Marketing Advisor, Mentor, & Educator

Kevin C. Whelan

Marketing Consultants

The tendency to overcomplicate

When you can do a lot of things, your tendency is… to do a lot of things.

But in so many cases, doing a few things well is better than doing many things poorly.

Complexity leads to breakdown, stress, and resource depletion. Simplification leads to focus and results.

This principle applies almost anywhere else you look. But I see it most often in people’s marketing strategies.

It starts small. But eventually, there becomes too much noise and activity.

You begin to lose focus. Everyone is exhausted. Things stop working.

So what do you do if you find complexity creeping into you or your clients’ marketing program?

Evaluate it from an 80/20 perspective.

There’s always something that is bringing 80% of the results for 20% of the effort. Do more of that if it aligns with your goals.

On the flip side, there’s always something causing 80% of the headaches making up 20% of your time, energy, or resources. Stop those things immediately, even if it hurts.

When you find complexity creeping in, and it always does, look for the 80/20.

And then as Stephen King says, kill your darlings.

Should you position yourself as a fractional CMO?

I was at a BBQ last year and my extended in-laws were asking what I do.

The easiest thing that came to mind was telling them that I’m like a fractional or part-time CMO (chief marketing officer).

I told them how companies too small to justify one full-time could work with me and get the same level of expertise applied to their business for a fraction of the cost.

I explained how we work on everything together over time, building according to goals and priorities, and evolving with their needs and challenges as they arise.

The instantly got it.

Even though they were not “business folk”, it just made sense to them.

If I said “I’m a marketing consultant”, their eyes would have glazed over. It’s vague and could mean any number of things.

Comparing myself to a “part-time CMO” quickly articulated what I really do. I tend to work with clients over a long period of time. Many months and even years if things are going well.

We tend to work on everything to do with new customer acquisition and retention. It’s a holistic job, not focused on one individual area or tactic unless it’s the key priority.

I won’t write your copy or manage your individual projects, but I will facilitate change, oversee all work, help you hire, and ensure you’re getting the best possible results with the resources you have.

Should you choose to position yourself as a Fractional CMO?

The answer to this question depends on your business and how you approach your work.

Here are some questions you might ask yourself to see if it’s right for you:

  1. Do you actually do executive-level work?
  2. Do you prefer to work at the strategic level or are you more focused on individual tactics by nature?
  3. Do you want to be seen as long-term partner or someone who works on special projects?
  4. Do your ideal clients tend to have an in-house CMO already? If so, your positioning might scare those clients away.

Personally, my clients tend not to have an executive-level marketing person. They have a manager who has some experience but I become their mentor while also helping the business owner at the strategic level.

This is my sweet spot. If it sounds like what you do, try describing yourself that way in sales conversations.

How I currently position myself

I currently position myself as a marketing advisor and mentor, but I regularly mention in conversation that working with me is like having a part-time CMO for a fraction of the usual big salaries they come with.

People generally get that. Many still refer to me as their fractional CMO because of those early sales conversations.

The most critical part is that everyone I speak to just “gets it” the first time they hear it.

It clarifies the type of work I do, the size of clients I work with, and the general value I bring to the table.

What more could you ask for?

What are the risks of fractional/part-time CMO positioning?

To me, there are two main risks of positioning yourself as a fractional CMO.

1. Being perceived—and therefore treated—as an employee

There’s nothing worse than setting the expectations that you are basically a contract employee.

Clients will expect you to produce deliverables and do things on their terms, their way, at their business, etc., which is not generally what a consultant does.

Or, they may not always listen to your advice, thinking you’re like another employee who they can listen to optionally if they wish to.

They may not like you disagreeing with their ideas or saying no to doing certain tasks if it’s not what you do.

Ultimately, it can become the wrong kind of relationship if you intend to be candid with your clients. Your job is to deliver the truth, not mince words if they need to hear the facts as they are.

Employees are expected to be agreeable, whereas consultants have a bit more room to stand strong, defending their ideas if they believe it will actually get results for their clients.

You need to be prepared to be fired for taking hard positions when you believe them to be the right path. Employees aren’t generally expected to take that role.

How you are perceived matters—you are not an employee.

2. Scaring potential clients away if it would undermine current marketing leadership

This is one of the main reasons I don’t position myself as a fractional CMO, except for during sales conversations or times when I say I’m “like having a …”.

The main reason is I want the current marketing manager to feel empowered and know that I will build on their work, not overhaul it or become a new boss to them.

My ideal clients have marketing managers in many cases, but none have CMOs. So it’s critical that I set the expectation that I’m not becoming a permanent member of their team, but instead someone who will mentor and advise on the process for as long as I’m needed.

Hence, my position as marketing advisor and mentor who is like having a part-time CMO on the team.

At the end of the day, you have to do what’s right for you and your business. I used to position myself as a fractional CMO, but not any more. It may change again over time, who knows.

How do you position yourself? Let me know on Twitter.

Oh by the way, if you like this topic, you’ll love Mindshare. Check it out for a free trial.

Reflecting and planning for the new year

Every year around this time, I reflect on the last twelve months to determine what worked and what didn’t.

This year is no different, but I’m also looking at it from new perspectives.

At a high level, I’m reflecting on things like:

  • where most of my revenue came from
  • where and how I spent money (and if it was spent wisely)
  • which projects I enjoyed working on vs. ones I didn’t
  • what my wins and lessons were for the year
  • what kind of work gave me energy vs. depleted it
  • what made me feel good vs. what made me feel bad

Ultimately, I’m looking for ways to make my business better.

So what does a “better business” look like?

For me, it looks like continuing to focus on higher-income activities, more leveraged products and services, more energy-producing work, and generally seeking to enjoy most of the work I choose to do.

If it were up to me, I would do mostly mentoring and teaching. And yet, those things are the least “profitable” to me right now.

Nonetheless, I’m seeing signs of life with Mindshare and I enjoy it a lot, so I plan to follow that.

But I also have to make sure I’m in a good financial position, which means analyzing the best business opportunities while balancing the more subjective targets.

My plan for the new year

My plan for the new year is to continue focusing on the few clients who bring in the most money (multi-location coworking spaces), give me the most energy (mentoring work), all while doing work that aligns with what I want for my future.

Each part is important, but the last part is probably the smartest area to focus on.

We get so caught up in the days, weeks, and months that we forget to look five to ten years down the line to make sure we’re aiming in the right direction.

I also want to spend more time tinkering. One of my early mentors was a big tinkerer and he still runs a highly profitable consulting business around his free time.

I’m a big believer that tinkering and learning is good for business—especially one dependent on your expertise.

Too many people neglect that part, I think. And that’s what makes this year’s takeaways a bit different than most.

So that’s my thought process. It’s a blend of rational and qualitative. Just like real life.

What’s your year in review looking like? Hit me up on Twitter.

The value of marketing expertise

When the pandemic first hit, I thought my business would get hit hard.

After all, the majority of my clients are in the coworking industry—an industry reliant on “shoulder to shoulder” consumption.

My first thought was that if people couldn’t use coworking spaces, the value of my services would drop significantly.

What happened, though, was that while demand for coworking stopped for a short time, it eventually started to return. Slowly at first, and then more over time.

Some markets are still hit pretty hard. But here’s the thing, while the demand for coworking is lower than it was before, it didn’t go away.

In fact, new markets are being created, and the spaces that are innovating around these changes are being set up for serious success.

The pandemic has created a decreased overall demand in the short term, but that only means it has become more important than ever to have good marketing. Companies are now competing for fewer buyers.

For me, that meant I ended up having my best year yet (by far). I never would have predicted it. But it makes sense.

Pandemic or not, marketing is the lifeblood of business. Without new clients (and retention), there is no business.

Never underestimate the value of your marketing expertise. Invest in it and it will pay you (and your clients) dividends. 

Should you pick a niche you’re passionate about?

One of the hardest things marketing consultants do for themselves is pick a niche.

At least, it feels like that for many.

Do you pick a target market you love or one that has the most potential opportunities?

I don’t have any grand answers to such questions, but I do know one thing: if work is just about paying the bills, it will never make you fulfilled.

Work is easily 1/3rd of your life. To me, you might as well try to do work you generally enjoy for people you enjoy working with.

It will make life more pleasant and will increase the chances of being successful over the long haul.

The opposite will make you miserable.

The trick to daily blogging

I used to go running first thing every morning.

I’d get up early, put on my running shoes and appropriate clothing, and get running. I’d be on the road before my brain even realized what was happening.

No matter what happened, I ran. I ran through rain, shine, show, ice and everything in between. Usually in the dark.

I did that for the better part of 6 months without skipping a day. I look back at photos from that time and I was noticeably leaner than other periods before or after.

The results were showing. Consistency was working for me.

The trick to running daily was to do without thinking too much about it. I would just put on the clothes and run for at least 20 minutes. That was the rule.

And because I did it every day, I didn’t have to think about it. I just did it.

I now see similarities with daily writing. It’s Christmas Day, and I’m writing this letter to you because that’s what I’ve committed to do. I don’t have to think about it.

This is day 48 of my streak. It works because I don’t overthink it, I just write and publish. The results will follow. I know it.

If you want to write daily, the trick is simple: don’t overthink it.

Keep it simple, keep showing up, do it no matter what (even on Christmas) and see what happens. You can’t help but create opportunities and if nothing else, it’s a fun challenge.

Death to bullsh*t

There are at least two ways to do marketing: the legitimate, straightforward, integrity-focused way, and the fly-by-night, bloated, hacky, and shortcuts way.

Below is an excerpt from a great little website by Brad Frost called Death to Bullshit that articulates exactly these two extremes.

I highly recommend checking it out and clicking the “Turn bullshit on?” link in the upper right to get the full experience.

We’re bombarded by more information than ever before. With the rise of all this information comes a rise of the amount of bullshit we’re exposed to. Death to Bullshit is a rallying cry to rid the world of bullshit and demand experiences that respect people and their time.

What is bullshit?

Bullshit lies on a spectrum somewhere between ineptitude and outright deception. Bullshit can be characterized in a few different ways:

  • Superfluous or unnecessary
  • Cluttered, clunky, or needlessly complex
  • Intentionally deceptive or insincere

Popups, jargon, junk mail, anti-patterns, sensationalism, begging for likes, tracking scripts, marketing spam, dark patterns, unskippable ads, clickbait, linkbait, listicles, seizure-inducing banners, captchas, QR codes, barely-visible unsubscribe buttons, 24-hour news networks, carousels, auto-playing audio, bloatware, sudden redirects to the App Store, telemarketing, ticked-by-default subscribe buttons, “your call is important to us”, pageview-gaming galleries, native advertising, the list of bullshit goes on and on and on. This bullshit assaults our senses in a desperate attempt to capture our attention.

People’s capacity for bullshit is rapidly diminishing.

“When information is cheap, attention becomes expensive.” —James Gleick

We as human beings are trying to maximize our signal and minimize the amount of noise we’re exposed to. Our willingness to be inconvenienced, interrupted, and insulted is dwindling. We’re finding more ways to circumvent bullshit, whether it’s through tools like ad-blockers or actions like cutting cable.

As the landslide of bullshit surges down the mountain, people will increasingly gravitate toward genuinely useful, well-crafted products, services, and experiences that respect them and their time. So we as creators have a decision to make: do we want to be part of the 90% of noise out there, or do we want to be part of the 10% of signal? It’s quite simple really:

  • Respect people and their time.
  • Respect your craft.
  • Be sincere.
  • Create genuinely useful things.

This site and accompanying blog explore the themes of information, bullshit, and craft. Enjoy.

Love,
Brad

When you first get started in marketing, you might have a tendency to throw tactics on the wall until things work. Or if you are feeling desperate, you might try some “hacks” to get people to use your thing.

It starts small. It looks like a new feature or idea. Next thing you know, you’re laying on piles of BS until you can’t even call what you’re doing marketing anymore.

It’s good to be hyper-aware of this slippery slope. To remember that good marketing is about service, value, and simplicity. Not hacks, gimmicks, or shortcuts.

There are no short-cuts and the cream always rises to the top. Avoid BS like a hawk.

 

P.S. Be sure to visit the main site and turn on the BS to get the full experience. 🙂

The 8 key documents I use in my marketing consulting practice

In my consulting work, I use Google Drive to managed shared projects and documents.

When I begin with a client, I ask them to create their own Google Drive folder and invite me. I then move my key working documents into their folder so they “own” them should I ever get hit by the lottery.

It’s essential my clients own all the work we do and have the keys to the kingdom at all times.

Anyway, here are the documents I use in case you’re looking for inspiration to solidify your consulting project deliveries:

1. Onboarding questionnaire

This is a document I use that has over 117 questions to get started. Yes, it’s a lot. It takes a couple hours to complete and gives me the full rundown of their current situation, goals, and more.

I’ve shortened it in some cases to make the process easier for some clients.

2. KPI dashboard

This is a spreadsheet that allows me to do pro-forma budgets and financial planning, keep track of expenses, revenue, sales, leads, close ratios, and other key performance indicators.

I call it the place where results can’t hide.

3. Marketing notes

This is where we keep notes from all our consulting calls.

I end up being the one to record most of what we talk about and decide on as next steps. It serves as our agenda for future calls as well, as we’re able to look back and see if the work we agreed to got done.

This has been super important for developing case studies and reviewing what we accomplished in any given time. It also keeps the projects on track and keeps people accountable.

4. Marketing strategy and planning worksheet

This is a series of questions I ask to prompt answers that get to the heart of what makes their business tick. From this document, we know what makes them unique, what we should work on, and where we should focus our efforts.

5. Marketing summary document

This is a document that basically summarizes everything we do.

It includes who they are selling to, what they sell, how they are positioned, what the plan is, and the thought process behind each marketing channel we use. We review this every 6-12 months to ensure it’s up to date and accurate.

It also lets new employees and suppliers onboard quickly and get up to speed on all the moving parts and why they are in place.

6. Recurring tasks and standard operating procedures

Anything that gets done more than once (i.e. not a one-off project but something that should be done at some regular interval) gets documented according to frequency. It’s broken up into daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, bi-annually and annually—fully customized to the reality of their projects.

The tasks get documented as a standard operating procedure so anybody could follow them. We use a combination of numbered steps and Loom videos to make it easy.

This process frees up the marketing manager to do things they must but later delegate responsibilities to new hires and outsourced support.

The goal is to create as much leverage around the in-house team as possible and rely on external as-needed specialists/assistants to perform specialized functions. Thus, the manager(s) can focus on what they do best and keep the big picture in mind.

For bigger clients, this all gets built into their project management software, like Asana.

7. Login credentials

We keep marketing-related login credentials in a Google Sheets document that is strictly shared with only the people who absolutely need it. All accounts must be kept in there and up to date each month.

There should be a standard marketing@domain.com email address to keep company accounts neutral of any one individual.

8. Project agreement

I keep the agreement as a PDF in the drive somewhere so we can refer back to our initial goals and scope at any time.

It comes in handy when people are wondering when we started, what we agreed to, what I do or won’t do, and other similar questions.

And that’s it!

Occasionally, I will include things like a project management spreadsheet or a short-term CRM spreadsheet for clients not ready to move into something more robust.

We also build a folder structure inside Google Drive (or any shared drive) to keep everything organized and in one place.

All of this takes a bit of time and discipline to keep updated (not as much as you might think) but it’s the only way to run an efficient marketing consulting practice, in my opinion.

If you’re interested in these templates, I share the onboarding questionnaire, proposal template/agreement, and KPI dashboard in the mindshare.fm membership.

I might sell the rest soon as a complete package, so get on my mailing list if you want to hear about those first (unless you already are, in which case, hit reply and tell me you’re interested!).

What is your lemon factor?

Something I’ve realized lately in my consulting work is that every company has a “lemon factor”. Mine is no exception, by the way.

And if you don’t quickly get clear on what it is, it will come back to haunt you.

Now that I’m aware of this truth, I ask my clients the question up front, what is your lemon factor?

They won’t always know or be able to accurately assess it themselves, so it’s my job to investigate just to be sure.

This knowledge is crucial for helping companies grow. Most of us are partially or completely blind to them. We get used to them.

What is a lemon factor?

A lemon factor is basically your biggest weakness. It’s why people shouldn’t or don’t buy from you most often.

Maybe you’re in an undesirable part of town or maybe you’re a jack-of-all-trades and master of none.

Whatever it is, it’s crucial you know what’s your lemon factor is so you know how to compensate for it.

What is the best way to compensate for it?

Double down on your X factor.

Your X factor is the thing that gives your company an edge. It’s your competitive advantage and the thing that makes you uniquely compelling.

Both the X factor and the lemon factor are essential things to be aware of so you can mitigate risks and compensate by focusing on what you do best.

You can’t ignore the lemon factor—both in your own business and your clients’. All businesses have them.

If you do ignore the lemon factor, it will become a blind spot in your work that will severely limit your potential down the line.

Know your lemon factor and compensate with an equally strong (or stronger) X factor.

The unsung tool in my consulting tech stack

One of the tools I enjoy most right now is called Command E.

It’s the kind of tool that can almost goes unnoticed in your day-to-day life except for how wickedly convenient it is.

It’s like a good sports referee—you don’t notice them when they do a good job. Command E does such a good job that it almost blends in with my computer.

With the stroke of two keys (Command + E on a Mac), I can search my email, Google Drive, Dropbox, calendar, and potentially many more tools all at once.

Google Drive, at the best of times, is a pain to navigate, and yet that’s where I store my shared consulting documents. I use it every day, often switching between folders and documents several times per hour.

Command E lets me search Google Drive and all my other places with literally two keys. It’s gold and worth every penny and more (it’s currently free but I’d pay real money for this).

If you haven’t used it, check it out.