The Process will Determine Your Success

by Bill Arnold | Mar 3, 2025 | Best Practices, Buyer Persona, Discovery & Assessment, Reporting, The Process

Two elements determine marketing and sales success: the caliber of the people implementing your program and the process they use to achieve it. It is not a random development but a carefully crafted program borne from both knowledge and trial and error. Genmark has incorporated a process that has been proven effective over and over again at some of the top marketing agencies in the nation. This process has proven to work regardless of your vertical.

To implement this program, we have brought together some of the finest marketers with a proven success track record. While some of our marketers are dedicated to a particular industry or vertical, we all continually share and learn from each other to ensure that no opportunity is missed.

While we won’t share ALL of our secret sauce, we thought we might share enough to establish what makes us different (hopefully better) than 95% of all marketing agencies. It is this difference that will define your success.

Evaluation of Your Program

Before we even sit down with a prospective customer, we believe that we should bring something to the table to establish why they are not achieving their desired success and that we understand their program. To this end, before our initial meeting, we take the time to analyze your marketing program so we can offer thoughtful insights. The deliverable for this is called a Snapshot Report.  This report is a pre-engagement analysis conducted before our first meeting. It helps us better understand prospective clients’ issues and problems. We analyze over 35 categories and upwards of 175 data points. We show up with a clear big picture understanding of why your program is not delivering results. This initial step helps establish a comprehensive understanding of the client’s current position and lays the groundwork for a strategic partnership.

The process includes an in-depth analysis of the client’s marketing history, including their previous campaigns, platforms used, and key performance metrics. Understanding these aspects is vital as it enables us to identify what has worked in the past and has not. Gathering data from various sources, such as web analytics, social media insights, and customer feedback, will provide a holistic view of the client’s marketing impact. This rich repository of information is instrumental in recognizing patterns that can inform future strategies.

Insights Kickstart: Engagement Brief

Once a prospect graduates to becoming a client, the real work commences. While the subsequent phases of our discovery and assessment process will drill down deep into your industry, program, and competitors, we understand that you have been struggling for success for some time and have unique insights and opinions. We want to know what you know. Before our initial kickoff meeting, we will share an engagement brief that allows you to core dump critical information and insights. The structured questionnaire is a foundational tool that streamlines the initial interaction between Genmark and its clients. This structured questionnaire is instrumental in extracting vital information about a client’s business. By utilizing an engagement brief, agencies can gain comprehensive insights into your operations, objectives, target audience, and unique selling points. This initial data-gathering phase is crucial for aligning expectations and goals, ultimately ensuring that the marketing strategy created is highly tailored and effective.

The engagement brief typically begins with questions about the client’s overall business objectives. For instance, agencies might ask, “What are your key performance indicators (KPIs) for this campaign?” or “What are your primary revenue goals over the next quarter?” Such inquiries help clarify the client’s expectations and allow agencies to align their strategies with the client’s performance metrics.

Another pivotal aspect of the engagement brief is understanding the client’s target market. Questions regarding demographics, buying behaviors, and customer pain points can illuminate who the marketing efforts should target. An example question might be, “Who is your ideal customer, and what challenges do they face that your product or service solves?” This information is indispensable in crafting compelling marketing messages that resonate with the intended audience.

Additionally, the engagement brief includes inquiries about any unique elements of your brand. Queries such as “What differentiates your business from competitors?” or “Are there specific brand values or messages you want to communicate?” guide the agency in creating a marketing strategy that is not only targeted but also distinctive. Ultimately, the insights gathered from the engagement brief lay the groundwork for a successful partnership between clients and agencies, facilitating the development of a well-informed marketing strategy that drives results.

The Kickoff Meeting

The kickoff meeting is a fundamental starting point for any successful marketing collaboration. This initial interaction between the ourselves and the client is crucial for laying the groundwork for a fruitful partnership. During this meeting, the agenda is typically focused on discussing the terms of engagement, clarifying roles and responsibilities, and establishing a clear communication plan. Such topics foster an environment conducive to open dialogue and expectations management.

One of the primary objectives of the kickoff meeting is to ensure that both parties are aligned on the project’s goals. It is essential to engage the client in discussing their objectives, vision, and potential challenges they foresee. This clarifies the campaign’s direction and helps the agency understand how to tailor its strategies effectively. An open exchange during this session allows the client to express their aspirations and concerns, which can significantly influence the project’s trajectory.

Additionally, the kickoff meeting is an opportunity to introduce team members from both sides. It is essential to delineate who will be responsible for specific tasks and who the primary points of contact will be. Clear role assignments can reduce confusion and ensure everyone knows their responsibilities, leading to more efficient project management. Furthermore, establishing a definitive communication plan will help maintain a steady flow of information, which is vital for project success. This might include setting regular check-in meetings, reporting frequencies, and preferred communication channels.

Setting the right tone during the kickoff meeting can have lasting effects on the collaboration. A positive and professional atmosphere fosters trust and mutual respect, encouraging an open exchange of ideas throughout the project’s life cycle. Ultimately, a well-structured kickoff meeting not only sets expectations but also builds a strong foundation for a successful marketing partnership, paving the way for continued collaboration and innovation.

The Discovery Dive

Genmark separates itself from 98% of ALL marketing agencies by the depth of our discovery and assessment. Most agencies engage in a review of the client activities and even delve into their targeted buyer personas. Genmark takes this process to a whole new level where we know the industry, the client, and their competitors often better than they do. We undertake this level of activity to ensure that the marketing plan we roll out is strategically optimized for success and takes advantage of any blue ocean strategies that may quickly propel our client’s market share ahead of their competitors.

While every deep dive is unique based on the client and its industry, most reports are over 175 pages that identify all the reasons that they are not achieving success and actionable items designed to correct them.  Here are some of the areas typically examined:

Know Your Targeted Personas

Every aspect of your marketing and sales initiative will be based on your understanding of your target audience. This is not simply knowing the demographics of who will most likely buy your product or service. Development of your personas is about understanding the messaging that each persona needs to see at each stage of the buyer’s journey inorder to proceed down the funnel. To accomplish this you need to under stand the type of content they need to see and where they go for information, education, and entertainment.

Creating buyer personas is a vital step for any business looking to connect with its audience on a meaningful level. We have a systematic approach to research and analysis, and develop personas that guide their marketing strategies, improve customer experiences, and drive growth. Remember, the key to successful personas lies in basing them on real data and continuously refining them to reflect changing customer dynamics. With well-crafted buyer personas, businesses can navigate the complexities of the market with confidence and precision.

We accomplish this by engaging in a structured buyer persona assessment process. The deliverables are the buyer persona reports. It will ensure that we are targeting your ideal customer profile in a manner that will achieve results.

 This report tells you:

• Priority Initiatives – What problem triggered the search for a solution?

• Success Factors – What do the buyers consider a successful engagement?

• Perceived Barriers – What barriers prevented this buyer from choosing your company?

• Buying Process – Process used to decide whom to purchase from.

• Places of Engagement – Where did they go to investigate a solution to the problem?

• Decision Criteria – What criteria did this buyer use to compare options?

Every piece of content and every marketing campaign must be created and driven by your targeted persona.

Creation of the Marketing Plan

A well-crafted marketing plan is the foundation of any successful marketing strategy. By taking a “measure twice, cut once” approach, we ensure that every campaign is backed by research and tailored to your unique business needs. Combining decades of experience with AI-driven insights, we create omni-channel plans that deliver measurable results and drive growth. With a clear roadmap in place, your business can navigate the complexities of the market with confidence and achieve its goals effectively.

A successful marketing plan must be comprehensive and omni-channel, detailing exactly what campaigns and activities will take place over a specific period. Our plans typically span a quarter, providing a clear roadmap for execution. This includes outlining the channels to be used—such as social media, email marketing, content marketing, and paid advertising—and specifying the expected outcomes for each campaign. Aligning strategies across channels is essential for driving pipeline and revenue.

One of the most important aspects of a marketing plan is setting clear expectations for results. By conducting thorough research and leveraging data, we can anticipate the outcomes of each campaign with a high degree of accuracy. This aligns with the idea that a marketing plan should not only guide actions but also provide a framework for measuring success. Regular analysis and reporting ensure that we stay on track and make adjustments as needed.

Monitoring, Reporting, and Adjusting

In the fast-paced world of marketing, success hinges on the ability to measure and adapt. Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) are the cornerstone of this process, providing quantifiable metrics that reveal how well your marketing efforts are performing. By tracking and analyzing KPIs, businesses can make informed decisions, optimize campaigns, and ultimately achieve their goals

Monitoring KPIs is not just a best practice—it’s a necessity for any successful marketing plan. By tracking and analyzing performance metrics, businesses can make data-driven decisions, optimize campaigns, and achieve their goals with confidence. With the help of AI-driven insights and a focus on the KPIs that matter most, we ensure that every marketing effort is purposeful, effective, and aligned with your business objectives. In the end, KPIs are more than just numbers; they are the roadmap to marketing success.

At Genmark we track hundreds of KPIs each month to understand what aspects of your program are working and what needs to be further optimize. We believe in never having to guess what is working, we measure everything and know.

Conclusion

If you are looking for a systematic and proven approach to grow your business, Genmark as the process that has proven to work across all verticals. One of the most significant advantages of a proven marketing process is its ability to eliminate guesswork. A clear strategy built on research, data, and tested methodologies removes the reliance on assumptions or trial-and-error approaches. Instead of wondering which campaign might resonate with your audience, a proven process provides evidence-based direction. This precision ensures that your marketing efforts are focused on activities that are most likely to deliver results, saving both time and resources.