Marketing Plan — the full deliverable
One brief from the owner of Alder & Fern Consulting (fictional — see the setup). The team returned a complete plan, a content calendar, and a roadmap presentation to take to the partners. Everything below is the kind of output that lands in Review.
The brief they typed: "Develop a 30-day marketing plan to position us as the
operations firm for specialty food makers. Channel mix, content calendar, and three
sample posts in our voice. Give me a short deck I can walk the partners through."
Deliverable 1 · Marketing Plan.md — exported to Word & PDF
30-Day Marketing Plan — "The Operations Firm for Specialty Food Makers"
Objective. Ten qualified conversations with specialty food manufacturers ($2–20M revenue) in 30 days, positioning Alder & Fern as the firm you call when the product scales and the operation doesn't.
Audience. Owner-operators and ops leads at growing food producers — people who feel the pain in overtime, changeovers, and missed ship dates but describe it as "we just need more hands." We speak to the boring expensive problems, not "digital transformation."
The angle. Every specialty food maker hits the same wall: the product scales, the operation doesn't. We own that moment. One channel done properly (LinkedIn), two posts weekly plus one owner story, every post ending in a conversation starter rather than a pitch.
Channel mix.
· LinkedIn (70%) — the owner's voice; operators buy from operators.
· Email (20%) — monthly "boring problems" letter to the existing list of 340 contacts.
· Referral touches (10%) — five past clients get a personal note with the new positioning.
Week by week.
· Week 1 — Positioning: owner's story post + two operations teardowns; refresh LinkedIn headline & page.
· Week 2 — Proof: the changeover case study with before/after numbers; first email letter goes out.
· Week 3 — Conversation: a poll on scheduling pain + founder Q&A post; engage every commenter personally.
· Week 4 — Offer: announce two assessment slots for Q4; personal notes to the five referral clients.
Sample post 1 (week 1, owner story). "Twelve years ago I ran a granola plant with a whiteboard and a prayer. The whiteboard worked. The prayer didn't scale. Now I help specialty food makers fix the systems behind the stress — starting with the schedule everyone argues about at 6 a.m."
Sample post 2 (week 2, proof). "A creamery we work with cut changeover time 30% without buying a single machine. The fix was a whiteboard, a stopwatch, and one uncomfortable meeting about who actually owns the schedule. The expensive problems are usually the boring ones. What's the boring problem eating your margins?"
Sample post 3 (week 4, offer). "We're opening two Operations Assessment slots for Q4. Two weeks, your whole line mapped, a prioritized findings readout — yours whether or not we keep working together. If your product is scaling faster than your operation, this is the fortnight that pays for the year."
Measurement. Leading: 2 posts/week shipped, 25+ meaningful comments engaged, email open rate ≥ 45%. Lagging: 10 qualified conversations, 2 assessment bookings. Review every Friday — Marketing agent compiles the numbers into the KPI sheet automatically.
Objective. Ten qualified conversations with specialty food manufacturers ($2–20M revenue) in 30 days, positioning Alder & Fern as the firm you call when the product scales and the operation doesn't.
Audience. Owner-operators and ops leads at growing food producers — people who feel the pain in overtime, changeovers, and missed ship dates but describe it as "we just need more hands." We speak to the boring expensive problems, not "digital transformation."
The angle. Every specialty food maker hits the same wall: the product scales, the operation doesn't. We own that moment. One channel done properly (LinkedIn), two posts weekly plus one owner story, every post ending in a conversation starter rather than a pitch.
Channel mix.
· LinkedIn (70%) — the owner's voice; operators buy from operators.
· Email (20%) — monthly "boring problems" letter to the existing list of 340 contacts.
· Referral touches (10%) — five past clients get a personal note with the new positioning.
Week by week.
· Week 1 — Positioning: owner's story post + two operations teardowns; refresh LinkedIn headline & page.
· Week 2 — Proof: the changeover case study with before/after numbers; first email letter goes out.
· Week 3 — Conversation: a poll on scheduling pain + founder Q&A post; engage every commenter personally.
· Week 4 — Offer: announce two assessment slots for Q4; personal notes to the five referral clients.
Sample post 1 (week 1, owner story). "Twelve years ago I ran a granola plant with a whiteboard and a prayer. The whiteboard worked. The prayer didn't scale. Now I help specialty food makers fix the systems behind the stress — starting with the schedule everyone argues about at 6 a.m."
Sample post 2 (week 2, proof). "A creamery we work with cut changeover time 30% without buying a single machine. The fix was a whiteboard, a stopwatch, and one uncomfortable meeting about who actually owns the schedule. The expensive problems are usually the boring ones. What's the boring problem eating your margins?"
Sample post 3 (week 4, offer). "We're opening two Operations Assessment slots for Q4. Two weeks, your whole line mapped, a prioritized findings readout — yours whether or not we keep working together. If your product is scaling faster than your operation, this is the fortnight that pays for the year."
Measurement. Leading: 2 posts/week shipped, 25+ meaningful comments engaged, email open rate ≥ 45%. Lagging: 10 qualified conversations, 2 assessment bookings. Review every Friday — Marketing agent compiles the numbers into the KPI sheet automatically.
Deliverable 2 · Content Calendar.csv — exported to Excel
| Date | Channel | Piece | Owner | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sep 1 | Owner story — "the whiteboard and the prayer" | Marketing | drafted | |
| Sep 4 | Teardown #1 — changeover scheduling | Marketing | drafted | |
| Sep 8 | Case study — 30% changeover cut | Marketing | outline | |
| Sep 10 | "Boring problems" letter #1 (list of 340) | Marketing | outline | |
| Sep 15 | Poll — "what breaks first when orders double?" | Marketing | planned | |
| Sep 22 | Q4 assessment offer — two slots | Marketing | planned | |
| Sep 23 | Referral | Personal notes to 5 past clients | You | needs you |
14 rows total — trimmed here. Note the calendar assigns the owner exactly one task: the personal notes only a human should send.
Deliverable 3 · Marketing Roadmap.slides.json — the deck for the partners, exported to PowerPoint
Six slides, rendered exactly as they export:
Fictional company; representative output, edited for length. Every deliverable lands in the Review column for your approval — nothing publishes itself.