Many of the clients I do consulting for own brick and mortar businesses. They know that they need to have an Internet presence, however they are confused as to where to begin. Simply having a website is not going to cut it. In this article I am going to walk you through the process some of the major items that you must have when developing an effective on and offline marketing plan for your business.
Keep in mind I have no way of knowing the size of your business, so I am going to give you the general idea of what you need to do to make your marketing dollars work for you. It does not matter if you have a mom and pop diner or you own a successful dentistry franchise, the information in this article will save you hundreds if not thousands of dollars, and you can instantly apply some of the strategies to your business right now.
Why Your Current Marketing Plan Sucks
Make a list of what type of marketing you are currently doing, i.e. do you have business cards, fliers, newspaper ads, do you have a website etc… After making a complete list of everything that you are currently doing to get your name out in the market place, its time to analyze what you have.
It is important to distinguish your marketing goals. Are you trying to convert your leads into sales, or are you just trying to name brand your company, product, or service. In this article the marketing strategy I am going to focus on is geared towards converting prospects into sales.
Lets start with the gatekeeper or the person that answers your phone. When you receive a call it is IMPORTANT that you ask the caller how did they hear about your business. This is a form of tracking and will give you a good indication of what advertising method is working best for you. You should keep track of where your leads are coming from. Lets say that the majority of your leads are coming from an Adwords campaign. You can now begin split testing to attempt to increase your conversion ratio even more. When it comes to marketing you should always be trying to increase your results.
If you are advertising in your local newspaper or running television ads on your local cable company you will need a means to track your leads. You should ALWAYS give a call to action in your ad. You want the prospect to take immediate action by either visiting your website or giving you a call.
I already covered what you should do when someone calls, so there is no need to reiterate that point. If you are running a print ad, and you are sending the reader to your website you should send them to a landing page specifically setup for that particular ad. For example – lets say you were running a special on a massage therapy session. You will want to place your landing page in a sub-directory something like this – www.yourdomainname.com/msnad. There are pros and cons to how the naming structure of the landing page should be, however that is a lesson for another blog post.
Once the prospect visits your landing page you now have the ability to track the number of people who visit your page as compared to how many actually respond to your call to action and convert to a lead. Lets say for every hundred people that visit your landing page, one will follow your call to action. Once you have gathered a little statistical information you can now begin split-testing. Your goal is to always improve your conversion ratio.
Split-Testing Online
With your landing pages in place and traffic going to them – it is time to do a little split-testing. In order to get a landing page up and running as fast as possible I will build a quick landing page, with text, a few images, and a call to action. Once prospects begin visiting the page and I have gathered some information as far as the number of daily visitors, leads etc. I will backup the page and replace it with a new improved one. The change can be something as simple as changing the headline, to something as complexed as adding video. If my new page receives better results the process will start all over again with split-testing a new page. If the new page does not convert as well, I will put up the original page and build a new landing page and the testing starts all over again.
The Business Card Conundrum
People are always giving me their business cards, and I must say that the majority of them are designed wrong. If what I am about to say to you hurts your feelings, I apologize, however the truth is the truth. If your business card has a huge photo of yourself, and a bunch of numbers to contact you, go slap yourself in the face right now.
Here is the best advise that you are going to ever receive regarding marketing your business. When it comes to marketing there is one question that all of your marketing campaigns should answer… W.I.I.F.M. That stands for, “Whats In It For Me?” That is what your prospect is subconsciously asking themselves. In fact it is all that they care about. If you start to develop your marketing with that thought in mind you will notice and immediate change in your conversion ratio.
Instead of having a business card with a lot of useless information and wasted space try this – try putting a website address with a special offer, or instant access to discount offers etc. It will depend on what type of business you are in. You should also utilize both sides of the business card. I could go on, and on about the graphic design of your ads but that is also is a discussion for another time. If you have any questions you can contact me and I will be happy to answer them for you.
Developing A Marketing Plan Of Your Own
Do not dive into the marketing game head first. Every marketing piece should have its own landing page, and tracking in place such as Google Analytics. If you are not familiar with Google Analytics I recommend that you visit www.google.com/analytics and start reading, it is a must for anyone that has an online presence.
Use www.clues.yahoo.com to do some research and get to know your targeted audience a little better. Do not assume that you already know your market, this is a huge mistake that a lot of business owners make both on and offline.
Make a list of what motivates your prospect to buy products and or services. Answer the question of how can you solve a problem or need that the prospect may have. It is also important that you keep in mind that people love to buy, but they do not like being sold to.
Final Thoughts
Before you begin spending your hard earned advertising dollars, you always want to know the demographics in which the advertising will be distributed. I see many smaller businesses waste thousands of dollars using a form of advertising which is to large for their current budget to bare.
If your not utilizing the full potential of your website now is the time to take advantage of it. Use your website to generate life long leads by collecting the users personal information. This will allow you to market to them over and over again.
Tap into existing customers by asking them for referrals or giving them some sort of incentive to spread the word. Even in todays world of technology, word of mouth is still the best form of advertising.
And last but not least ALWAYS PLACE A CALL OF ACTION IN YOUR ADS.
Please take a second to leave your comments below regarding this article. If you love it… GREAT, If you think that it was stupid hey its all good, either way I want to hear form you!
Developing A Marketing Plan
Keep in mind I have no way of knowing the size of your business, so I am going to give you the general idea of what you need to do to make your marketing dollars work for you. It does not matter if you have a mom and pop diner or you own a successful dentistry franchise, the information in this article will save you hundreds if not thousands of dollars, and you can instantly apply some of the strategies to your business right now.
Why Your Current Marketing Plan Sucks
Make a list of what type of marketing you are currently doing, i.e. do you have business cards, fliers, newspaper ads, do you have a website etc… After making a complete list of everything that you are currently doing to get your name out in the market place, its time to analyze what you have.
It is important to distinguish your marketing goals. Are you trying to convert your leads into sales, or are you just trying to name brand your company, product, or service. In this article the marketing strategy I am going to focus on is geared towards converting prospects into sales.
Lets start with the gatekeeper or the person that answers your phone. When you receive a call it is IMPORTANT that you ask the caller how did they hear about your business. This is a form of tracking and will give you a good indication of what advertising method is working best for you. You should keep track of where your leads are coming from. Lets say that the majority of your leads are coming from an Adwords campaign. You can now begin split testing to attempt to increase your conversion ratio even more. When it comes to marketing you should always be trying to increase your results.
If you are advertising in your local newspaper or running television ads on your local cable company you will need a means to track your leads. You should ALWAYS give a call to action in your ad. You want the prospect to take immediate action by either visiting your website or giving you a call.
I already covered what you should do when someone calls, so there is no need to reiterate that point. If you are running a print ad, and you are sending the reader to your website you should send them to a landing page specifically setup for that particular ad. For example – lets say you were running a special on a massage therapy session. You will want to place your landing page in a sub-directory something like this – www.yourdomainname.com/msnad. There are pros and cons to how the naming structure of the landing page should be, however that is a lesson for another blog post.
Once the prospect visits your landing page you now have the ability to track the number of people who visit your page as compared to how many actually respond to your call to action and convert to a lead. Lets say for every hundred people that visit your landing page, one will follow your call to action. Once you have gathered a little statistical information you can now begin split-testing. Your goal is to always improve your conversion ratio.
Split-Testing Online
With your landing pages in place and traffic going to them – it is time to do a little split-testing. In order to get a landing page up and running as fast as possible I will build a quick landing page, with text, a few images, and a call to action. Once prospects begin visiting the page and I have gathered some information as far as the number of daily visitors, leads etc. I will backup the page and replace it with a new improved one. The change can be something as simple as changing the headline, to something as complexed as adding video. If my new page receives better results the process will start all over again with split-testing a new page. If the new page does not convert as well, I will put up the original page and build a new landing page and the testing starts all over again.
The Business Card Conundrum
People are always giving me their business cards, and I must say that the majority of them are designed wrong. If what I am about to say to you hurts your feelings, I apologize, however the truth is the truth. If your business card has a huge photo of yourself, and a bunch of numbers to contact you, go slap yourself in the face right now.
Here is the best advise that you are going to ever receive regarding marketing your business. When it comes to marketing there is one question that all of your marketing campaigns should answer… W.I.I.F.M. That stands for, “Whats In It For Me?” That is what your prospect is subconsciously asking themselves. In fact it is all that they care about. If you start to develop your marketing with that thought in mind you will notice and immediate change in your conversion ratio.
Instead of having a business card with a lot of useless information and wasted space try this – try putting a website address with a special offer, or instant access to discount offers etc. It will depend on what type of business you are in. You should also utilize both sides of the business card. I could go on, and on about the graphic design of your ads but that is also is a discussion for another time. If you have any questions you can contact me and I will be happy to answer them for you.
Developing A Marketing Plan Of Your Own
Do not dive into the marketing game head first. Every marketing piece should have its own landing page, and tracking in place such as Google Analytics. If you are not familiar with Google Analytics I recommend that you visit www.google.com/analytics and start reading, it is a must for anyone that has an online presence.
Use www.clues.yahoo.com to do some research and get to know your targeted audience a little better. Do not assume that you already know your market, this is a huge mistake that a lot of business owners make both on and offline.
Make a list of what motivates your prospect to buy products and or services. Answer the question of how can you solve a problem or need that the prospect may have. It is also important that you keep in mind that people love to buy, but they do not like being sold to.
Final Thoughts
Before you begin spending your hard earned advertising dollars, you always want to know the demographics in which the advertising will be distributed. I see many smaller businesses waste thousands of dollars using a form of advertising which is to large for their current budget to bare.
If your not utilizing the full potential of your website now is the time to take advantage of it. Use your website to generate life long leads by collecting the users personal information. This will allow you to market to them over and over again.
Tap into existing customers by asking them for referrals or giving them some sort of incentive to spread the word. Even in todays world of technology, word of mouth is still the best form of advertising.
And last but not least ALWAYS PLACE A CALL OF ACTION IN YOUR ADS.
Please take a second to leave your comments below regarding this article. If you love it… GREAT, If you think that it was stupid hey its all good, either way I want to hear form you!