Vision Of Success

I’m sure you have some ezines that you look forward to. I know I do. I’ve been on hundreds of lists over the years. And over the years, there are a few that I’ve been on for a long time, and still read when they pop into my email box.

One of them is by Joy Gendusa, CEO of PostcardMania. PostcardMania is a printing company out of Florida that prints millions of postcards every year. And because of how well her company has done, Joy now speaks and writes very effectively on marketing for small business (and shows you how to use postcards effectively.)

Today’s title intrigued me:

I Hate To Say It, But Most Of You Are Missing The Boat

And the statistics she listed really made me open my eyes (see her blog):

• Out of 450, only 92 had a way to capture the contact info of the visitor and only 4 did it on the homepage! With the other 88 I had to search around the site to find the fill-in form.
• 29 of them left their website addresses OFF THE CARD COMPLETELY! And believe it or not (this really shocked me),
• 118 of these businesses do not have a website at all. What do you think most buyers do before they call or show up?

If these people are spending money marketing - even in the current bad economic times - wouldn’t they use every tool at their disposal?

Apparently not. 

Above all, the most important tool available to every small business owner is a website. It has unlimited potential, and can be used to enhance every marketing promotion you have.

Back to postcards. The best way to mail a postcard campaign is to make an offer and drive them to your website for a special. And of course they must sign up, giving their email address for future promotions.

But if this isn’t clear, and the first thing a person sees when they visit your site, your marketing failed. You have to have a clear strategy in place for every step of your campaign, and make sure you are gaining as much exposure as possible.

In hard times, you need a vision.

[Want to talk marketing strategy?  We've been helping people for over 10 years develop strong, effective online marketing strategies. Let's talk.]

All right, I’m impressed.

As you know, I read a lot. I read at least one book a week, and usually have a half dozen books or so laying around between my desk and my night stand.

I buy a lot of business books, and they are usually a part of a promotion through a friends, or part of a promotion to gain traction with places like Amazon.

But the newest promotion is by Seth Godin, and really “wow’d” me. So of course I have to share.

Back in August, an announcement came out through my Twitter that Seth Godin had a new promotion. Pre-purchase his newest book, Tribes, to be released in October, and you’ll become a beta tester for his new social site, Triiibes. So of course I had to play.

I’ve been on Triiibes ever since, and try to participate in discussions daily. I’ve really grown to love the site, and met a lot of great people.

Today I received a package in the mail. Inside was Seth’s book, Tribes. It’s sitting on my desk, next in line to be read. But what struck me was the letter included with the book.

This isn’t the book I ordered through Amazon. Instead, Seth sent out a second book in advance for all of us to read ahead of time. With one request that when we receive the second book from Amazon, that we give the book to someone in our network that could use it.

What a promotion! WOW!

Imagine as an author having hundreds of books pre-sold before the publishing date.  Imagine these hundreds of people developing a social site, that will have thousands of pages built for you when the book comes out, and others venture in and decide to join as well. Imagine sending out hundreds of additional books, with a request you pass the book along - what kind of traction will this have!

I guarantee you a ton. Not only will I be sharing my book with some lucky client of my own, but I’m sharing the idea with you too.

Oh, and one more thing. As a special “surprise”, Seth used the beta testers’ profile pictures to create the inside book jacket. How cool is that. 

What can you do to create your own WOW promotion? Have you ever done something that made others say WOW?

You’ve been leaving phone messages and playing telephone tag with a top prospect all week. With just a few questions left, you’re sure you can turn this prospect into a client.

Should you continue to try and reach her over the phone?

Or can you effectively answer her questions by email, and convert her without a conversation?

That greatly depends on the type of person she is.

According to one study, email is most effective with those people whom you have a competitive relationship with. If you have a more cooperative relationship, face to face is the best choice.

But as we become more web based, and your client isn’t necessarily in a place for you to meet face to face, its becomes more important to use email effectively.

We live in a visual society.

Email is great - you can answer a lot of questions that way. But what about adding a video? Or a photograph of yourself? Especially if someone likes relationships, the idea of seeing you or listening to you answer a question may help convert them.

Also, post different profiles on social sites, and write a variety of articles and papers on different sites. Rather than just relying on a simple email, connect to a variety of sources online (not just your website and blog) and showcase your knowledge. People like trusting those who build relationships with others. And social sites can easily show how you’re connected to others.

Question of the day: I’ve been working with a web designer, and trying to get it to the point I like it well enough to actually release it to the public. The problem is its been 9 months since I hired him, and I don’t feel like I’m any closer now to releasing it than I was 9 months ago. He took my ideas and put them up, but it wasn’t quite what I wanted. I’ve been tweaking, rewriting, tweaking some more … you get the picture. What should I do?

I’ve run across this question several times over the past week while I’m out and about talking to people.

What if you would have released your website 9 months ago? What could you have achieved?

Maybe several new clients.

Maybe linking up with an association for a speaking engagement.

Maybe a book deal.

Who knows. You never got your site up and running, so the entire past 9 months was like you didn’t exist in the online world.

Website is not synonymous with perfection. Having a website means you put out some information, and you tweak it. And tweak it. And tweak it some more. Websites are never perfection. Instead, they are a constant work in process.

Try something. If it works, stay with the same theme and add more. If it doesn’t, change things around a bit.

When you have a website, you have a base to build on. You have your starting point.

And from there its all downhill. 

image source Digital Direct Multimedia

In traditional markets, you created content, used it once, and let it die. The white papers went into the drawer, never to be seen again. Instead, you started a new paper, and changed the content around to reach out to your current target market.

In the online world, content never dies. Post it online and it will continue to work for you again and again.

I found a site today that is using online content exceptionally well. Jody DeVere, founder of AskPatty.com, has created a site that trains and certifies auto dealers to serve the female customer base. Instead of approaching a car dealership and feeling intimidated or overwhelmed, a woman can head over to AskPatty.com and receive a ton of information on the entire car buying experience. On her site, content is king. She gathers content from a variety of sources, and uses it on her blogs both in written and audio format. Content is also syndicated through RSS feeds to a variety of other sites, like Mommytalk and Twitter.

So how can you be an online content expert?

1. Gather all of your existing content. From white papers, to brochures, to articles; anything that you’ve used to promote your business can be turned into quality content for online promotion.

2. Create new content. Hire a ghost writer/blogger if you aren’t good at writing articles, or are short on time. Create as much new content as you can that directly relates to your current target market.

3. Post your content to your blog on a regular basis.

4. Syndicate your content to as many online resources as possible.

5. Monetize your website/blog in such a way that you are making money from your content. It may be ads; it may be sponsorships, it may be product or service purchases. Bottom line: have a way to make money from the traffic you’re driving to your site.

Repeat steps 1-5.

I read an interesting article today. Chunka Mui, co-author of Billion Dollar Lessons answered a few questions pertaining to his book.

As a small business owner, I’m like every other small business owner - very passionate about what I do. But I know I’m not alone when I say that some of my ideas didn’t hit the mark. I tried something and continued pushing it even when it didn’t sell.

So how do you know when to move forward and when to pull out with your ideas?

Mui provided an interesting answer.

The question was:

How does one choose between “staying the course in the face of doubt” and “embracing change”?

When you begin to see change in your marketplace, make a series of predictions. Then track your predictions. If the change is faster than you predict, it’s time to get out. If it’s slower, you may be okay.

It’s time for me to make a few predictions for the rest of 2008.

How we do business today is not how we will do business tomorrow. In fact, it’s changing every day.

I ran across this interesting list today - 25 Things Vanishing From America. On their list was:

• Yellowpages
• Classified Ads
• Dial Up Internet Access
• Phone Land Lines
• Cameras that use film
• Hand written letters
• News Magazines and TV News

Most of these seem all but obvious. Yet many people would disagree. I browsed through the comments on each of these, and was amazed at what people had to say.

Even if you don’t agree that these items are disappearing from today’s business world, you will have to admit that times are changing. I’m a lot like the author, and haven’t had a Yellowpages in my home in at least 10 years. It goes from front porch to recycling bin. If I can’t find it through an online search, I guess I won’t find it.

So how do you use this knowledge for the future? If any of these ideas are a major player in your business, its time to change.

• If you’ve always used Yellowpages, maybe its time to take a portion of your yearly fees and invest them in website marketing.
• If you’ve always used classified ads, maybe you need to try online ad places like Craigslist.com

And so on.

The point is if you’re using a buggy whip and the car is being created heavily, its time to refocus your business.

I could also add to the list:

• Watches - who needs a watch when you carry around your cell phone?
• Calendars - who needs one hanging on the wall when everything is computerized?
• Commercials - who is watching them when everything is TiVo’d, recorded, etc?
• Big Retail - aren’t you sick of “same store different city” concept? I am - bring back originality.

What else would you add?

So you decide you want to sell one of your widgets.

You put together an email that talks about your widget. You may even show a photo of your widget, and send it out to your clients. And you send your email out to your entire list.

How direct are you with your overall selling process?

I’m a member of Barnes & Noble. We shop there a lot, and of course I’m a member.

So once a week I get emailed info on their current weeks sales, and an occasional coupon to help motivate me to visit online or come in and buy.

Because I’m a member, they have everything on file for past purchases. So my emails aren’t just talking about current releases, they focus the email specifically to me.

So this week, my email started out “New From an Author You Know” and went on to say that since I’ve purchased a book from this author, I may be interested in the newest release.

Great marketing!

The book is for my daughter, and yes, we’re heading over after school to buy it.

Consider these two questions:

1. How many customers do you have that regularly buy from you?

2. Do you know what they buy and what they would be interested in buying from you in the future?

In both cases, you can probably divide your list into categories, and send out emails that pertain exclusively to that list.

Maybe a portion of the people purchase holiday cards from you every year. You can send out an email saying you know they’ve purchased holiday cards from you in the past, and if they purchase 100 cards between now and October 15th, you’ll throw in an additional 25 at no cost.

How’s that for motivating your clients to purchasing more.

It’s all about knowing who your clients are, and giving them what you know they want. Motivate them. They already love what you have, why make the buying process difficult?

To celebrate our daughter being back in school, and our chance to get back to work on a fairly regular basis, we decided to head out to lunch at our fav - Qdoba.

We spent a long time going over our goals for this fall, and talking about ways to bring in different types of clients. While we were talking about lead generation, we suddenly got onto the topic of lifetime value of customers.

We’ve been Qdoba regulars since they first came to town - at least six years ago. Qdoba has a frequent customer card that allows you to get one meal free when you purchase 10 meals. Because we usually go together - 2 meals at once - we usually can fill the card in five visits.

Each meal is about $6, which means they give you $6 when you spend $60. We also made the assumption we filled one card every two months (it is our favorite place after all). Which means we spend about $360 a year, and they give us $36 of free food each year.

Because we’ve been going there for around six years now, we’ve spent about $2160 - if you assume everything I mentioned above is constant. [Wow, this is actually a great lesson for me - I can't believe how much we've spent going out to lunch once every week or two.]

And because it’s one of our favorite lunch spots, we’ll be going there well into the future. Which means our lifetime value will end up being several thousand dollars. What’s an occasional free meal to someone who is going to bring several thousand dollars into your business?

You can see how quickly even $6 adds up. What about big ticket items? Maybe you have a $1000 monthly program, or several different products worth several hundred dollars a piece. How many times do your clients buy from you? What’s your overall lifetime customer value?

Once you find out how valuable a client is to you, you can begin to see how much you can spend to get a client through your doors. If your average client is worth $5000, maybe mailing $100 worth of marketing materials to gain that client isn’t very much after all.

As I’m planning two new promotions for the fall, I’ll be spending some of my time calculating the lifetime value of my clients. Even with quick calculations, I know my numbers are high. I’ll definitely be using this to come up with my promotions.

Over the past few months I’ve spoken with dozens of business owners about designing a website, a blog, or both.  Some get it. And some don’t.

In many cases a small business owner simply wants a small brochure type site to exist online - something they can direct current and prospective clients to see their work. In theory this sounds great. And I always encourage a small business owner who currently has nothing, to at least start with this type of a site.

But what most small business owners are lacking is the understanding of the long term effects of having a website. Your website isn’t just a brochure. It isn’t just a one time form of marketing that will help you gain a current client.

It is your best long term strategy for building your business.

Imagine creating a brochure for your company. You spend hours gathering the photographs, creating the copy, working with a designer, and sending it to the printer. The final brochure looks great, and you’re excited to start handing it out.

If you print 1000 brochures, you have 1000 chances to connect with potential clients. In some cases some people will share the brochure with others. But once the 1000 brochures are gone - you have to start over.

Now let’s take a look at a website.

Let’s say you go out and design a site filled with information. You start up a blog, and you start sharing information on a regular basis. You create a great article that specifically targets one section of your niche.

The potential of this article is lifelong. As long as your business is in existence, and as long as your website is up and running, this article can work for you. Months from now. Years from now.

[I wrote an article in 2005 that is still on my site, and pulls a huge amount of traffic every month. I would never delete or change it.]

If you create a brochure, the goal is to have it generate leads.

If you create a website, it too can have a goal of generating leads. But it can also do a whole lot more.

• You can capture email addresses for future, free promotion.
• You can promote your services.
• You can have a shopping cart for products and services.
• You can use it to expand your business model.

Many people go into a website with a closed mind. They create it as a way to advertise their business to their local marketplace.

But once they get online, they open up their minds, and find many ways to connect and sell to people. It is possible to grow any type of business - product or service - to an international level.

And if someone has the capability of making a decision and acting out it immediately, you’ll see a definite rise in your sales.

[Ready to market your business with your website? Check out our monthly marketing services, and let us join your marketing team.]