My niece has been one to keep a hot sauce bottle in her purse long before Beyoncé mentioned it.
She doesn’t settle for mediocre flavor and has a backup to defend against bland experiences.
Bland experiences. That struck me – and yes, this is a business analogy so brace yourself.
I was working on a framework to describe how we approach clients who are doing bland and random acts of marketing. Their randomness and safety results in bland content and the Marketing team repeatedly needing to defend their impact.
As with all good memorable frameworks, you start with the actionable steps and then you find a clear and logical way to express them.
If you’re lucky, it’s a word that fits the occasion. (Like my book CASH)
In this case it was SAUCE.
Now, to take a quote from Frank’s Red Hot – “We put that s*** on everything!”
When you’re not sure if your current content plan is working…
A. Lee Judge
Put some S.A.U.C.E. on it.
Here’s the framework and the challenge we present to a client when we dig into their Marketing (and Sales) content initiatives.
SAUCE
- Strategy
What strategic priority does this content support? Is it visibility, brand lift, lead generation, thought leadership, or relationship-building? You must answer this first. - Audience
Who is this for, and where do they consume information? Your audience my not just be the consumers of your product. They could be the buyers, influencers, or partners. Know exactly who they are and examine their content consumption hangouts. The content you need to create may change depending on these answers. - Users
Who internally needs this and how will they use it? Are you developing this for just the customer or do you also need to make it for the Sales team, Partners, Distributors, or internal education? - Contribution
How does this content contribute to business progress and revenue impact? We use contribute because “attribute” is a trap. First decide where you want your content to impact, then add that back into the strategy plan to make sure that the content moved the intended needle. - Execution
How will this be created, distributed, and used consistently? Knowing what to make is one thing – know how to make it is another. Then once it’s made, there must be a distribution and consistency plan to keep the content machine moving. Not just cranking out content, but creating the right content for all of the right reasons and distributing to the right places.
If your content marketing doesn’t leave a good taste in the mouth of your leadership, you need to put some SAUCE on it.
If you need help, we’ll keep a fresh bottle available for you.
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About A. Lee Judge
A. Lee Judge is a Keynote Speaker on Sales and Marketing and the author of CASH: The 4 Keys to Better Sales, Smarter Marketing, and a Supercharged Revenue Machine. With 20 years of enterprise experience, A. Lee Judge is sought after by Sales and Marketing leaders and is the founder of Content Monsta, a B2B video and podcast production company. Revenue Teams book A. Lee Judge for company kickoff events, SKOs, RKOs, and executive meetings. He delivers practical frameworks that align Sales and Marketing, connect content to revenue, and drive measurable results. As a Sales and Marketing Speaker and advisor, A. Lee Judge equips teams with actions they can use right away.
