Vision Of Success

In the pre-Internet days, communicating with your customers took a whole lot more effort. You had to plan a promotion, create the marketing piece, print out address labels and attach them to the marketing piece, head to your post office and buy a bulk mailer or buy individual first class stamps and stamp each piece individually. Then drop everything into the mail. The whole process could take anywhere from several days to several weeks, depending on your use of graphic designers and printers.

But then the Internet rolled around, and everyone jumped on the bandwagon of email. Email is a quick form of communication that allows you to send anyone anything at little or no cost. Of course the problem with email is because of its low cost, everyone does it. It’s not uncommon for someone to get several hundred email a day.

With that kind of incoming messaging, your communications have little to no chance of making it through – and creating the sale – unless you provide your customers strong value and they anticipate and even wait for your arrival.

As a part of your marketing strategy, consider the following when building a campaign.

1. Don’t just send email because of its value to you. Give your customer the value. What do they want to know? What do they care about? They don’t care about the details of your business. They care about how your business affects their lives.

2. Send email on a regular, anticipated time interval. Tell your customers when to expect email from you, and what to expect in the email. “Sign up for my weekly ezine in which I provide you with simple 5 minute tips on organizing your home office.” This gets straight to the point, tells people when they will receive your information, and how they can use your information. People can decide before they sign up if this type of correspondence is for them.

3. Don’t overwhelm your customers. Different industries have different email patterns. If you are emailing to a consumer, they may only open up personal email once or twice per week. If you send one or two email per day, you’ll quickly overwhelm your customer, causing her to opt out of your email. If you email business owners, they may appreciate daily correspondence, and like quick tips to start out their day. Find out what your customer prefers, test your responses often, and give them what they want.

4. Don’t forget about the mail. Just because email is a great system that’s inexpensive to use, don’t forget that snail mail can be equally effective. Try working the two together. Email your customers to watch for a new promotion you’re about to put into the mail. Send out your postcard. Then email a week or so later asking if they received the postcard, and giving them further incentive to make contact with you.

5. Instead of emailing people with all of your information, offer them choices. Autoresponders are a great way of emailing people only the information they are truly interested in. If you have a new product coming out, give them a chance to sign up on another list that will provide more information. They will receive a variety of emails based on this new product, and their desire for your information.

Above all, keep trying. If something doesn’t work, look at the possible reasons why. Is it your timing – maybe it’s a holiday. Is it the message – refine the way you say it. The important thing is to be consistent, and be willing to change to reach your fullest potential.

Lori Osterberg has created three successful businesses in the past 10 years, and along the way discovered the secrets of taking a local small business and turning it into a worldwide success. She now shares this passion with people all over the world, and speaks, writes and mentors on using technology to grow your business – and stay small at the same time! Receive her FREE ezine at http://www.visionofsuccess.com/

Have you tried Craigslist.com to advertise your products or services?

Have you ever posted a video to YouTube.com to gather attention?

Now you can combine the two efforts at http://www.realpeoplerealstuff.com/ Create your video showcasing your product or service, and place it in the appropriate category. It’s really easy - and because there isn’t a lot of competition yet, you have a good chance of being noticed!

Lori

Are you a gadget person? I love new things, and am anxiously awaiting the arrival of the new IPhone.

I love Apple’s marketing campaigns because they focus on ease. They make you want what they have to offer because it’s easy to use - and its cool! And while other phones have similar capablities, the IPhone just makes it seem like you’ve always wanted this type of technology - and that you’ll be able to use it every day without even thinking about the operations.

So in just a few days, it will be interesting  to see how many people trade in their old phones for an IPhone - and to see just how well Apple’s marketing works.

Lori

I recently attended an expo, and connected with a variety of potential customers.

In order to convert a new relationship into a customer, it takes more than just hoping they use your business card to give you a call.

I’m an email person. So for many of my new contacts, I created a simple email to send over to them, and provided them with a variety of links to my site where they could learn even more about me. A great majority of my contacts ended up either emailing me back or calling me based on these emails.

For the rest of them, it was all about the phone call.

When you call a prospect, what do you say? Chances are you probably get a voice mail. Do you go into detail on your products and services. Or do you continue to build the relationship, waiting to “sell” your products and services at a later time?

Soft selling is about providing enough information to make your prospects curious, and create the desire to want more. You can do this on email, or on voice mail. Just remember it’s up to you to build the relationship!

Lori

If you’ve been following any of the online buzz, you know social sites are the rage at the moment. You’ve probably been to digg and delicious, but what about DailyHub?

DailyHub is designed to offer you information directly related to running a small business. It’s great if you need some help running your own small business - and if your target market is small business owners.

Lori

I often volunteer in my daughter’s school, and love helping out when I can. As the school year came to an end, I received a stack of thank you notes from the kids. For the first time in my life, I was told:

“You da bomb!”

Huh?

Of course after my daughter translated for me, I figured out being “da bomb” was a good thing.

People communicate in different ways. They think differently. They talk differently. And they search differently.

It can be a difference in ages. Or a difference in communities. Or a difference in cultures.

When you’re communicating one on one with a person, you can compensate for the difference in words and phrases.

For instance, I was on a business trip in Boston a few years ago, and asked a woman if there was a pop machine near by. She had no idea what I was talking about until I finally corrected myself and said “soda machine”. I could see her confusion, and changed my wording until we came up with familiar phrases.

Online, you can’t see your prospects confusion. You can’t tell what they want, or what would make them understand what you have to say. You have to know your business well enough to understand what they want ahead of time, and share that information online.

1. Just because you understand what you sell, doesn’t mean your prospects will. Take a look at your site through your clients’ eyes. Better yet, talk to people that aren’t connected with your business, and find out what they think of your site. Is there any confusion?

2. Give people what they want. Some people love statistics. Some people love long stories. Some people want just the facts. Some people are visual and want lots of graphics. Provide different pages with different things, and give people the choice to move around for more information. People read what they want and need to make a decision.

3. Make your copy speak to your target audience. Don’t use technical lingo, or industry related material that your prospects won’t understand. Don’t use slang or phrasing that might not make sense in different cultures. Be as plain and matter-of-fact as you can be.

4. Get started. Your site doesn’t have to be perfect at the beginning. The important thing is to get it out. Build from there. Everybody has to start somewhere, and having a five-page site is a great starting point. You can always add the detail as you go along.

5. Don’t skimp on the information. You don’t have to put up a five-page brochure site and leave it unchanged for years to come. Instead, get your site online, and build supporting pages as you go along. Your first “services” page might describe all of your products. Over time, create detailed pages on each product, and describe it thoroughly.

6. Never assume your prospects will understand. You understand your business. You live it every day. But your prospect may be brand new to the industry, and know nothing about the details. Websites have the potential to describe and define as they go along by using description boxes, and linking to other pages for further explanation. FAQ pages are also good starting points for people that need further information.

7. Ask questions. Find out what made your prospects turn into customers. Use this information to add and change your online strategies.

Above all, be flexible. Marketing isn’t something you do once. You work at it month after month for as long as you’re in business. What works today may not work tomorrow. But if you’ve developed a large variety of tools, you’re more apt to capture the attention of a new visitor. And turn them into a customer.

Then YOU will be “da bomb” too!

Lori Osterberg has created three successful businesses in the past 10 years, and along the way discovered the secrets of taking a local small business and turning it into a worldwide success. She now shares this passion with people all over the world, and speaks, writes and mentors on using technology to grow your business – and stay small at the same time! Receive her FREE ezine at http://www.visionofsuccess.com/

I received an interesting story in my email this morning. In an ezine from one of my favorite writers, Michael Masterson, he explained how one of his clients was taking on the obesity issue. The CEO issued his employees a challenge: as a takeoff from The Biggest Loser, he was also going to stage The Biggest Loser contest within the office. He gave people time away from the office to work out, and even brought in a personal trainer to help them achieve their goals. The winner would get money, prizes, etc from the office.

The story was very motivating, and I loved the idea. But I also got to thinking about it from a different aspect.

For most personal trainers, they head to the gym and wait for individuals to come into the gym and request working out with them. They get their clients throught the gym, or by networking in the community - looking for one client at a time.

But the personal trainer in Michael’s story has a completely different approach. He is getting business MANY at a time. Because he entered the corporate world, and with the CEO’s blessing, he has multiple clients immediately, and can work with them in groups and individually, and probably can build up his client base for years to come.

Also, he now has the experience of working in a corporate environment, and can bring this philosophy to other corporations. In other words, he can add clients by the dozen in one shot!

I’ve talked to personal trainers at the gym, and they always complain about how scarce business is. Picking up one or two new clients per quarter is a big deal to them.

But by tweaking the way you connect with people, the personal trainer in Michae’s story can add dozens of new clients any time he chooses!

How can you tweak the way you think? How can you step away from the pack - and the way most people market their businesses in your industry - and find a huge pool of potential customers?

It’s out there. You just need to think about it.

Lori