20 Questions

Marketing Questions to Ask Clients

Strategic questions to understand your clients' marketing needs, goals, and challenges, helping you develop effective marketing strategies and campaigns that deliver real results.

1

What are your primary marketing goals, and how do you measure success?

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Why this works

Establishes clear objectives and success metrics, ensuring your marketing efforts align with their business goals and can be properly measured.

2

Who is your target audience, and how well do you understand them?

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Why this works

Reveals their customer knowledge and market research, helping you understand their audience and identify any gaps in their understanding.

3

What marketing challenges are you currently facing, and what's holding you back?

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Why this works

Identifies pain points and obstacles, allowing you to address their specific needs and provide targeted solutions.

4

What marketing strategies have worked well for you in the past, and why?

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Why this works

Shows their successful approaches and what resonates with their audience, helping you build on what's already working.

5

What marketing strategies have failed, and what did you learn from them?

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Why this works

Reveals their past failures and lessons learned, helping you avoid repeating mistakes and understand their risk tolerance.

6

What's your current marketing budget, and how do you allocate it?

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Why this works

Establishes financial parameters and resource allocation, ensuring your recommendations are realistic and achievable within their budget.

7

What marketing channels are you currently using, and which ones are most effective?

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Why this works

Shows their current marketing mix and channel performance, helping you understand their existing presence and identify opportunities.

8

What's your biggest competitor doing in marketing that you admire or worry about?

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Why this works

Reveals their competitive landscape and concerns, helping you understand their market position and competitive pressures.

9

What's your brand story, and how do you want to be perceived in the market?

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Why this works

Explores their brand identity and positioning, helping you align marketing efforts with their brand values and messaging.

10

What marketing tools and technologies are you currently using?

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Why this works

Shows their current tech stack and capabilities, helping you understand their existing resources and identify integration opportunities.

11

What's your sales process, and how does marketing support it?

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Why this works

Reveals the connection between marketing and sales, helping you understand how marketing efforts should align with their sales funnel.

12

What marketing metrics do you track, and what do they tell you?

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Why this works

Shows their measurement approach and data insights, helping you understand their analytical capabilities and reporting needs.

13

What's your timeline for seeing marketing results, and what's driving that timeline?

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Why this works

Establishes expectations and urgency, helping you set realistic timelines and manage their expectations for marketing outcomes.

14

What marketing resources do you have in-house, and what do you need help with?

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Why this works

Reveals their internal capabilities and gaps, helping you understand what services they need and how to position your expertise.

15

What's your biggest marketing opportunity that you haven't been able to capitalize on?

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Why this works

Identifies untapped potential and growth opportunities, helping you prioritize initiatives that can deliver significant impact.

16

What marketing trends are you following, and which ones interest you most?

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Why this works

Shows their awareness of industry trends and interests, helping you align recommendations with their interests and market opportunities.

17

What's your customer acquisition cost, and how does it compare to your customer lifetime value?

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Why this works

Reveals their unit economics and profitability, helping you understand their business model and optimize marketing efficiency.

18

What marketing content resonates most with your audience, and why?

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Why this works

Shows their content performance and audience preferences, helping you understand what types of content to focus on.

19

What's your biggest marketing fear or concern?

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Why this works

Reveals their anxieties and risk factors, helping you address their concerns and build confidence in your marketing approach.

20

What would success look like for you in the next 6-12 months?

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Why this works

Establishes their vision for success and key milestones, helping you align your marketing strategy with their long-term goals.

Best Practices for Client Marketing Conversations

Expert tips and techniques for getting the most out of these questions.

Best Practices

Listen More Than You Talk

Focus on understanding their needs and challenges before proposing solutions. Ask follow-up questions to dig deeper into their responses.

Focus on Business Outcomes

Connect marketing strategies to business results and ROI, showing how your recommendations will impact their bottom line.

Provide Strategic Insights

Offer valuable insights and recommendations based on their responses, demonstrating your expertise and value.

Question Sequences

The Goal Setting

1
What are your primary marketing goals?
2
How do you measure success?
3
What's your timeline for seeing results?
4
What would success look like in 6-12 months?

The Challenge Analysis

1
What marketing challenges are you facing?
2
What's holding you back?
3
What strategies have failed?
4
What's your biggest marketing fear?

Common Pitfalls

Don't Jump to Solutions

Avoid proposing solutions before fully understanding their needs and challenges. Take time to gather all the information first.

Don't Make Assumptions

Avoid assuming their level of marketing knowledge or making assumptions about their business model or target audience.

Don't Focus Only on Tactics

Focus on strategic understanding first, then move to tactical recommendations. Strategy should drive tactics, not the other way around.

Conversation Templates

The Marketing Discovery

1
Step 1: Start with: "I'd like to understand your marketing goals. What are you trying to achieve?"
2
Step 2: Follow with: "What challenges are you currently facing in your marketing?"
3
Step 3: Deepen with: "What's your biggest marketing opportunity that you haven't been able to capitalize on?"

Further Reading

"The Lean Startup" by Eric Ries
"Crossing the Chasm" by Geoffrey Moore
"Hacking Growth" by Sean Ellis

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