It’s been a while since our last newsletter, as we’ve been working on a new design for our website. Which, I’m pleased to say, is complete. We have a few things to clean up over the coming days and weeks, but I invite you to check out the new KelfordInc.com.
We used to have two websites: One for this newsletter and one for our marketing consulting. Now, it’s all one thing.
Because all we do at Kelford Inc., every single day, is show our clients the way to knowing what to say. So we wanted to show you, our past, current, and perhaps one-day clients, exactly how we do that by showing you how we do it for ourselves.
Take a look at our new website, and explore our more than 800 newsletters/blogs on topics from marketing failure, to content, to AI, to marketing anxiety, to questions to ask yourself.
We hope you like it and enjoy what you read.
Reply to this email or send us a note at labs@kelfordinc.com to tell us what you think!
We’re well into January now, and what a year it’s been, eh?
I’m sure you’re feeling lots of ways about, well, lots of things, and marketing might not be one of them. Believe me, I understand.
But if having a better sense of your marketing in 2026 would help you feel a bit better or clearer in general, I hope I can help a little today.
So, how are you feeling about your marketing in 2026?
Do you know what to say, where to say it, and to whom?
I mean, that’s the challenge, isn’t it? Every year it’s a new plan, a new campaign, a new set of ideas, but the problem remains the same:
What do we say?
Today, I want to share just one short idea, a quick question, to help you figure out what you need to say to move your ideal prospects one step closer.
Let me ask you this:
If your website disappeared. If your marketing budget went to zero. If everything you currently do to get customers went away and you couldn’t do it anymore...
Who would still find you?
Chances are, you can think of someone. A type of customer or a real person you actually know. The person who needs exactly what you offer, and would go looking for it, even if you weren’t looking for them.
What I want you to do is think about whether the marketing you are doing is targeting and reaching them, today. Is it focused on what they value most, and is it placed in places they actually go?
What I see all the time is what I call “aspirational marketing,” or marketing targeting people who don’t care, aren’t aware, or who are oceans of time or space away from the business.
But wouldn’t it be so nice if we sold to them?
But... that’s not how it works. We don’t find customers somewhere out there in the abyss of the market.
We find them nearby. Next to us. Looking for us or at least the thing we provide.
Our job is to tell them we do it and then to show them that we do it the way they value most.
Don’t let your marketing in 2026 become a series of aspirational attempts at influence, when what’s really needed is direct, clear, and specific marketing to the people most likely to notice it.
Because they’re looking for it.
Are you looking for them?
Reply to this email to tell me what you think, or ask any questions!
Kelford Inc. shows you the way to always knowing what to say.