Strategie & Positionering
Marketing has to get better? Don't start on the outside.
Pick a time that works for you.
"Our marketing has to get better." It's the sentence almost every intro call starts with. Sometimes direct, sometimes wrapped as "we're not doing enough with LinkedIn" or "our website doesn't deliver enough" or "we're getting too few leads." Under every variant sits the same unease: the idea that something in marketing is broken and it should be going better.
What often follows is what I call the reflex. The owner looks at what they see, compares it to what they see working elsewhere, and points at what has to change on the outside. Different content, faster website, new funnel, more ads, better automation. All visible work. All logical-looking interventions.
And in nine out of ten cases it's treating symptoms.
Imagine: an SMB owner in business services gets too few leads via LinkedIn. They decide to post three times a week instead of once. Three months later: still too few leads. Conclusion: LinkedIn doesn't work for them.
What was actually going on: their positioning was unclear. Their ICP had never been sharpened. In their posts they were addressing anyone who might ever need business advice. They wrote things nine other consultants also wrote. No matter how often they posted, the story didn't land, because there was no story. Three posts a week wasn't their problem. That was the symptom, not the cause.
We see this pattern more often than we want to admit. The website gets rebuilt while the proposition is weak. The ad campaign gets set up while no one can say who the client is. The content calendar gets filled with topics that don't specifically hit anyone. Lots of motion, little direction.
De vraag is zelden "doen we genoeg?" maar bijna altijd "doen we het juiste?" en daarvoor moet je dieper kijken dan de buitenste laag.
A few years ago at Skillable, Bas van der Voort's agency, I saw a simple diagram that exposed something I'd been trying to explain in vague words. He showed marketing as a series of concentric circles: tactics on the outside, and in the core the positioning and the offer. With the observation that most companies work on the outer layer while the problem sits in the core.
We adopted that model for our approach, but translated it into our own version. We don't work with four layers, but with three. And we made the middle layer specifically for what our three pillars do: Visibility, Authority and Market Radar.
Het ziet er zo uit:
Tactics on the outside. Three pillars in the middle ring. Positioning and ICP in the core.
Three circles. From the outside in. What I'm about to explain below is what sits in each layer, and why the order of thinking has to look the opposite of what most agencies encourage.
On the outside sits everything you see when you look at a company. Their website. Their LinkedIn posts. Their ads. Their funnels. Their automations. Their CRM flows. Their newsletters. It's the visible layer, and that's why it's also the layer that gets almost all the attention.
Two things make this layer treacherous. First: there's always something to do here. You can always post another piece, rewrite another page, build another automation. The to-do list never ends, so it feels productive. Second: other companies see the same layer, so the temptation to copy each other's tactics is big. If competitor A is posting carousels now, I'll post carousels too.
What's missing here: the lever. A better LinkedIn post that comes out of unclear positioning stays unclear. A faster website that makes the wrong promise keeps making the wrong promise, just faster. The outer layer amplifies what sits beneath it. If what sits beneath is weak, you're amplifying weakness.
One layer deeper sits the work that delivers compounding results. These are our three pillars, and each operates on a different part of the buying journey.
Vindbaarheid is dat je gevonden wordt als iemand zoekt. In Google. In ChatGPT. Op LinkedIn. Vindbaarheid is de basis-aanname dat je überhaupt bestaat in het hoofd van je doelgroep wanneer hij wakker wordt met een probleem. Tactiek zonder vindbaarheid is praten in een lege ruimte.
Autoriteit is de reden om jou te kiezen, niet je concurrent. Het is je vakkennis op papier, je manier van denken zichtbaar gemaakt, je referenties die anderen overtuigen dat je weet waar je het over hebt. Autoriteit zorgt dat de mensen die je vinden, ook voor jou kiezen.
Market Radar is zien wat er beweegt voor het in je pipeline opduikt. Welke bedrijven oriënteren, welke shortlists groeien, hoe je positie verandert. Het is je zicht op het deel van het traject waar je klant zit voor hij jou kent.
The three pillars only work if they run together. Visibility without authority delivers clickers but no choosers. Authority without visibility stays a good story no one hears. Market Radar without the other two shows signals you can't act on. That's why we talk about a system of three pillars, not three separate services.
In the middle sits what makes everything beneath it possible. The core. This isn't a layer where you do tactics, it's the layer that gives tactics direction. Two elements.
Positionering is het antwoord op de vraag: waarom zou iemand jou kiezen en niet de tien andere partijen die hetzelfde lijken te doen? Dat is geen marketing-tagline. Het is een strategisch antwoord dat verankerd zit in wat je werkelijk anders doet, voor wie je het doet, en waar je je niet op richt. Een goede positionering sluit klanten uit. Een zwakke positionering probeert iedereen te bereiken en bereikt niemand.
ICP staat voor Ideal Customer Profile. Niet je doelgroep, want doelgroep is een marketingwoord dat te breed is om iets mee te kunnen. ICP is concreet: welke sector, welke omvang, welke beslissingsmacht, welk koopgedrag. Hoe scherper je ICP, hoe relevanter je signalen, hoe specifieker je content, hoe gerichter je vindbaarheid. Een vage ICP is de hoofdoorzaak van vage marketing.
With every new client this is the first thing we do before we touch tactics. ICP sharp on paper. Positioning that cuts. If those two aren't right, everything that comes on top is just cosmetics.
If you recognize that your marketing is stuck on layer 1, the solution isn't to work harder on layer 1. It's to look one layer deeper. Three steps that work for B2B SMBs with serious ambition.
Eerst: zet je ICP op papier. Niet "B2B-bedrijven die groeien willen". Wel "Nederlandse zakelijke dienstverleners met 10 tot 50 medewerkers, een marketing-coördinator van minstens één persoon, en een omzet tussen de €1M en €20M, die voor zakelijke beslissers werken in financiële dienstverlening, recruitment of consultancy". Hoe scherper, hoe beter. Test het door tegen drie scenario's te toetsen: zou ik dit bedrijf opbellen om mijn dienst aan te bieden? Past hij bij wat we al goed bedienen? Heeft hij budget om ons in te huren? Drie keer ja, of het is geen ICP-bedrijf.
Daarna: hertest je positionering. Twee tests die werken. De eerste: kun je in één zin zeggen wat je doet en voor wie, op een manier die alleen op jou slaat? Als je zin werkt voor zes andere bureaus in jouw sector, is hij niet scherp genoeg. De tweede: noem drie soorten klanten waarvoor je niet werkt en waarom. Als je dat niet kunt, ben je niet echt gepositioneerd, je bent open voor wie er binnenkomt.
Pas dan: stap omhoog naar de pijlers. Met heldere positionering en scherpe ICP weet je nu welke vragen je markt heeft, op welke termen je gevonden moet worden, welk verhaal je moet vertellen om autoriteit op te bouwen, en welke bedrijven je marktradar moet volgen. Plotseling is laag 2 niet meer abstract maar concreet. En laag 1 (de tactiek) volgt vanzelf, want je weet wat je moet posten en waarom.
This isn't an academic exercise. It's what makes the difference between marketing that has to prove itself every month and marketing that compounds.
To be clear: this is not a plea to ignore tactics. Tactics are the expression of your strategy, and without expression there's nothing. Posts have to be written, websites have to be built, ads can work for specific goals. It's a plea to respect the order. First the core, then the pillars, then the tactics. Not the other way around.
And it's not a plea for months of strategic thinking before anything happens either. Sharpening ICP can take a workday. Testing positioning can take a week. Both also deliver concrete work directly: an ICP document you send to your whole team, a positioning statement that ends up in your hero. From that moment, every layer 1 and layer 2 action reinforces the others instead of running alongside.
Marketing has to get better? Almost always. Just don't start on the outside.
An honest conversation about where your marketing stands now. ICP, positioning, and which layer deserves attention first. 30 minutes, no sales pitch, no obligation.