What is marketing? Is it the same as selling?

As a full house marketing agency, what kind of information can you provide to clients before selling them on marketing services?

• (competitor research, customer profile, etc.)

• Answer:

  What most often works best is not giving the customer insight into their own business but giving them a framework for how you intend to improve their business.  If they can clearly see where they are now, the options available to them, and how you can help improve their business based upon a structured framework that is measurable, then they usually come on board. In short sell how you do business and why that's different and valuable.  If you're doing the same as everyone else then reconsider your strategy. Michael Porter said "Strategy is about making choices, trade-offs; it's about deliberately choosing to be different". Here's a nice framework I was involved in creating.  It's unique and when understood by clients they almost always 'buy in'.