Developing a Strategic Marketing Framework

One of the most common phrases I used to say as a job-searching MBA was “I’m interested in marketing strategy”. And ironically enough, one of the questions I found myself asking the most was - “what is marketing strategy”?

For many, it’s a nebulous concept with a hard to quantify impact on a company’s bottom line. While channel specific marketing can help drive sales or increase awareness, marketing strategy is the connective tissue that holds it all together from beginning to end, front to back. And often times it is the most important (and most forgotten) element to truly successful campaigns.

With my most recent job searching process, I decided to formalize my own marketing strategy framework. It started relatively simple – borrowing from the already established ‘Rule of Thirds’ framework that allowed me to highlight how I would structure problem solving in a potential future role. The marketing strategy framework categories are:  

1.     Campaign Strategy

2.     Integrated Planning

3.     Unique Approach

Its overall scope flows like a funnel - highest level concepts at the top, execution across key channels in the middle, and a few genuinely unique tactics at the bottom. Most importantly though, the framework can help establish an overall campaign budget using both quantitative and qualitative criteria.

Within the first category of the framework, campaign strategy, several elements should be considered to inform marketing plans:

1.     Goal Setting

2.     Audience Development

3.     Strategic Positioning

4.     Creative Direction

A common goal is oftentimes the single benchmark for success. This makes it the most important element of a marketing strategy to establish - it is the north star for which all future decisions are marked against. Whether it is brand awareness, product sales, or something in between, agreeing upon specific goals before all else will help prioritize decision making. Audience development identifies the target market for a campaign. While traditional marketing used to establish the audience within broad gender and age-based demographics, today’s digital world allows campaigns to target specific psychographic demographics, such as interests, purchase intent, or previous behaviors.

Strategic positioning is the emotional core of what a product provides – in the entertainment world, this is often times the element directly established in tandem with producers, showrunners, and directors. Across all products, whether it be a movie, a car, or even a bottle of toothpaste, the strategic position is the unique value it provides. Finally, creative direction is how the campaign strategy elements are communicated both visually and textually across the entire campaign. Major creative pieces such as trailers or key art should speak to the campaign as a whole, while digital creative can match targeted imagery or messaging with a specific audience across a global network of advertisers.

While campaign strategy solidifies high-level elements, integrated planning is where the rubber meets the road – connecting how that strategy will roll out across major marketing channels. For the most part, those main channels will include some variation of:

1.     Paid Media

2.     Social Media

3.     PR

4.     Editorial

5.     CRM

6.     Distribution & Partnerships

In general, the elements established within the campaign strategy should inform the investment across each marketing channel within the integrated plan and can be throttled up or down depending on the point in the campaign’s lifecycle. Setting out to grow brand awareness of a global product in a new market will require a significantly different integrated plan than an established product in a niche market looking to increase sales at the end of a fiscal year in order to meet business goals.

The final piece of a marketing strategy is the unique approach a campaign takes in order to achieve its intended goals. While some may consider this as “how to go viral,” what’s most important is meeting fans where they congregate the most with what they love the most. In today’s world, successful marketing is about building, fostering, and engaging with a community, extending a product beyond just a brand but into a lifestyle as well. How that is communicated will be completely dependent on the campaign strategy, but much to its namesake should really feel unique to those who are matter most.

This marketing strategy framework works to establish criteria for how to build out an overall 360-marketing plan, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it will fit every marketing strategy role out there. Throughout my career I’ve seen vastly different job descriptions under the same title – especially when it comes to more strategic roles. Marketing strategy can run the gamut from being campaign focused, creative focused, or operational focused, but it is always valuable to ground a strategic position through a structured framework.