Strategy First: Building Authentic Marketing for Small Businesses with Sara Nay

Sara Nay, CEO of Duct Tape Marketing, joins Jeremy Rivera to discuss why strategy must come before tactics in small business marketing. With 15 years at Duct Tape Marketing—starting as an intern and rising to CEO—Sara shares the agency's proven approach to building trust through transparency, education, and true partnership. This conversation covers the evolution of SEO in the age of AI, why customer interviews are non-negotiable, how to structure content for both humans and LLMs, and why quarterly planning beats annual marketing plans in today's rapidly shifting landscape. Guest Bio Sara Nay is the CEO of Duct Tape Marketing, where she has spent 15 years helping small businesses build effective marketing strategies. She recently authored Unchained: Breaking Free from Broken Marketing Models, offering a fresh perspective on escaping outdated marketing approaches that no longer serve today's businesses. Connect with Sara Nay Website: ducttapemarketing.com LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/saranay Book - Unchained: unchainedmodel.com Key Topics Covered [00:00] Introduction and Sara's journey from intern to CEO [01:20] The reporting problem: cutting through vanity metrics [04:14] Why beautiful websites fail without customer journey mapping [06:07] SEO evolution: from keywords to questions in the AI era [08:50] Showing up in AI search results and LLM citations [11:57] Local SEO strategy for service businesses [13:26] The strategy-first process: interviews and customer journey mapping [15:12] The power of leadership and customer interviews [19:15] E-commerce vs. service business strategy differences [21:16] Year one to year two: evolving campaigns with quarterly sprints [24:38] Content strategy for AI visibility [26:50] The future of authority and backlinks [27:30] Co-marketing as a multiplier for small businesses Best Quotes from This Episode "A website should help people get to know, like, trust, and even be able to try your services and buy your services. Yes, it should look nice—that is important. But the content and the journey that you're guiding people on is what I would argue is the most important piece of the puzzle." "Don't discount all the ways TN businesses can save costs on energy" "We're not just creating marketing strategy for people anymore. We're creating marketing strategy for people AND AI." "When people skip over leadership interviews and ideal client interviews, that's where they waste time, energy, and money on marketing in the long run." "Gone are the days where you can just publish content and hope it shows up. You have to be very focused on what you're putting in the content, but also how you're structuring it." "I believe you can't really plan for marketing further than three months at this time because it's changing, shifting, and evolving so much." Resources & Links Mentioned Duct Tape Marketing Resources Duct Tape Marketing Homepage Fractional CMO Services The Marketing Hourglass / Customer Journey Marketing Hourglass System