another long to-do list. You'll leave with a better understanding of marketing and a clearer picture of where to focus your time, energy and effort.
