Editor’s Note: This is the second blog post in a series entitled: How to Create Insanely Good Content. Catch up on Part 1 here. 

Many small business owners struggle with the idea of strategy, but in the simplest terms possible, a strategy is the plan from which you plan.

Your strategy doesn’t need to be complicated, but it needs to be clear and help you to remain focused. Especially when it comes to writing important marketing emails, blog posts, and other promotional activities, everything you create should fit into your strategy.

In this post we’re going to give you a brief overview of the 13 Box, one page market strategy structure.

Then, we’ll walk you through the first three boxes, which will help you to focus on:

1. What You Do
2. How You Do It, and
3. Where You Do it.

From there, we invite you to download your copy of, How To Shape a One Page Market Strategy, written specifically for this blog series. It provides a more comprehensive explanation of developing your one page market strategy and has a printable workbook at the end to make life that much easier for you.

The image above provides a snapshot view of the one page structure, but we’d suggest you download the companion worksheet for this post from here. Apart from being prettier, it will allow you to work along as we walk through the first three boxes.

OK now that you’ve done that, we’d ask you to just remember that this is a quick overview of the process, and at the bottom of the post you’ll find a link to download your copy of the eBook.

The Power of the Page

What effect can a single page have on your business? Well, let us answer that by asking you a few, perhaps challenging questions.

If we were to look at your marketing and promotional materials, or read some of your emails or blog posts, could we clearly identify who your market is? What your point of difference is? Or, what your value proposition is?

Would we see cohesion and consistency within your marketing messages?

That’s the power of the page — it gives you focus and clarity around the key strategic elements of your marketing communication. It provides something of a checklist that you or your team needs to cover as you create marketing materials and communication. And it makes sure everyone involved in your marketing process stays on the same page.

With this clarity, you’ll be ahead of many of your competitors. And what effect would that have on your business?

Let’s get started.

The One Page Structure

Looking at the illustration or worksheet you’ll notice 13 Boxes divided into 4 rows. Boxes 1, 2, and 3 are your Strategic Focus Areas and address these key questions: What do you do?, How you do it?, Where you do it? This is the section we’ll walk you through shortly.

Boxes 4, 5, 6, and 7 on the second row, are your Strategic Headlines which remain fixed. They are:  Attract,  Connect, Differentiate, and Communicate.

The third row, boxes 8 – 11 set out to define each of these headlines into Strategic Statements, which act as your guideposts when creating marketing materials, promotions or communications.

And the final row, boxes 12 and 13 are what we call the Power Boxes. They are designed to help you to refine Boxes 8 – 11 into two powerful and influencing marketing statements.

Power Box 1 combines your Attraction and Connection Statements (Boxes 8 and 9), and Power Box 2 combines your Differentiate and Communicate Statements (Boxes 10 and 11).

One Rule To Rule Them All

As you work through the one page strategy there is one rule that we ask you to try to follow, and that is the 21 word or less rule. By limiting yourself to completing each box in 21 words or less, you are forced to create statements that are as concise as possible.

Let’s take a look at the first three boxes now.

Box 1 – What You Do

What is it that your business does as a primary objective? To help you, start your statement with; “It is my business to… “

For example, It is my business to help business people talk about their business better.

In the first post of this series, you were provided a three-question worksheet. If you completed it, Question 3 will help you to complete Box 1.

Box 2 – How Do We Do It?

Following Box 1, which is your What, Box 2 is your How. How will you do what you do?

Here are a few unlocking questions to help with your thinking:

1. Will I help people with a product or service or both?
2. How will people buy it?
3. How will they use it?

Start your statement with, “I will do this by…” Here’s an example: I will do this by establishing the 13 Box System as an online multi-medium based training system.

Box 3 – Where Do We Do It? (Primary Market)

In many ways, this is the easiest question to answer. If your business is to provide consulting services, then where will you do this? Or if your business is to sell computers then where will you sell them?

In this box we are looking to identify where your primary, and if applicable, secondary market is.

Is your business brick’n’mortar or digital? Do you supply goods and services at a local, regional, city, state, national, or global level?

Example: Our primary market is business professionals who use the internet as a learning tool within Australasia, Europe, and the U.S.A.

The Full Monty

The very act of having articulated these three key strategic focus areas could provide you a degree of clarity that many of your competitors don’t have. And please don’t underestimate just how critical these statements can be to helping you communicate your business better, and more effectively.

You now have the makings of a pretty solid elevator pitch. After all, what are the three most common questions you’ll be asked once you shake hands at a meet and greet?

But don’t stop there, by completing a one page market strategy you’ll work smarter. Invest the time and energy on your business now and you’re going to save energy and probably a whole lot of frustration.

Because every time you’re planning or having a conversation about your marketing, bring out your one page strategy. It will help you to remain focused and make those marketing conversations much shorter, ensuring everyone is on the same page because they’ll understand Who your market is, How you want reach and attract that market, and the key points of how you want your message communicated.

We thank you for allowing us to help you on your journey. Remember that this post is a very condensed overview of How to Shape a One Page Market Strategy. To get a complete understanding we suggest you download your FREE copy of the eBook. 

The post How to Create Insanely Good Content Part 2: Shape a One Page Market Strategy appeared first on Constant Contact Blogs.