Last Updated on: 1st May 2025, 02:02 pm
In this informative video, marketing veteran Rob walks through the often-overlooked power of marketing checklists. With 30+ years of experience, he demonstrates how to create printable resources that do more than just provide value—they drive traffic, generate leads, and increase business.
Key Takeaways From Rob’s Training
Rob uses the example of a business checklist to illustrate his “marketing tree” concept: where citations and listings form the roots, your website forms the trunk, and your various content channels form the branches. He shows how a single piece of well-designed content can be strategically deployed across this ecosystem for maximum impact.
The Power of a Well-Designed Marketing Checklists
A good checklist solves a problem for your audience while simultaneously establishing your expertise. Whether you’re a roofer creating a “Post-Hailstorm Roof Inspection Guide,” a painter offering a “Home Color Selection Checklist,” or a baker providing a “Wedding Cake Planning Timeline,” these resources position you as the industry authority.
Making Your Collateral Work Harder
The real magic happens when you leverage your marketing collateral across multiple channels. A single high-quality checklist can be:
- Featured on your website for downloads
- Shared across social media platforms
- Highlighted in blog posts with expanded content
- Included in email marketing campaigns
- Printed as physical handouts for events or meetings
Essential Elements for Marketing Success
For your marketing collateral to generate real business results, ensure it includes:
- Clear branding – Your logo, colors, and visual identity should be prominent
- Contact information – Make it easy for people to reach you
- Website links – Direct traffic back to your online presence
- QR codes – Create seamless connections between physical and digital experiences
- Strong calls to action – Guide users on what to do next
The Common Mistake to Avoid
Many businesses and marketers create beautiful, useful collateral but stop short of the strategic follow-through. They design a great checklist, upload it to their website, and consider the job done. Without intentional integration into your broader marketing ecosystem, even the best resources won’t drive the traffic and leads they could.
Think Like an Advertiser
Each piece of marketing collateral represents a touchpoint with potential customers. When you approach your checklist creation with an advertiser’s mindset rather than just a designer’s eye, you transform it from a simple resource into a powerful lead generation tool.
By thoughtfully crafting valuable resources with strategic branding and distribution plans, you can use marketing collateral to drive more website traffic, generate quality leads, and ultimately grow your business.
Want More Marketing Tips?
Other than making marketing checklists, Rob can help you grow your business in other ways. Personal coaching, Simply Be Found’s listings engine, Google profile boost, and social media suite are all there to help your business grow organically. Check out our membership benefits and see how we can help you.
Transcript
- 0:00 | Intro: Why Marketing Collateral Matters
- 0:14 | Creating a Printable Checklist for Your Business
- 0:36 | Reusing Content Across Your Marketing Tree
- 0:54 | Where to Share Your Checklist
- 1:16 | Making Your Checklist Work for Marketing
- 1:38 | The Importance of Branding in Printables
- 2:00 | What Info to Include in Your Collateral
- 2:29 | Why Clear Calls to Action Matter
- 2:56 | Using Social, QR Codes, and Website Links
- 3:22 | The Problem with Forgotten Follow-Up
- 3:40 | Examples of Checklist Use by Industry
- 4:02 | Think Like an Advertiser, Not Just a Designer
- 4:26 | Your Marketing Ecosystem & Traffic Strategy
- 4:39 | One Great Checklist Can Transform Your Business
- 4:42 | Where to Learn More & Closing Thoughts
0:00 | Intro: Why Marketing Collateral Matters
Rob: All right. So we’re going to talk about marketing collateral. So when you put marketing collateral out about your business, let’s say it’s going to be something on your website that’s going to be a printable piece. So let’s go ahead and let’s draw that out.
0:14 | Creating a Printable Checklist for Your Business
Rob: Okay, so you have this printable piece that’s going to be able to say—say it’s a checklist of things that they can do to be able to get their business to the next level. So you’re going to build out the content. You’re going to make it look really good. You’re going to have all your checklist and everything.
You’re going to tell them, “Hey, you should print this.” This might be something that they print out and they’d be able to share. It’s a checklist to be able to do.
0:36 | Reusing Content Across Your Marketing Tree
Rob: Well, this same checklist you could share on social media. So when you talk about your tree of organic marketing, so when you talk about that root base being your listings, your citations, all that stuff, your tree trunk being the website, and then all your branches at the very top, this is where you can reuse your content. So now you have this checklist. Okay.
0:54 | Where to Share Your Checklist
Rob: So where can you all use this checklist at? For one, you can use it on social media. So social. You can use it on your blog. You can write a whole blog post about it. You might use it on and link to it inside of your email marketing as a go-to.
You might post it out in other spots for you to share it. You might print it out and have it as a handout instead of a piece.
1:16 | Making Your Checklist Work for Marketing
Rob: So what do you have to do to make sure that this can actually work as marketing? So yes, you just provided someone a checklist.
Yes, you just provided them this entire good markup of all this different marketing that they could, you know, of this list they could go through and they could do to make their life easier in some way, shape, or some form. Well, you got to make sure that this right here has your branding on it.
1:38 | The Importance of Branding in Printables
Rob: ‘Cause at the very end of the day, if they share this out and it goes viral, you want them to know where to go, who you are. It’s going to have your brand on it. It doesn’t have to be 100% all about you, but you want your brand on that.
You’re the expert. You provided this checklist. This is what you’re able to do. So inside of that brand, you need to have some clear expectations.
2:00 | What Info to Include in Your Collateral
Rob: How are they going to contact you? What website can they go to? Is there a phone number they should call? Now for us, we don’t take phone calls inside of our business, so we wouldn’t put the phone number because it wouldn’t make sense.
Is there going to be a QR code that you could put inside of it that would then generate and shove somebody to where they can go download this, go see more about this checklist? Where’s the—you know, put a QR code on there. Put some kind of branding to where they could take action to your business.
2:29 | Why Clear Calls to Action Matter
Rob: So much marketing out there gets shoved out and put into place that they do not focus on a good checklist for one. They don’t focus on how that person’s going to take action. So people use what’s called calories, and I call them marketing calories outside of the world of business.
But they have all this stuff that ends up happening. They have all these messages going on. They need to be guided to how they’re going to take action on that business, how they’re going to be taken in there.
2:56 | Using Social, QR Codes, and Website Links
Rob: So when you share it on social media—boom—download this free checklist. Boom. Here’s how you get a hold of us. Here’s how you get to that, you know, download. Here’s a QR code. Here’s this. Here’s my website. Here’s how you get a hold of us. Here’s how—here’s who we are.
And we are the experts for this right here. You have to guide them through. They’re going to be the ones to do this work. They’re going to be there, but they want to make life easier. They can come here. Possibly they might be able to get some value from that. Think about this as advertising and not just go through and create a checklist.
3:22 | The Problem with Forgotten Follow-Up
Rob: To go and we go and wondering why you don’t get results. You have to think about every single piece that goes in there. When you send that email out, that’s a touch point. That’s a touch point. It’s creating each of those pieces. So like for example, if you’re a roofer and you have a checklist of how to check your roof after a hail storm…
3:40 | Examples of Checklist Use by Industry
Rob: Or a painter, what to do when you’re picking colors, or “Well, here’s your checklist for, you know, when you get ready to paint your house,” or whatever it might be. You might be a baker:
“Here’s what to plan for for your wedding cake.” You’re the expert. Showcase yourself. Showcase yourself in there. Use that as an advertising touch point to get you more business.
4:02 | Think Like an Advertiser, Not Just a Designer
Rob: This is a hidden gem that a lot of businesses forget about, and a lot of marketers don’t even know what to do. They go, “Oh, I’ll just design this really cool checklist. Boom. It’s done. It’s on our website. It’s great.”
But then they don’t think about that next step that they need to take. They don’t think about how that could be used. They don’t think about how it connects inside of your entire treetop of your whole entire ecosystem.
4:26 | Your Marketing Ecosystem & Traffic Strategy
Rob: Of how you can use that to be able to drive more traffic to your website, drive more sales to your business, and get your—get more business in there, get—gain more leads, get everything from that by creating one piece of information because that one piece of information might be the winner.
4:39 | One Great Checklist Can Transform Your Business
Rob: For your business to take it to the next level.
4:42 | Where to Learn More & Closing Thoughts
Rob: If you want to learn more about marketing tips and more about marketing, come check us out SimplyBeFound.com. My name’s Rob. I’ve been doing this stuff for 30-some years, and I do videos like this all the time. Make sure you like, make sure you subscribe, find us everywhere. You can find us on YouTube. You can find us on social.
You can find us inside of most podcast apps. Try to be able to listen to our podcast. But think about this the next time you do a printable. Think about this next time you do a podcast or a checklist of any kind. And think about how you could be able to drive more traffic to your business by using tips like this. Thanks for watching. Have a great day!
