All Audiences

Have you ever noticed how dramatic movies tend to start with lots of backstory behind the characters?

Think about Apollo 13, for example. The first part of the movie is focused on their family life, children, etc.

Why do they bother going into all that backstory? What does it have to do with the main plot?

They do it so you are emotionally invested in the characters. It gives them meaning and you can empathize with them a lot more.

I’ve been thinking lately about how best to use backstory in marketing. As a professional, I think it’s important to share some of your personal life inside of your professional identity.

Otherwise, you’re kind of like an interchangeable extra in the film. Nobody cares what happens to you.

Like the thousands leading the charge in Braveheart, we only really care about the characters we know.

If you want people to care, share some of your backstory.

When I work with clients, there are an infinite number of data points and layers we could look at to shape our work.

But at the end of the day, only a few high-level KPIs matter most as it relates to measuring the effectiveness of your marketing.

The KPIs that matter most at the end of the day are the following:

1. Number of leads

It could be subscribers, chat inquiries, telephone calls, contact form completions, appointments booked, it doesn’t matter.

All that matters is the total number of people who gave you their contact information and expressed interest in your business.

Subscribers are the grey area, but nobody subscribes to your list without some interest in what you offer, so I call that a lead if it makes sense for your business and is part of your sales funnel.

The main thing is that you captured their contact information.

2. Number of qualified leads

Now that we know the total number of inquiries (whose contact information you collected), we want to figure out how many of those leads are in the buying mode and qualified.

It could mean that they have the money, means, and interest in buying what you have to sell.

The definition is yours to create, but I wouldn’t consider subscribers “qualified” until they express actual buying interest.

3. Number of new clients/customers

Needless to say, this is a critical number.

If you sell products or services at various price points, break down the number of new clients by product/service so you have a better picture of where your sales are coming from.

This will matter more in the next few points, too.

4. Total marketing spend

So how much are we spending on marketing, all-in?

You’ll want to track that closely so you can figure out the next few KPIs.

Break it out by channel/type so you know where you’re spending your money, too.

I track all this in one single spreadsheet, by the way.

4. Cost per lead/qualified lead

Divide the total marketing spend by number of qualified leads in that period and you have your cost per lead.

You can do the same for total leads in general, or just qualified leads depending on what/how you’re measuring.

I mostly care about qualified leads.

5. Cost per new client acquisition

Divide the total marketing spend in that period by the number of new clients you signed up.

This is your cost per acquisition. This is the golden number and tells you whether your marketing is profitable or not.

But the only way you’ll know that is if you have a good idea of the next number.

6. Customer lifetime value

It’s crucial to have an idea of your lifetime value (LTV). Even if it’s a rough estimate.

There are too many ways to calculate it in this quick post, but a quick Google search will give you some formulas.

Break it out by service so you have a distinct LTV by service.

7. Weighted average expenses

Let’s say you sell consulting. It’s 80% of your revenue. You also sell a membership, which is 10%, and an eBook, which accounts for another 10% of total revenue.

I like to weight marketing expenses based on the total expected revenue in a business.

In this case, I’d allocate 80% of all marketing spend towards my consulting, 10% towards memberships, and 10% towards eBooks.

Now, I’m able to figure out my approximate cost per lead and cost per acquisition based on the weighted average.

It’s not perfect, but it works really well to give you a glimpse into whether you’re profitably acquiring leads and customers/clients for each service.

More on this some other time.

8. Profitability and payback periods

The last thing we look for is cost per lead, cost per acquisition, and payback period.

Are we acquiring leads and clients at a price we can sustain? When is our payback period (i.e. how fast do we get our money back)?

This should be obvious with some quick math based on revenue projections for the new business/opportunities.

9. Other secondary numbers

There are a ton of other things we could look at, such as marketing spend as a percent of revenue, total revenue, net new revenue growth, churn, capacity etc. but those don’t tell us quite as directly how well our marketing is performing.

You should still track those and many more things in one single spreadsheet.

And that’s it!

It all boils down to:

1. How many opportunities did we get?
2. How many new clients/customers did we sign up?
3. How much did we spend to acquire them?
4. Is all of this working out profitably for us?

That’s all that matters at the high level.

From there, we investigate where those leads came from so we can determine what’s working and what’s not.

We then go down the rabbit hole to find out how to get more opportunities and clients at a price we can afford.

Having these numbers gives us a high-level view of the health of our marketing.

There are many more KPIs you can look at in your marketing, and I share a spreadsheet template that I use in all my engagements inside of Mindshare.

Sign up if you’re a marketer looking to level up your consulting business.

If you’re a business owner, reach out and I’ll hook you up with the KPI spreadsheet (the place where results can’t hide).

Let’s talk about this ad by Ocean Spray.

Well. 👏 Done. 👏 Ocean Spray. 👏
https://t.co/PDCsEtPG5A

— kevin c. whelan (@kevincwhelan) November 27, 2020

As you can see by my tweet, I support the audacity.

The thing about marketing is, if you play it safe, you’ll get safe returns at best. Or, at worst, you’ll become irrelevant and go out of business.

But if you double down on your best customers or clients—to the detriment of being attractive to most others—you run the chance of becoming beloved to the people who really matter.

An aspiration worth striving for, with significant upside potential if you choose wisely.

It’s the same concept with many brands recently taking “risks” by choosing sides on social issues, like Nike did with the Kaepernick campaign for example.

Which, by the way, despite threats of boycotts and backlash, netted the company $163 million in earned media, a $6 billion brand value increase, and a 31% boost in sales.

If you don’t put anyone off with your marketing, you’re definitely not having anyone fall in love with your brand either.

As somebody once said, and I’m not sure who, “Love me or hate me, there’s no money in the middle.”

I was sitting here, thinking about what I wanted to write about today. I was stumped for ideas.

In cases like this, I usually reference my list of ideas, notes from my client calls, or even my research document.

But this time was different. I asked myself, “who am I trying to reach with this post?”

And then it hit me: write for my ideal client. Duh!

By the way, this is a real person, not an avatar. Someone who already pays me well, refers me to others, enjoys what I offer, and complains the least.

As soon as I thought about one specific person I could write to, the ideas came flooding in. I knew exactly what to say.

If your writing resonates with your ideal clients, it will likely also resonate with many more like them.

To me, this is an idea worth using often.

Imagine your prospective clients are aiming for a target in the distance with a bow and arrow.

One target is the size of a house, the other is the size of a penny.

Which one are they more likely to hit?

The one with the biggest surface area, of course.

And it’s the same with your marketing. The more of it you do, the larger your “surface area” becomes and the easier it is for your clients to find you.

Yes, you want the highest quality possible at every touch point. But it doesn’t need to be perfect for it to be effective.

When given the choice, I’d rather a large dartboard with low points than a single bullseye that nobody can hit.

Make your target big enough, then optimize for higher points per square inch.

P.S. Do your like this content? Check out my audio mentorship and community for marketing consultants here: mindshare.fm.

Someone on Twitter asked me what my audio setup was after sharing this monstrosity of a wire management “system”.

Some IT person out there would be LIVID at my cable management “system”. pic.twitter.com/3TWAy139Va

— kevin c. whelan (@kevincwhelan) November 20, 2020

I’ve been asked this before, so I thought I’d just write it here to make it easy to reference later.

Here’s what I use currently:

1. Shure SM7B

I use this any time I’m recording audio for a podcast.

The sound quality is excellent and it’s used by many of the biggest podcasters out there.

But it definitely costs more than your average USB mic and requires the pre-amp and Cloudlifter to get it sounding right on your computer.

Details on that are below.

2. Rode PSA1 Boom Arm

I originally bought this when I started out with the Rode NT-USB (listed below), but I’ve since added the Shure SM7B to it instead and use a little stand that came with the Rode NT-USB for that mic.

It’s a good boom arm and I’d recommend it to just about anyone who needs one.

3. Scarlett 6i6 pre-amp

A friend of mine sold me his used Scarlett 6i6 pre-amp interface. Since the mic used an XLR cable, not USB, you need this to send the sound data to your computer’s USB port. It’s the middleman.

The only problem is, the Shure SM7B is quiet, so you need something to boost the sound without creating lots of hiss. Another downside to the mic, but that’s the cost of having good sound!

I use the Cloudlifter CL-2 Mic Activator for that, which seems to be the most popular choice on the internet.

Both the Cloudlifter CL-2 and Scarlett 6i6 come with two XLR ports, so I could do in-person interviews with separate mics, if I wanted. Since I had the 6i6 from a friend already, I figured I might as well get the CL-2 to go with it.

If you only need one audio input port, I think the 3i3 and CL-1 would work just fine and would save you a little bit of money. But I’m not an expert on any of this stuff.

4. Cloudlifter CL-2 Mic Activator

As mentioned above, the Cloudlifter boosts the sound without creating added background noise.

If you have a USB mic you wouldn’t need the Cloudlifter OR the Scarlett since it would connect right into your computer.

But you do lose a little bit in the sound quality, if that matters to you.

5. DBX 286 S Preamp/Processor

This device lets me use my Shure microphone on live streams and Zoom calls. Without it, the volume tends to be too low.

It also lets me control things like the input volume, has a de-esser, compression, a noise gate, and a lot of other tools that ultimately reduce background noises and other odd sounds from getting into my audio.

It’s much easier than editing things in post, and gives me a series of physical dials to play with if I get bored on a podcast or Zoom call. 🙂

It’s not pictured in the photo above, it was bought some time afterwards.

6. Rode NT-USB (with Shure SM7B’s backup wind guard)

The Rode NT-USB was my first external microphone and works very well. I use it for my Zoom calls instead of the Shure SM7B which can be a bit finicky to get to the right volume on Zoom.

I added the Shure SM7B wind guard to the mic since my pop filter that came with the Rode mic broke off when I knocked it over (I had set up the stand backwards so it wasn’t balanced).

7. Microphones for when I’m travelling 

I also use a Samson Go mic when I’m on the road and it comes with me in my little tech kit. It connects via USB and creates surprisingly decent sound in a pinch.

Lastly, I use an Altson Ultra-Compact Clip Omnidirectional iPhone Microphone for quick iPhone audio recordings. It plugs into the lightening port on my phone directly. The sound ion this is also decent, surprisingly.

8. Sony MDR-7506 Headphones

I bought these after seeing several people recommend them. I’ve heard they last for years (decades).

I’m a big believer in buying right not twice, so I grabbed them.

The big benefit is they plug directly into the pre-amp so you can hear yourself in the monitor in real time vs. a slight lag you hear when plugging into the computer. The lag makes you hear yourself too much and it’s distracting.

They also have an adaptable size output so you can plug them into standard audio ports or larger ones like the pre-amp has.

9. Garage Band

Where would we be without Garage Band? I don’t do robust editing, so Garage Band works well for me when editing podcasts or audio for Mindshare.

It was super easy to learn, so once I reach my technical limits with it, I’ll try other things.

If you’re on PC, you might look into Audacity which is free.

10. HyperDrive GEN2: Next Generation USB-C Hub

This is the magic box that pulls it all together. I bought it off a Kickstarter campaign and lets me plug all my things into one box, which then plugs into my Macbook’s USB-C port.

Simple, clean, easy to grab my laptop quickly to go, or plug things back in with one wire.

If I were to buy it again, I’d get the one with 18 or more ports because I’m already using up most of my USB/USB-C ports. But for now it works.

You can buy one here if you want (not an affiliate link).

So that’s my audio setup. Perhaps in the future I’ll do a full rundown of the rest of my tech if anyone is curious.

We’re all inundated with information.

Blogs, podcasts, social media, books, courses, you name it.

So, if you want to reach busy people with educational content, cutting through the noise will be your biggest challenge.

The things I’m most drawn to these are:

1. Audio content
2. Short articles/emails
3. Twitter

The common thread is the ease in which these ideas are consumed.

Give me too much to read at once, I won’t do it (unless it’s an actual book or course).

Write me a newsletter with too many ideas, I’ll start to ignore it because it feels overwhelming.

But give me a single piece of short-form wisdom at a time or put it into audio format? I am very interested.

Why? Because I apply my brain continuously all day and it can only handle so much input.

When I consume content, I want it to be as easy to consume as possible—unless it’s a deep-dive course or book. In that case, I will invest my energy.

And if this is how I feel, there are many more busy professionals like me out there.

So, if you’re trying to reach busy people with educational content, my advice to you is this:

Create content you would want to consume and do it as efficiently as you can.

There is a time and place for deep-dive content.

But if you’re focused on reaching busy professionals, it might not be the right way to have your message consumed.

Today, I received a number of flyers in the mail. I ignored most of them but one in particular stood out: a local real estate market data newsletter.

It was sent on behalf of a local real estate brokerage, with whom I’ve come into contact before.

The first time was when I was looking for a house in the area last year. They had a representative doing an open house at one of the places we looked at.

He was knowledgeable and courteous, and came prepared with a mini booklet to showcase the features of the house.

It was more than your average one-sheet—it stood out for its quality. Which makes sense given the house costs several hundred thousands of dollars.

He also offered to send us listings that fit our profile since our realtor was located out of town and he regularly got early access to houses coming onto the market locally.

Since then, I’ve noticed their distinct signs outside of houses for sale nearby. They are an independent brokerage, so their branding stood out with its unique colour and appearance.

And today, probably my sixth or seventh impression of their brand, I saw their flyer amidst all the other materials that came with the mail.

While I ignored the rest, I noticed theirs immediately. My wife did, too. We talked about them for a minute, too.

Marketing doesn’t work by a lucky single encounter with your brand. It happens by having multiple positive touch-points over time. That’s why people who look for short-term wins aren’t thinking about marketing the right way.

Marketing is a long game. The key is showing up frequently and consistently, ideally with a visual identity and messaging that stands out.

If you want results today, try doing sales outreach.

If you want opportunities to come to you instead, think long term and build your marketing with the aim of earning repeat exposure in a quality and unique way.

This idea was shared by Julian Shapiro on Twitter and I had to share it with you.

One of the most rewarding things I do is help people create consistent content for the first time, whether that’s on their blog, email, or social media.

The metaphor is simple: When you first turn on a dirty tap, the water will flow dirty for a while. But if you keep it running for long enough, it will eventually run clean.

It works the same with almost anything you create. Your creative work and ideas will start out being not very good. Downright bad even.

But when you commit to the process, it’s only a matter of time before your work begins to flow pure.

Your bad ideas leave your system, your work becomes a little easier, and the output a bit stronger every time you publish. Eventually, you can produce great work.

But it only happens if you trust the process and stick with it long enough.

Related: If you haven’t read The Practice by Seth Godin, go out right now and buy it.

When you launch something new, you never know whether it will succeed or not. By definition, you’re taking a leap of faith.

You’ll always feel excited when you begin. But by the time you launch, you might also feel resistance, imposter syndrome, or even downright fear of embarrassment.

And that’s okay. That’s how you know you’re creating something.

You don’t have to have all the answers when you begin. In fact, you never will.

But you do need to trust that you’ll make good decisions along the way. Business is an iterative process, after all.

If you go into your new venture knowing you’ll relentlessly follow the needs and wants of your best customers, it’s really only a matter of time before you succeed.

There are exceptions, but it’s really not much more complex than that.

Today I launched Mindshare, a rebranding of the Mentorship program I started a few months back.

It’s a community for marketing consultants seeking to sell their expertise instead of their hands.

It also includes resources and a private podcast feed with thought-provoking strategies and long form interviews to help you grow your marketing business around your expertise, not just your labor.

If you want the backstory, I talk about my story and how it led to this launch here in this Twitter thread:

A story and announcement for you today.

🎉👇

— Kevin C. Whelan 🦕 (@kevincwhelan) November 13, 2020

And if you want to package and sell your marketing expertise instead of your effort, check out the Mindshare Community and become a member.