Your mid-year marketing reset: Five steps to unfreeze your strategy

July is in full swing, winter’s chill is well and truly on, and if you’re like many New Zealand founders and directors, you’ve probably noticed your marketing engine sputter a little. Content ideas feel thin, your carefully laid strategy gathers dust, and motivation? It’s hiding under a warm blanket somewhere.

Here’s the good news: Mid-year doesn’t have to mean a marketing slump. In fact, winter is the ideal moment to pause, reassess and build real resilience into your digital efforts. Over the past decade I’ve helped everyone from tech start-ups in Wellington to boutique retailers in Queenstown run this very process, and it works. In just a few focused hours, you’ll gain clarity on what’s truly driving results, free up precious headspace, and emerge with a streamlined roadmap for the rest of 2025.

Below are five practical steps to guide your mid-year marketing reset. Each one is designed to be done in a single afternoon (or delegated), so you can get back to leading your business and feeling confident that your marketing is firing on all cylinders.

Audit what’s actually moving the needle

You can’t improve what you haven’t measured. Block out 60–90 minutes and tackle this with curiosity (not guilt):

Channel performance: Open Google Analytics (or your reporting tool) and list your top three traffic or lead sources. Are paid ads still delivering? Has LinkedIn quietly overtaken Instagram?
Content impact: Scan your last ten social posts, emails or blog articles. Which three drove the most engagement or enquiries? Note the common themes, formats and calls-to-action.
Funnel friction: Walk through your customer journey, all the way from first click to a signed contract (or purchase). Where are people dropping off? Often it’s a clunky enquiry form or a landing page that doesn’t sell.

Loren’s top tip: Delegate the data-pull to a VA or marketing coordinator. Use your time to interpret the insights and decide where to focus next.

Revisit your why and your goals

Halfway through the year, your business priorities might have shifted. It’s worth checking in:

Clarify your objective: Do you need more brand visibility, a surge in new clients, or deeper loyalty from existing ones? Choose one primary goal – anything more just becomes extra noise.
Refresh your customer profiles: Situations change, budgets tighten, needs evolve. Ask five customers or prospects a simple question: “What’s your biggest challenge right now?” Their answers will shape your messaging.
Set micro-milestones: Rather than “grow revenue by 20 percent,” aim to “secure 25 new enquiries by the end of Q3.” Small and measurable targets keep you and your team that much more motivated.

Loren’s top tip: Hand off the survey logistics to a junior team member. Remember, your focus should be on validating the insights and updating your strategy.

Streamline your workflow

When you’re juggling multiple hats, efficiency is your best ally:

Batch content creation: Block two hours monthly to write captions, draft emails or record short videos. Batching cuts down context-switching and turbocharges productivity.
Standardise with templates: Use a branded Google Doc or Canva layout for posts and newsletters. Templates eliminate “blank page” paralysis and reduce back-and-forth with designers – this one has been a game changer for me.
Automate the repetitive: Schedule social media with Buffer or Later, and connect enquiry forms to your CRM via Zapier. If a task is repeatable, let technology handle it.

Loren’s top tip: Pick one low-value task you dread, whether it’s scheduling posts, managing spreadsheets, or something else, and either automate it or delegate it this week.

Diversify for resilience

Relying on a single channel or tactic leaves you vulnerable to sudden changes, so spread the risk:

Test a new platform: If Facebook ads have been your bread and butter, repurpose your top posts as a LinkedIn article or a short email sequence. Even a $200 trial budget can help to reveal untapped audiences.
Run micro-experiments: Two-week A/B tests on headlines, creatives or audiences that can bring in those quick learnings without blowing your budget.
Nurture owned channels: Paid ads can shift overnight. A healthy email list (my favourite), a private Facebook group or a customer referral programme gives you direct access no algorithm can block.

Loren’s top tip: Appoint one team member to pilot a “new channel experiment” by month’s end, and review the results together in your next huddle/team stand up.

Invest in your people and culture

Your marketing will only be as strong as the team behind it. Use this reset to energise and upskill:

Host micro-trainings: A 20-minute “lunch-and-learn” on writing clearer calls-to-action or interpreting analytics goes a long way.
Run cross-functional huddles: Invite all members of your team (e.g. sales, product, customer service, etc) into a quarterly marketing catch-up. Fresh perspectives often spark breakthrough ideas.
Embed light debriefs: After each campaign, spend five minutes on “one win” and “one tweak” before moving on. Simple, but powerful.

Loren’s top tip: Let your marketing lead run these sessions – you provide the strategic framing and buy-in, they handle the facilitation. I do this with my team and it’s changed the way my team think, and how I lead… for the better.

Putting it all together

Winter isn’t a season to coast (even though it feels like it’s time to hibernate). This is actually the best time to hit your strategic reboot button. Use these five steps as your roadmap, and I promise you’ll enter the second half of the year with clarity, confidence and the flexibility to adapt as markets shift.

For more insight from Loren Tomlinson, have a listen to her marketing podcast, Coffees & Content. Season 1 is available on NZBusiness, here.