Jim's Marketing Blog

Marketing tips and ideas to help you grow your business

Being positive about your business

By |

By Jim Connolly
In business, confidence is massively important! I’m not talking here about our self-confidence; but rather the level of confidence that other people have in us, our business and our services.

I would like to ask you a question!

When someone asks you; “how’s business?” – what kind of answers do you tend to give them?

If you want people to buy from you, recommend you or invest in you; it’s vitally important that you always speak in positive terms about your business!  If there’s nothing positive to say about your CURRENT business position, then tell people all about your exciting plans for the future!

business confidence sales referrals successWhat a ‘positive’ answer does

Whenever you speak about your business in a confident, positive way, it causes people to feel confident about you and your situation.  This is really important, because your future success will always be in direct proportion to the number of people that ‘feel’ confident or positive about; you, your abilities, your business and it’s products or services.

If you think about it, the current economic situation is a great example of this.  The direction the stock markets take is always determined by the ‘confidence’ of those, who invest in stocks and shares.  If they feel positive about some news or a rumour – they act positively and the market grows.  If they lack confidence in something they act negatively and the market shrinks.

What a ‘negative’ answer does

Whenever you speak in negative terms about your business, you cause people to lose confidence in you.  This is one of the most commercially damaging things anyone can do to their business!

I have lost track of the number of small business owners I have spoken with over the years, who ALWAYS find something negative to say about their business, no matter how well things are going for them! What they seem unaware of, is that these negative comments about their business can spread like a virus.

Soon, their suppliers, competitors and potential clients start speaking negatively about them and BOOM – they can actually ‘talk themselves out of business!’

For example, there are countless companies who have gone broke, PURELY BECAUSE a false rumour suggested they were in financial trouble.  Very quickly, people’s confidence in the company starts to dip; so they stop using them, (fearing they will lose their money.)  Suppliers stop providing credit to them and all of a sudden, that company REALLY does have a financial problem! That’s how important it is to generate confidence in you and your business!

Especially in today’s erratic economy, make sure the seeds YOU plant in the marketplace are 100% positive.  Make YOUR business the one that people feel positive about and want to buy from, recommend or invest in. Talk only about what you want and not what you fear.

NEVER, EVER FORGET you are ALWAYS just one great idea away from your first (or next) million!

Marketing and customer service

By |

The most effective way to grow a business, is to win new clients with great marketing; whilst keeping your existing clients happy with great customer service.  Sadly, many businesses are strong in one of these areas and weak in another.  I have experienced this first hand recently, when one of the service providers I use for my business, was ‘bought out’ by one of their competitors.

The original company were very strong on customer service, but really poor when it came to marketing their services. As a result, their clients loved them, BUT they were unable to win enough regular business to survive.

The new company is the total opposite!  They are shockingly poor at customer service, but far sharper on their marketing. As a result, they will find winning new clients quite easy – but the rate they lose them, means the growth of their business will be just as sluggish as their poorly-marketed predecessors.  This is probably why they bought the original company’s client list.

A wasted business development opportunity!

As I write this blog post, I wonder how many other clients of this newly-acquired business are also looking for a replacement provider? I wonder how much more successful things would have been for them, had the new owners kept the original level of customer service; and then used their marketing skills to drive in even more clients?

By the way: If you want to find out what your clients think about the level of service they receive from you, and what kind of service your future clients would like, you might find this really useful.

The value of your network

By |

If you are one of those dedicated people, who invests a lot of their time developing a network of contacts, I have a question for you:

“How valuable to your business, (in financial terms), is your network of contacts?”

I ask this because in my experience, many small businesses focus almost exclusively on developing networks of people, with little influence in their marketplace!

networking events groups leverageA VERY low leverage activity!

You can end up wasting thousands of pounds worth of your time and money on local networking events and joining networking groups; whilst simultaneously limiting the time you have to actually RUN YOUR BUSINESS! A lose-lose situation.

Although a local Accountant or Bank Manager can be an excellent source of credible referred business; not everyone in your local business community has credible access to your target market.

Without credibility, a lead or referral is worthless!

This is because when a person who lacks credibility recommends your business to someone, you become associated in their mind with that ‘non-credible’ person.  I wrote recently about a Lawyer whose law firm has suffered terribly; after he joined a networking group and had his good name associated with some hard-sell tactics, used by a few of his fellow networkers to generate leads!

Of course, one of the most effective ways to network today is from your desk! Millions of people have totally ditched traditional, time-consuming networking, for free online networks.  I use one myself called Twitter which is excellent!

There are also more formal online networking groups like ecademy and linkedin that you might like to explore – neither of which I use or endorse! In any case, the costs will be massively lower than traditional networking.  So will the demands on your time – essential for people like us who run small businesses!

Opinion polls and surveys

By |

Marketing tips from Jim Connolly
How valuable do you think it would be for you and your business right now, if you could find out what your clients and prospective clients are interested in, worried about or excited by?

Well, if you work in sales or run a business, this kind of information is gold dust!

marketing opinion polls surveysFor example, armed with this valuable data you can focus your sales messages on what the marketplace really wants – dramatically increasing your response rates and sales figures! It could also help you find additional services that your existing clients want and would be happy to pay for! I’ve seen this double a company’s turnover in 3 months! You could even spot unhappy clients and fix whatever is wrong, before they leave you for a competitor!

How can you get this super-valuable information?

Client surveys and opinion polls!

You start by writing to (or emailing) your existing clients with a simple ‘client survey.’  This should run to no more than 6-8 questions.  Each ‘question’ should actually come in the form of a statement, which asks your client what they think, based on a simple 1-5 response.

For example
 Please answer the following by marking the appropriate box; from strongly disagree [1] to strongly agree [5]
“The service I receive from
Acme Recruitment is excellent”         [1]  [2]  [3]  [4]  [5]

Also, leave a space below each answer and ask your client to add additional information if they wish.  This is really important!  Usually, the only people who add comments are clients to are either extremely happy or extremely unhappy. For those who are in the latter group, it gives you the chance to find out what’s wrong and put it right, before they leave!  This can massively improve your client retention.

The value of opinion polls

If you want to find out what your potential clients are interested in or motivated by, one of the best ways is via a simple opinion poll on your website or blog!  As you can see from the right hand side of this blog, I use them myself; to make sure that what I write about is directly relevant to my readers!

Think about it.  The most valuable marketing information for you and your business, is information that is both powerful AND also directly relevant to you!  The opinion polls I use, give me a valuable insight into the opportunities and threats that are of most interest to my readers.  For example, as I write this, the current opinion poll on this blog is telling me that since the credit crunch started, almost 90% of my readers (who voted) have seen a drop in sales.

Poll YOUR marketplace

You need to find out what’s important to YOUR potential clients and your marketplace too!  Fortunately, it has never been easier or less expensive to gather these opinions.  A simple piece of opinion poll software can be installed on your website or blog in minutes.  The software I use on this blog is excellent and 100% free (or you can give the software writer a donation) – you can get a copy for your blog here.

As you can see, the value of gathering data from your clients and your potential clients can be enormous.  If you do not already poll your marketplace and clients I strongly advise you to start!

Marketing and problem solving

By |

Whatever line of business we are actually in, we are always a professional problem solver. People pay us to solve their problems – think about it:

If you have a web design business, you solve the problem of ugly, ill-functioning websites.  If you have an insurance business, you solve the problem of unprotected risks or financial hardship etc.

Because your prospective clients are looking for service providers, who can solve their problems – just imagine how unimpressed they would be; if your marketing messages were all about YOUR business and YOUR amazing special offers.

If you want your prospective clients or customers to be attracted to you and your business – make sure your marketing messages are focused on the answers to their problems.

Take time to research the key problems facing their industry and when you speak with them – find out what problems their business is uniquely facing. Then, learn how to match the answer to their problem with your product or service.

Even if your product or service can only resolve part of one of their main problems – it’s enough for them to totally change the way they see you as opposed to ANY of your competitors.

You will become one of those rare businesses we value so much – which offers us the answers and peace-of-mind we all long for!

Making your marketing work

By |

Imagine a building project, where the carpentry work was being carried out by an insurance broker, the electrical work was being handled by an accountant and where the bricks were being laid by a web designer!

That project would be a total mess!  Although the people working on that building are all intelligent professionals in their own area – none of them are professional builders!

Marketing havoc

Believe it or not, I see the result of this kind of havoc all the time; when I meet with the owners of small businesses!  I see what happens when someone who’s an expert in Law or Recruitment or Insurance etc, but  with no marketing background or experience, handles their businesses marketing!  They usually waste a fortune; on advertising that could never work, mailshots that no one reads or websites that no one visits.  They not only waste a fortune, they miss out on masses of new business too!

Marketing & cause and effect

If your sales and profits are not what you want, you must either hire a marketing professional or decide to learn professional marketing.  Business is all based on cause and effect, which is great news.  It means you can achieve any result you wish; providing you do the correct things, in the correct order – correctly!

The law of cause and effect also assures us that; “if you always do what you have always done, you will always get what you have always got.”

In other words, you can’t expect better results without making better decisions and taking better actions. The business owner who moans about her lack of success, but refuses to improve her effectiveness through study and application is a fool!

Free marketing material to help you

As one of the UK’s best known marketing professionals, I have produced a stack of free marketing material for you.  It’s on my main website at www.jimconnolly.com; in fact, 100% of the sales and marketing material there is free – even the audio program!  I also write a massively successful marketing newsletter, which you can subscribe to using the button below.  All the marketing material on my main website and in my newsletter is written by me and the free audio programs are written and narrated by me – to help you make your marketing as powerful as possible.

I hope you find it useful!

Listen to the marketplace

By |

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

By |

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

By |

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!

By |

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!

By |

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.
    .
  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.
    .
  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.
    .
    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

By |

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.
    .
    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.
    .
  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.

Good marketing advice?

By |

I have just been reading some dreadful marketing advice; given by a self-proclaimed ‘marketing guru,’ to the owner of a small business. The advice was in answer to a question posted on Twitter.  The advice was totally incorrect and showed that this so-called marketing ‘guru’ didn’t even possess a basic understanding of marketing.

I checked-out the guru’s website and…

Because the advice was so obviously given by someone with no marketing background, I was curious and decided to check out her website.  In seconds you could see that this lady was clueless when it came to marketing!

Her website was horrible.  It lacked even basic Search Engine Optimisation, the copy writing (wording) was shockingly poor and the site looked really ‘cheap!’

The site was littered with marketing buzz-words, and as you would expect, there were the obligatory links to various affiliate marketing programs promising to make you RICH RICH RICH!!

Bad marketing advice can kill a small business!

We live in an age where anyone can set up a website or blog and claim to be an expert on anything!  That’s why, as a respected name in marketing, I decided to start a website a couple of years ago – www.jimconnolly.com – that just GIVES AWAY FREE MARKETING information to anyone who wants it. No, you don’t even have to subscribe to anything or register – it’s ‘just there’ for you to read, listen to and enjoy the results!

Small businesses and those just starting out, rely heavily on free advice.  I wanted to make sure there was a 100% free, reliable marketing resource for them, which they could use to massively improve their sales results. Because I base all the marketing information at jimconnolly.com on ideas I have used to generate millions in sales for clients and myself, people know they can trust the advice there.  Of course, it’s also the reason I launched this marketing blog!

Jim who? – Never heard of you!

If you don’t already know who I am, I have been a marketing professional for over 20 years and I have run my own successful, international marketing business for the past 13 years.  I have generated many, many millions of pounds and dollars worth of sales and my marketing material now reaches millions of people each year, spanning over 70 countries.  My newsletter is read by thousands of people on every continent and my audio programs are used all over the world.  I have also contributed to programming on The BBC, ITV and Channel 4 in the UK and CBS and CNN in North America.

I hope you find this blog useful. I am adding new material all the time and I encourage you to leave a comment and share your thoughts with other readers. Please feel free to share this blog with your friends, using the buttons below!

Spot opportunities and improve client retention!

By |

As the owner of a business or someone involved in marketing, you should regularly ask your clients for feedback.

2 REALLY GOOD reasons why YOU need client feedback:

Firstly, it allows you to spot opportunities that you would have missed AND avoid problems before they happen.  For example, if you ask your clients what additional services they would like you to offer, and a uniformed reply comes back – you have just identified a whole new income stream for your business!

Secondly, it can help you spot if a particular client is unhappy or thinking of leaving!  Clients who are disgruntled are often among the first to reply to feedback requests!  By listening to their problems and resolving them, you can reduce the number of clients you lose. This is an excellent way to quickly improve client retention. Client retention, sometimes called ‘attrition’ should be a part of every business’s marketing mix.

A simple email, asking clients what they think about some of the key elements of your services is all you need. Ask them to score each section on a scale of 1 to 5 and see what comes back.  Always provide a section for them to leave a comment, idea or suggestion.

The answers are often very illuminating – AND ALWAYS useful!

What’s your competition like?

By |

At the recent Olympic Games, every athlete knew exactly what the ‘personal best’ figures for each of their competitors was.  That’s because it’s almost impossible to succeed at anything, unless you know what you are competing against!

Equally, to compete successfully in business, you need to research what you are marketing against!  We call this research Competitor Analysis.  So, I have a question for you:

“How much do you know about your competitors and what they offer?”

In my experience, most small and medium-sized businesses know very little about the quality of their competitor’s services.  They will often believe that their own service is very good, but when you accurately compare it against their competitors, it’s generally no better than average.

I am convinced this lack of Competitor Analysis is why there are so many average services out there!  After all, no one sets out to be ‘just average’.

Businesses then market their services, thinking that what they offer is great value – and wonder why they get very little positive response! It’s not always the quality of a small business’s marketing that’s letting them down, but the ‘attractiveness’ of what they are offering!

In order to motivate someone to switch from one provider to another, there must be a compelling reason for them to do so.  This means you need to know what your competitors offer, so you can make YOUR services more valuable than theirs!

Competitor Analysis explained

Competitor Analysis is where you analyse what your competitors are offering to the marketplace.  This allows you to see how YOUR services stack up against the other services being offered to your potential clients (and existing clients!).  As part of your Competitor Analysis, you will need to find out things like; what kind of guarantees your competitors offer, their payment terms, their prices, the range of services they offer and their opening hours etc.

I spoke recently with the owner of a recruitment company, who told me that his main competitors all offered a very poor service, compared to his.  I asked how he knew.  He replied that whenever a client moved from a competitor to him, they always said what a poor service they had just received!  He was basing his ‘research’ on what these non-typical, disgruntled people said!

You cannot build your competitor research, based on the jaundiced opinions of anyone!  You need to know what the reality of the situation is, because THAT’S what you will be marketing your services against!

I have a friend who sells homes in London, which market for over £2,000,000.  She found her clients were often hesitant about improving their home before marketing it, thinking it was already ‘good enough’ to quickly attract a buyer.

So, she started taking new clients to view a selection of homes in the same price range as their own – so they could clearly see what their home was competing against.  Universally, this totally changes their opinions and they are happy to make any required improvements.

Most businesses are like the home-owners who think that their home is already great value, without knowing what the others are like.  This can prove commercially fatal – especially in today’s challenging economy!

Some ideas to start your competitor analysis

Competitor Analysis on the Internet

Depending on the industry you are in, you can often get a mountain of extremely valuable information by visiting a competitors’ website.  If you are in retail, for example, you will immediately be able to see; their product lines, prices, delivery times, guarantees etc.

No matter what industry you are in, most websites will have an ‘about’ page, which tells you all about the company.  You should also be able to tell very quickly what each company thinks it’s best at – because people sell their services based on their strengths!

You will also be able to tell in seconds, if they have had their website professionally copy written or not.  This is a key indicator as to how seriously they take their marketing.

Conversations with THEIR clients

Whenever you meet someone, who is using the services of one of your competitors, ask them how well they are being looked after.  This is a more accurate measurement of the quality of a competitor’s services, than the earlier example; where people with an axe to grind were relied upon.

An existing client is someone who can generally, be seen as having an ‘average’ or ‘typical’ experience of a service provider.  If they say their service provider is great or awful – ask them; “In what way?”  Then listen!

Avoid conversations with suppliers

I have found conversations with suppliers, who also supply one’s competitors, to be close to worthless!  Also, be extremely careful what you say to anyone who gives you too much information.  As my mother used to tell me; “those who bring news, carry news!”

After your Competitor Analysis – What next?

After your Competitor Analysis, take a good close look at your own business and find ways to beat them!  Don’t just try to match them – look at how you can go one better.  If you cannot offer a better service to someone than they already get – why on earth should they switch to you?

For example, would YOU go through all the hassle of switching from your current; accountant, insurance broker, bank or recruitment provider; for a service that’s no better than you already receive?

Of course not – and NOR WOULD ANYONE ELSE!

Only when you have developed a service that you know, with confidence, is better than your competition, are you ready to market it. When you have a great service, and you get that message in front of potential clients with compelling marketing, the sky’s the limit.  You can achieve anything!

The power of a great marketing statement

By |

I saw a piece of marketing earlier today, which clearly demonstrated the power of a well-written marketing message. It was an advertisement for an Internet hosting company.  It makes what ‘sounds’ like a very positive statement; regarding the quality of their service – until you think about what they are actually saying!

Here’s what their marketing message said:

“We guarantee that websites hosted on our servers, will be working 99% of the time!”

However, 99% reliability for an Internet hosting company is AWFUL!

The promise of your website being online 99% of the time, if you select them to host your website MIGHT sound like a great deal – but it’s not!  It’s shockingly poor!

What they are ACTUALLY saying, is that if your business has it’s website hosted with them, you can expect it to be down, off-line and unavailable for the equivalent of THREE FULL WORKING DAYS EVERY 100 DAYS! So, over a period of little more than3 months, your potential clients or customers will be unable to find your website for a combined period of 24 hours – (that’s three working days, based on the 8 hour working day model)

There are 2 marketing lessons here

  • Firstly, the power of a well-crafted marketing message is enormous.  You can make something sound irresistible and inspire people to contact you and buy from you in their droves – even if your service actually sucks!
  • Secondly, even with great marketing, unless your service is excellent, you will lose clients just as quickly as you gain them – perhaps even faster!  When I searched for this company’s name on Google; it generated page after page of people complaining about the service they received. If only this company was as devoted to service, as it seems to be with its marketing, it would be massively more successful.

Marketing success

Marketing success comes only when you are able to win AND retain high quality business.  Looking after your clients and providing them with more than they expect, every step of the way, is not only great customer service; it’s extremely good business practice too!

Increase sales & profits quickly

By |

Here’s a powerful marketing tip, which will show you how to massively increase your sales very quickly.  It’s also a super-fast way to boost your cash flow and sky-rocket your profits!

In order for us to begin, I need to ask you something:

“What additional, valuable products or services ‘could’ you offer to your existing clients, which they would be happy to pay you for?”

This is a key marketing question; because selling additional services to an existing client is easily, the single fastest way to MASSIVELY increase your sales and profits! It’s an exceptionally high leverage marketing activity, because the return you get is totally disproportionate to the amount of time and effort required.

The reason the results are so amazing, is that you already provide a GREAT service to your clients and they already trust you.  This means that buying an additional product or service from you is a VERY easy decision for them to make. There’s no risk attached because they already know how brilliant you are!

Selling additional services to existing clients

Here’s a recent example, based on a client of my marketing program. This particular client came to me because he needed to quickly and dramatically increase his cash flow and profitability.

His company provides IT maintenance services to around 120 local, small businesses.  I suggested he find another service to offer his existing clients – before thinking about winning new clients.  He said that a few of his clients had asked if he provided an online data back-up service; which he did not.  So, he looked for prices, to see how much it would cost to provide the service and found that he could make an average profit of around £500 a year, per client, by offering this service.

I sent out a well crafted marketing email to his clients and in just 48 hours, we generated £21,000 of pure profit for him! Because this is an annual service, payable in advance, the end result was an immediate, MASSIVE cash flow boost!

Leverage the potential of your existing clients before looking elsewhere

Before you spend a penny seeking to win new business from new clients – make sure you are not missing out on a windfall profit opportunity from within your existing client base!

Selling additional services helps retain clients too

Not only does offering a wider spread of services to your clients make them more profitable to you, they are also far, far less likely to leave you for another provider.  To replace the provider of one service is relatively simple, but to replace a service provider who looks after 3 or 6 or more of your needs is a very different matter.

When you provide more services to a client, you also provide more value and the marketplace ALWAYS rewards value!

Selling additional services to existing clients is easy and extremely profitable, so what’s stopping you?

Premium rate phone numbers KILL sales!

By |

If you run a business and you want people to call you to enquire about your services or buy from you – NEVER use premium rate numbers for your sales phone line or main phone line!

Here in the UK there are some misguided small businesses who (unbelievably) only offer a premium rate number for people to call them on!

NUMBERS THAT BEGIN WITH EITHER 087* OR 084* are a VERY bad idea for your business – as they place a hurdle between your potential clients / customers and your products or services.

Why are premium rate numbers such a bad idea?

Because, no one wants to pay a premium rate to call YOUR business to enquire about your services!  Why should they have to pay you, to be sold something – come on, get real!

I have variously heard it estimated that using any premium rate number for your main phone line or your sales / enquiries line, can lose you between 60% and 80% of ALL enquiries and sales.

Not only will people like myself refuse to use these rip-off numbers, many companies have these numbers barred from their phone system – so their employees can not actually dial these numbers, even if they wanted to spend money with you.

Also, if you call these numbers from a UK mobile phone, it can cost a fortune (hardly likely to encourage people to enquire about your services!  Everything your business does should make it as EASY and attractive as possible for people to call you.  The message you send out by using a premium rate number is 100% negative – it’s a money-grabbing scam.

Some people REALLY HATE premium rate numbers – Look!

There is so much resistance to businesses screwing people with these rip-off numbers that a wonderful website has come to the consumer’s rescue; www.SayNoTo0870.com If you need to dial a company hiding behind one of these awful numbers, check out www.SayNoTo0870.com and see if there is a regular price alternative.

If you are serious about winning business – drop the use of premium rate numbers for your sales line or your main phone number.

Clear marketing sells

By |

In marketing, clarity is extremely important!  Your marketing messages need to clearly state what you do, what the benefits of your services are and why a potential client should do business with you or buy from you!

Clear marketing

Clear marketing messages command a potential client’s attention with laser-like precision!

Sadly, most small businesses use a foggy, conversational approach to their marketing and as a result, they lose stacks of business unnecessarily!

Most small business websites lack clarity

When you read the wording (or the copy) on the homepage of a typical small business website, it rarely gives you the core information you need!  Instead, you usually find a welcome message and some general ‘blurb’ about the company.  There’s nothing there to motivate the visitor / reader to click anything or do anything. As a result, most people quickly leave these sites and stacks of potential sales and enquiries are lost. This vague, generalised approach to marketing is a complete waste of time and money!

For example

I recently saw a website for a company that had the following headline across its homepage…

“Providing integrated business solutions to SME’s.”

Apart from mentioning that they work with SME’s (Small to medium-sized Enterprises), I have no idea whether they are; business advisers, software developers, accountants, recruitment specialists, hr consultants or anything else!

To make your marketing message stronger- try this!

Take a look at your existing marketing.  Read your website, your sales letters, marketing emails and brochures or flyers etc.  Make sure that each of your marketing messages explains clearly:
1. What you do.
2. How it will directly benefit the reader.
3. Why they absolutely need it (right now if possible).
4. Why they should buy ‘it’ from you (and not someone else).

This simple exercise can produce immediate, measurable results!

Beating the credit crunch!

By |

Whenever times are hard and the economy heads south, people (and businesses) have to think a lot harder before they spend their money.  This is something we have seen time and time again during past recessions.

However, the ‘credit crunch’ has given us a MUCH BIGGER problem, because our potential clients not only have less money than before – they are finding it hard or impossible to access credit too.  As a direct result, generating sales or winning business is set to become increasingly harder, with potential clients understandably extremely cautious about spending their money.  Perhaps more cautious than ever before.

One thing we know with total certainty, is that the marketplace for YOUR services is about to become more and more competitive.

This means your marketing has never been more important

You must be able to get the attention of your prospective clients and then totally convince them that you offer the best possible option for them.  Any business today, whose marketing is ‘average’, is going to find the coming two years (some say three) increasingly painful. The only solution is to improve the way they sell and market their services.

Why is marketing so much more important now?

During a normal or strong economy, people don’t have to think too hard about making a purchase and are measurably less choosy.  As a result, until recently, even poorly marketed companies were able to generate a level of sales; just by ‘being there’ or contacting prospects at the right time.

However, during a bad economic climate, people think far harder before they buy anything.  As a result, we are seeing people and businesses now shopping around for the best offer before they spend a penny.  Thus, they end up buying from the best marketed businesses, because these are the businesses who know how to grab their attention and make their offer sound the most attractive or compelling.

Today, good timing and hard work is no longer enough. You must learn how to out-market your competitors if you want to survive – let alone thrive!

Marketing provides an answer – Thankfully

Amid the doom and gloom, there’s always a ray of light.  You see, as well as receiving a massive number of emails from readers who are really struggling right now – I have also received a small number of emails from readers who are experiencing their best year EVER.

When you understand why some businesses are doing so well right now, you will have an opportunity to do the same.  But first, you need to know what ‘the average’ business does when faced with an economic slump.  This is really important.

Most businesses do nothing

The ‘average’ business today will continue to sell and market their services as if nothing was happening.  Sure, they will moan about the economy and their lack of trade; but they will just keep on doing the same ineffective marketing they always did.

They pin their hopes on things ‘just getting better’ before they run out of money.

In essence, they will stay inside their comfort zone and refuse to move, as if they were a 60 foot oak tree.

But some businesses take action!

Some businesses realise that there is a real opportunity here!  They know that when times are tough, prospective clients always look for value – and making your services look more valuable is all about GREAT marketing.  So, they decide to get serious about their marketing and thus they reap the rewards.  The rewards are far greater than you might imagine.

Marketing lessons from recessions

We know that during past economic recessions, the businesses that improved their marketing and marketed their services the most successfully, managed to gain a disproportionately large share of their marketplace.

Also, when the economy improved, they were in the perfect position to continue growing at a super-accelerated rate!  If you choose, you can turn the credit crunch into a springboard for your business. You can grow at the same time as your competitors shrink.  You can use the coming months to transform the future of your business and your life – but only if you take action and do the right things in the right way.

So – what next?

First of all – STOP!

If your business is currently finding it a struggle to generate the volume and quality of sales it needs – Stop whatever marketing you are doing immediately.

Because…

If you keep using the same kind of marketing, you will keep getting the same results.  Your sales, profits and turnover will not ‘just get better’.  In fact, as the credit crunch continues, your sales, turnover and profits will drop unless you improve things.

Five steps to beat the credit crunch

Step one

OK – as I mentioned above, the first step is to stop all marketing activities that are not making you money.  No matter how ‘comfortable’ you are with whatever you are doing, if it’s not working STOP doing it.  Either find a way to leverage better results from it or discontinue it completely.

Step two

Start getting tons of business through your website. It’s a fact; a fully-optimised website is both the most effective and the least expensive way to generate sales, leads and enquiries. Your website can (and should) generate leads and enquiries for you all day every day.

I know people in just about every industry who now get the vast majority of their leads and enquiries via their website.

You can reduce your annual marketing costs by 90% and increase your sales by 100’s% (or more) at the same time!  Almost all of all MY marketing is now done online.  However, before you start enjoying all those leads and enquiries from red-hot prospective clients, your website needs to tick two important boxes:

  • Firstly, it needs to look professional and have all the functions you need in order to collect enquiries, collect email addresses and make sales etc.  If you want to know why some businesses get leads from their websites on an hourly basis (or better), whilst most websites generate almost nothing, you need the second and most important element…
    .
  • Secondly, your website MUST MUST MUST be Search Engine Optimised.   The reason most small and medium sized business websites fail, is because no one can find them!  So, you will need to get an SEO expert to make your site the one that people find when looking for whatever type of services you offer.

This is the most important step, yet hardly any small business websites are professionally optimised.  Interestingly, 100% of all large company websites are optimised.

Getting a website optimised, is like picking up a shop, that’s located down an old dusty road with no passing trade – and placing it BANG in the centre of Oxford Street or 5th Avenue!

Step three

Read the sales and marketing posts and articles here on the blog.  Everything is written by me, based on what’s proven to work.  I put the blog together because most small and medium-sized businesses rely heavily on free marketing advice – and as a marketing professional, the marketing advice I found online was often pretty awful.  I found that much of it was either shockingly poor , or very out of date. Look at this.

Step four

Download and listen to this FREE audio program.  It will tell you how to get regular referrals, recommendations & leads.

Step five

There are some superb ideas waiting for you right now at TheIdeasBlog.com.  It has often been said that you are never more than one good idea away from achieving a massive breakthrough – so take a look.

The credit crunch is really hurting a lot of businesses right now.  If you have found this credit crunch marketing report useful, please forward it to as many people as possible.