Why positioning comes before promotion

When sales slow down, the instinct is to buy more attention. But if visitors can't quickly see who you help and why you're different, more traffic only means more people leaving.

The five-second test

Show your homepage to someone outside your company for five seconds. Then ask what you do, who it's for and what they should do next. If they can't answer, your first marketing problem is your message.

Say who it's not for

Businesses worry that narrowing their message will shrink their market. In practice, a clear focus helps the right prospects recognize themselves. You can still accept other work, but your message should speak to the buyers you most want.

Use your customers' words

The best language for your website is often already in sales calls and customer emails. Note how customers describe the problem before they hired you. Their phrasing tends to work better than internal terms.

Then promote

Once the message is clear, every channel works harder. Ads have something definite to say, search content has a focus and your sales team tells the same story as your website. Promotion multiplies what's already there, so it's worth making sure that's something clear.