The Marketing Consultant’s Work: Better Leads, More Sales, Profitable Results

The Marketing Consultant's Work: Better Leads, More Sales, Profitable Results

In today's competitive, increasingly complex digital environment, businesses are struggling to attract their target customers. That's why you need to market yourself effectively to get more leads and customers with the help of a marketing consultant.

In this blog post, you'll learn more about how working with a marketing consultant can help you better reach your customers and close more sales. Also, you can better understand the business issues that a marketing consultant can solve with the best skills to look for when hiring one.

Advantages of Working with a Marketing Consultant

Marketing consultants are professional advisors who use their expertise and knowledge of marketing to help companies create and execute marketing strategies. They are hired to temporarily assist the company's leadership in determining a marketing message, formulating a plan for marketing campaigns, and deciding which channels to use to reach the target audience.

After the campaign is put into action, marketing consultants are also responsible for monitoring its success, making any necessary edits, and ensuring that it produces the desired effect.

Hiring a digital marketing consultant with knowledge and experience in your industry gives you the following advantages:

The Work of a Marketing Consultant

A marketing consultant's primary duties directly benefit your business which includes the following:

What Issues Can a Marketing Consultant Solve? The Benefits of Hiring a Marketing Consultant

A marketing consultant can solve some organizational and strategy issues. These include, but aren't limited to:

"The company owner/founder doesn't have enough time to run marketing."

A founder/CEO might oversee a company's marketing program with the help of a junior-level staff member in the early stages of the company. Later in a company's life, this will take valuable time away from their other responsibilities.

A marketing consultant will manage the entire marketing program and give the CEO more time to spend growing their company. Investing upfront in a marketing consultant contract could establish the campaigns, benchmarks, and controls to make your marketing more effective.

"We aren't different enough to stand out from the competition."

The marketing consultant understands how to use unique strategies from your direct competitors to make your company stand out. This will help you generate more leads, retain accounts longer, and create a marketing plan with some serious kick.

To stand out from the competition, hiring a marketing consultant produces results in brand development and awareness. Thus, he directly helps refine the message or purpose to step up or differentiate the brand from others.

"Our team is still learning how to market."

Developing a marketing program using in-house talent offers a big learning curve. A marketing consultant has been there, done that, and can get your marketing program running faster than home-grown talent while also coaching your team to bring them up to speed quickly and effectively.

Marketing vision falls more under the purview of the marketing consultant than anyone in the company. It requires a person experienced in different marketing strategies but with a feel for marketing that will guide them through unfamiliar terrain where strategies that worked before might not work again.

"We're testing multiple marketing channels but aren't seeing a good return."

When there's no marketing leader, you're stuck with the pay and pray approach. A marketing consultant understands which marketing channels will work best for your company and will use them well, allowing them to stay agile, shut off your inefficient marketing spend, and direct it to more fruitful channels.

Also, a marketing consultant gives these companies access to leadership in their marketing efforts without having their entire marketing budget drained by executive compensation. They focus on the targeted strategies and effectiveness of the chosen campaigns to produce more results for less money.

"We don't know what our marketing metrics mean or why they matter."

You need transparency to run a successful marketing program. A marketing consultant helps you understand what each metric means, why it matters, and how it should affect your strategy going forward.

The hired marketing consultant helps you establish marketing metrics and help the team understand which ones to watch and why they are important. Hence, your company receives better targeting, upsell, cross-sell, conversion campaigns, and better marketing architecture.

"Our product is too technical for the average prospect to understand."

A marketing consultant loves creating a clear message for your team to rally around. They'll help you translate your complex offering into a simple and meaningful message to your prospects while also reflecting your unique strategies.

Your consultant crafts a user-friendly message around a technical or complicated product. For startups and up-and-comers, it's an opportunity to work with top-shelf marketing talent at a cost they can afford and a commitment level that avoids waste and produces results. 

"Our CEO and head of sales want to take marketing in different directions."

A marketing consultant brings a new perspective to the table. They'll create a marketing program that benefits the company as a whole and aligns sales and marketing for greater effectiveness.

Thus, they can solve any number of marketing and organizational issues. But does that mean that they're some kind of "magic pill"? Not exactly.

Marketing Consultant Skills to Consider When Hiring One

Marketing managers use both hard and soft skills to carry out their duties successfully. Important skills for marketing consultants include:

Communication

Well-developed communication skills are crucial for marketing consultants. All marketing professionals should communicate their ideas efficiently, both to their teams and to their audience.

For a marketing consultant, communication may involve writing copy and emails, holding one-on-one meetings, leading group discussions, public speaking, and negotiating. Generally, marketing consultants must have extensive knowledge and years of experience before they can operate their own business for an effective communication process.

Collaboration

Collaboration involves being able to work well with teams of other professionals. This includes the ability to take ideas from multiple sources and find a way to make them complement each other.

Marketing consultants can often serve as mediators between a company's executives, content creators, and other employees. Creating campaigns that incorporate everyone's preferences is often challenging but is necessary for the job.

Adaptability

Marketing consultants often work for clients in multiple industries and fields. They should be able to adapt their strategies to suit each company.

Marketing consultants may be asked to change directions or alter a project on short notice. If you can perform well in various environments and work well with a range of personalities, you are more likely to succeed as a marketing consultant.

Creativity

Marketing consultants use their creativity to design innovative campaigns that capture the imagination of the public. Creative marketing consultants can think outside the box and develop unique ideas that help their clients' products stand out.

Creativity is also frequently helpful in finding effective solutions to stubborn problems. Consulting services include managing all the advertising, customer relations, and accounting activities involved in assisting clients.

Organization

Marketing consultants use their organizational skills to execute complex campaigns while adhering to a strict schedule efficiently. Organized consultants can delegate tasks, enforce deadlines, and manage multiple assignments at once.

A marketing consultant who is organized can manage their team effectively, helping to avoid delays caused by miscommunication or confusion regarding responsibilities. Thus, hiring a marketing consultant can also be the key to establishing a brand identity and building a loyal customer base.

Proficient

Most employers expect marketing consultants to hold a complete educational background, certifications, or extensive training in marketing, business, or a related field. Marketing consultants often choose a particular industry to specialize in and may request to work primarily in their chosen field.

Coursework for a marketing consultant position includes organizational communication, public relations, economics, marketing principles, and basic finance. They must also possess a good background in business-to-business marketing methods, social media, and writing for media.

Flexibility

Acquiring industry-specific skills helps aspiring marketing consultants cultivate the expertise they need to act as advisors. Accruing various types of practical experience is crucial for marketing consultants since they draw from their past experiences when working with current clients.

Trustworthiness

One of the fundamental truths of marketing consulting is that clients will only hire professionals whom they trust. As a consultant, you must prove that you are knowledgeable, experienced, and capable of making a positive impact on the company while being honest and up-front about your level of education, professional skills, and abilities.

Also, a marketing consultant consistently follows through on any promises that you make. Earning a client's trust takes time, but customer loyalty can be extremely rewarding once you have it.

Increase Your Business Profit with Cam's Consultancy Services

With Cam's digital marketing consulting, we make everything above possible, focusing on one RESULTS through feasible KPIs.

New to Digital Marketing and looking to get started?

Cam can help you get started by working on what is needed. We will do a free consultation by understanding your goals and your business.

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Do you need to improve the result of your campaign?

If you currently have an active website or a social media profile/advertising account on Google, Facebook, Instagram, or LinkedIn, Cam and his team can do a free audit and strategy review.

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Schedule a free consultation to learn more about hiring a Fractional CMO