Jim's Marketing Blog

Marketing tips and ideas to help you grow your business

Assess. Improve. Execute

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Assess Improve Execute

Today, I’m going to share a strategy with you that helped me increase a client’s sales by just over 180% in 5 months. It’s achieved even better results than that with other clients.

It can be summed up in just 3 words: Assess. Improve. Execute.

Here’s how it works.

Assess

The first step to boosting your sales results is to assess your current situation. I spent some time digging into my client’s sales and marketing process and identified her company’s primary problem. It wasn’t the quality of their sales team. It turned out they offered a superb product and when people saw it, they absolutely loved it. The problem was that they were getting too few chances to demo their product. This means I needed to radically increase the number of high-quality sales leads they attracted.

Think about it: Even without improving your conversion rate, you will double your sales figures by doubling the number of targeted prospects you speak with.

Once we identified the root of her problem, it was time to improve things and free my client to dramatically increase her company’s sales results.

Improve

There were a number of areas in my client’s marketing that were under-performing. This is why she wasn’t generating the volume of high-quality enquiries she needed. She knew her marketing wasn’t working the way she needed it to. But like many business owners, my client assumed the enquiries they attracted were about average in number and quality. She was wrong on both fronts. A common mistake, which had been needlessly losing the company a fortune.

By making a small number of essential improvements at the very beginning, we were able to considerably improve her company’s results. And fast. Really fast.

I remember the easiest adjustment I made, was to improve the focus of their sales message. It had previously focused on what their business did, how great their product was and how amazing their team was. It’s a common mistake.

If your marketing has a similar focus, it’s a bad, bad idea!

And here’s why.

No one buys a service or a product. They buy the result.

  • You don’t buy exercise equipment. You buy looking good and feeling great.
  • So, sell the result of investing in your product.

Anyhow, we then dug a little deeper and uncovered a series of similarly untapped, windfall opportunities.

One of them was for me to transform their website into a lead generating machine, by improving their marketing copy. I needed it to make prospects on their site feel massively more curious.

Curious?

Assess. Improve. Execute

Why curious, Jim?

Think about it. Every client / customer enquiry you have ever had, or will ever receive, only happened because the other person needed to know something. So, if you want your marketing to attract massively more leads, it needs to create more curiosity… and answer fewer questions.

Previously, their website tried to answer as many questions as possible. I rewrote their marketing and made sure it provided just enough information.

Just enough information to inform the prospect and ignite their curiosity.

Just enough information to compel, to motivate and to inspire eager prospects to contact them with a high-quality client lead.

We wrapped these ideas into a plan, along with half a dozen other tactical improvements. Now we were good to go!

Execute

Oh man! Without doubt, this is the stage that excites me most. This is why I do what I do.

It’s where we execute on the new marketing strategy and measure the feedback. There’s something wonderful about the energy I get from clients, as they see their business performing the way they always wanted it too. And often far, far better.

Assess. Improve. Execute. Focus like a laser on those 3 steps and watch your business grow.

Move your customers from something, to something

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Today, I’d like to share a very powerful marketing strategy with you, which few, if any, of your competitors are aware of.

marketing, usp, different

As you know, every business provides a product or a service. And that product or service solves a problem for the customer. In order to solve their problem, it needs to create a change. To move them from (something) to (something).

For example.

  • From broke to wealthy.

  • From discomfort to comfort.

  • From bored to entertained.

  • From confused to clear.

  • From worried to confident.

  • From struggling to succeeding.

  • From vulnerable to safe.

  • From lonely to connected.

  • From loss to gain.

  • From ignorant to informed.

  • From stressed to relaxed.

  • From lost to guided.

Here’s the part very, very few business owners get right.

You need to figure out the change your prospective customers are looking for. Their ‘from what’ and their ‘to what’.

Warning: The biggest danger here is believing the answer is obvious.

It almost never is

Seriously.

For instance, NO successful coffee shop focuses on changing you from thirsty to quenched. None of them.

They change you by creating an attractive atmosphere. An atmosphere, where you can go from stressed to relaxed, or from tired to restored, or from lonely to connected, from stuck to creative or from bored to entertained.

The world’s top coffee shops know this. It’s what their marketing focuses on. It’s why we see very little emphasis placed on the coffee beans used, yet huge emphasis placed on the welcoming, positive atmosphere.

The improvement this shift in your focus will make is almost impossible to overstate.

Here’s another example.

The world’s most expensive restaurants don’t focus on taking you from hungry to full. You can go down the street and get the same number of calories from a burger joint for pennies. Instead, these restaurants focus on their exclusivity. They take you (and your guest) from feeling normal to feeling like a star.

How this relates to your product or service

Determine what change or changes your prospective customer is truly looking for.

Focus on the ‘from what’ part. Your marketing message needs to meet them right there. It needs to talk to their current situation. It needs to address the discomfort they’re feeling. This means your message will be on the very same wavelength that they’re on. This dramatically and profoundly increases the sales impact of your marketing

Then focus on the ‘to what’ part. Your marketing needs to illustrate how your product or service transitions them to their end point. To the very thing they desire.

This marketing strategy is designed to directly address the wants (or needs) of your prospects and position your products or services as the answer. Almost no small business does this and amazingly few medium-sized businesses.

I strongly recommend you consider adding this strategy to your 2023 marketing plans.

Seek context before you move on

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You heard what the customer or client said, the words they used. That doesn’t mean you also know what message they were trying to convey.

In our normal conversations, this is no big deal most of the time. But in an important conversation, it can create major problems.

Imagine someone tells you their business grew by 15% last year. They might want your congratulations. Equally, they might want your commiserations. Without clarity regarding the context, your reaction and response could be way off.

Always get the context before you respond.

Have you seen what those liars are saying?

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marketing liars

Have you ever looked at the marketing promises made by your competitors?

  • Your most unreliable competitors will promise to deliver on time, every time.
  • Your lowest quality competitors will promise premium quality at low prices.
  • Your least competent competitors will promise a highly professional service.

And they’ll all have testimonials. Testimonials that are often the opposite of what a real client or customer will experience from them.

It’s horrible. It sucks. But it makes sense

After all, they’re hardly likely to admit that working with them or buying from them is a total nightmare. You see, the mindset that says it’s okay to produce low quality work and charge over the odds for it, has no problem being dishonest in other areas of their business.

What does this have to do with you?

Everything!

It has everything to do with you. And here’s why.

Your prospective clients or customers have been lied to before. This means the claims you legitimately make in YOUR marketing will only be treated seriously, if you back them up.

Here are a couple of tips to help you make the truth of your marketing a lot more believable.

One way to add credibility, is to link from your website to external (preferably independent) sources. For example, link from your website to external reviews or positive press / media coverage on news sites. Similarly, if you’ve been accredited by a respected organisation, link to the page on their website, where you’re mentioned.

Another way to add credibility, is to show up regularly with useful information, via a newsletter, a blog, a podcast or on social networks. By providing genuinely useful, informed advice, you demonstrate your knowledge. You also have an opportunity to show your personality. By demonstrating your knowledge and allowing your marketplace to get to know you, you create a potent marketing mix, which helps build trust.

Please don’t just find this advice interesting.

Do something with it.

When the economy is in bad shape, people think a lot harder before making any investments. This includes investing in the services or products you provide. Showcase your credibility and make the decision to invest in you as easy as possible.

A new beginning or oiling the keys?

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Marketing forward

In business, things have changed more in the past few years than they did in the previous 2 decades. That ‘old’ way of marketing your business, which you’ve been patching-up and trying to repair since before the economic crisis, since before the pandemic, is no longer fit for purpose. It’s too irrelevant to be adapted.

It’s like oiling the keys on a typewriter, in an attempt to compete against the productivity of a laptop.

Here’s a proven, vastly better way forward.

Give your marketing a new beginning

What I did with massive success for my clients during the pandemic, and have carried forward since, is to start their marketing again. A totally new beginning. I began, by asking them to answer the following question:

If you were marketing your business for the first time, based on the new economic realities and marketplace expectations, what would your marketing need to look like?

By answering that question, you rid yourself of the toxic baggage that’s holding you and your business back. You give yourself the freedom to perfectly match the needs and wants of your prospective clients or customers. You free yourself of the legacy mistakes that are currently working against you.

That type of radical improvement is simply not possible, when all you’re doing is oiling the keys.

Go!

So, go on. Imagine you are marketing your business for the very first time. Take a look at the all-new landscape your business is surrounded by. Now, match your marketing strategy, your marketing tactics, your marketing messages, your promises, your guarantees, etc., so that they’re exactly what your prospective clients want and need.

I can tell you from experience, get this right and the results are spectacular.

Content marketing topics to grab your prospect’s attention

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content marketing topics

I write a lot about the importance of being useful with your marketing. A number of you have asked me if I can give you some specific examples, which you can apply to your content marketing.

And that’s exactly what I’ve done in this post.

Their needs and your products or services

Start off by thinking about the services you provide or your product range. Then, consider the following topics (or theme ideas) and how you can incorporate them into your content marketing messages.

People have an inbuilt need to feel connected: Share ideas to help your prospects connect with useful contacts. The Wall Street Journal wrote about how I achieved this for one of my clients – 4 Marketing Strategies That Paid Off For Small Companies.

We also share a common need for a sense of belonging: Share ideas to help your prospects feel like an integral part of your business. I do this with my newsletter. From day one, I focused on building a reader community of prospective clients. And every day, readers contact me with questions, ideas, updates and concerns… knowing they will always receive a reply from me.

Everyone is trying to succeed at something: Share ideas to help your prospects achieve their targets, goals or dreams. Obviously, as with pretty-much every topic here, if you offer a specific product or service that can help them in this area, incorporate that into the content.

We all need to feel safe and secure: Share ideas to help your prospects reduce risk or feel safer.

Everyone wants to avoid wasting time: Share ideas to help your prospects maximize their time, or help them complete certain tasks faster, etc. I’m not a time management expert, but I’ve shared tons of ideas in this area, based on decades of running a successful business, without working crazy hours. The response is always excellent. So don’t be put off sharing from your experience.

People want to improve and expand their knowledge: Share your industry knowledge, sure. But ALSO share your experience with them. For example, if you’re an accountant, don’t just focus on tax, profit and loss or the latest business news. They can get that anywhere. Tell them the common factors you’ve identified in successful businesses. And the ones you’ve identified in those that flounder or fail. Your experience is extremely valuable.

We also want to avoid unnecessary stress, especially now: Share ideas to help your prospects feel more relaxed and assured. If there’s a specific product or service you offer, which can assist them with this, incorporate that into the message or idea.

Aim for unmissable

Are any of those topics missing from your content marketing? If they are, look for ways to incorporate them. Because this kind of useful, relevant information is the cornerstone of successful marketing. You’ll know you have the balance right, when your content marketing is SO USEFUL that people would miss it if you stopped.