Sticking to the marketing norm will stunt your growth!
I once sat down with a non trade business owner and we got talking about business and marketing and I suggested he try promoting his business with flyers, he bluntly shot my idea down and dismissed it saying it wouldn't work for him!
I asked if he'd ever tried it to which I got the reply of no because it doesn't work! So I asked him how he knew, to which he told me he had spoken to a larger competitor who had told him it doesn't work......
A few months later I was talking to someone in the same industry and mentioned this, I got the reply 'that's how I get most of my business!'
Try different routes to market
So my moral of my story is that you should try every avenue of marketing your business, what didn't work for one business doesn't mean it won't work for you, there are lots of variables and so long as you do small manageable low cost tests.
On top of this you should try variations of the same marketing method, so if you want to try doing a flyer drop do 2 different versions of it with a different message on each. One may not work or work as well as the other, you may try an offer on one and none on the other to test the response that you get, then you can take the one that worked well and do a different version of that.
What marketing have you seen in a different industry that you can try in your trade or property business?
To your marketing success
Paul Jennings
A simple 4 Step marketing plan
Most tradespeople I speak to have no plan for their marketing, no plan means no direction to growth no way to get what you want from your business.
Churchill said 'Fail to plan, plan to fail' and this applies well to many things but very well to marketing!
Now if you have started your business as a lifestyle business, that's okay although the the stuff I put out probably isn't for you, however if you want to grow a real business and you've not got a plan and I mean one that's written down on paper (it's no good just in your head) then you have a lifestyle business, so this blog post is about getting that plan down on paper and the key things you need to create a basic marketing plan for your trade or property business.
Here are the 4 key steps you need to think about and have in your plan.
Step 1. Who are your customers and clients?
Knowing who your target market are, is really, really important and the answer here can't be anyone.
You don't want to be going to quote for jobs for people who want you to work for £10 an hour or those that don't understand the value you give them!
Build a picture of them and what they do, their interests and their family the house they live in.
Step 2. What will you tell them?
What is your USP, why should they use you and pay your price?
And more importantly can you prove that you can deliver what you say or do you have a guarantee that says what happens if you don't?
Step 3. How will you get your message out?
You need to detail how you'll spread your message, the actual marketing you'll be doing and you need to have many ways to market your business and be doing many things all at the same time not just one!
It may be Networking, Pay Per Click, Flyers, Social media, Direct mail, Blogging and articles or one of the many other ways to market your business.
Step 4. When will you do this?
You need to plan when you're going to do your marketing, you need to figure out how much time you're going to put into getting new customers and clients, they are the life blood of your business and what puts the food on the table so if you're not working on getting more you've got a stagnating or dying business.
So hopefully as you've been reading through this simplified marketing plan you've made some notes on your 4 step marketing plan, If not grab a sheet of paper now and write it down, strike while the iron is hot as they say and then follow through!
To your marketing success
Paul Jennings
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