Training & Coaching

Are you and your colleagues so busy running your day-to-day business operations that you have little time to think about marketing? Are you spending too much time and money on marketing activities that do not generate sales? Could your efforts to win and keep customers be more focused?

If so, you’re not alone. These are common challenges that hold many businesses back from realising their full potential.

Based on best practice, this masterclass has been developed to help businesses overcome these challenges, put in place a structured approach, and achieve marketing success.

Who this masterclass is for

Owners and directors of start-ups and small to medium-sized businesses, as well as sole traders.

Why you should attend this masterclass

Covering the essentials of marketing, on this masterclass you will learn how to:

• Develop a plan to market your business.
• Undertake market research to understand your customers better and generate insight about them.
• Choose which types of customer to target.
• Position your business to stand out from your competitors.
• Identify which marketing and communications options, both digital and traditional, are most relevant for your business, products and services.
• Set a marketing budget.
• Get the best from any creative agencies you work with.
• Measure and evaluate the progress and effectiveness of your marketing.

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Do you want to advance your understanding of the marketing function, ensure marketing strategy is aligned with business strategy, think critically about the role of marketing in your organisation, challenge constructively, and use marketing to improve overall business performance?

This one-day course is designed to help board members get to grips with marketing.

Who this masterclass is for

Board members, chief executives, managing directors and non-executive directors from all sectors and sizes of organisation, as well as charity trustees.

Why you should attend this masterclass

You will learn:

• The board’s role in determining, implementing and monitoring marketing strategy.
• What questions board members should be asking the marketing team.
• What to expect of a good marketing team.
• What the marketing team needs from the board.
• Key concepts in marketing and what determines a customer-oriented business.
• The importance of a clear purpose (vision, mission and values) and effective strategic thinking.
• Market research techniques to understand customers and generate insight.
• Tools for customer segmentation and targeting, branding and competitive positioning.
• The structure of a strategic marketing plan, the process and tools required to develop it, and how to critique it.
• The elements of the marketing mix, the different promotional and communications options available and how to select between them.
• How to measure and evaluate marketing progress and effectiveness

This intensive Mastering Strategic Marketing Programme of masterclasses includes similar content to that covered in the core marketing courses of leading business schools’ MBA programmes, providing a comprehensive introduction to all the core concepts in strategic marketing.

Session 1
Marketing strategy
Market research and insight

Session 2
Segmentation and targeting
Competitive positioning

Session 3
Buying behaviour
Pricing

Session 4
Brand management
Product development

Session 5
Services marketing
Distribution channels

Session 6
Marketing communications
Marketing metrics

Each session lasts for three hours (half a day), with reading time in advance of each session estimated to be about three hours. Sessions take place every fortnight.

The textbook for the course is Marketing Management: European Edition, Kotler, Keller, Goodman, Brady, Hansen. Additional reading materials may also be provided.

Who this masterclass is for

This series of masterclasses is aimed at marketing professionals at all levels, as well as professionals in other disciplines, who want to gain a grounding or refresher in core marketing concepts.

The number of delegates for each series is limited to 15.

A series of training sessions covering the essentials of developing and implementing a digital marketing (including social media) strategy for your business.

Session 1: Developing a digital marketing strategy

Setting digital marketing objectives.
Developing an overall strategy to achieve the objectives.
Defining key audiences and messaging, and thinking about customer journeys.
Choosing the most relevant digital marketing channels for the business.
Preparing a calendar of digital marketing activities for the year ahead.
Looking at different types of content and preparing a content plan.

Session 2: Implementing a digital marketing strategy

Getting the most out of the business’s digital marketing channels.
Creating content.
Choosing tools to implement activities time- and cost-efficiently.
Monitoring and measuring the performance.
Understanding legislation that is relevant to digital marketing.
Creating a social media policy.
Dealing with user reviews, including negative comments.

Each session lasts for three hours (half a day).

There are some 21 million people over the age of 50 in the UK, accounting for more than a third of the population. They are the fastest growing demographic, enjoying longer, healthier and more active lives. They hold 80% of the country’s wealth, 60% of its savings and 40% of its disposable income.

Yet this increasingly important and diverse group is often neglected, patronised or stereotyped by organisations whose marketing is focused on younger consumers (with overall less spending power). And often when they are targeted, they are treated as a homogenous mass with a one-size-fits-all approach that can be counter-productive.

It makes commercial common sense to change the approach to marketing to over 50s.

Who this masterclass is for

This practical half-day masterclass is aimed at organisations that want to reappraise and improve how they market to over 50s. It will provide you with insight, advice and ideas, as well as practical techniques and tools that you can use to engage and inspire over 50s.

Why you should attend this masterclass

By the end of this masterclass you will know how and be able to:

Understand the complexities of over 50s consumers, and their varying needs, behaviours and attitudes.
Ignore myths and prejudices about the over 50s and marketing.
Use techniques for defining and segmenting this diverse market using more factors than age.
Target and engage effectively with the over 50s.
Identify opportunities for products and services.
Understand ageing effects and the implications for different communications channels, including online.
Appreciate what turns the over 50s on in terms of marketing messages.
Avoid alienating them.
Develop marketing opportunities, making the most of digital (including social media) and traditional channels to gain and retain customers.

Business and marketing strategy workshops will enable you to make time for the sort of reflection, discussion and decision making that will define your organisation’s future success.

As your independent facilitator, I can help you put the day-to-day operational issues to one side and focus on the bigger picture. Using a structured, participative process, I will objectively help you:

Clarify your thinking.
Tackle challenging issues.
Explore trends and opportunities.
Stimulate new ideas.
Choose among strategy alternatives.
Build consensus.
Agree a realistic action plan for implementation.

Many entrepreneurs and owners of small to medium-sized businesses are so busy running their day-to-day operations that they spend little time thinking about marketing. Some spend too much time and money on activities that do not generate sales. Their efforts to win and keep customers often lack focus. Sound familiar? These are common challenges that hold many businesses back from achieving their full potential and in some cases actually cause them to fail.

The sharper marketing programme helps start-ups and established businesses in any sector develop their marketing strategy. It is a competitively priced one-to-one coaching package that will give sharper focus and structure to your marketing.

Over the course of four tailored, one-to-one sessions, you will develop a thorough, marketing plan for your business. You will also commit time between each session, using practical tools based on proven techniques to work on your plan. Knowledge will be transferred on an ongoing basis to enable you to make informed marketing decisions yourself and to ensure sustainable effort and results going forward.

Your marketing plan will act as your clear action plan for the year ahead and help improve your business performance.

Once you’ve completed your plan, a monthly review meeting can be arranged to keep you on track too.

My coaching and mentoring services can help you achieve your business and personal goals by.

Asking you questions to provoke your thinking.
Acting as an objective sounding board and giving you feedback.
Offering constructive suggestions and advice based on broad business experience.
Providing an outsider’s perspective to challenge norms and preconceived ideas in your sector.
Expanding your marketing knowledge and expertise.
Typically coaching and mentoring sessions take place once a month and last for up to two hours.

This Marketing Leadership Coaching Series, comprising six monthly one-to-one sessions, has been designed specifically for marketing professionals who are either looking to prepare themselves for progression to a senior marketing leadership position, or have recently taken up a senior role, or have been in a senior position for some time and want to enhance their performance.

Each session, lasting for two hours, addresses a particular theme, so that we cover all the key aspects of becoming or being a marketing leader. The programme is flexible, and we will review and revise it as appropriate during our first session.

Recommended reading materials for each session will be provided. At the beginning of each session we will consider the learnings and application of them since the last meeting.

Session 1
Setting goals for the sessions
Developing marketing leadership skills

Session 2
Big picture strategic marketing thinking
Planning and securing investment

Session 3
Influencing and persuading
Challenging and being challenged

Session 4
Mobilising your CEO and the Board
Shaping the agenda and evidencing value creation

Session 5
Leading (vs managing) and growing your team, and directing agencies
Collaborating with peers in other functions and other their teams

Session 6
Reflecting and pulling it all together
Planning for future personal development