---
title: "Marketing"
description: "How we structure marketing to drive revenue and growth"
asIndexPage: true
---

import { Steps } from "nextra/components";
import Youtube from '../../../components/youtube';

# Marketing

> "Marketing is about values." - Steve Jobs

<br />
<Youtube id="4mvHgLy_YV8?si=74cmdMmcH3gmpv0R" />

Without a strategy, marketing is:
- throwing social media posts with reach anxiety
- starting podcasts that no one listens
- writing newsletter that even team members don't read

Marketing is telling your own words in some channels for a purpose. Without a purpose, it's just noise - like how some do.

Before starting we should align on some terms:

- **Framework**: The blueprint that organizes our marketing efforts
- **Purpose**: The fundamental reason behind our marketing activities
- **Campaign**: Marketing actions
- **Goal**: The specific, measurable result we aim to achieve through our marketing activities
- **Brief**: The document outlining how we're executing a campaign

## Framework(s)

Marketings looks like art, must be managed like math. At Menlo, we follow some frameworks for alignment. 

Our marketing efforts consist of 3 purposes and each marketing action must target at least one:

1. Grow the market
2. Increase the market share
3. Capture market share in a more efficient way

Each purpose requires campaigns with clear goals. Goal types:

- KPI Goals
- Project & Campaign Goals
- Experiment Goals
- Hiring Goals

Campaign executions must leave no questions, so each marketing campaign requires a brief format:

- **Goals**: KPIs, timeline, relevant OKRs
- **Audience**: Who we're targeting
- **Creatives**: Messaging & creative assets
- **Channels**: Distribution
- **Ownership**: Who is involved

## Positioning

Marketing starts with positioning - we always think thorough where to sit in the market before new launches.

No one cares about product functions, it's all about what you provide. If your positioning requires explanation, it isn't working. We never talk about what our product does until we've established what problem it eliminates.

We start with a positioning:

- What is our product/service/platform?
  - In customer language, what is it?
  - What pain point do we eliminate?
  - What we improve?
- Who is this for?
  - Who benefits most from this solution?
  - What characteristics define this segment?
- Why is it better?
  - What are the other players?
  - How do we outperform alternatives?
  - What makes us uniquely valuable here?

## Big no's on marketing

We're playing our game, not theirs.

- Throwing out marketing activities to see what sticks
- Burning money at Ads
- Random posts
- Copying what others do
- Actions without planning or goals
- Prioritizing paid activities over organic
- Jumping on hypes over strategy

## Big yes's on marketing

- Growing together with others
- Playing our game in the highest level
- Listening selectively - Absorb market feedback, but filter it through strategy
- Adding value to what we're working on
- Repurposing content 
- Being opinionated about the differentiation and why we're doing
- Understanding the technical aspects at a level that explains a child
- Being aware of the target audience and the messaging