← Cian Pacifico · Approach
Marketing, in the order I’d do it.
Thirteen years in, the pattern is hard to miss. The businesses that grow aren’t the ones running the most campaigns. They’re the ones where the strategy, the work and the numbers are actually talking to each other. Most of my job is getting those three in the same room, and then keeping them there.
Eight principles
- 1
Strategy first
Everything starts with clarity.
I start by asking who you’re for, what the margins are, and why someone picks you over the place down the road. Owners often need a few goes at that last one. That’s not a detour — that is the finding.
Once those answers hold still, most of the campaign decisions make themselves.
- 2
Build the full funnel
Visibility alone doesn't build revenue — conversion does.
Getting found is the easy half. The rest is what happens after someone lands — whether the page answers the question they arrived with, whether there’s an obvious way to get in touch, and whether anyone replies when they do.
Build that part and the months stop swinging.
- 3
Creative & content that connect
Creative should communicate, not just look good.
I shoot as well as plan, which has made me suspicious of work that only photographs well. An ad earns its place by saying something true about the business, in the first frame, before anyone has decided whether to keep watching.
Strong content builds trust. Strong creative drives action.
- 4
Advertise on the right channels
Not every platform is necessary.
Every channel costs something — the budget, or the attention it takes to run it properly. Pick wrong and you don’t just lose the money; you spread the message thin enough that it stops landing anywhere.
Two channels run properly beat six run badly, every time I’ve seen it. Follow how your customers actually buy, not whatever is having a moment.
- 5
Optimise for search & intent
Generating demand and capturing it are different jobs.
Creating demand and catching it are two different jobs. When somebody types the thing they need into Google, the wanting has already happened — the only question left is whether you are there.
That traffic converts better for a fairly boring reason: the need came first.
- 6
Retarget & follow up
Almost nobody buys the first time.
People read, they leave, and they come back a week later when the problem gets louder. Retargeting and follow-up are just how you stay reachable in the meantime.
Most of the distance between interest and action turns out to be patience.
- 7
Measure what matters
Real performance data, not likes.
Impressions and likes tell you a post did numbers. They don’t tell you whether the business made any money. I watch what a customer costs to win, how many of them convert, and what they’re worth over the whole time they stay.
You cannot scale something you can’t see clearly.
- 8
Optimise first, then scale
Scaling something unstable only makes it unstable faster.
Spending more on a shaky campaign just buys a bigger version of the problem. I would rather spend a month making it boring and dependable, and then open the tap.
Structure first. Expansion second.
None of this is clever. It is the difference between doing marketing and actually running it.
Read the notes