Messaging Strategy Workshop
Clear Messaging Accelerates B2G and B2B Growth
Is Poor Messaging Confusing Your Customers, Employees, and Teaming Partners?
Build
Credibility and Trust
Address
Pain Points
Solutions
Over Products and Services
What is Marketing Messaging Strategy?
Messaging is your ability to explain that your company has the ideal solution to your clients’ problems.
The greater the targeting and alignment between your message and your clients’ problems, the more likely you are to close new deals.
Alignment of marketing messages requires the evaluation of 3 components.
- Product/services: including brand messaging, core values, features, and benefits
- Understanding your target markets: what are their pain points, and how important is it that they get solved?
- Competition: who else is offering a solution, and is yours better?
Your core marketing messages should be inherently part of all marketing communications and can be incorporated at three different levels:
- Corporate level: brand messaging framework, mission statement, brand position statement, and elevator pitch
- Product (or service) level: differentiation from the competition
- Marketing campaigns: brand promise, emotional connection, inclusion in content, and getting people to buy your product or service
Marketing Message Examples of Change
Your messaging will change over time. Here are some examples:
1. You Learn Something New
Companies typically get input from their sales and marketing teams, who have a deep understanding of their client’s needs. In some cases, additional market research is appropriate.
During your ongoing sales and marketing activities, you should be looking for validation that your messaging is on-point and, if not, make adjustments.
2. Changes in Target Markets
It may seem appealing to target new markets with your existing products, but changes in market segments have a direct impact on messaging.
3. Addition of New Products and Services
Perhaps the most obvious reason for a change in messaging is with the addition of a new product or service—messaging should be a part of any new product introduction project.
4. Competition
Your competition does not stand still. If they learn more about the market than you, or launch a better mousetrap, then you will need to adjust your marketing messaging.
5. Client Needs Change
Clients and market segments as a whole are also not standing still. Their need will change over time and those changes require you to adjust your messaging, if not your product offering.
How Can a Marketing Message Strategy Impact Your Business?
Schedule time to talk to our messaging experts.
Messaging and the Buyer’s Journey
If it wasn’t complicated enough already, it’s essential to recognize that messaging needs to be modified at the different stages of the buyer’s journey.
People researching a solution are looking for different information than those who are ready to buy. The trick here is to cleverly build out messaging as a funnel that guides potential buyers to a closed-won deal.
Looking at a simple 4-step sales funnel: Top (get found), middle (nurture), bottom (sales pitch), close (the deal), it’s easy to see why the messaging needs to be modified.
Messaging and Buyer Personalities
As anyone who has held a sales position knows, buyers are people, and people are not all the same. There are multiple ways to categorize buyer personas and Ocean 5 has identified four characteristics that impact the way potential customers react to your messages.
Aligning your message with buyer problems is fundamental, but so is the ability to adjust for personality.
What Our Clients Are Saying
“Strategic Impact!”
“Ocean 5 brought a new perspective to our messaging and campaign development. With strategic consideration of target verticals, personas and problems solved, we expanded our campaigns’ reach, accelerated execution, and reduced the overall cost.”
“Brought Great Value”
“Strong analytical, strategic, technical, and marketing skills that brought great value to our organization.”
“Makes the Comples Seem Simple”
“I was impressed with Ocean 5’s ability to make the complex seem simple.”
We provide technology and IT solutions (SaaS) to both the federal government and private sector. Ocean 5 stood out due to their expertise in both.”
“Gained Clarity and Direction—Pure Genius!”
“Pure Genius! The marketing strategy workshop with our executive team was excellent. We now have a clear direction and an executable plan. We are thrilled to be working with Ocean 5 on the implementation and continuous improvement phases.”
Why Choose Ocean 5 for Marketing Messaging?
We make the complex seem simple.
So far, we have outlined 19 variables that contribute to strong marketing messaging (and there may be others in your particular industry).
- 3 inputs to consider—product/services, competition, and market segments
- 3 levels of messaging—corporate, product/services, and campaigns
- 5 reasons why messaging will change—we learn something new, new product introduction, new target market, competition advancement, and the client needs change
- 4 messages—one for each stage in a simple sales funnel
- 4 different buyer personality types
Working through this maze takes a disciplined approach, so Ocean 5 developed the Messaging Strategy Workshop.
Messaging at the corporate or product level is typically a stand-alone project or part of a broader strategic planning engagement. Campaign messaging workshops are typically a precursor to a website design project, search engine optimization, advertising, or an email marketing program.
Included in Our Marketing Messaging Workshops
The workshop output will form the basis for the messaging across all marketing platforms and assets. Areas of discussion include:
- Market segmentation
- Product/service offerings
- Developing personas
- Competitor review
- Messaging throughout the buyer’s journey
- Messaging vs. content
- Content strategy
At the end of the workshop, you will have core messages at four different stages of the sales and marketing pipeline—along with clear recommendations on how to incorporate messages into marketing programs.
— The Ocean 5 Difference —
Relationship
We build long-term collaborative partnerships with our clients.
Approach
We combine strategy, consulting, and marketing execution.
Focus
We align business development and financial objectives with measurable results from marketing.
Results
Ocean 5 clients have a record of realizing 500% ROI!
A Sampling of Our Clients
We are recognized for our expertise in established business-to-business (B2B) and business-to-government (GovCon, B2G) companies with a growth goal. Our clients include cybersecurity, staff augmentation, IT/technology/IoT, software/SaaS, engineering, logistics, and manufacturing companies looking for a strategic marketing partner to help them get to the next level.
