Blogging Archives - Page 16 of 68 - Jim Connolly Marketing

How to crush the feast or famine cycle

By Jim Connolly | November 16, 2016

If your sales results are too erratic or you find yourself in that feast or famine cycle, this post is written just for you.

Most businesses offer products or services, which people are only interested in when they have a problem. If your business provides the answer to a problem, there’s a very good chance you’re using the wrong marketing approach.

I’m going to explain why and also show you how to get it right.

Knowing you before they need you

Coaches, accountants, designers, dentists, trainers, financial professionals, lawyers, translators, consultants, etc., are only sought after, when someone has a requirement.

Here’s the thing: If they already know who you are, before they need you, you are massively more likely to earn their custom, than some provider they have never heard of. For instance, my most recent client had been a subscriber of mine for months, before hiring me.

I once heard Mercedes’ head of advertising say, that if Mercedes focused on showing people advertisements, the week before they were about to buy a new car, it wouldn’t work. So, Mercedes focus on getting their marketing messages in front of us when we’re kids. Then, when we’re 35 and are thinking of buying our first luxury car, we think of Mercedes.

Whilst that approach is too long-term for most small businesses to consider, the advice is sound. It’s all about the client or customer knowing who we are, before they need us.

Switch from short-term gambits to a long-term strategy

Make marketing an ongoing part of your business, not something you do when you lose a client or when sales are down. Remain relevant to your marketplace. Stay in their mind (sometimes called ‘front of mind’). Keep earning their attention, through strategic, useful, permission-based marketing.

In a nutshell: If you want great, long-term results, you need to make great, long-term plans.

10 Things to start today, which your future self will thank you for

By Jim Connolly | November 4, 2016

Here they are in no particular order.

Dream bigger dreams. Big, inspirational dreams are far more motivating than puny goals.
Get into the habit of walking daily for 30 minutes. It will improve your life in so many ways. This Stanford study agrees.
Too busy for a 30 minute walk? Get serious about solving your time management problem. This will help you.
Focus on what you want. Not what you fear.
Stop aiming for perfection. Instead, strive to be better than you were yesterday.
Look for opportunities to step up and lead. Your marketplace desperately needs leaders.
It isn’t the 1980’s — So, instead of focusing on closing sales, focus on opening relationships.
Start a blog or a newsletter. If you already have a blog or newsletter, start taking it seriously. Here’s how to become an overnight blogging success.
Avoid toxic influences. Everyone and everything you connect with has an impact on you. Choose wisely.
Stop waiting for things to improve. Instead, plan for improvement, then work the plan.

I hope you found those suggestions useful. More importantly my friend, I hope you do something with them.

Attract sales, leads and new clients

By Jim Connolly | August 31, 2016

If you want to attract more clients, sales or sales leads, you’ll LOVE today’s article.

I need to start by sharing one of the cornerstones of great marketing. It’s simply this: Focus on your prospective clients and their needs, rather than your own needs.

Some call it paying it forward.

Others call it contribution.

You can call it whatever you like, but it’s the same thing. Focusing your efforts on the other person and not on yourself.

Why?

Bring the marketplace your seed, not your need

I live in a rural village. It’s coming to the end of harvest time. Ask a farmer about the harvest and she’ll tell you this: If you want a bountiful harvest, you need to bring your seeds to the soil. Not your needs. You can tell the soil how much you need a great harvest. You can pester the soil for months with selfish requests… and nothing productive will happen.

The marketplace is very similar. It doesn’t give a shit about what you need!

This is why pestering people for leads at networking groups is such a soul-destroying waste of your time. It just makes you look needy. The same is true of sending strangers marketing emails they never asked for. Ditto, posting needy marketing messages on social networks. All of these are super-low leverage and reflect poorly on you and your brand.

That’s what self-focused marketing looks like. You see it every day. And it has never been less effective.

Here’s a way better alternative for you to consider.

Attract sales, leads and clients

The thing is, you don’t need to pester anyone. Your prospective clients present you with an opportunity to plant as many seeds of contribution as you want to. [Think about that for a moment.]

For example, I reach tens (and tens) of thousands of prospective clients daily, by giving away as much useful information as I can via my blog and social networking channels. Without pestering anyone, I generate sales, leads and enquiries from new clients every day.

However, to earn that privilege I have to consistently focus on you. I have to uncover your needs, so I can deliver valuable, free information that will be of use to you and your business.

The bottom line is that the process of giving and receiving, starts with the giving part. If you want to receive more, give more. They say: “The best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago. The second best time is today.”

So start today

Give value, not pitches.

Be useful, not annoying.

Offer help, not deals.

Attract attention, not scorn.

Repeat tomorrow.

So, are you building a tribe or writing drive-by content?

By Jim Connolly | August 15, 2016

Why do the vast majority of small business owners see such poor results from their content marketing? Why isn’t it attracting sales or new client enquiries every day?

The answer is that almost every small business is making the same mistake. And this mistake makes it impossible for them to succeed.

Here’s what you need to know, in order to get the best possible results.

Content marketing and leaky buckets

The problem with trying to fill a bucket, which has a big hole in the bottom, is that the water flows out just as fast as it flows in. It’s a never ending task, unless you get a new bucket or fix the hole.

Most content marketing advice, including that written by many so-called experts, is based around the idea of treating your content marketing, like a bucket with a hole.

It’s about attracting drive-by readers with ‘killer’ headlines.
It’s about churning stuff out, rather than publishing useful information.
It’s about using a cookie-cutter approach, like hundreds of thousands of others, which makes you and your content invisible.
It’s about SEOing your thoughts, rather than expressing your thoughts.

Seth Godin said it extremely well:

“The copywriter/editor who trades in meaning for lists, using calculated SEO keyword loading and sensationalism designed to attract the drive-by audience, earns the privilege of doing it again and again, forever.”

It’s like trying to fill that broken bucket. It’s also the total opposite of growing a tribe.

They drive by

The thing about drive-by readers, is that they drive by. They are attracted to hyped up headlines and quickly go from one, “The growing trend that will scare the crap out of business owners everywhere”, article to the next.

If your content marketing is based around chasing them, you’re making life way too hard for yourself.

Grow a valuable reader community

To grow a great community or tribe around your work, you need to attract the right people, retain their attention and earn their trust.

This means showing up regularly with useful information, rather than sensationalist, predictable content for the drive-by crowd.

It means avoiding so-called content marketing systems or anything, which claims to be a one-size-fits-all “solution“. All that junk will do is make your content marketing invisible. It will leave your content camouflaged, amongst the hundreds of thousands of others using the same cookie-cutter approach.

Instead, focus on building deeper connections with people who will value your work, share your work, call you, email you, hire you or buy from you.

Anything less is a waste of your time and will stop you benefiting from the amazing opportunity, which could be yours if you use content marketing correctly.