Interview: Startup Marketing Strategy with Onna Cunningham
Onna Cunningham is a marketing expert with a number of achievements under her belt. After working as an executive at multiple marketing agencies, she launched her own international marketing collective Luna in 2020. During this time, she also co-founded a successful funded startup as Chief Marketing Officer, and now acts as a mentor for other startups hoping to achieve their marketing goals.
We were able to grab some time on Onna’s busy calendar recently to ask her thoughts on how startups can create a successful marketing strategy.
LunarLab: We have been impressed by your work with companies of all different sizes. What makes startup marketing different from larger businesses?
LunarLab: Are there any tactics or strategies that you recommend startups heavily focus on in the early stages?
Onna Cunningham: Yes! I cannot stress heavily enough how important it is to have a killer pitch at the ready. There are mentors and investors waiting to support you but you must cleanly and clearly communicate your idea to them. You have made the irreversible leap and dedicated your one wild and precious life to this incredible idea. You owe it to yourself to nail the pitch.
LunarLab: How can startups set themselves up for a really successful product launch?
Onna Cunningham: Plan ahead and enlist everyone! Whether you use Notion, Asana, Monday (I’m a Notion fan) in the two to four weeks leading up to a product or feature launch go ahead and articulate every task that needs to be considered and completed by each team. I’ve included a checklist we use for product and feature launches that might be helpful.
LunarLab: In your experience, what are some common ways that you’ve seen startup marketing fail? How can businesses avoid those pitfalls?
Onna Cunningham: Having worked in and alongside startups for the past five years in Birmingham and across the globe I have noticed a trend in our hometown to over allocate time and resources to branding and brand-adjacent deliverables without properly considering customer acquisition and retention strategies. Unfortunately, I’ve seen too many hefty branding price tags for gorgeous work that does not ultimately grow the business because it wasn’t accompanied by a comprehensive marketing plan, communications push, and paid media strategy.
My first piece of advice is be judicious about how you allocate your marketing dollars, even if it means evolving the brand over time. Invest time and money toward locking in your investor pitch, having airtight messaging, and putting together a balanced marketing budget for how to take that message to your target audiences. Know what your marketing mix needs to be and invest accordingly.
And secondly, I would encourage founders to hold your marking partners accountable. Know the difference between internal and external branding and push your agency to produce both. Collaborate with them on establishing baseline KPIs so you know exactly how your money is being invested and can develop realistic expectations alongside your marketing partner that allows them to perform.
LunarLab: What’s the number one advice you would give to a new founder who doesn’t have experience with marketing?
Onna Cunningham: You cannot do it alone and it’s unlikely that you are in a place to hire a full, in-house team to support all the elements you’ll need to execute a comprehensive marketing plan that supports regular product launches. Find a marketing partner that knows how to assemble the just-right team of creatives, strategists, PR executives, and media buyers to suit your needs and match your ethos. Invest in a distributed team that can truly assemble, create, and disassemble based on quarterly objectives you collaboratively develop without the padded price tag of a traditional agency. Review your monthly reports. Trust in their expertise and require that they reciprocate that respect. Pay attention to how your marketing partner talks about their work with you. Are they your biggest cheerleader on their own channels? Do they seamlessly integrate alongside your leadership team? Do they play well with your other vendor partners? Seek out those who are curious, tenacious, and mindful.
LunarLab: Thank you for the excellent guidance! How can startup founders find you if they want to talk more?
Say hello at [email protected]
