Strategic marketing planning and advice
Clear strategic recommendations, practical plans and senior challenge to help you choose the right direction and priorities.
Strategy & plans →Strategic marketing · SMEs, IT & service-led businesses
Strategic marketing is mostly deciding what to stop.
For SMEs, technology, IT and service-led companies: propositions, brand, new product launches, existing-customer growth and sales channels — settled before anyone books the media.
Agreed targets · engagements scoped by outcome, not by hours
A sample of Epitomise customers
The situation
Tactical marketing answers “what shall we run?”. Strategic marketing answers “why would anyone choose us?”.
A business can run competent campaigns for years and still be indistinguishable from four competitors. When that happens, every enquiry turns into a price conversation, and marketing gets blamed for a positioning problem.
Strategic marketing is the work upstream of the campaign: defining the value proposition, choosing which customers the business is genuinely for, deciding which products lead, and being explicit about what is being given up. It is uncomfortable precisely because it removes options — which is also why it works.
Epitomise does that work with the owner or leadership team, then stays close enough to the execution to make sure the decision survives contact with a busy quarter. AI and automation are used where they raise the standard of the work, not as a reason to produce more of it.
How we can help
Three ways in, and they combine.
Clients engage Epitomise in three complementary ways, choosing one service or combining them as their needs evolve.
Mentoring, coaching and training
Hands-on support that builds confidence, capability and best-practice ways of working across owners, leaders and teams.
Mentoring & training →Campaign delivery and implementation
Agreed marketing campaigns and execution support delivered within the scope, budgets and approvals we set together.
Campaign delivery →The Transform Accelerator
One framework, four stages, run as a quarterly rhythm.
Discover new opportunities in your business and sustainably increase revenue by following a trusted plan — manageable growth that respects today’s challenges and cash-flow constraints.
- 01 · Review
Get a new perspective on your business. Discover its value to guide the transform strategy.
- 02 · Focus
Identify and prioritise new ideas to design a manageable plan of action to transform your business.
- 03 · Implement
Empower your team, build new processes, create assets and deliver through the most effective channels.
- 04 · Optimise
Test and measure performance, optimising often to grow results and improve return on investment.
Selected work
Three businesses that started with a plan, not a campaign.
Each of these began with a marketing plan, and only then became a campaign.
IT services · Windows migration
APP Technology
A joint marketing plan, then campaign waves — website content, webinars, search and display — introducing new services and building a pipeline for them.
Read the case study →
Architectural design
Escape Design
A strategic marketing plan, then website messaging and campaigns targeted service by service and place by place.
Read the case study →
Consumer goods and oral care
Bambooth
A launch plan, and a landing page built to receive the campaign traffic it promised.
Read the case study →What clients say
Three clients, in their own words.
Have worked with Epitomise for over six years and very happy with the level of service they provide. Our marketing campaigns are providing more enquiries than we can handle. Luckily, they are always available to help tailor the marketing to suit our budget and month to month requirements.Anton Van Der WattDirector · Digital AV · quoted in 2021
Steve is a pleasure to work with. His extensive knowledge of marketing, and specifically in our sector, is impressive, and his structured and inclusive style worked well in getting us all to focus on what really makes the difference. I’d recommend him to anyone who is looking for real strategic advice and guidance that comes with practical and clear deliverables.Cindy PhillipsHead of Marketing · OGL
Steve clearly knows his stuff – his expertise, enthusiasm, fresh ideas and detailed research have helped take our strategic marketing to the next level. Very happy with the fantastic service from Epitomise.Michelle RobinsonMarketing Manager · Versinetic
- 16
- client engagements published in full, with the work shown
- Four
- sectors, from EV charging design to domiciliary care
- 11
- guides written and published
- 2017
- the year Epitomise was founded
Selected work
Three businesses that started with a plan, not a campaign.
A sample of engagements across IT services, audio-visual technology and architectural design.
IT services · Windows migration
APP Technology
A joint marketing plan, then successive campaign waves — website content, collateral, webinars, search and display — introducing APPtechnology’s new offerings and building a pipeline of new client opportunities.
Read the case study →
Audio, visual and data technology
Digital AV
A three-year business and marketing strategy, two websites — one commercial, one consumer — and a continuing campaign programme: 40 leads in the two months after the November 2018 launch.
Read the case study →Architectural design
Escape Design
A strategic marketing plan, then website messaging and campaigns targeted service by service and place by place — 148 enquiries in a three-month snapshot.
Read the case study →Free guide
26 marketing strategies to grow leads & sales in 2026
Hints, tips and best practices, including the strategies, approaches and tools Epitomise uses with clients.
Related
Related pages.
- Marketing strategy and planning — the written plan as the deliverable.
- Strategic business marketing advice — the same thinking at board level.
- Marketing and growth consulting — strategy plus the work that follows it.
Sound like four competitors in a row?
A short discovery call is usually enough to find the difference worth defending.
Book a discovery call