Jim Connolly Marketing

What everybody needs to know about costs

By |

attract sales leads, attract clients

The price and the cost are never the same thing.

For example.

  • The price of a TV set can be a fraction of the cost attached to watching it. Some people who spend hours watching TV every day, find it costs their health, relationships or education.
  • Other’s buy a TV and find the price is an investment, because they limit their TV time, selectively choose what to watch and expand their knowledge.

The internet is packed with business advice, ranging from toxic to gold dust. And the stuff that seems like gold dust is usually the most toxic.

This is especially the case, with anything that claims to provide a shortcut to success. There are no shortcuts. Just direct routes.

If you want to make better decisions, before you decide to pay the price, stop for a moment and consider the cost.

Prepare for your website or blog to go viral

By |

business growing, how to

Something interesting happened on Saturday.

At around 8am, I published this blog post.

By 9am, I was experiencing a massive surge in traffic. To qualify that, the traffic was so heavy that I initially thought my site was under a DDoS attack.

But it wasn’t.

It was real people, visiting Jim’s Marketing Blog, in massive numbers… from Apple!

It turned out that the folks at Apple had decided to feature that post very prominently, in their Apple News app. So, for the next 24 hours, my work was being seen by wave after wave of people, who had never heard of me before. And it generated a record-breaking number of new client enquiries, for a weekend.

More importantly…

What does this mean for you and your business?

Business owners work hard to attract traffic to their sites. You may be one of them. If you are, how well prepared are you? What would actually happen, if your website or blog was featured in the news or went viral?

Well, if you’re like the vast majority of small business owners, within minutes, your site would become inaccessible! That’s because the typical hosting packages most people use, are not capable of handling the very success, they want their site to achieve.

Most basic hosting would grind to a halt if 100 people, let alone 1000’s of people, tried to use a site simultaneously. And with your site inaccessible, you’d lose all those prospective client enquiries or new readers.

Yes, the investment required for reliable, robust hosting is significantly higher. However, it means when your site hits the jackpot, you’ll be ready to reap the rewards. In short, if you’re serious about building a high traffic website or blog, invest accordingly.

Update: People have asked me what my hosting set up is. I have a dedicated server (Heart Internet), plus an additional service, which provides extra security and a way to deal with traffic surges (Sucuri).

Do this and you’ll never need to sell again

By |

attract sales leads, attract clients

Do you sell to prospective clients or do they hire you, instead?

That’s not a play on words. The difference is huge. In fact, the difference is what separates the most successful service providers from the rest.

For example, I haven’t sold my services to anyone in years. However, new clients hire me all the time. My marketing attracts their attention, then inspires them to contact me. No selling required. Ever.

You can do the same.

That’s how successful marketing works

It attracts enquiries from prospective clients, who have a need for your services. And because they’re approaching you for your skills and professionalism, something extremely valuable happens.

They position you in their mind as a professional with the expertize they need. They don’t see you as a salesperson. They don’t see you as a needy service provider pitching them. So, instead of feeling like they’re being sold to, they’re simply having a conversation with you, about what they need. It’s wonderful. It’s zero pressure.

And the difference it makes is huge!

If your current marketing doesn’t regularly attract targeted enquiries from prospective clients, it’s working against you. It’s placing a very low ceiling on your potential. It’s a source of unnecessary stress. Thankfully, it’s also 100% avoidable.

Attracting new clients doesn’t need to be difficult. It’s simply a matter of doing the right things, correctly. Right now, as you read this, there are people, in your industry who are already doing it the right way and enjoying the rewards.

You can too

It starts with the decision to take action. That’s a decision that most small business owners dodge. They don’t want things to remain the way they are, yet at the same time, they’re comfortable. So they put it off, because they just had a good week or maybe they signed up a new client.

Then 12 months later they wonder why their business has spun its wheels for another year!

There’s no need to settle for things the way they are. The expertize you need is out there. You just need to let go of the failing familiar, so you can grasp the rewards that are waiting for you outside your comfort zone.

Here are some really useful numbers for your business

By |

business development, marketing focus, numbers, planning

How will you know when your business is profitable enough?

How will you know when you’re attracting the right number of sales leads or new client enquiries?

How will you know when you have enough social networking contacts?

How will you know when you’re getting enough traffic from search engines?

How will you know when your newsletter, podcast or vlog has enough subscribers?

How will you know when your attrition rate (the volume of customers or clients you lose) is on target?

How will you know when you’re receiving enough referrals?

How will you know when you’re financially secure for life?

Put a number on it

In business, the numbers are essential. They allow us to measure our progress. They quickly let us see if we’re on track or off track. They show us if we’re being productive or just being busy. And they help us identify where we need to focus our resources.

If you have not done so already, I recommend you put a number on all the key areas of your business.

Then monitor those numbers.

It will help you move forward faster. It will help you avoid costly detours and it will also provide you with amazing clarity.

How to be in high demand

By |

It works like this. When the supply of something is limited, the demand is high. The more limited the supply, the higher the demand.

Conversely, the things that are most plentiful have the lowest value. They’re easy to provide. Most or all of your competitors provide these. As a result, they’re everywhere.

There’s a lesson here. A lesson that’s based on a pattern you’ll see in every high demand business. These businesses embrace the tricky stuff. The kind of things that are in short supply, because most of their competitors aren’t providing it.

There’s always a very limited supply of people who will.

Embrace the tricky stuff. Because that’s where the demand is. It’s where the best clients are, too.

Whose business are you building, yours or someone else’s?

By |

what is inspiration, what's inspiration

Image: Shutterstock.

Today, let’s look at one of the key factors in building a remarkable, profitable business.

Malcolm Gladwell was once asked how to write a best-selling book. His answer was as follows:

“The moment you write a book hoping it will be a best seller, your chances of it becoming a best seller go downhill. […] You write the book you would want to read.”

Gladwell on Steve Jobs

Gladwell then went on to explain that Steve Jobs never brought a product to market, because he thought the marketplace wanted it. Instead, Jobs developed products that he wanted to own.

Think about that for a moment:

  • Gladwell writes books that he would want to read. They are unlike any other books in his niche. In fact, the title of one of his books, Tipping Point, has become a widely used phase. And his books are also among the best selling non-fiction books of the last 2 decades.
  • Jobs created products because he thought they were beautiful. Jobs’ success with Apple led to his company being the most highly valued in the world.

There’s an amazingly wonderful insight right there. Something we can all learn from.

What’s the lesson?

If we want to create remarkable products, remarkable services and deliver remarkable experiences, we should deliver what we believe is valuable. What we believe is right. What we believe in.

Think about it: The only way we can hope to build a meaningfully different business is to tap into our uniqueness. To give the marketplace what we would value, if we were the customer or client. If we simply look at what our competitors do, then find a way to do it a little faster or a little cheaper, we become unremarkable.

When Roger Banister broke the 4 minute mile barrier, he was remarkable. The next guy, who ran a little faster than Bannister, wasn’t.

In short, it makes commercial sense to offer a meaningfully different product or service. Ship something that you value highly.