Jim Connolly Marketing

Marketing tips and ideas to help you grow your business

The marketing power of being first

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Photo: Shutterstock.

I’d like you to consider the following, seemingly unrelated facts. They’ll provide you with a really useful insight for your business.

  • Although it’s 2022, we still remember Sir Roger Bannister as the first person to run a mile in under 4 minutes.
  • Apple became the world’s most valuable company, largely from the profits of its iPhone; the world’s first smart phone.

There are a couple of really valuable business lessons here.

When you are the first to do something, it’s talked about and it’s remembered for a very long time. We remember Bannister, even though Australia’s John Landy broke Bannister’s record just weeks later. Landy was faster, yet remained relatively unknown because he wasn’t the first person to go sub 4 minutes. The first person was covered worldwide in the media of the day. Landy was largely ignored.

Secondly, it doesn’t have to be perfect. The first iPhone was really buggy. It even lacked a basic copy and paste facility for over a year! However, it was extremely useful, compared to the so-called feature phones that preceded it.

You and your business

Here’s a highly valuable question to ask yourself: What useful adjustment or change to your product or service, could you be the first in your industry to provide (locally, nationally or globally), in response to the current economic challenges?

Here’s why that question is potentially of so much value to you.

You don’t need anyone to tell you that we live in very uncertain times right now, or that lots of business owners are struggling. However, other businesses large and small are innovating and inspiring their marketplace, just like they did at the start of the coronavirus pandemic in 2020.

Again, just as in 2020, the businesses that will thrive are the ones willing to adapt to the new, commercial realities.

It’s easier than you might think

Fortunately, you don’t need to reinvent the wheel. For example, an idea that’s common in another industry may be unheard of in yours. It just needs to be new to your locality, industry, profession or marketplace.

And it absolutely doesn’t need to be perfect. It just needs to be useful, based on the 2022 requirements of the market you serve.

The wrong kind of people

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marketing, prospecting

You can’t build the right kind of business, with the wrong kind of people.

  • If the wrong kind of people work for you, they’ll ruin your business.
  • If the wrong kind of people hire you, they’ll ruin your business.

The solution seems simple: Decide exactly who the right people are. And then intentionally hire, and market to, the right people.

The tricky part? Saying ‘no’ to the wrong kind of people!

That’s why the best time to hire someone is before you desperately need a position filled. And the best time to choose a new client, is before you desperately need a new client.

It’s that easy.

And it’s that difficult.

But it’s required.

Great ideas are not anointed

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marketing ideas

In business, great ideas are not anointed. They flop or fly based on feedback from your marketplace.

Sure, you can do a thought experiment. You can sketch an idea out and estimate what the possible outcomes might be.

The thing is, the only way to really know if that idea of yours will fly, is to try it. To put your idea in play.

Yes, do the research. Be sure to do the planning, too. But then you need to get moving. You need to take action and shift your idea from concept to reality.

Taking action requires courage, because once your idea is in play, it has the potential to flop. However, taking action is the only way to give your idea wings. And the best idea in the world can’t fly, without wings.

The lack of sales leads isn’t your problem

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get more sales leads, client enquiries

What do you think is the most common problem that business owners ask me to help them with?

It’s a version of this: “Hi Jim. I need to get more sales leads (or client enquiries)”.

However, in over 25 years of working with business owners, I have never met or spoken to one whose actual problem was a lack of leads.

Their core (or root) problem is always a lot more obvious and a lot more direct. It’s THAT core problem, which needs their attention.

Not more sales leads

Their core problem will be a need for bigger revenues and profits, or a need for more high-value sales, or perhaps a need for more high-quality clients. That’s their actual problem. Instead, they are looking for answers to their “more leads” question. And it causes them all kinds of frustrating challenges.

Their incorrect focus points them in multiple, fruitless directions. It also confines their thinking around one, solitary aspect of marketing. And it misses their core problem completely.

When I explain this to business groups, I use the following scenario.

  • Imagine someone owns a car and notices the smell of rubber whenever they’re driving.
  • Their core problem is not the unpleasant smell of burning rubber.
  • Their core problem is that something in their vehicle is either burning or drastically overheating.
  • However, they focus on getting rid of the burning rubber smell.
  • They decide to drive with the windows open, but that doesn’t work.
  • They decide to buy an air-freshener, but that doesn’t work. They then buy a few more and none of them work, either.
  • They decide to have the vehicle completely cleaned inside and outside. That doesn’t work.
  • They then decide to plug their nose. This gets rid of the smell, but they can taste the rubber in their mouth.
  • Finally, their smelly car refuses to start. Its electronics have burned out. And their vehicle is trashed.

Focus on your core problem

Then look for effective ways to overcome it.

Just to get you started, here are some useful questions I came up with (in exactly 5 minutes), to help you redirect your thinking to successfully resolving your core problem. Use them as a starting point and add your own great questions.

  • What adjustments can I make to my product or service, which will open it up to a new, massively profitable marketplace?
  • Who has already achieved what I need to achieve, and how can I get them to show me the way forward?
  • How can I increase my average customer spend by x%, starting next week?
  • What new, high value services can I provide to my existing clients?
  • How many ways can I think of, to increase my referral rate by XYZ%?
  • How can I motivate customers to buy from me more frequently?
  • What 5 money making lessons can I learn from [insert name of a successful company outside your industry]?
  • What are the best ways I can find to radically improve my client or customer retention rate?
  • Who are the people that my marketplace already trusts, and what’s the best way to get to know these trusted people?

And yes, one question would be about sales leads, such as “how can I attract more high quality sales leads, on a regular and predictable basis?”.

I hope that helps provide you with some additional clarity, as you plan to smash your business targets.

Marketing that sticks, is marketing that sells

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marketing that sticks sells, marketing spreads sells,

Marketing that spreads does exactly that. It spreads from one person to another. And by itself, it’s a total waste of your time, energy and focus.

REALLY?

Yup!

That’s because marketing that merely spreads isn’t necessarily marketing that produces bankable results. Clickbait headlines, cute / outrageous / funny videos, provocative images, newsjacking, etc., can all be used to make a marketing message spread like fire.

Without generating anything of value for your business.

Marketing that produces bankable results; (creates sales, attracts new clients, grows your market share, boosts your revenues and profits), is marketing that spreads AND sticks. Most business owners pay way too little attention to that last part.

Marketing that sticks?

Marketing that sticks makes the prospect pause to take action, before they spread it. If it’s online, at the very least, they’ll bookmark it or save it, so they can go back to it later.

Otherwise, they’ll place the order, make the enquiry, fill in the form, call the number… and THEN pass it on.

Yes, marketing that spreads is marketing that sells, but only if it sticks. So be sure to include a direct marketing request (or call to action) in all your marketing. And especially anything designed to ‘go viral’ or be passed around.