Go figure, an unhappy prospect! I know, I know, we should be treating all of our suspects and prospects with respect, but this went a little far and has a good lesson attached to it.

So the email goes on to say that he sent an email promotion to his list of prospects that are on his newsletter list with a “Happy Holidays” promotion and discount. This prospect actually “opted-in” to his email list.

So my client is rattled. He has on prospect out of 800+ that have emailed him saying, “Please don’t send me any more of these sales emails. I am tired of being sold to and really don’t appreciate you sending me these promotionally emails all the time”.

Obviously had a bad day, no doubt. But here’s what shocked the heck out of me next.

My client asks me, “Should I keep sending email promotions to my list, it seems like people don’t appreciate it.”

And here’s where I lost it…and my response with a different name to protect the innocent.

“Hi Bob,

This is going to come across somewhat direct. That is the way I intended it.

If you are going to let one person that had a bad day stop you from achieving your goals and dreams you should go work for someone else.

I’m serious. Sales and Marketing your products and services is an honorable job. You create jobs. You support the economy.You have 1 prospect out of 800+ tell you to stop sending “sales promotions” and you want to hand up the towel?.

Don’t quit selling. Don’t ever quit marketing. And by all means, don’t let one single person or anyone for that matter get you off track. Insulate yourself from criticism and put the headphones on and keep doing what you are doing.

Your Coach,

Matt”

I bet Bob isn’t alone either. If you have a spouse, employee, friends, or families getting in your head put on the force fields.

NOTHING gets done until something is sold. NOTHING! I believe the business owner, sales person, and marketer is the most honorable job on the planet. If we don’t sell, nothing gets done.

Never stop marketing or selling. That is your number one job as a business owner.

To your success,

Matt

I remember growing up playing sports, I always had to have the number 10. That number was worth scrapping for I tell ya…

Something just felt right about that nice crisp even number 10. Well in honor of the number 10 on today 10/10/10, I had to pay tribute.

Wrapped in a marketing lesson of course.

Ok, so here we go.

The top 10 signs you need a marketing plan right now:

10.  You tell your sales team to go SELL…they continue to come back empty handed.

9.  You are starting to get a reputation as the “annoying pest” vs. the “welcome guest”.

8. You frequently get referrals from your best clients and you can’t seem to convert them consistently.

7. Your prospects ask you what you do and your response could be mistaken as your nearest competitor.

6. Your nearest competitor is “stealing” all the business in your area using the Internet.

5. Your Employees all have a different answer on why a potential client should do business with you.

4. You can’t define your ideal client in 2 sentences.

3. Growing your business is always on your New Years goals but it never seems to happen.

2. You don’t invest in marketing because you can’t define the ROI.

1. The Economy has changed forever. If you don’t have a marketing plan, you will get eaten alive.

I know, that’s probably not what you wanted to hear but it’s the truth.

The economy has changed, and if you don’t get a marketing plan and strategy together you are going to find your competitors building relationships with your prospects and leaving you behind.

The power of 10…

In honor of 10/10/10, take 10 minutes right now and get clear on the very next steps you need to take to get a solid marketing plan in place for the next 3, 6, and 10 months.

To your success,

Matt

I think as business owners and entrepreneurs we have a tendency to let our ADD get ahold of us and jump from one tactic to the another.

What I started to realize is that I need to spend more time developing each marketing “tactic” before moving on to some of the others outlined in my marketing plan. I haven’t been building each “tactic” out long enough to really maximize the results.

Glad I realized the potential now…

When I coach others I see this often. They shotgun blast from marketing tactic to marketing tactic. When that doesn’t work they move on. In my case, I have some things working now and generating leads but I am not maximizing their full potential.

Time to regroup…

My advice is build your marketing system one brick at a time and make sure you have tested, tweaked, and built some measurable results before jumping off to the next “brick” in your marketing system. I know it’s hard at times, but guaranteed to maximize your results. More often than not the tactic won’t deliver the resulst you want right away. You are going to have to test and tweak. If you don’t, you aren’t building a system.

Here’s a quick exercise that I did on vacation that will help you:

1) Take out a sheet of paper and write down all of the “bricks” or marketing tactics you are leveraging right now.

2) Highlight one (1) tactic that is generating results for your business. Determine with one with 5-10 hours you could really take it to the next level.

3) Get er’ done. Spend the time on improving this one marketing tactic in your business this week.

4) Rinse and repeat. Take the next one on the list and work on that until you have improved the results.

This is a very simple exercise. I am already getting new ideas on how to focus in and improve on areas that are already working. The good news is I am not starting from scratch which is for sure leveraging my time.

If you have a tactic that isn’t working at all, you might want to re-assess the effort and determine the return on the investment of your time.

At a bare minimum, identify one key area and “amplify” it one brick at a time.

To Your Success,

Matt

I realized this week that this is a real problem that plagues small business owners. You get so uncertain about whether an investment is going to pay off, you never actually try anything.

If that’s the case, all you have is hope. That’s not a plan to grow a business, or survive in this “new economy”.

Let’s just get this out of the way right now. FAILURE IS GOING TO HAPPEN!

You are going to make investments in marketing that won’t pay off. I had a campaign recently that failed miserably. No doubt it sucked. The good news though is that I learned something in the process. Had I not tried in the first place, I would have never had the discovery of what actually did work to generate new leads for my business.

You don’t have to accept failure, but don’t avoid it. The key here is measuring your investment.

Here are three (3) quick marketing tips to beat the fear of marketing failure:

1) Clearly identify your target. What are their needs, wants, pains, and frustrations? How does your offer address those?

2) Create a clear call to action. Add a special offer with a deadline. Create a reason to act.

3) Measure your results. If you cannot measure your results, you are flying blind. Create a custom link on your website to track. Use a specific phone number for your offer to track how many calls were made for each specific campaign.

The bottom line here is getting really clear, executing, and measuring your results. Test and Tweak!

this isn’t about throwing a bunch of money at a marketing campaign. You can start small, measure your results, then go big. But most of all, expect failure will occur, just be ready to deal with it and move on.

To your success,

Matt

Here is a quick quiz:

1) Do your marketing campaigns typically have one step?

2) Do you frequently move from one marketing tactic to another?

3) Do you frequently wonder why that email, postcard, or fax blast didn’t produce any results?

If so, you might be a promoter. There is a big difference between the two. Here’s why…

Your prospects are bombarded daily with marketing and advertising messages. Me too promotional sales and one shot pony campaigns don’t work, and they don’t generate results.

Educating your prospects, taking the long term view of cultivating a relationship and truly differentiating yourself is critical. Especially with social network and the ADD induced state most of your prospects find themselves in…

They can’t pay attention to the road while texting, let alone long enough to pay attention to your one time promotion…

It isn’t quite as easy building a true marketing strategy, but well worth the results.

You have a choice. Build a proven marketing system that works, or continue being a promoter wondering why you can’t generate more revenue for your small business.

Sometimes a little straight talk is called for…:)

To your success,

Matt

Did you say zero? Almost…

The worst number in business is the number 1. Here’s why…

If you are dependent on ONE source of leads for your business, you are already in trouble. I don’t care if it is referrals, pay per click (PPC), direct mail, or email marketing. Relying on a one source is dangerous, especially in this new economy.

Smart small business owners are realizing that the convergence of offline and online marketing is the WAY to build a marketing system to generate leads on a regular basis. More importantly, having the peace of mind that if they lose one lead or revenue source, they can keep trucking along.

Here’s how you can start moving your business in the right direction today:

1) Grab a piece of paper and write down all of the way leads and prospects come into your business today.

2) Highlight which of those sources produce the most results for you now. Ask yourself, “Does my business depend on one source for leads and new business?”. If so, move to step 3.

3) If you are in fact dependent on one referral partner, one lead source, or one tactic you need more sources. From the list you created, start outlining a list of more ways you could cost effectively generate leads for your business.

4) Create a plan. Now, grab that calendar and I want you to focus on building one lead generation tactic each month. If it takes 2 months, don’t worry about it. Just keep adding to your system, one layer at a time…

5) Pat yourself on the back. I know, it sounds corny but most business owners don’t get to step #2.

I guarantee if you take the five steps above, your business will be better off for it. More importantly, you will be generating more leads and business than ever before. As you know, it doesn’t happen overnight.

Through patience and persistence you will have a marketing system you can rely on, even in this economy.

To your success,

Matt

As we discussed, your local marketing will continue to “suck” if you don’t use the right keywords.

In this post, I want to give you a sneaky little trick to pull a list of really juicy keywords right from your competitors websites.

After the last exercise, you should have a list of the competitors you are competing with online in your local area. (Here is the link to that post if you didn’t read it..http://www.marketfin.com/does-your-local-marketing-suck/ )

Re-cap, after the last effort you should have a list of all the websites fighting for eyeballs in your local search space.

Ok, time for a little local marketing espionage:

Step 1) Visit your competitors website in your favorite web browser

Step 2) In your web browser, Go to View | Page Source

Step 3) In the middle of all the crazy looking HTML programming, look for the text that says:

“<title>” and “<meta keyword=>”

Each of these will be followed by a list of keywords that your competitors are using. Yep, right there out in the open. Pay attention to how they are used.

DON’T just copy and paste these on your website. You can use these keywords to maximize your results quickly, especially if yours are blank.

Many small businesses have a blank title or keyword tags. At a minimum have your web developer add those local terms that make the most sense. Including your business name as well is always a good idea.

Repeat this step for the top competitors on your list and you will be well on your way to competing head to head in your local online marketing space. You can use this keyword list for optimizing your website, integrating into your online blog or website content, and Pay Per Click or Social Media campaigns.

As always, let me know if I can help!

Go Target, Attack, and Profit,

Matt

Watch this video as Malcolm Gladwell discusses differentiation. This has many applications for your small business.

Enjoy,

Matt

Quite honestly, it is so good I need to use it more myself and make it a habitual response to a question many small business owners get on a daily or weekly basis.

Especially those of us that are heavy networkers.

Here it is…How many times does someone ask, “How are you?”, or “How is business?”. Quite often I imagine…

How often to you (or I) respond with “Great!”, or “Good”? Too often…

So here’s the small tweak, the one sentence that I have found first hand will generate more leads for your business.

Instead of responding with a simple “Great”, say this:

“Business is very good, but I am always looking for more clients who need <insert your product or service here>…”

Then, have the cards ready or better yet a referral card for them to hand out.

Very simple, Extremely effective.

Let’s make this a habit together.

To your success and prosperity,

Matt

I have small business owners consistently ask me how to generate more leads for their business. While these tips aren’t a shortcut to a successful lead generation system, they will kick start your efforts…

Here are a few lead generation ideas for your business:

Tip #1 -  Ask More Questions -  Head right over to search.twitter.com and start searching for keywords related to your product or service. Find those conversations that are already occurring and send a Direct Message to the person and ask them how you can help. Ask them what they like and dislike about your particular industry, product, or service. Focus on adding value to them. I guarantee if you make this a habit you will grab a couple new clients in the process.

Tip #2 -  Yelp! For Help -  Customer service sites like yelp are making it possible to eaves drop on your customers.  Although we are more likely to say things on the net we would not say face to face does not mean your customers will say it on your site.  Companies like Yelp encourage customers to come to their websites and lay at the good, the bad and the ugly of other companies.  You may find it worth while to visit these sites to find customers that are satisfied with your company and reward them or find customers unsatisfied and try to make them happy again.  Trolling these sites should defiantly be part of your market strategy.

Tip #3 -  Be a Connector – If you want more leads for your business, give first. Here’s what you can do. Target one business in your network that you think you can promote to your list of clients or even prospects. Send an email or highlight that business as a business of the month. I guarantee if you do this once a month, you will start getting referral leads back into your business like never before.

Remember, if you create value for others first you will always win. I am testing a few strategies using this technique. They are already yielding some great results. More to come on my little experiment soon…

These are just a few quick tips I thought will help you if you are stuck.

As always, let me know if I can help you. My purpose is to help you and your business make more money faster with proven lead generation and marketing systems for your business.