| Let me get right to the point. The single
most powerful small business marketing tool on the planet is a marketing system.
But … when I talk about a marketing system I am not
referring to those academic exercises found in college marketing books.
A marketing system by my way of thinking is a simple (in
many cases one page) document that specifically answers who you are, what you do, who
needs it, how you plan to grab them by the throat, when you plan to do it and how you plan
to pay for it…in a way that everyone in your organization, network, and client base
can clearly understand.
So, let’s break it down into some simple steps.
1) Narrow Your Focus
Create a description of your ideal client. Describe them as
though they are sitting across the desk from your at this moment. Define only the market
that you know needs what you offer and values what you have to offer. It is just as
important to understand who you don’t want as a client.
2) Find and Communicate Your Core Difference
Even if your make it up, you’ve got to find something
that makes your business stand out from the pack. Once you do, you’ve got to build
your entire marketing program around this difference. Is it red trucks, is it an unheard
of guarantee, is it a very specific market niche. You can’t stand out trying to be
all things to all people.
3) Package Your Business
Look for ways to build your unique difference into the
experience your client or prospect has with your firm. Everything about your firm should
communicate and deliver your unique promise. Package your services as products,
communicate your unique process, name your service offerings.
4) Educate
Throw away the sales brochures and create marketing
materials and web site content that clearly speaks to your ideal client and gives proof
that your indeed uniquely qualified to solve their problems. Create case studies,
testimonial sheets, client lists, process description, service descriptions, the story of
why you started your business.
5) Install the Lead Generation Trio
Advertising that generates permission, public relations
that provide proof and referral systems that guarantee trust. Each of these three lead
generating tactics works hand in hand to create a nonstop flow of highly qualified leads.
6) Automate and Dominate
Once you start to create a flow of leads let technology do
the heavy qualifying and selling for you. Ezines, email, blogs, web sites, white paper
delivery, subscription lists – all must be automated in order to most effectively
communicate as consistently as is necessary in today’s advertising message onslaught.
7) Live by a Calendar
Create the system and then work the system. Do whatever you
must to make sure that you do at least one marketing activity every single day. Create a
monthly calendar and give each month a marketing system theme. Get everyone in your
organization involved – put the calendar in a very public place.
Use the steps above to create the strategies, tactics and
promotions that will deliver and communicate a powerful, consistent message and you will
find that marketing is a pretty simple game.
Copyright © 2005 John Jantsch |
