Entry Point

A six-week diagnostic of your effectiveness culture that shows what it is costing you, and what to fix first.

Six weeks Built on EFFECT £17,500
Book a discovery call See what your culture is costing you
What you receive

Section 02

A quantified diagnostic of effectiveness culture across the six EFFECT dimensions, and a figure for what it is costing you.

The Effectiveness Culture Diagnostic is a structured diagnostic of where your marketing organisation's effectiveness culture is strong, where it is weak, what that is costing you, and what to address first. It is built on the EFFECT Framework and combines a structured survey across the six dimensions of effectiveness culture with stakeholder interviews, document review and an audit of ten recent marketing decisions. The output is a quantified maturity assessment, a finance reviewed Cost of Culture figure, a benchmark against comparable organisations, a written report, a prioritised roadmap, and a presentation to your leadership. How every engagement begins. The full fee is credited against any solution commissioned within three months.

  • A structured Effectiveness Culture Survey completed by your marketing organisation, scored across the six EFFECT dimensions.
  • A quantified maturity assessment for each dimension, with comparative benchmarks against other organisations.
  • The Cost of Culture: a finance reviewed figure for what your effectiveness culture cost you over the last year, broken down by the six dimensions.
  • A Value Baseline of five decision measures, from decision time to finance confidence, so progress can be proven rather than assumed.
  • A written diagnostic report integrating the survey results, the stakeholder interview findings, the document review and the Decision Audit.
  • A clear identification of the highest-priority gaps and risks, with a solution territory recommendation (measurement, operating system, or culture).
  • A prioritised twelve to twenty-four month roadmap of recommended actions, with value targets.
  • A summary view designed to be presented to a CMO or board.
  • A presentation of findings to your leadership team.
  • The full Diagnostic fee credited against any EFFECT solution (Signals, Flow, or Embed) commissioned within three months.
What your culture is costing you

Section 03 · The Cost of Culture

The Diagnostic ends with a number your finance director has already agreed.

Culture scores explain the problem. They do not get a budget approved. So alongside the scores, every Diagnostic puts a value on what your effectiveness culture cost you over the last year, in your own numbers.

Weeks 1 and 2

The Value Baseline

I record how long your decisions take, how much of your budget moves on evidence, how much of your spend is tested, and whether finance uses marketing's numbers in its own forecasts. This is the line every future improvement is measured against.

Weeks 2 to 4

The Decision Audit

I trace ten significant marketing decisions from the last eighteen months, from the evidence available to the decision made, and value those that were delayed, overridden or never made using your own returns.

Week 6

The Cost of Culture

A conservative figure, stated as a range, broken down by the six EFFECT dimensions and reviewed by your finance team before the readout. It shows which solution removes the most of it.

Illustrative example

A marketing mix model shows one channel returning £1.20 for every pound and another returning £2.50. The evidence to move £400,000 between them exists in January. Nobody owns the decision, and it is approved in October.

At the model's own returns, that delay cost around £390,000. Most Diagnostics find more than one decision like it.

How the figure is kept honest

  • Only decisions where the evidence existed at the time are counted. Nothing is judged with hindsight.
  • Every value uses your own model outputs, test results or finance's own hurdle rates, never an industry average.
  • Every figure is a range, and the readout leads with the lower end.
  • Your finance team reviews the figure before your leadership team sees it.
  • It measures value already lost to decisions. It is not a promise of future revenue.

At your Annual Reset, the baseline is measured again and a fresh Decision Audit is run on the year's decisions, so the change in what culture costs you is proven rather than assumed.

How it works

Section 04 · Six-week structured engagement

A defined rhythm of activity each week, with your organisation involved throughout.

The Diagnostic runs for six weeks from kick-off, with a working group of two to three people supporting the engagement on the inside, and a named finance sponsor for the Cost of Culture.

Week 01
Intake & Design
Initial briefing. Confirmation of scope, stakeholders, documents to review, and the ten decisions to audit. The Effectiveness Culture Survey is launched. Value Baseline measures recorded.
Week 02
Discovery
Survey runs. Stakeholder interviews begin (8–12, 45–60 mins each), including your finance sponsor. Desk review of planning artefacts and reporting. Decision Audit begins.
Week 03
Discovery
Survey continues. Final stakeholder interviews completed. Each audited decision traced from evidence to outcome.
Week 04
Assessment
Survey results scored. Benchmarking against comparable organisations. Delayed, overridden and unmade decisions valued with your own returns. Initial findings note shared for input.
Week 05
Synthesis
Cost of Culture reviewed with your finance sponsor. Roadmap design and value targets. Solution territory identified. Diagnostic report and leadership presentation drafted.
Week 06
Delivery
Final report shared. Readout to your leadership team, opening with the Cost of Culture. Discussion of next steps and recommended solution path.
Who it's for

Section 05

For senior marketing leaders commissioning effectiveness work on behalf of their organisation.

The Effectiveness Culture Diagnostic is for marketing functions of twenty or more people inside organisations of three hundred or more, whose leaders are under pressure to demonstrate the value of marketing more clearly. It is built for senior marketing leaders, including CMOs, Marketing Directors, and Heads of Brand, Performance, Effectiveness, or Strategy, who are commissioning effectiveness work on behalf of their organisation and who need a structured, defensible diagnostic to underpin a programme of change.

It works best when there is genuine appetite from leadership to act on the findings. It is not for organisations looking for a measurement audit, an attribution review, or a martech evaluation. The Diagnostic diagnoses culture; the technical work that follows is downstream of it.

Proof

Section 06 · Case Study 01

A FTSE 100 financial services brand commissioned the Diagnostic to define and shape their effectiveness culture. Twelve months later, they asked me back to measure how far it had travelled.

The Situation

The marketing function was under pressure to demonstrate its commercial value to a sceptical board. The Head of Marketing Effectiveness had built a credible measurement infrastructure but knew that the technical work alone was not shifting the conversation. The brief was to assess whether the broader effectiveness culture of the marketing organisation was strong enough to support the work.

The Diagnostic

The Effectiveness Culture Survey was completed by the senior and middle layers of the marketing function. Twelve stakeholder interviews were conducted across marketing, finance, and the business units. The diagnostic revealed a maturity profile that was strongest in Create Measurement Systems and Elevate Insight, but materially weaker in Empower People and Transform Culture. The headline finding was that the technical work of effectiveness was happening, but the cultural conditions for it to land and travel were not in place.

The Outcome

The roadmap was adopted by the marketing leadership team and translated into a twelve-month programme of work. Twelve months later, the same diagnostic was re-run. The maturity profile across Empower People and Transform Culture had shifted materially, and the conversation about marketing's contribution had moved from defence to direction. The follow-up engagement was commissioned to measure that shift and recommend the next phase of work.

Read all case studies
The Framework

Section 07

The Diagnostic is built on the EFFECT Framework. Six dimensions of effectiveness culture.

Empower People. Focused Priorities. Fix Processes. Elevate Insight. Create Measurement Systems. Transform Culture. Each dimension is assessed during the diagnostic, and findings are reported against the framework's structure so that recommendations are coherent, prioritised, and ready to be implemented through one of three solutions: EFFECT Signals (measurement), EFFECT Flow (operating system), or EFFECT Embed (culture).

The Effectiveness Culture Survey instrument used in the Diagnostic shares its methodological foundations with the Effectiveness Culture Index, the international benchmark of effectiveness culture I am building with the World Federation of Advertisers, with fieldwork from October 2026 and a first report in spring 2027. Organisations that complete the Diagnostic will be invited to contribute to the ECI dataset, with full anonymity.

Read the framework in full
The Practitioner

Section 08

Delivered personally by Nick Milne. No junior team. No substitution.

Nick built the marketing effectiveness function at O2 and led effectiveness transformation across seventeen European markets at Samsung before founding Go Ignite. The framework, the methodology, and the diagnostic are his work, refined across six years of consulting engagements with organisations from FTSE 100 banks to challenger brands.

There is no junior team, no offshored analysis, and no substitution. You buy his time and his attention.

More about Nick
FAQ

Section 09

What you might be wondering.

What does the £17,500 cover, and what is excluded?
The £17,500 covers the full six-week engagement: intake and design, the Effectiveness Culture Survey, eight to twelve stakeholder interviews, desk review, the Value Baseline, the Decision Audit and Cost of Culture, scoring and benchmarking, the written diagnostic report, the prioritised roadmap, and the leadership presentation. The full fee is credited against any EFFECT solution (Signals, Flow, or Embed) commissioned within three months. Travel and accommodation costs for in-person stakeholder interviews and the leadership presentation are charged separately at cost. No other expenses apply.
How is the Cost of Culture calculated, and will our finance team trust it?
I trace ten significant marketing decisions from the last eighteen months and classify each as evidence led, delayed, overridden or never made. Only decisions where the evidence existed at the time are valued, and each value uses your own model outputs, test results or finance's own hurdle rates. Every figure is a range, and the readout leads with the lower end. Your finance sponsor reviews every valued decision before your leadership team sees the total, and can remove anything they cannot support. The figure is value already lost to decisions, not a forecast of future revenue.
What if we do not have a marketing mix model?
The Decision Audit still works. Where no model exists, I use controlled test or incrementality results, platform lift studies discounted by a factor your finance team agrees, or the margin finance already attributes to the activity. The figure is less precise and the range is wider, and the readout says so. Where no credible basis exists, the decision is described rather than valued: an honest finding is worth more than an unsupportable number.
How many people from our organisation need to be involved?
A working group of two to three people supports the engagement on your side, with a typical commitment of two to three hours a week, plus a named finance sponsor who reviews the Cost of Culture in week five. Survey respondents (a representative sample across senior, middle, and operational levels of the marketing function) commit fifteen to twenty minutes each. Stakeholder interviewees commit forty-five to sixty minutes each. The leadership presentation in week six is typically attended by the marketing leadership team and key stakeholders from finance and the business.
What happens after the Diagnostic?
The Diagnostic identifies which of three solution territories your organisation needs most: EFFECT Signals (measurement and proving ROI), EFFECT Flow (planning, process, and ways of working), or EFFECT Embed (culture, capability, and cross-functional adoption), and which removes the most of your Cost of Culture. You can commission the recommended solution, with your Diagnostic fee credited in full. Many organisations commission the Diagnostic and the solution together from the outset as one programme, from £40,000 in total, with phase two scoped at the week six readout and a break clause after the Diagnostic if they choose not to continue. You can implement the roadmap internally using the diagnostic as your guide. Or you can take stock and revisit when the timing is right. There is no obligation to commission follow-on work. The Diagnostic is structured so that the deliverable has independent value regardless of what you decide to do next.
How is the Diagnostic different from a measurement audit or an effectiveness review?
A measurement audit assesses whether the technical infrastructure of marketing measurement is fit for purpose. An effectiveness review usually focuses on the performance of marketing investment and the methodologies used to evaluate it. The Effectiveness Culture Diagnostic diagnoses something different. It assesses the culture in which the technical work sits, on the basis that the same dashboards, models, and processes produce wildly different outcomes in different organisations because of the culture surrounding them. The Diagnostic tells you whether your effectiveness culture is strong enough to make the technical work productive, and what it is costing you when it is not.
Who completes the survey, and how long does it take?
The Effectiveness Culture Survey is designed to be completed by a representative sample across the marketing organisation, ideally including senior, middle, and operational levels. Sample size depends on the size of the function, but typically twenty-five to fifty respondents. Each respondent takes approximately fifteen to twenty minutes to complete the survey. Response rates are managed by the working group on your side, with reminders supported by Go Ignite where useful.
Can we do a focused Diagnostic covering only some of the dimensions?
Yes. The framework is most powerful when applied holistically, because the dimensions interact and a focused diagnostic risks missing cross-dimensional issues. Where a focused engagement is the right scope, I will discuss it during the discovery call and adjust the scope and pricing accordingly.
Will the report be confidential?
Yes. A standard non-disclosure agreement is in place for every Diagnostic engagement, and the report is shared only with the parties you specify. Your Cost of Culture figure is never published or cited, named or anonymised, without your written permission. Any contribution to the Effectiveness Culture Index dataset is anonymous and aggregated.
What if we need to start sooner or later than six weeks from kick-off?
Start dates are flexible, subject to availability. The six-week duration is fixed once the engagement begins.
Begin the engagement

If your marketing function is under pressure to demonstrate its value, the question is whether your effectiveness culture is strong enough to support the work.

The Diagnostic answers that question in six weeks, with a figure your finance team has reviewed and a roadmap you can act on. Book a discovery call to discuss the engagement.

Book a discovery call