Jim Connolly Marketing

Listen to the marketplace

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Here’s one of the most valuable pieces of business advice I ever received.  It was given to me by a retired accountant way back in 1995, a few weeks before I started my business.

It is simply this: “Listen to what the marketplace is telling you!”

He went on to explain that if, for example, you find prospective clients (your marketplace) expect the cost of your service to be lower than you quote – the marketplace is telling you that it cannot see enough value in what you offer.  This means you must either make the value of your service more obvious with better marketing or increase the value of your service by adding more benefits to it – preferably both.

No matter how well someone markets an ‘average’ service, they will always struggle.  There are thousands of business owners out there who work long hours and extremely hard, with little reward.  This is because they are trying to sell something that the marketplace sees little value in, like yet another ‘average’; accountancy service, legal service, recruitment service or web design service etc.

Business is always going to be a struggle for them, because the marketplace is attracted to value – not ‘just another average service’.

As a successful marketer you should ALWAYS be looking for new ways to add value to whatever you offer.  The more value you pump into your product or service, the easier you will find it to make highly profitable sales and you will NEVER have to sell based on price. This marketing tip will help!

WordPress.com and business blogging

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I wrote a post a while ago, saying that WordPress.com was a good place to host your business blog, if you were just starting out and wanting to ‘test the water’ as it were.

However, since then I have been emailed by a reader; who pointed out some poorly publicised, but extremely important limitations to a WordPress.com hosted business blog!

I looked into this and found 3 REALLY IMPORTANT reasons why I believe you should NOT use a WordPress.com hosted blog for your business.  Here they are:

1. WordPress.com insert ‘hidden adverts’ into your blog

Automattic (the company that runs WordPress.com), inserts ‘hidden advertising’ into the blogs hosted on their servers.

Hidden?

Yes, the ads they place into your blog are hidden from you – so you can’t see what THEY are advertising to YOUR readers in YOUR company’s name! Because Automattic use Google Adwords for these ads, they could be advertisements for your competitors products or services!  This is perhaps why they feel the need to hide these adverts from their users?  Anyhow, many of their users have no idea these adverts even exist; because they will not be able to see them when they look at their own blog. The ads are only displayed to their readers!

As of last week, you can pay to have these adverts removed, the fee is currently $30 a year.  This is an improvement, as until last week you were stuck with them! However, there are two far bigger problems with hosting a business blog at wordpress.com!

2. WordPress.com won’t let you advertise anything

I have been in marketing for over 20 years and I own and run a very successful international marketing business.  I don’t know a single company, which has a commercial blog and does not use it to promote their business or market their services in some way.  The whole point of a commercial blog is commerce after all!

Although Automattic actually encourage people to host a commercial blog at WordPress.com, they forbid any form of commercial advertising!  So, if you have any desire to advertise your services in your blog; you simply can not use WordPress.com – full stop!

3. WordPress.com won’t let you link from your posts to your website

One of the major marketing benefits of having a business blog, are all the links you get from the blog to your main website.  These links can be really useful for a business blog!

For example, the newsletter button at the foot of my blog posts is a link; however, it would be BANNED from use on a wordpress.com hosted blog! Also, links from your business blog to your main website can really help with the sites Search Engine Optimisation (SEO).

However, these links to your main website (what Automattic refers to as a ‘third party’ website) are forbidden on a WordPress.com hosted blog.  Their terms of service state that by making content available on your blog, you warrant that it:

“does not contain unethical or unwanted commercial content designed to drive traffic to third party sites or boost the search engine rankings of third party sites

Although it is impossible to understand what they mean by ‘unwanted commercial content’ (as this is always going to a matter of opinion), the threat itself is clear.  If someone at Automattic sees that your posts link to your business website – you could have your blog suspended until it is removed!

Conclusion

Even if you pay Automattic to have their adverts removed from your blog, you are still left with a blog that:

– You cannot link from as you wish
– You cannot market advertise or promote your services on or even insert adwords
– You cannot customise fully
– You cannot advertise other people’s products or services on
– You cannot add commercially useful plugins to

A ‘free’ business blog on WordPress.com, with the ads removed, your own url added, some slight changes to its look and some extra space will cost you between $70 and $145 dollars a year.  For not much more, you can enjoy full control of a blog and (most importantly) use it to market your business; by hosting it with another provider.

I love WordPress software and the people in the wordpress.com user community are fantastic! WordPress.com servers are really reliable and very secure too.  However, if you want a commercial blog that you can advertise your services on and you want the freedom to link when and where you wish – I believe you need an analternative host.

UPDATE: Because some people are commenting here, without checking the date of the post (September 2008), I have disabled comments.

2 years later, changes to WordPress.com Terms and Conditions make it slightly more business friendly, but ultimately it is still a platform over which someone else has control.  WordPress.com these days says you CAN link from the blog to your 3rd party site (or main website) though they decide if you are OVER linking!  Any time you elect to put your time and effort into building something, which someone else can suspend or delete, you are taking a risk.  If you are happy with that risk, WordPress.com is still the best free platform out there.

Think long and hard before you build your marketing on a platform they do not control.

Jim.

Big blog update

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I have just relocated this blog; from being hosted at WordPress.com to being self-hosted professionally.  This will allow me to provide you with far more resources and remove the limitations of having the blog hosted at WordPress.com.

Mr Mark White – “Thank You!”

The entire relocation / migration process has been expertly handled for me, by business blogging guru Mark White.  You probably already know Mark from his massively successful Better Business Blogging site.  If you don’t, you need to stop reading this, grab a coffee and take a look at the masses of highly valuable information there.  If you are in sales or own a small-medium sized business you will love it!

Thanks for all your expertise Mark!

To make it in sales – fish for whales!

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When I started my first sales job, over 20 years ago, my boss gave me a piece of sales and marketing advice that has helped me generate millions of pounds worth of sales – and I am going to share it with you right now!

“To make it in sales, fish for whales!”

I asked my former boss what his comment about fishing for whales actually meant.  He explained:

“Jim, if you go fishing and you catch 10 goldfish, you won’t even fill a cup – but if you catch 10 whales, you will fill half the beach!”

Sales leverage

With that simple explanation, he taught me how the amount of time and effort required to win a £50,000 sale, was not a great deal more than it took to win a sale of £5,000.  This simple idea totally blew my mind!  It was my introduction to what I know today as leverage.

I immediately realised that if I wanted to succeed in sales, I needed to prioritise my sales efforts and focus on where I could deliver most value as a salesperson – because that’s where all those whales are!

If you want to dramatically improve your sales figures, make sure your time and energy is invested wisely – fishing for whales and not goldfish!

How to get your fees or prices right in 3 steps!

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One of the most common marketing mistakes I see small businesses and consultants make, is that they set their fees or prices too low. They claim to offer a valuable, high quality service, but then lose credibility (and sales), by offering that service for a bargain basement fee.

In this blog post, I am gong to give you a superb three step guide to make sure you get your fees or prices right every time.

Marketing and mixed messages

When your marketing messages promise a high quality service, but your fees are suggesting a bargain-basement service, you send out a damaging mixed message.  In marketing, these mixed messages are to be avoided at all costs, because they create uncertainty and they lose you business.

If someone is uncertain or confused about something – and you ask them to make a decision, they will always (well 99% of the time) simply say ‘no!’

A mixed message makes us feel uncertain, so in business, rather than risk making a mistake, the natural human response is to walk away from the deal.

It’s about value and NOT about being ‘cheap’

Your future clients are looking for value! They want to get as much ‘bang for their buck’ as possible and they already know that ‘cheap’ products and services offer very poor quality.  When the economy is weak, people are even more focused on value than usual.  Businesses and consumers will eliminate anything from their outgoings, which they think is not offering them great value.

Three steps for setting your prices or fees perfectly

  1. I always suggest to my clients that they start by researching their competitors; to see what the average price or fee for their industry is and to see what kind of guarantees or promises they are competing against.  Here’s a great free guide to show you how.
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  2. Next, after researching what your competitors are doing, you should aim to go one better.  Look for ways to pump more value into your service, so that it’s MORE VALUABLE to potential clients than what your competitors are offering.  Can you stay open later?  Can you offer a unique guarantee?  Give yourself enough time to really examine all the opportunities to increase your value.
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  3. Finally, you need to set a price or fee that accurately reflects an attractive proposition for your new, highly valuable service.  You achieve this by using the exact same technique used by all marketing professionals – Test, measure, test measure.
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    Test your new price / fee and measure the response you get.  Then, adjust the fee until you hit ‘the sweet spot’ – the fee that allows you to make a GREAT profit AND gives your clients GREAT value!  I have written a great free guide for you, which will show you what to do – it’s here.

Make sure your prices match your promises.  It will not only make it far easier for potential clients to see the true value of your services – it will make your business far, far more profitable too.

The marketing power of association

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It’s a fact; before someone becomes a client or customer of your business, they need to trust you.  One of the fastest ways to create an image for your business, which people in the marketplace will trust (and desire), is to make “the power of association” a part of your marketing mix!

Marketing and short cuts

People are programmed to look for short cuts when it comes to making decisions!  This is why the recommendation of a friend is so powerful.  If there are 10 equally good print companies in your area and you need to pick one, the one that has been highly recommended to you by half a dozen of your friends will win your business every time!

The recommendation of your friends quickly and powerfully reduces the level of risk you feel about using the recommended company.

In marketing, you can ‘leverage‘ the power of association to create a similar decision making short cut in the mind of all your prospective clients!

The marketing power of association

If your prospective clients associate you or your business with a highly respected person or organisation, they mentally link you and them together.  This instantly elevates your reputation in the marketplace!

For example, an unknown designer can make a fortune, simply by having Brad Pitt say he loves wearing their clothes!  Yesterday, he or she was an unknown designer – today they are a super-cool designer to the stars!   Their designs are no better or worse than they always were, but their new association with Brad Pitt means there will now be massive demand for their work.

Brad Pitt’s praise created a short cut, by showing people these designs were ‘cool.’  His comments would also generate a stack of invaluable free publicity. That’s the power of association!

How the power of association helps me

If, for example, someone has never heard of me, they might be cautious about using my free marketing advice.  However, when they learn that I have contributed to The BBC or CBS or their favourite newspaper – they instantly see me in a different light.  My work takes on a totally different perspective, because of my associates.

How the power of association can help YOU!

More importantly, the power of association can be used to massively improve YOUR results!  If you want to benefit from the power of association, you need to do two things.

  1. Firstly, you must be extremely selective about who and what you associate yourself and your business with.  You need to deliberately target people and organisations that will increase your reputation in your marketplace.
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    For example, phone your local radio station and ask if they need a newspaper reviewer for their early show.  (That’s how I got my first coverage on The BBC!)Think of the people and organisations that are most respected in your profession and form associations with them.
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  2. Secondly, you must make sure that everyone knows about your high calibre associations!  It’s not enough to be linked to some great people and organisations; you need to make sure the marketplace knows.

The power of association can also work AGAINST you!

I spoke with an accountant recently, who told me he had wasted over £1,000 sponsoring a business event.  The event was a free-to-attend lunch and seminar; hosted by a well-known UK business development organisation.

Although he got a handful of leads from the event, they were a total waste of time.  He explained; “they just picked my brain for free accountancy advice!”

The reason his sponsorship could never have worked is simple.  He had just associated his accountancy practice with an organisation well-known across the UK for providing free, low quality business advice! Also, the people attending the event were those who are looking for FREE, generic advice.  These are the very worst people to market his premium accountancy service to, because advice from a qualified accountant is neither free nor low quality!

So, it’s extremely important to be selective, regarding who you associate your business with.  The right associations will attract business and the wrong associations will lose you business even faster!

Avoid this common problem

As I mentioned earlier, a personal or professional recommendation CAN be a wonderful source of new business.  The problem here, is that very little is ever said about the DAMAGE that can result from having your business recommended by people who lack credibility or are unprofessional!

For example, I was emailed by one of my newsletter subscribers, who runs a small law firm.  He had been a member of one of those networking groups; which meet for breakfast once a week to swap referrals.  To remain a member of this network, you have to provide leads every week.

He found that a few of his fellow networking associates were using the same ‘high-pressure techniques’ to generate leads for him; as they were using to generate leads for their own direct sales businesses.

Two years later, his law firm’s professional reputation is still tarnished; because of the hard sell approach used by his former networking associates!

What next?

Every association you have is either helping you gain credibility and trust within the marketplace or it’s bringing your reputation down!  Take time to list and then evaluate the credentials of everyone whose name or logo you use in your marketing.

Next, decide which side of the scales they are on!  Are they helping you or hurting you?

If they are not improving how the marketplace views your business, you should seriously consider disassociating from them immediately.