business strategy

Your Allies named Most Outstanding Marketing Agency 2018 – UK

06/19/2018 by Linsay Duncan

The awards celebrate business leadership, women in business and more across all seven continents of the world. Your Allies was chosen after successfully beating off competitors throughout the far-reaching and intense selection process.

Our commitment to marketing excellence

Earlier this year we were named Marketing Agency of the Year by the Innovation & Excellence Awards 2018 so it’s a great honour to once again have our work – and approach – acknowledged.

Your Allies (formerly Marke2ing) has grown consistently over the past few years – proof that businesses need part-time experienced marketing director support. Commitment to marketing excellence for our clients has also been a key contributor to this growth. To once again receive recognition for this is something we’re incredibly proud of and highlights the value of our flexible business model.

We’re excited for what the rest of 2018 holds and look forward to continuing our work with our esteemed clients and brilliant partners.

Your Allies awarded Marketing Agency of the Year 2018

01/12/2018 by Linsay Duncan

Corporate LiveWire’s panel of judges nodded to our dedication to SMEs and to our ethos that growing businesses should have access to the same calibre of professional marketing as larger corporations.

Outsourcing marketing responsibilities can free SME business leaders free from the ties and restrictions that come with full-time employment, or often expensive contractors. It gives our clients to access proven strategic support and professionally executed plans – always with the freedom to dial support up or down, just as they need it.

Also highlighted was Your Allies’ (formerly Marke2ing) agile approach to maximising marketing investment through pragmatic budgeting. The judges saw this as a big plus for SMEs faced with industry, economic and social changes such as Brexit.

This SME-focus and agile approach were also acknowledged last year by the UK Business Awards when we were recognised for our Excellence for SME Marketing. We are looking forward to continuing to grow our support offering for SMEs throughout 2018 and if you are interested in learning more visit our services page.

5 Signs You Should Invest in a Business Marketing Mentor

09/23/2017 by Linsay Duncan

As a marketer, being challenged by your job – whether through a step up the career ladder, taking on management responsibilities or tackling a new project – is a good thing. Right? Yes, it’s change and challenge that grow us as professionals. And life would be incredibly dull if the landscape stood still.

How we handle pressure like this can directly impact how we progress professionally.

Coping with challenging situations isn’t always about being the hero. Coping is also about knowing when to ask for help. If you’re a marketer and find yourself stuck in one of these situations, it may be time to call in reinforcements.

The big promotion

You’ve made that step up you’ve been dreaming of. That senior marketing position is now yours. Congrats! But now, how to manage all that added responsibility, extra pressure from above, and new challenges it brings? You’ve also got to manage the transition from your previous job while trying to make an impression in your new role. Gulp.

This can lead to even more hair-pulling if you don’t happen to have an experienced marketer around to lean on. Someone who’s been in your shoes. At crucial times like these where you need to step up, and fast, it might be time to learn from a marketing mentor. They can pass on their experience, and impart valuable knowledge whilst up-skilling you. Quality mentoring can seriously help you fast forward progress.

First time steering the helm

Exciting, motivating, interesting, challenging, worrying, terrifying – all sentiments likely to hit the first time you’re handed the reins in a senior marketing position. When people turn to you for guidance and strategy for the first time, it can be overwhelming. Where do you start? How do you pull a marketing strategy together? What direction should it take? And what sets a good strategy apart from a bad one?

Of course, there’s lots of helpful advice online – ‘how to’ guides, strategy templates etc. Well worth exploring. However, when time is tight or online resources only take you so far, that’s is where calling in an outside professional can be a smart move. A business marketing mentor experienced in shaping and delivering strategies, who’s done this before, can give just the steer and practical advice you need to set you on the right path. Saving you time and taking away that fear of the unknown.

The time-poor leader

Why oh why isn’t human cloning a thing yet? Frustrating when work is so manic that you feel you need two of yourself or another 24 hours in each day. During periods when it seems time constantly slips through your fingers, and there’s only more of the same ahead, stop for a moment. If lack of time is noticeably impacting performance the sensible thing may be to ask for help.

Pulling in an extra set of hands to share the workload or hand over a project to, can bring immediate relief. Not to mention help you win back previous time. A marketing mentor worth their weight in gold can help you wade through your workload, boost performance, and help you shine.

People management

Taking on responsibility for a larger group of people, particularly for marketers new to people management, can be incredibly daunting. After all, it’s people’s careers and professional development you’re influencing here! While some people thrive on it, people management skills are not innate in everyone.

Similarly, when leading an inexperienced team or people who need up-skilling in areas you’re not an expert in, how do you know if you’re capable of addressing their needs? Acknowledging gaps in your own leadership expertise is a strength, not a weakness. Now you know exactly where you need help and can seek out help.

There are people gifted in this area who can offer invaluable advice and knowledge, to help you become the people leader you’ve always strived to be. What’s more you’ll find there are marketing trainers with ready-made courses designed to bring the people manager out in you.

The unknown

With successful growing business, one thing you can be sure of is that change lies ahead. From focusing on new markets, entering new territories, expanding product ranges to mergers and acquisitions, marketing will need to adapt and respond. When faced with new demands, where do you turn?

If your CEO is asking new and challenging things of you, and there’s no time to re-train or go on a course to upskill yourself, consider bringing in an expert. A good business marketing mentor will be able to walk you through the steps to get you where you need to be. They’ll give practical advice but can also feed into the actual project or strategy you’re working on. Having someone show you the ropes once, can payback tenfold. Good professional support can leave you with skills and capabilities that stay with you throughout your career.

Accelerate performance

What all of this boils down to is recognising when it makes sense to accelerate performance through outside help. Whether for your performance or that of your team, or of the marketing you deliver. Struggling on whilst things slip and stress mounts is neither sustainable nor good for your sanity. With a quality business marketing mentor at your side before you know it those hurdles will be far behind.

You’ve upgraded your marketing – now what?

07/19/2017 by Linsay Duncan

Your Allies guest blog from Jonathan Peachey, Metis

If you’re in the enviable position of already having marketing up and running, the leads starting to flow in, turning into new clients – then you may now be facing the challenge of how to deliver more work. How do you manage that growth? What processes do you need to take you from leads through to the delivery stage? Our colleagues at Metis have a few sound ideas about how to tackle this. Read on…

How’s your working life going? Are you finding that either you’re flat out delivering work or you’re desperately looking for more to do? We’ve seen feast and famine in many businesses. Getting the balance right is really tough. It’s because businesses don’t have enough information.

Under-8s soccer

Blaming feast and famine on lack of information seems a bit of a stretch. Especially when it looks like an under-8s soccer match, where everyone rushes around the pitch chasing the ball.

But we’ve seen this many times, including with the consultancies we serve at Metis, and we know that to get a steadier stream of leads and business through the door, you need to make the right decisions. And that depends critically on information.

Running hot and cold

For example:

To decide whether sales need to go faster or slower, you need a live view of the amount of work that will be delivered over the next, say, 3 months.
That information also affects resourcing – run too hot, and you’ll need to be planning ahead to bring in temporary or freelance staff. Lose sales momentum, and you may have people sitting around doing nothing.

And not all client work delivers the same profit. Let’s say that your marketing activities are bringing a constant stream of leads. If you know which projects and clients/customers are most profitable, you might decide to use the new business to replace less profitable accounts, rather than try to keep selling to them.

We usually find that the consultancies we serve actually do have all the information they need. The problem is it’s squirrelled away in spreadsheets and systems that don’t talk to each other and get out of sync.

We couldn’t find a ready-made solution for that when we ran our own businesses, so we built one. Metis’ award-winning cloud software brings together sales tracking, resource management, job financial control, timesheets and expenses. Because all the information is in one place and is up to date at all times, it can give you answers immediately, taking the drudge out of information-gathering and cutting the risk of taking decisions based on partial or conflicting data. It’s quick and easy to set up and use and comes with a high ROI.

Playing like champions

Now your people can play like the champions they are. You’ve picked the right formation, based on the team’s availability and what you know about the profitability of each customer. You can go out and market yourselves without feast and famine to contend with. The right software will be a foundation for growth and a means to get rid of the clutter of spreadsheets.

This, of course, is where marketing agencies like Your Allies come in. They can advise on all the different ways you can reach your target audience, and how to use each one to its best effect. And you can do lots for yourself, with services such as HubSpot.

Photo by Jonathan Petersson on Unsplash

How to Transform your B2B Marketing from Bust to Boom [INFOGRAPHIC]

06/29/2017 by Linsay Duncan

The ABCs of Marketing B2B

Looking to step your B2B marketing performance up a notch? This infographic reveals the strategic must-haves and marketing essentials you need to have in place to secure marketing success. Central to it all is bringing in the right marketing resource to pull it all together. Read on to find out how to transform your B2B marketing…

Free download

You can also download the ABC of Marketing B2B infographic>>

And if you’d like to talk to one of our co-founders about how to transform your B2B marketing, get in touch by calling 0203 137 3343 or sending an email to hi@YourAllies.co.uk.

Your essential guide to making B2B marketing work

If marketing investment is on your mind chances are you’re considering how to best improve your marketing performance overall. For business leaders of growing SMEs we’ve developed an essential guide to making B2B marketing work. From identifying where to start and finding good marketing resource, to assessing investment requirements and getting the right building blocks in place – our guide takes you through, step by step.

More inspiration to transform your B2B marketing

There’s a lot of foundations and elements to consider when it comes to building a high performing marketing function. Read on for more steer to set you on the right path…

How to choose the right marketing resource: 10 questions to ask

06/29/2017 by Linsay Duncan

Finding transformational B2B marketing resource

It’s time to decide. If you’re gearing-up to boost your B2B marketing investment through an agency, freelancer or in-house team, you need to get the screening process bang-on so you can be confident in your hiring decisions. But with a raft of potential options (and suppliers) at your disposal, not to mention a market awash with freelancers, how can you assess what’s best for your business?

Our outsourcing vs inhouse marketing guide may help, however no matter the type of B2B marketing services you choose, you need to truly believe in the people you entrust with your marketing. It’s too important to risk to amateurs. So you need to be satisfied that they’re experienced in helping businesses like yours, in your sector, at your growth stage, with your budget.

You’ll also need reassurance that they’re right for you on a cultural level. Bring in a big hitter used to chunky budgets and teams of specialist agencies and you might end up with great strategy but little hands-on support. Go too far the other way and your marketing could lack leadership, direction and effectiveness. Hmmm…

Questions, questions…

So what are the questions to ask before hiring a marketing consultant or staffer? The ten cracking interview conundrums we’ve come up with will help you bottom-out the calibre of the marketing professional in front of you. It’s not a full agency brief or marketing job description. And we won’t cover all the detailed checks you need to ensure your chosen marketer has the right paperwork – that’s one for you.

Read on and you’ll arm yourself with the killer questions that’ll separate the shiny but fluffy marketer from the down-and-dirty ROI-deliverer… and enable truly stellar B2B talents to shine through. Here we go…

Question 1: Tell me where you’ve done this before…

Start by looking to put your brand, business and precious marketing budget in safe hands. This question is your chance to dive headlong into your candidate’s background, creds and experience. Focus on whether they know what’s important for a B2B business at your stage of development. Ask them to quote examples of previous B2B successes and outline the real cost of B2B marketing. Can they offer a strategic steer as well as rolling their sleeves up and mucking in?

Question 2: What’s your core area of expertise – and where will you need external support?

Let’s be honest. It’s rare to encounter the full marketing deck of cards in one person. However, to pick up the marketing reins and build high performing B2B marketing from the get go, you’re going to need someone with a broad skillset, able to manage multiple marketing disciplines, either on their own or through trusted suppliers. Look beyond your current position and imagine what’s coming next. Don’t just focus on skills that address your current pressure points – you’ll need to hire the talent to catapult you beyond your current travails and into your next phase of development.

Question 3: How will you get to know my brand and my business?

Here’s your chance to see how your candidates or agencies propose to get under the bonnet – and their willingness to get to grips with the details. This is where agencies and in-house contractors might differ. Marketers with in-house experience should seize the opportunity to show how they’ll walk the walk, seeing key stakeholders, taking road trips with Sales, talking to customer services and product development and getting stuck into competitor and client research. This is not a job for someone who loves their desk…

Question 4: What does ‘accountability’ mean to you?

In B2B, there’s no room to hide. And with every pound of budget to be cherished, accountability matters. So you’ll you need to feel confident they know how to track, measure and report success. Have they done this before? If so, how? Ask for details. After all, it’s their chance to stand up and be counted… and demonstrate they’re a rain-maker, not a big spender.

Question 5: How will you support and work in partnership with Sales?

This should be one of the most important relationships in your business – a partnership, not a rivalry, designed to generate revenue growth. So quiz your candidates on how closely they’ve worked with Sales in the past. Ask about the closeness of Sales and Marketing teams in their previous roles. Listen out for use of sales language and familiarity with the sales process. And if it sounds like Sales are the enemy, they’re probably not for you…

Question 6: What’s the biggest marketing challenge in a growing business?

Listen up for an issue that will resonate with you and your growing pains. Any marketing professional worth their salt will tackle this one gleefully and reflect the kinds of challenges that are keeping you up at night. Most importantly, they’ll show you that they know how to solve them – and use examples that draw on their previous problem-solving experience. P.S. A marketing challenge isn’t “I can’t find the right print supplier”.

Question 7: If we’re not cutting through, how will you turn things around?

Time to turn to the dark side. Don’t just imagine wins and strengths. Pick out challenging situations to bring out your candidates’ true colours. Stuff happens. Things go wrong. Strategies fail. So see how your potential marketer approaches cock-ups with remedies that’ll give you an idea of what really makes them tick. And because hypothetical questions aren’t always helpful – try and keep it real; around you, your businesses and your real world issues.

Question 8: How will you connect to my market, competition and clients?

Time to separate the outsiders from the candidates who’ve done The Knowledge. So find out how close they are to your audience, your competition and your space. A skilled B2B marketer can reel-off a host of channels and sources. But will those be relevant to you? How do they keep pace with market evolution in your sector? Deep down, how much do they really know? Remember, you’ll rely on them to stay current and move ahead at the speed of change.

Question 9: How will you help grow my business?

This is the question that gets nitty with the gritty. Because what you need now might look very different in 6, 12 or 18 months’ time, test whether they’re sufficiently adaptable and capable of delivering beyond the next financial year. Find out how they’ll approach your longer-term marketing strategy, planning and execution. Ask for insights about current trends. Then introduce some of your more distant goals and assess whether they’ve got what it takes to get you there.

Question 10: How will you market marketing?

Investing in your marketing team means making it more visible and accountable, whether it’s in-house marketing or outsourced marketing. And your leadership team might need some convincing along the way. So your chosen marketer or agency will need to earn respect, demonstrate resilience, prove their worth (literally) and show they’re adding value to your business. What will they do to achieve this, and grow the profile of marketing (as a team and a discipline) sometimes in the face of internal resistance…

Get your essential guide to making B2B marketing work

A new approach to your B2B marketing, with a fresh infusion of talent, energy and expertise, can do more than sharpen your approach and focus your brand. The right people, whether they’re in-house or outsourced marketing specialists, can transform an unproductive line on your budget into an engine of growth at the heart of your business. It’s all down to you – and the people you choose. Download our free essential guide now for insight into how to build high-performing B2B marketing!

And one final question for you…

If you’re thinking of investing in professional B2B marketing services, there’s no time to lose. Why outsource B2B marketing? As a leading B2B marketing supplier in London we’ll be happy to enlighten you. To turbocharge your B2B marketing investment with our insight and experience

Additional reading

If you’re planning on interviewing B2B marketing agencies, take a look at Hubspot’s “7 Questions Every Client Should Ask Before Signing an Agency” (Jul 2014) and Entrepreneur’s article: “10 Questions Every Entrepreneur Needs to Ask Suppliers”.