NetworkedBlogs
Archive for May, 2010
Building Your Business On A Solid Marketing Platform
Ask yourself these FOUR KEY QUESTIONS:
“How can I start seeing positive results from my marketing efforts and spend?”
“Do I feel that our current approach to marketing is delivering the results it should?”
“Who should I listen to when seeking practical advice on marketing?”
“Am I ready to do something positive to change the way our market works?”
A fast-paced, condensed, three-hour seminar presentation designed to get your marketing moving – we lift the lid on some of the best kept secrets in marketing that are cost-effective and key to business success, no matter what your size or budget. You’ll learn how to harness the latest technology that will make your marketing budget stretch futher and give you ‘more bang for your buck’..!
Delegates from our last event said:
“Nial’s presentation was inspiring and informative”
“He provided a clear overview of how to approach your marketing”
“Interesting, inspring and informative – 10 out of 10!”
“This event really gave me time and space to think about my marketing”
“A fun event that I’d recommend; helped me sort my head out”
“Helped to clarify principles I knew but didn’t know how to implement”
Business owners and those responsible for the ‘bottom line’ all know that getting results from marketing is critical to sales and creating profit. A core of any business, effective marketing is the front-end of the sales process and yet so many businesses struggle needlessly because they haven’t been given the best tools for the job, what’s more, they waste valuable resources; time and money, and are watching their profits go to their competitors.
If you missed the previous Seminar this is your chance to grab a FREE seat (worth £97) and attend ‘Make Your Marketing Work!’
21st June 2010
Holiday Inn – Norwich Airport
9am -12pm
Limited Seats
CALL OUR 24HR BOOKING HOTLINE TODAY – 0843 289 4082
[Just leave your name, email and return telephone and we'll confirm if you've been successfully allocated a FREE seat]
OR EMAIL – events@makemarketingwork.co.uk
I’ve noticed a change in people, have you?
With another Bank Holiday just gone and Spring in full swing, or should that be bloom, it’s a good time to remember that just about every business is impacted in some way by seasonal change and even the weather generally.
My father, who had the longest list of different jobs and careers you could ever expect to find, always told me to be aware of the seasons and what this means to each business. At first I was tempted to believe that this only really had an impact on businesses that were directly affected by the Great British weather. He was right though…
Certainly, if you have a business where the sunshine or rain has a direct effect, the changing weather will reflect in your takings. Running a coffee shop, for example, is great during the winter months when shoppers want to step inside to get warm again and enjoy a cup of freshly brewed coffee but when the weather warms up things change. The British public have fully embraced the ‘café culture’ of our continental friends and when the warm rays of sun shine we all want to be outside enjoying it and making the most of it, so a café with outside seating is essential these days.
However, I believe that the seasons have an even greater overall impact. The annual calendar does, without a doubt, affect various consumer conditions, even if this is only because of the impact of things like the start of a new tax year. We also keep that mental calendar in our heads for things holidays (especially if you have children) as well as things like birthdays and other important anniversaries. And even if our business doesn’t appear to have a seasonal element, perhaps the businesses of the people we serve do.
With a really enjoyable Spring following what has been one of the hardest Winters we have seen for some time, I’m sure you, like me, have noticed how the longer days and warmer sun has had a positive effect on the general mood and demeanour of the people around us. It’s noticeable how we respond to this and it translates into a change in attitudes, even if only slightly.
So, my point is this; have you stopped to think how the changing seasons have an impact on your business and , most importantly, your customers and clients. I often see businesses who plough on through the year with really very little consideration for the fact that seasonal change is something that should be taken into account. The retail market reacts to this with obvious changes to product range and offers but how aware are you that seasonal change can effect your business?
One very important element of marketing is also to be aware of topical influence and how we can keep our business fresh and topical simply by demonstrating our awareness of those things that influence others. I bet there will be a few bars offering a no-election night this week!
Most of all, enjoy the Spring, perhaps Summer is just around the corner!
Recommended Actions:
Look back over your trading figures and look for seasonal trends. Anticipate these ahead of time – it’s no good reacting too late. Consider how you can leverage seasonal change and trends and incorporate these into your marketing plan. Make sure your marketing messages are topical and connect at a personal level with your readers/viewers.
Why most businesses struggle with their marketing
And why your business should be boring and predictable!
For a little over twenty years now I’ve been looking at what makes a successful business tick and, more to the point, why it is that so many businesses struggle to get off the ground and stay aloft. For several years I was convinced that the only way to be sure my own business would be successful was to read every book, study every ‘guru’ and learn the hidden secrets that clearly eluded so many.
I also fell for the big lie; I now call this the M-myth… OK, Mr Gerber got there first but just as the ‘E-myth’ explains what holds back so many business owners (and it’s a must read!), my version, the M-myth, is a simple way to let you know that marketing really isn’t as difficult as you might imagine and much of what people believe about it just isn’t true.
Now, I know I’ll ruffle more than a few feathers when I say this but let me share something very important with you. Most of what you’ll read and hear about marketing, especially from the so-called marketing experts, is total bunkum. What a lot of marketing experts want you to believe is that marketing is actually a very difficult and complex subject and far too technical for the average business owner to understand.
The truth is very different. I believe (and have proved) that you can teach most business owners and managers the simple mechanics of good marketing practice and that these can be applied very quickly and easily. Above all, you don’t need to spend a small fortune. There’s no magic involved and there is a simple formula that can be learned and followed. You just need someone you can trust to show you how this works and how to apply it to your business.
Certainly, there is no getting away from the fact that a very large proportion of businesses, of all sizes and types, are wasting hard-earned profits, making unnecessary mistakes and losing out to the smarter, better informed competition. The big problem with marketing is that there are so many ways you can approach it and an almost endless list of marketing methods and approaches. This tends to be confusing for a lot of people; as a result they normally resort to doing one of two things:
1) Try to do what they THINK will work for them and spend time and money going around in circles never really getting the consistent results they want and never being really clear about what works and what doesn’t. Or…
2) Alternatively, they trust a marketing ‘expert’ who helps them spend money on feeling good about their business but still doesn’t really produce results that can be defined or, most importantly, replicated.
There are a couple of really vital things I’d like to make you aware of and can guarantee that if you start to apply this type of thinking to your marketing, and your business as a whole, you’ll begin to see better results and be able to build on this progressively. Both of these points were vital business components I learned from my mentor about ten years ago and I’ve proved since then how essential and valuable these really are.
RULE No. 1 First of all, make marketing the core of your business.
This radically changes the way many business owners think of their business. All too often marketing is an afterthought in many businesses. Let me paint you a picture; most of us go into business, in a particular field, because we have an interest, passion or in-depth knowledge of it. This is exactly what Gerber talks about in the E-myth. This is not wrong but what is vital is to understand that the core strength in your business is probably not going to be your knowledge of the given subject but rather your knowledge of business mechanics themselves. In other words; don’t focus on your expertise in making chocolates, selling insurance, designing IT solutions, or whatever it is you do; focus on your business skills first.
It’s shocking to consider that most people running their own business are doing so not because they know, have learned or have been taught about good business skills but rather because they are knowledgeable and have a passion for the subject of their business. Many business owners and managers actually know very little about how to run a business using proven and successful systems and processes.
Of all the business skills you need to learn about, one of the most essential (arguably THE most essential) is to know how to market what you have. If you cannot successfully market what you have, every other element of your business fails to have any purpose. It’s no good being the best salesperson if you can’t attract good prospects and potential customers. It’s no good being the best specialist in your field if you don’t have anyone to buy your products or services from you. It’s no good being adept at the management, financial control, etc. in your business if you don’t have a queue of people wanting to buy from you.
Many business owners will look at a way to outsource their marketing. If you make and sell widgets, or if you provide customers with a great service it seems obvious that this is where you need to focus your efforts but the fact is that everything in your business will flow from your marketing.
I’ve often come across business owners who tell me that they have such confidence in their brand and customer loyalty that they simply don’t need to promote or market what they have. Admittedly, a very few businesses are so famous, so unique, that they will always have a queue for their product/service, however this is very rare. It’s no coincidence that a large number of these other businesses have simply withered and perished during the last recession. You cannot, ever, be complacent about your ability to attract new customers, if you have no marketing platform, you put your business at serious risk.
My mentor shared with me a concept that your business should become a marketing business and in fact you should outsource everything else! That might sound a little too radical but I hope I make the point. Know how to successfully market what you have and you will always have a business that thrives and has the potential to be profitable. Invest in yourself and your business; learn how to market what you have properly and successfully, everything else will fall into place.
RULE No. 2. Business should be ’boring and predictable’
When one of my early mentors first told me this I was a little shocked and really rather disappointed; I wanted my business to be fun, exciting and a challenge that I could really get my teeth into. Then he explained more fully; your business should follow a proven system. Every business is a ‘system of systems’. You should know what happens in your business and learn that when you do something the result will be predictable. I’ve come to understand this philosophy and appreciate the simplistic beauty of it.
When you begin a marketing campaign you should have a resource of data and knowledge from your previous campaign and be able to build upon this. Each time you run a new campaign or exercise you can get a better result and continue to fine tune it. Just like a Formula 1 racing team, you don’t turn up at the next race and start making radical changes that you are uncertain about. You build on the experience you have and the business data that tells you what works and what doesn’t. This is something I’ve been applying over the past couple of years to email marketing; now my results are consistently 200-300% higher than the industry averages.
I know this concept works and I can prove it to you. Just about every successful business I’ve ever come across, worked with or engaged with as a consumer, has something in common; they have solid systems and processes that they follow every day. These aren’t guess work, they are supported by the evidence of success built up over time. So what about that new business that’s just starting out? Well, even better; if yours is a new business you have the chance to start as you mean to go on and build systems in your business that test and measure what you do and what results you get. Once you’ve got systems in place you can repeat these over and over again, continually fine tuning and refining your business. This will help you to ensure your business becomes ‘boring and predictable’ – and why do you want this?
- Your business should be systemised, then you can train others to run and manage the different components for you.
- You can actually take time off, step away from the day-to-day running of your business – do you have a business or a job?
- You can replicate and scale up your business when you have proven systems and processes – think of all the largest companies; from a coffee chain like Costa to airline like Virgin, a high-street bank and supermarket, they all share something in common, they have standard systems and operating procedures.
- You can build systems within your business that become part of the asset value and you can sell it!
KEY LEARNING POINTS:
- Don’t believe everything you hear or read in the marketing books – marketing doesn’t need to be complex!
- Accept that learning and understanding about business skills is often more important than the subject of your product or service
- There are lots of marketing methods and approached; you need to find the ones that work for you; you’ll need to test and measure to find this out.
- Don’t continually repeat marketing campaigns and exercises because you THINK they work; get the evidence from your results!
- Put solid marketing at the core of your business and build everything else around this, or outsource parts of the business that you don’t need to do.
- Don’t become reliant upon strong customer loyalty always have a marketing plan in place and use it.
- Build systems in your business, no mater how small it might be – scale up and replicate these for growth and capital value.
- Avoid radical changes and jumping around with ideas; follow a structure and build your business on it one step at a time.
And lastly…
Aim to have a business that’s boring and predictable - this way you’ll know what to expect, have control over your business and the ability to step away from it and enjoy it. Remember; you’re building a business, not giving yourself a job!
Resources; Michael Gerber on the E-myth.
Nial Adams