Small Business Development Blog

The Difference Between Marketing and Selling

Simply put, the difference between marketing and selling (or sales) is; marketing helps to create or find someone interested in your product or service (we can call this person a 'lead'), whereas sales or selling focuses on converting the lead (enquiry/expression of interest) into a paying customer/client.

Again, keeping things really simple; if you needed to put one measure or metric on each of these different areas of business (marketing & sales) to determine success (often called KPIs or Key Performance Indicators), I would say that the...

Marketing KPI = Number of Leads generated in x period (e.g. 1 month or 1 quarter or 1 year), and the

Sales KPI = Conversion Rate % from Lead to Client in x period.

Difference Between Marketing & Sales by the Numbers

A picture can paint a thousand words, right? Well, I'm betting a table will help out too...

Outbound Marketing - Direct Marketing Methods

Direct Outbound marketing is all about proactively contacting and communicating with a selected number of your target market, we could call them Suspects (an actual list of people from our overall target market that we believe are worthwhile communicating with). 

		Marketing Activity	Marketing Result	Sales Activity	Sales Result	Conversion Rate
Target Market	10,000					10%
Suspects		1,000				10%
Leads			100			30%
Opportunities				30		33%
Clients					10

So, in the above example let's say we wanted to get 10 new clients in a set period (e.g. a week, a month, a quarter, a year, whatever), working backwards using estimated (or previous existing) conversion rates for each stage we might estimate what will happen. We can also see what marketing effort & sales effort is required, i.e. the time required to execute and the investment required for all that activity.

e.g.
1000 Suspects all sent a Direct Mail Letter with a Free Offer & receive a follow-up Phone Call, designed to generate Leads.

10% or 100 Leads are generated and we send them our Offer (leads are people that show interest in our offer).

30% or 30 Opportunities are identified by a qualification process (so, basically 30 out of the 100 people are genuine 'opportunities' to do business, based on asking some simple questions about; need, time frame, & budget).

33% or 10 become paying Clients (taking 30 opportunities through the sales process 10 choose to do business with us)

Inbound Marketing - Internet Marketing Methods

Inbound Marketing is all about capturing a person's contact details, that is a person actively looking for your types of products, services, or a service provider in your industry, or information in your field of expertise (basically, helping people find you).

		Marketing Activity	Marketing Result	Sales Activity	Sales Result	Conversion Rate
Visits		2,000				5%
Leads			100			30%
Opportunities				30		33%
Clients					10

In our table of numbers we can replace directly marketing to a list of suspects, with website visits. A website's goal is normally pretty straight forward, and normally 1 of only 2 options; i) make a sale, or ii) generate a lead/enquiry. Now, most businesses and websites aren't e-Commerce based (as yet) so for most of you it's likely that the sole purpose of your website should be to capture a lead or enquiry. So;

Marketing Department - 1) Increase Visits, 2) Increase Leads by increasing Visit to Lead Conversion rate.

Sales Department - 1) Increase Clients by increasing conversion rate i.e. running a Qualified Lead / Opportunity through your sales process to convert into a paying customer.

Small Business Marketing & Selling

In small business it is important to remember this distinction between marketing and sales, largely because most small business owners do not have a huge team, in fact you could be the whole marketing department and sales department in one. Knowing the difference and what KPIs to use to measure results, will help you identify quickly what area needs to improve, to improve your overall business results - profits! The answer is never 'I need more clients', the answer should be, 'my marketing department needs to increase the leads we get from the current 10 in a week to 20'. Or, 'the sales department needs to execute tactics to improve their conversion rate from 10% to 20% within the next 3 months'. Do either of those things and if all other factors are equal you will then double the business! Right... time to obsess about marketing & sales skills!

Action Points

We identified 3 critical success factors (CSF) in the success of owners of small & medium businesses; Focus, Knowledge & Behaviour. So while this little piece of knowledge is useful, or the reconfirming of what you already know can be useful... it really is worthless unless you implement that knowledge, which is what CSF 3 (Behaviour) is all about. Behaviour is characterised by making great decisions and taking great actions from those decisions.

So, what Decisions are you going to make from this knowledge, and what Actions are you going to take?

Go for it!

 

Building a Customer Base for a Restaurant

How to attract, keep and grow a customer base for a  restaurant and any other business …

Building a customer base, and with it revenue and profits, for any business not just a restaurant requires selecting and implementing marketing tactics. Follow this simple process and you’ll be ahead of the pack…

Step 1 – LEARN:

Once you have read through the below process if you do not understand any terms, you may need to increase your knowledge, fill in those gaps by getting smarter and clearer. Read more, make a plan, take action. 

Step 2 – DISCOVER:

Figure out detailed answers to the below questions, get as specific as you can, write it down:

1. your location (city, retail high st, office park, mall, suburbs)
2. your product/service offering (sandwich shop or Italian restaurant or both and/or ?)
3. market positioning (budget, midrange, premium, or niche),
4. your target customer profiles (e.g. Bob the office worker for a quick sandwich at lunch, Jane the mid level manager to entertain clients at lunch, The Smith family of 5 for Friday night out dinning, etc), and
5. what makes you unique or different.. (i.e why would someone pick you?).

Here’s a tip: if you don’t like your answers, if they seem a little vague or boring or disjointed, then you likely need to improve what it is your business does and how you present yourself. It should all come together in a nice positioning statement.

Step 3 – PLAN:

Build a plan by selecting the appropriate marketing strategy & tactics. To do this you can review a number of different small business marketing tactics listed in the marketing tag of this blog, you’ll get shed loads of ideas. 5 quick points we would recommend would be: 

1. Online Domination: Use Inbound Marketing Tactics. If someone even thinks about searching for ‘Italian restaurant [your local suburb / area / Las Vegas]’ online you want your business to be the top choice. Do a test search as your potential customers online, what pops up, I bet a mix of direct restaurants & business directories & restaurant directories in organic search, … so you need to implement; PPC, SEO, getting listed at the top of Google Local Business (the Map the pops up now for any [profession + city or suburb] search), business directory listing (normally 2 dominant directories which could be nationwide, statewide or only citywide), restaurant directory listings (in most cities there are between 2 & 4 main players).
2. THE KEY TO ONLINE DOMINATION IS CUSTOMER REVIEWS: Just about all directory websites (even the google local listing) have the ability to review and rate your restaurant. Get this right and it will be self fulfilling prophecy. Get it wrong and you are in trouble. Presented with a choice of 10 businesses, if one had 40 reviews averaging 94%, another has 4 reviews at 99%, another 16 reviews at 84%... most people will pick the 40 at 94%. If you are not that business, damn! Tell the whole team, we now live in a world where every customer experience needs to be it’s very best… the more excellent reviews we get the more customers we get, the more successful the business it, the better environment it is for everyone working in / for a successful business! Ask customers to please review you online.
3. Customer Experience Improvement: Give people more of what they want! You can also get valuable information by asking people to fill in a quick customer survey when they come in or dine in. “What 3 things would you like to see improved?” etc…
4. Local Area Promotion: (drop flyers in every office within walking distance, with an opening offer that has high perceived value (cafes can do this by offering a free muffins with every 2 coffees, or something else… give perceived value …not hard value that muffin may cost you £0.15 or $0.25 to make but have a retail value of £1.5 or $2.5!)
5. PR: Whatever you can do to help your small business generate PR is so important. Free advertising is not to be ignored. Tell the world you have a cool new place. (PS: it had better be cool or nobody will care and no publisher will give you the time of day. What is ‘the story’ behind you or your business or your customers?)
6. Customer Details Capture: Use one or all of the following; 1) online booking form, 2) phone in booking form, 3) walk in form, 4) business card bowl for monthly draw, 5) VIP loyalty cards, etc. GET THEIR DETAILS. Required details; first name & eMail address.
7. Permission Marketing: Now that you have your customer details you need to regularly communicate via eMail once per month or so (also by mail if your businesses price point can handle that) to your database. Special offers, closed VIP nights, etc… make them feel special. What you are after is an increase in visits and loyalty.

Step 4 – CREATE:

This is where you or someone in your team or an outsourced professional ‘create’ any required components of the plan… e.g. (flyer, survey form, loyalty card, eMail template, greeting script, etc…)

Step 5 – IMPLEMENT:

Execution and implementation is EVERYTHING. The best plan in the world, designed from the best knowledge in the world, is worthless unless it is implemented. You need to take massive amounts of action. Do whatever it takes to get things done! If they are in your plan, and it is truly important… then nothing else matters more than executing the tasks required to make it happen.

Step 6 – RECORD & REPORT:

Business ownership, and effective management, requires the ability to manage data... to manage measurements. First you need to know what you need to measure and then set target or goal KPIs (Key Performance Indicators). Now you need to setup a way to Record your actual numbers and a way regularly Report on those actual numbers against your target numbers. Lastly if you don't like the results, what specific actions will you take to get better results for next weeks or months report!

Action Points

Building a loyal customer base is all about hitting a sweet spot with your target customers. If you hit that spot they will reward you with repeat business, referrals, and great reviews. So, focus on: 1) the customer and there experience, 2) but to build your business fast you also need to tell people about it… use promotion, and 3) you need to be easily found by those actively looking for what you offer… use inbound marketing.

Follow the process.

Go for it!

 

Small Business Marketing Techniques and Return on Investment, ROI

How to increase your marketing ROI by recording and reporting on quality information. Then selecting the best small business marketing techniques...

Marketing has got to be right at the top of the 'wish we could get better results list' for many small businesses and their MDs. News flash... marketing is about ROI (return on investment)! If your marketing techniques do not provide you with a return on your investment, they are crap!

For SMEs it is vital that marketing techniques deliver return on investment almost immediately, because without results in month 1, 2 or 3... you will not have any money to invest in further marketing. So, I ask you...

• What is your ROI from your marketing overall?
• What is your ROI from each of your individual marketing techniques?
• What is your acquisition cost per new client or sale overall?
• What is your acquisition cost per new client or sale for each individual marketing technique?
• What is your acquisition cost per new lead or enquiry overall?
• What is your acquisition cost per new lead or enquiry for each individual marketing technique?

Don't know the answers to these questions? ... Then how the heck can you expect to get better results? Magic beans won't help.

Hey, I understand it's tough... you're running a business, you're flat out as it is, you wear 5 different hats as it is. This is just another task to add to the to do list, or the nice to have list, right?

Well, no. It is now much much easier for small business to measure return on marketing investment. There is an army of savvy people and tools out there that solve this very issue. And that in turn will lead you to much better marketing results by selecting the best performing strategies and techniques. You see, what we are after is the right information.

Why Information is the Key

If you've been in business for more than a few years it's highly likely that you've heard the old saying.. "you can't manage what you don't measure". Now, most people nod their heads in agreement, but very few have all the information they need across all areas of the business. 'Knowledge is Power', another well known saying... for business owners and MDs quality (or the right) knowledge is the key to success. Quality knowledge comes from the right information.

The better the quality of the information, the better your knowledge is, the better your decisions are, the better your actions are, the better your results, the happier everyone in your team and life will be.

I found out a long time ago that if you want to deliver better performance in any area the easiest and first place to start is by recording and reporting on it. This instantly brings no bull facts to the table and draws the attention of everyone involved to deliver better results. This simple action alone has got to be my number 1 marketing or sales technique... Implement a Recording and Reporting System.

Small business marketing techniques

There is no magic list of small business marketing techniques which work for every small business wanting to get the maximum ROI. Each business should be unique and so you'll need to develop your own "[insert your company name] Marketing System" where you select the best strategies, tactics & techniques for your business. However, I'm not a huge fan of the typical marketing consultant / business coach or consultant default cover my butt speak like "well you have to test and measure". It makes me want to say... "Ummm, what about I take £20,000 or $20,000 from your bottom line net profit and tell you its all good because we are testing and measuring?"... This is mad, why don't we learn from others all around us that are doing well and thus we minimise the expense of 'test'. So... in this spirit, here are the top techniques I currently use myself and with clients to get RESULTS and max ROI;

• Marketing Fundamentals
  • Positioning Statement and USP
  • Lead Generation Offers (No Risk & High Value Offer that has the potential customer providing their contact details in exchange for something of value to them and permission to communicate with them)
    • eBook
    • Case Studies
    • Kit
    • Report
    • Online Video
    • Whitepaper
    • Events
      • Archived Webinars
      • Live Seminars
      • Live Webinars
      • Experience Days / Evenings
  • Lead Nurturing Offers (Engage the Lead in your content, company, and the experience your company/product/service is about so that they)
    • As per lead generation offer types listed above.
• Outbound Marketing
  • Direct Methods
    • Direct to Target Market (Only to high value very targeted suspect list)
      
      • Cold Calling
      • Direct Mail
      • Direct eMail
      • Phone, eMail, Phone
      • Phone, Mail, Phone
      • Telemarketing
    • Strategic Partners or Referral Partners (Only to those with high direct influence with your target market, or those able to directly provide plenty of repeat business)
      • Cold Calling
      • Specifically approach at Networking Event
  • Mass Advertising Methods
    • Public Relations
      • Awards
      • Press Releases
    • Networking Events
• Inbound Marketing
  • Website Enhancement
  • Landing Pages and Conversion Pages
  • SEO (Search Engine Optimisation)
  • SEM (Search Engine Marketing)
  • Blogging
  • Social Media
• Permission Marketing
  • Newsletter (eMail and/or Print)
  • Direct Mail
  • Direct eMail

WARNING! This list is almost worthless! That is, unless you do 3 vital things;

1. IMPLEMENT it,
2. Implement it well (there can be a world of difference between how you execute different campaigns using the same basic marketing technique, get it right or wrong...the results will show up in your ROI. You must use best practice to produce the best results), and
3. have a Recording and Reporting System to see where to focus your limited resources (your time, your staffs time, your marketing budget).

Successful implementation is ALWAYS the hurdle that stops small businesses improving results with marketing, but one of the key ingredients to overcoming this hurdle is to have quality information and your eye focused on it. This comes by way of a recording and reporting system...

Setting up Recording & Reporting for Marketing Return on Investment (ROI)

You can do this using a range of methods to suit any budget and level of sophistication required;

• Paper base manual daily/weekly/monthly marketing & sales recording sheets. Then reporting sheet.
• Excel spreadsheet
• Accounting software
• CRM software
• Marketing software

What should you record & report?

• The Profit Funnel - # of Suspects/Visits, conversion rate 1, # of Leads, conversion rate 2, # of Opportunities, conversion rate 3, # of customers/sales, total value of customers/sales, average sale value, total gross profit, average gross profit per sale.
• Marketing ROI, Overall - direct revenue from marketing campaigns, direct gross profit from campaigns, marketing expense, ROI (gross profit - marketing expense), ROI%, acquisition cost per lead, acquisition cost per opportunity, acquisition cost per sale.
• Marketing ROI, Tactic 1 - direct revenue from marketing campaigns in tactic 1, direct gross profit from campaigns in tactic 1, tactic 1 marketing expense, tactics 1 ROI (gross profit - marketing expense), ROI%, tactic 1 acquisition cost per lead, tactic 1 acquisition cost per opportunity, tactic 1 acquisition cost per sale.
• Marketing ROI, Tactic 2 - etc

Action Points

All of this above is just a part of what makes up what should be a clear map or system for how you conduct your marketing, an Integrated Marketing & Sales System. But, if you start with this simple tactic... start recording and reporting on your marketing information, you'll get better results immediately!

Small Business eMail Marketing

How To Run Effective Small Business eMail Marketing Campaigns

eMail Marketing Is A Powerful Way To Educate, Communicate, Build Trust, And Solidify A Relationship With Potential And Existing Customers. Start Using It Today!

Why aren't more SMBs using eMail marketing? It is one of the most affordable, easy to understand and effective ways to drive more sales for any organisation, yet the relative take up is poor compared with the possibilities. The answer is more a question of time. Where are you going to get the time for another task in an already busy day?!

At mimosaPLANET we've considered this and we have got some useful recommendations that will have your business running regular effective eMail Campaigns no matter what your situation, check it out...

So Here Are Our Recommendations?

1. Harden Up: Please, you can't find an hour or two once a month?! Come on! Heck, I do it weekly. If you're serious about getting leveraged results, block out regular time in your diary for the next 6 mths ahead to execute campaigns. You'll also need to select a provider or platform to use, as regular eMail doesn't have the tracking and reporting that you will require to be successful. There are many excellent providers out there, they do offer slight differences better suited to different businesses and situations, so contact us and we'll be happy to recommend a provider that suits you.
2. Outsource It: Ok, I get it, you really are busy. That's cool, sometimes it's easier to just get someone else take charge who knows what they are doing, right? So, LET US DO IT FOR YOU. We can work with you on a number of different engagement models that will have your business successfully running eMail marketing campaigns;
• a. Setup eMail Marketing: We setup an account for you with the best provider for your needs, upload your logo and select a format/template. You supply us some content, then we launch your first campaign for you and train you or a member of your team in the process. We'll even schedule a calendar of events and tasks for you to follow to take over from there.
• b. Managed eMail Marketing: You simply supply the content and the mailing list and we do everything else. We can do this on a per campaign basis or per month basis.
• c. Professional eMail Marketing: We handle everything, we plan a promotion or campaign strategy, we organise a copywriter for excellent content, a graphic designer for a custom banner, manage your mailing list, launch campaigns and provide campaign reports, whatever is required to make it successful with-in your budget.
• If outsourcing sounds like it could be the option for you, contact us to discuss further.
3. Delegate It: If you have an office administrator, a PA, a marketing or sales manager or assistant, or a spouse who handles stuff like this... get them on to it. So executing will be just like recommendation 1 above, but instead of ‘Harden Up'... it's ‘Smarten Up'! Get them to contact us for a recommended provider.

So, What About The Campaigns?

You can send an eMail Campaign about anything really, just be sure to follow regular marketing principles of TARGET, OFFER, COPY.... See previous marketing articles for more details. The easiest place to start by far is the monthly newsletter, simple yet effective. 12 eMails a year... that's easy right? Other campaigns might not be so scheduled, they might just occur when required. But the most effective ROI is gained from a calendar planned schedule of campaigns. i.e.

1) Monthly Newsletter on the first Tuesday of every month at 1pm.

2) Monthly Promotion, 2 eMails per month sent on the 1^st & 3^rd Thursday at 7am. Promotional product changes each month, so does the offer.

If you are worried about "being a pest by sending too many eMails", people will tell you when you are sending too much, they'll unsubscribe, so then you scale it back. There are some companies that send many each week, it's more about relevance, make your content relevant and interesting and you're onto a winner. Here are a few ideas for campaigns;

• Monthly Newsletter
• Weekly Tip / Advice
• Special Announcement (new product, new team, new service, new area, milestones reached, birthday)
• Event Promotion (workshops, seminars, trade shows, expos)
• Special Offer
• Product Promotion

One more thing; if you are unsure about the Unsolicited Mail Act / Law in your country and how to compile, we recommend you read a short guide or report specific to your market to answer all your legal questions about eMail marketing. But in short; 1) no permission - no eMail. 2) Give option to "Opt Out" of receiving further eMail communication.

This week's Action Points...

Make a decision which of the 3 options will work best for your business, then make it happen. Small Business eMail Marketing; you won't find a quicker, more cost effective marketing solution to increase your revenue. The ROI is a complete no brainer.

 

Open Days, Information Evenings, Closed Door Sales - Put On A Special Invitation Only Day/Evening

If You Have The Right Incentive & Promotional Campaign Your Customers Will Come, Giving You The Opportunity To Deepen Your Relationship With Them...

Fact; if you're in business you are trying to sell your product or service. Deepening your relationships with your best clients is vital for continued business success. So is nurturing relationships with your B grade clients that have the potential to become A grade. It doesn't matter if you operate in a B2B or B2C environment, running an invitation only event in the form of an open day, information evening or closed door sale is a great way to strengthen relationships and get introduced to new leads if you get your current clients to bring a friend. Learn how to pull this off successfully...

What Are The Different Types Of Events?

Open Day: Good to bring customers together where there is a benefit to be had from your customers meeting each other, i.e. A grade clients talk B grades into becoming A grades. Also great way to get your customer to bring a friend to receive ‘xyz' free gift, your customer gets a gift, you get introduced to a new prospect, most likely in your target market, and the prospect gets introduced to you and your company (and you can give them a gift too if you like).

Information Evening: Great for product/service launches or specific topics of discussion or a focus on particular product/service offering.

Seminar: 20 + people in theatre style seating. This is really more of a new lead generation strategy, long the domain of Property and Business Services firms. Why? Because it works. I've really just included this here to explain the difference between a seminar and a workshop below.

Workshop: 5-20 people in more of a training/classroom environment that is more giving and interactive than the seminar model which can reek of ‘hard sales pitch'. The workshop is about helping people and giving huge value. It is a great value add to your customers. You can run it as an expert in your product or service or get another industry expert to add value to what you do, showing you care more about a long term successful relationship with your client than a quick short term sale. The dollars you'll bank in your customers' emotional bank account will provide you with lots of loyalty and repeat business.

Closed Door Sale: This is a straight loyalty reward strategy. Basically what you are saying is... "because you're a past/current client we are going to offer you these extra savings or benefits to ‘Mrs Smith' off the street, come in and take advantage".

VIP Evening: Closed Door Sale meets Information Evening. Target a specific group of your customers who, for example, already use 1 product from a specific product line. Invite them to learn more about the other products in that line and receive a special offer. Your goal is to deepen the relationship so the customer purchases now 2 or 3 products from that line and gets more benefits than just purchasing 1.

How Do Make The Initial Decisions On What Type Of Event?

The Value: The event itself needs to provide value beyond the ‘promotional offer', that's just the bait to get some there. Without real value being offered no one will turn up. Ask yourself the following questions;

• What do my clients value?
• What do they want from me?
• How can I help them?
• How can I add value beyond the basic product or service I provide?

Answering these questions helps you build an idea of the type of event you will run and the benefit to your clients coming along. No benefit to coming along, no attendees. Here are some examples...

 

What Our Clients Need, Want & Value	Type of Event & Client Benefit
Our clients just want to make savings on purchases of our products.	Run an invitation only VIP client evening or closed door sale with event limited special promotions i.e. Buy 2 get 1 free on all products from the ‘abc' brand line for 3 hours only at this invitation only VIP customer evening.
Our clients want to get more value from the products & services that they have with us already.	Run an educational workshop on how to get the most out of ‘xyz' product. Clients get the the benefit of getting the most from their investment in your product or service.
Our B grade clients want to understand more about the product or services we offer before they can commit to more.	Run an Information Evening to advise on the current products, services, solutions they are using and the different outcome with the features and benefits with the upgraded solution. Get a current user (an A grade client) to also come to the event and share their experience and/or a third party Subject Matter Expert (SME) in the industry to provide solution insights.

How Do I Market It?

The Offer: Like any successful marketing campaign you need to have a powerful offer to get your target market to take action. i.e. each person will receive a free t-shirt on arrival.

Send A Direct Mail Post Card Invitation: Send either a Letter or a Post Card (best) as a personal invitation. People respond more favourably to an ‘invitation' than they do to ‘marketing'. Make sure you communicate the value or benefit gained from coming to the event, and more importantly the offer just for coming. You will get a much higher response if you send a postcard voucher for 1 free t-shirt redeemable on attendance of the event than if you simply send a letter saying "come along to my event it'll be great".

Promote At Each Client Touch Point:

• At normal sale time, on the phone or face-to-face interactions.
• At fulfilment time, i.e. when you finish delivering a product or service.
• With invoices and statements.

Send eMail Event Invites:

• 3 weeks out - First Mailing, target those likely to come (i.e. those who live in the area).
• 2 weeks out - Second Mailing, re-mail to those that didn't RSVP, give them a deadline, i.e."RSVP by [Date 4 days from mailing]".
• 1 week out - Third Mailing, communicate urgency to act now, i.e. "RVSP Now - We only have room for the first 40!"
• 2 days before - Reminder Mailing, remind your guests 2 days before the event.

Phone Reminder:

If the numbers are small enough and you have the resources, I strongly recommend calling everyone that RSVP'd the day before the event. No shows are normally as high as 50% for events like this, but if you make a personalised call to person you are likely to reduce no shows to 20%. Make sure you prove value on the call, and to get this value the client just has to come!

The Event

Just keep thinking and asking yourself when you are planning the event... "am I'm giving great value at this event, will people rate it a 8 or 9 out of 10 or only a ‘take it or leave it' 5 out of 10?". Deliver value and you will deepen the relationships with your current customers and they will become more loyal and spend more with you. This whole strategy is about increasing the life time value of your customers through giving them more value. Life time value extends beyond how long a customer stays with you; it incorporates how much they spend each transaction or each year and keeps extending to how many new customers referrals they bring you by becoming an advocate for your company. The goal.... Increase the % of your customers that qualify as advocates. If you have an army of customers out there telling the world just how wonderful you are, that's about the most powerful marketing you could ever have.

To make your event a success, run an internet search under ‘running a successful event' or similar. You'll find lots of checklists and tips.

This week's Action Points...

Setup a regular schedule of events, start by having a quarterly event and you can assess if you need to increase the frequency once you have a few successful events underway. Good luck, ps invite me and I'll give you an honest feedback on your marketing.

 

Product of The Week or Month - Educate And Communicate About All Your Products

Have A Product Of The Week Or Month To Increase Repeat Business...

This is a really simple way to begin to systemise your marketing approach. After all, marketing is basically just educating people about you, your company, what makes you different, why I should use you, and your products & services. Education needs to be done through a communication channel or medium. With an ongoing product of the week or month campaign you can keep your customers informed at every touch point. Here's how easy this is to setup...

First; Desired Outcome

What is the specific reason you will launch this campaign? What is your specific target?

• a) 10% increase in the overall revenue
• b) 10% increase in the number of overall transactions/orders/visits
• c) 10% increase in the number of unit sales of each product highlighted

Second; Pick A Starting Product To Highlight

If you sell heaps of one product but not much of another, is it because your customers don't need it/want it or do they just not know you sell it and actually do buy it, but from someone else? This is a big question, and it's quite different to the sales strategy of cross-selling other products when making a sale. Product of the Week or Month is a Marketing Promotion strategy designed to educate people (mainly customers and prospects) about your other products and services they may not know you have.

Now, you can get really good at this over time with improved technology and systems to send specific ‘product of the week/month' communications to a specific group of your database based on segmentation criteria. But, heck day one, let's keep it simple and start by communicating one highlighted product or service two all of your customers and prospects. Pick a product which is likely to have high appeal to your customers but you don't sell many of them.

Third; Educate What?

Move from Features to Benefits... and ultimately toward describing the Experience the product or service creates. Here's an example of the difference between features, benefits and the experience.

Example Feature: This car has Independent Rear Suspension (IRS).

Example Benefit: IRS will ensure your vehicle stops faster and has superior handling making it the safest car in its class; that means you and your family can be assured and safe in all driving conditions.

Example Overall Experience: A luxury family sedan that for the first time brings style and safety together without compromise, making the ‘XYZ' Zoom a desired vehicle that'll have style setters in a class of their own on safety... You'll turn heads and hold cutting edge conversation.

Of course, you'll not present is in this headings fashion, but you get the idea of what to either talk to customers about or use as copy for written communications.

Fourth; Select Communication Mediums & Frequency, Create Collateral

The more the merrier could never be true. Cross-platform is the technical term, the idea is to link marketing communications from different mediums to drive the message home to effect a positive action like a purchase. i.e. Communications using an eMail, a Direct Mail piece, in-store promotion stand, flyer with invoice, in-bound call waiting message, flyer with sale call, in the monthly newsletter, website home page highlight, etc...

I'd recommend using each of the above platforms, or as many as possible, this way you can communicate with your customers at each normal touch point, about ‘the product of the month' (like a flyer with invoice) and in other more proactive direct ways (like a specific eMail ‘Product of the Month highlight'.

The great news is, you can use much of the same content for each medium. This content will form collateral and you or a member of your team can create basic collateral, but if you want to represent your brand in the best way use a graphic designer for best results. Make an attractive Offer for maximum response.

Fifth; Test Campaign ROI

Is this going to work or are you wasting your time and money?

At the start you won't know at all what the response will be; you'll build stronger projection power in time... at first just run the numbers and ask is this likely or not?

Parent Campaign Name:                       Product of the Month
Campaign Name:                                 Product of the Month-Aug08
Company Name:                                  ‘XYZ' Ltd
Month:                                                Aug08
Product of the Month:                            XYZ' Blah
Communication Mediums & Freq:            eMail:                        3x500 (1^st week, 3^rd week, 4^th week)
                                                          Direct Mail:                 1x2000 (1^st week)
                                                          Flyer with Invoice:        300(based on average # of inv pmth)
                                                          Website Page Update:  n/a
Total Investment:                                  $2000
Product Price:                                      $395
Product Gross Profit:                            $235 ($395 - cost of product at $160)
Break Even Units:                               9 ($2000 / $235 = 8.5 = rounded to 9)
Desired Outcome:                                10% increase in total # of XYZ Blah units sold in Aug/Sep/Oct
Last Year's Aug/Sep/Oct unit sales:      160 (previous period XYZ Blah Sales)
Target Unit Sales:                              16 (160 x 10%)
Target Campaign GP:                            $3760 (16 x $235)
Target Campaign ROI:                           $1760 ($3760 - $2000)
Target Campaign ROI%:                        88% ($1760 / $2000 = 0.88) 

So the question then becomes is it likely that you will hit 9 extra sales to break-even? If so the campaign is an investment. So let's look at some possible outcomes based on conversion rates;

Direct Mail Responses:                                  20 (at 1% x 2000)
Direct Mail Sales:                                          5 (at 25% x 20)

eMail Open Rate:                                          225 (55% x 500)
eMail Click Through Rate:                              45 (20% x 225)
eMail Response Rate:                                    5 (11.1% x 45)
eMail Sales:                                                  3 (60% x 5)

Flyer with Invoice Responses:                         12 (4% x 300)
Flyer with Invoice Sales:                                 3 (25% x 12)

Website Page Responses:                               2 (0.2% x 1000 unique visitors pmth)
Website Page Sales:                                       0 (20% x 2)

TOTAL Responses:                                         39
TOTAL Conversion Rate:                                 28%
TOTAL Unit Sales From Campaign:                   11
TOTAL ROI:                                                   $585 ((11 x $235=$2585)-($2000))                                             

Sixth; Implement Campaign

Talk to your team and make it happen.

This week's Action Points...

This is a quick process to maintain each week or month once it is setup, and even the initial setup is quick, so set a launch date for week/month 1.

 

Subscriptions, SLAs and Preferred Supplier Agreements - Increase Repeat Business With Contracts

How To Effectively Communicate Subscriptions, Service Level Agreements, & Preferred Supplier Agreements To Your Customers & Prospects...

There is a very good reason larger organisations do not follow the same guideline range that small businesses do to determine the value of the business (normally a multiplier between 0-5 x EBIT = goodwill). Larger organisations can be seen ranging from 5-50 x earnings. Why?

The higher the multiplier, the more likely it is that the future profit of a business will be solid. One very effective way you can increase repeat business and the multiplier, which influences the value of your business, is by getting your customers to commit to a contract. Here's how...

Just About Every Person or Business Is a Customer On a Contract With Someone, I Bet You Are, ... So Why Don't You Sell Them?

Hey look, maybe you do sell them already, but there is probably room for improvement, right? The point is, most people or businesses have a contract with another business, i.e. a mobile phone provider for 12/24/36mths, a landlord for 5 years, a utility company in perpetuity, computer or car lease for 36mths, software for 24mths, a newspaper for 12mths, etc.

All these situations are just common place and accepted normal business practice. What it provides each of these companies with is guaranteed repeat business. They make the sale once and get paid each month for it, or all upfront for a whole year sometimes. They don't have to try and entice the customer to come back and make another sale. This is a very profitable way to do business.

With larger organisations, no matter what their industry is, they realise the value in having certainty about future sales, profits and cash-flow. This certainty can be delivered by; Subscriptions, Service Level Agreements (SLAs) and Preferred Supplier Agreements (PSLs). Even if your business is retail, you can't discount this approach. It can be a little obvious to see how this works for the big service based companies above, and I can understand how sometimes it's a little hard to believe that people would commit to your business in a similar way. Especially for retailers, but even retailers solidify their companies future earnings through repeat business in the form of loyalty and reward programs.

Here are some examples of what different industries can do;

Retail/ Wholesale/Distribution/ Manufacturing:

The lines between what is retail, wholesale, distribution and manufacturing can be blurry with many doing two or all of these classifications using direct channels and merchant channels, but here are some basic examples;

Subscriptions; Most people have a subscription to something. Magazines, newspapers, virus protection.

Preferred Supplier Agreements; stationery, photocopiers, mailing. A PSA is a contract that limits the customers options, if not removes them all together, from using another provider.

Service Level Agreements; firms that manufacture products can look to greatly increase revenue and ensure repeat product sales if they have a "Services Division". At the lowest form these are sold as ‘product warranties' i.e. 3 yr warranty, where the regular warranty of a product is just 1 yr. Think the consumer appliance market. Other examples include products sold to other companies that often have the option of a support package.

A SLA outlines quantified levels of service a company is promising to give to a customer, for a set rate, for a fixed period with xyz conditions. The benefit to the company is ongoing repeat business from the one sales effort for 1, 2, 3, 5, 10 whatever years... giving predictable future earnings and cash-flow. Often in larger B2B situations a condition is the customer has to use the company/provider exclusively. The benefit to the customer is guaranteed better service at a lower rate and predictability to cash-flow.

Trade Services (Builders, Electricians, Plumbers):

Maintenance Agreement; regular scheduled preventative maintenance servicing to a site or group of sites or installed equipment or client owned equipment.

Professional Services (Lawyers, Accountants, Consultants):

Service Level Agreement; agreed levels of service delivery like time frame acknowledgement, response & turnaround. Plus the amount of work covered, extra work at reduced rates %. All covered by a fixed monthly amount to make cash-flow easy and predictable for a set term. e.g.  A customer or prospect of ‘abc' law firm that signs a 12mth fixed fee agreement of $3000pmth, will get direct and unlimited phone calls and emails to a partner in the firm and a guaranteed same day response, and priority turnaround on all work, plus receive up to $3500 billable hours per mth.

Find The Value In Your Business?

In truth, there are no rules, you can take a concept from one industry and apply it to another. You can take a common practice from large firms in your industry that deal in a different market space and apply them to your market space.... Or you can keep your existing offering to your current market and target the next market up the ladder (bigger dollar value sales) with a new contract offering (SLAs, etc).

Look for the value, in what you do! The value is not in the product or service you provide, the value is in the outcome it achieves. Write out the outcome from your products or services. Write out the desired outcome, check with customers to make sure you have this correct. If there is a difference you have work to do to close the gap.

How To Communicate An Agreement?

To achieve a desired outcome, you need a solution. Move from selling products and services to providing solutions! This is not just a play on words, it is a company and brand; strategy, direction, and position. To achieve this position start by making solutions simple for yourself and your prospects or customers by ‘packaging' these solutions for different situations. i.e.

• Regular Support; $45 per month for people that are light uses of your product that want to have peace of mind that they can call when the odd hard situation arises they can't deal with.
• Premium Support; $75 per month for heavy users of your product that want to be able to get priority help for complex issues that arise often.

Notice how each solution has a name, it has a fixed price (it will also have conditions on what you get for that... let people compare the two options), it highlights the situation light or heavy users, and it explains the outcome the solution provides. This is how to effectively communicate your agreement.

Obviously for many businesses and customers such a relationship for an agreement will need to be customised and is likely to be different and often negotiated. The key word is RELATIONSHIP! I can just hear some of you now saying "I already have a relationship with my customers and many use us every month, and others just use us ad-hoc, when they need it, we can't lock them into a contract, they just won't sign it". Yes, true... but what does this mean as a relationship? It means each customer you have sits on a relationship scale, a loyalty ladder if you like, at the top of the ladder are customers that have you have signed agreements with that get great value and are raving about you. At the bottom customers you've sold to once and don't have their details or keep in touch with and you'll probably never see them again..... and everything in between.

Your goal is to drive customers to the top of the relationship scale where in B2B you become partners in their success. In B2C you become vital them living their life how they want.

B2B: Solutions for business success.

B2C: Solutions for need, desire and want fulfilment.

Position your solution appropriately.

Closing An Agreement?

Read some of my past articles on sales and go and buy a few sales books (they all teach similar principles). The only way to ‘close the deal' or ‘make the sale' is by understanding why people buy and why they don't buy. Learning about sales psychology is not deception and trickery, it's smart business sense. If you're alive, you're a sales person, why not be a good one?

This week's Action Points...

FIND YOUR BUSINESSES TRUE VALUE to unleash the better business you've promised yourself and family.

 

Communication Campaigns Timetable - How Regularly Do You Contact Your Past Customers?

 

Stop Attrition & Boost Your Customers Annual Spend

I know that you've heard you need to keep in contact with your customers every 90 Days or you risk losing them through indifference. You will probably agree that it would be a good idea to run with this strategy in your business, in some way of another... i.e. letter, email, phone call, event, meeting, or visit.

The real issue is executing this strategy. Setting it up and most importantly maintaining it. Learn the keys to making this work for your business to stop customer attrition and increase annual customer spend...

What Are The Options?

Contact Channels:

• Post
• eMail
• Phone Call
• Fax

Communication Reasons:

• Happy Holidays (New Year, Easter, Christmas, etc)
• Happy Birthday
• Thank You for being a client
• Thank You for paying on time
• Company News
• Company Events
• Special Offers and Promotions

Some Common Communication Strategies:

• Regular Newsletter (Daily, Weekly, Monthly, Quarterly)
• Direct Mail Letter (Monthly or Quarterly)
• VIP Client Day (Quarterly, 6mthly)

Campaign Success Considerations:

• Target: Who are you sending this to? All past clients you have details of, only clients from the last 2yrs, only those you haven't heard from in 1 yr or more, etc?
• Offer: What is so valuable that a past customer just has to respond? What is a powerful offer?
• Copy: What are you going to say? What are you communicating? With what purpose?
• Call to Action: What do you want them to do specifically?

Desired Outcome:

• Inform (on company, on products, on services, on case studies, on industry)
• Educate (on niche)
• Build Relationship by Helping, Assisting, Congratulating, or Thanking
• Response to which channel (ph, return post, fax, email, website)
• ‘x' number of new opportunities to make a sale from camp
• ‘x' number of new sales

Create a Simple Plan Using a Calendar & a 1 Page List

The easiest way execute regular communications to your customers is to start with a small number of communications campaigns on a regular timetable; Just start with 1 campaign type, once you've nailed the basics just add more campaign types. Ultimately you can start to communicate more relevant information... I'll tell you how to do this in an upcoming article. From day one though this is the process...

1. Get your calendar out and set a ‘launch date' for the first campaign 3 weeks from now.
2. Decide on the details of this 1 campaign.... what channel, reason, strategy, frequency, campaign considerations, and outcome. Use the above information to help. Start with the desired outcome first, as each other option is determined from your desired outcome. Write this down... you are now creating a simple document to support this campaign for the next time you do it.
3. Then mark out the next date on the calendar, and the next, etc... for the next year. Tip: Use a computer and /or phone and mark a 3 week reminder for each of the next campaigns.
4. Make a decision; who will create the content (i.e. direct mail letter, newsletter template, newsletter articles, phone scripts, etc whatever is required by your selection of options from step 2 above. For each part required, who will it be? You, a member of your team, a graphic designer, a copywriter, a business development specialist, etc...). You will find you need to do two things to make sense of this;
   • Write a list of tasks.
   • Write a name next to each task.
5. Now that you've figured out who is doing what, you simple create deadlines for each task and communicate to all involved. 

This week's Action Points...

"Time" is an easy excuse to use for not doing this, we're busy, right? But doing this could actually save you time; the time that you might be using to find new business. By focusing on maximising the relationship with existing contacts you can have a very profitable business in a short amount of time. So set the date and proceed.

 

Public Relations - Do You Have An Ongoing PR Strategy?

Attract New Leads By Getting Regular Messages Delivered In  The Media

In today's article, the last in our month of Interruption Marketing strategies designed to generate new leads, we discuss PR. Few small businesses think proactively about Public Relations, but if you could get your company's story, situation updates (people and products), key messages, and favourable customer experiences all delivered to your target audience for no cost, wouldn't you want to use this strategy?

So What Is PR?

It's pretty straight forward really; PR (Public Relations) as a profession is the practice of managing a company's communications, it is wide reaching and covers internal and external communications and information flow. As a marketing strategy for new lead generation for small and medium businesses (SMBs), PR can best be used easily in the following four sub areas;

• Press Releases: Getting an article written about your business and then having it published in the local newspaper, the daily newspaper, TV news or current affairs show, or radio requires a ‘story' that is news worthy. A story that is news worthy provides mountains more credibility that an advert. The audience's natural perception, right or wrong, is that this company matters, it's something special... it got in the news.
• Awards Events: Becoming a finalist in an industry award provides plenty of opportunities for a positive message to be communicated to many audiences. Awards also build credibility.
  • First you get the opportunity to communicate (in person, by eMail, by letter) to your customers, suppliers and contacts that you are a finalist in the ‘xyz awards' for ‘abc category'.
  • Second, you also get to expose your business to new audiences. You see, most awards are sponsored by one or many companies. These companies want the exposure that the association with the awards event brings. They often communicate messages of congratulations in wider media, and to their customers mentioning the finalists.
  • Third, it is a news worthy story... you can send out a press release about it to get an individual article in relevant media published.
• Expert Positioning: Why is it that people consider authors, public speakers, and regular columnists as people with credibility and naturally give them more attention that others in the same field. A perception can be quickly built, and solidified over time, of a perceived expertise....that person can become "the expert".... the person to go to first in that field. There is nothing stopping this being you and your company. Here's how...
  • Write a book.
  • Write an article and contact an editor (of any media, magazine, daily newspaper, etc) about having a regular advice column.
  • List in directories as a public speaker for conferences as an expert in whatever your field is.
  • Create a list the associations that you, your suppliers, your referral partners, and your customers are or should be members of, then ring the presidents or event coordinators and setup a meeting to become a quest speaker in your field of expertise.
  • Post 3 answers daily to forum questions. Find the best online forum to reach your audience and commit to either adding comments to posts or starting posts every day.
• Online Community Building: Online communities include the large sites built for social networking, like facebook, or specific niche community sites, or even sites built by companies as a marketing strategy... they provide a niche community with value but behind the scenes it is a way to educate consumers about that companies specific brands, products, and services.

The goal of online community building is to communicate to each segment in a way that is most relevant to them. Mass marketing strategies of the past communicated the same message to everyone. Now with the increase of media fragmentation and the ability of anyone to find information and even participate in content creation (user generated content) in many different places, communication needs to be relevant. And with the internet it can be.

Let's say your business provided Financial Advice & Planning... This way you could market (communicate) to the youth market (18-30) by launching a new product targeted at 18-30 and communicate & educate about the benefits of starting saving early, compound interest etc through a facebook profile.... You could then communicate in a different way, with a different message to a different audience, eg baby boomers on your own purpose built retirement site, setup to help baby boomers retire.

How Do I Get PR Working For My Small Business?

Press Release Execution Options:

• Get a PR agency to plan and manage everything. Awesome if you have the budget.
• Get a professional news release company to write an article each month (they'll find the ‘story' and the latest new worthy info) and send it to a targeted list of editors and reporters. They then follow up the key media to get you published.
• Get a professional copywriter to regularly write articles about your company. A good copywriter will find the ‘story' by asking you questions. Then they can work their contacts to try and get it published, but you must also be proactive in creating a list of target editors and media of where you want your stories and send the story out and it follow up. Get a person's name to send it to. Copywritters areway more cost-effective than you might think, way more!!! And you can always use the copy for other marketing methods, letters, information packs, brochures, and websites.

One of my clients was lucky enough to have a client send a local newspaper editor an eMail about why they thought they should do an article on my client. Within a few days a reporter and photographer had come out and a few days later the positive article and photo appeared in the newspaper. Now, here's the kicker... if you didn't know this.. media feeds off media... so they ended up with a 3 ½ minute article on a main network TV breakfast show, priceless! If you have a super super friendly client ask them to help out with an email about you to an editor.

• DIY... good luck! If you try this approach often the story never gets written or the DIYer never does it regularly, it's a once off.

Awards Events:

Just start to take notice, and start entering events where appropriate. I'll tell you what, the worse that can happen is... from filling in the entry form you figure out all the things you are not doing correctly and you'll madly spend the next year dramatically improving your business so you have a chance of winning next year. Wow, a ‘turn-around story', that's another press release!

Expert Positioning:

A little bit of research and you can do any of the options listed under 'expert positioning' above, all with the end result... an expert in your field. Sorry, you already are an expert.... what you need to become is a 'well known' expert, or a 'perceived' expert to new audiences.

Online Community:

This can be hard and easy. Hard because you could stuff it up by pushing a product on a community and you'll get punished and because it is online, what is written about you stays around FOREVER! Easy because it provides huge leverage, you can talk to many in a personal way with one communication. To start requires nothing more than creating an account with a community site, to succeed takes genuine effort and desire to entertain or provide relevant information over product pushing.

This week's Action Points...

Pick an area and jump right in, I recommend you start with Press Releases using execution options B or C (I know 3 companies/people you could use for a great result here, let me know if you want details). Set a goal of 1 published press release per month or 1 every 2 months or 1 per quarter. The important part is the regular showing. PR may not work in isolation, but add it to all your other activities, strategies and campaigns and it can provide huge value and give you more creditability in a prospects mind .... So next time they see your advertising they might think "yes, I want to know more, I'll make an enquiry".

 

What is SEO & SEM? - I Bet You Could Get More From Your Website?

How To Get More Visitors To Your Website Through SEO & SEM...

Don't know what SEO and SEM are? Heck, neither did I a few years ago, but if you don't know about them now, chances are you are not maximising the return on an investment you have most likely already made. I'm talking about the investment of your website.

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) are the marketing techniques used by a professional to get your website to rank higher in search engines like Google and Yahoo. Search Engine Marketing (SEM) relates to highly targeted ads that appear only to people that are actively looking (searching) for that particular product or service. They are the sponsored links at the top or on the right of Google's search results.

These two strategies are very powerful methods to get more visitors to your website...

I'm Not An Expert In This Field...

And that's the point, you're probably not either. In fact you may just be starting to learn about all this new online stuff and looking for more information and clarity to some of the jargon and terms. I'll give you a basic understanding, and then you can choose to progress as follows;

Step 1) DIY. Do some of quick improvements if you have a Content Management System (CMS) that you have access to on your website (that means the ability to login to your website and edit and add content to it).

Step 2) Get a professional specialist to work on it. This is the best method in the long run, because you and I will probably never learn enough to be as good as an expert in this field. But what is important is an understanding of the basics and what you are looking to achieve.

So, let's explain....

Search Engine Optimisation (SEO)

In terms of internet search marketing strategies, there are basically too method; Organic Search and Paid Search. Organic search is where your business pops up when someone types in a search word or phrase looking for your products, services or profession. The higher you are up on this list the greater the chance people will click through to your website. Obvious really, if you're listed on the first page awesome, on page 4 you're forgotten.

So this brings up the questions of;

• ‘Why are some websites listed above others?'
• ‘How does the search engine determine which site ranks first, second, third, etc?'
• ‘How do I get my website to the top?'

Here's the real issue... Nobody knows the 100% answer to these questions but the Search Engine companies themselves. It's a closely guarded secret. This is because ever since search engines have existed in the mid 1990s people have been trying to manipulate rankings on them through illegitimate ways. You see, search engines work on algorithms... basically complex mathematical equations to determine website rankings. These algorithms are now based on heaps of different criteria, they used to be simple, in fact Google states it now uses over 200 different ‘signals' to determine a web pages ranking. But if you had to boil it down to basics, I'd say there are two main points to work on to begin with to get a higher ranking for your website legitimately;

• Content: This is the actual words on a website. If you had a business that produced green beans and started putting the words ‘the best green beans in the world' all though a web pages content, then chances are that if someone searched for the phrase ‘the best green beans in the world' you would rank on the first page. The lesson here is the content on your website, and more specifically on individual pages that are promoting the products and services of your business, need to consider what words, questions or phrases people are typing in when searching.

Getting on the first page of a search for ‘the best green beans in the world' is pointless if 99.9% of your prospects used the search phrase ‘green beans provider'. Getting this right requires patience, wow I just struggled to even write that word (patience), but patience and persistence are required to test different words and phrases. This is where a SEO consultant is highly valuable.

• Links: Google's founders created PageRank. PageRank determines how many other sites link to a page. If a page has many links to it, especially from other sites that have high PageRanks themselves, then that page is given more relevance and subsequently ranks higher in organic search results than other pages related to the searched phrase.

So having your business listed (with links back your site), in large popular websites can build your sites ranking. Such sites include; directories, social networking sites, community forums, media sites.

A professional SEO consultant will know all the other methods to use and how to execute them to affect a better ranking result.

Search Engine Marketing (SEM)

This is a simple marketing concept and strategy really, it's a lot quicker and easier to pay for results in a search engine than work to get high organic search results... it's called paid search. Paid search is what has built the Google empire to make US$16.5Billion in Revenue in 2007. Google Adwords are the listings you see on the right of the page when you do a search.

The great thing for businesses is that unlike traditional fixed fee advertising, paid search has the following features;

• You are only charged for those people that actually click on your ad.
• Only people that type in keywords, terms or phrases that you choose to be listed with will see the ad, so you can target it to the correct audience. You can even limit the geographically area right down so that only people that are searching from a city or suburb see your ad.
• You can set a maximum monthly budget for your paid search campaign, so when that budget is reached, your ad is simply not displayed any more, preventing a unexpected large bill at the end of the month.
• The price you pay per click (or lead to your website in reality) is determined by you and the open market. If you are prepared to pay $5 per click for a keyword and everyone else is only prepared to pay $0.50 then you'll likely be at the top of the list until your monthly budget is hit.

Key's to making this paid search marketing strategy work are;

• Use the right key words. This could take some time and testing.
• Use Direct Response advertising principles and interruption marketing to get people to click on your advert not the other ads. As I've discussed before, offer something... a Free Brochure, or Free Guide/Report to help the decision making process of the prospect.
• Landing Pages. Paid search should not link through to the home page of your site. People normally search for a specific product or specific service; it's likely you have many products and services. You will be much more successful running multiple paid search campaigns for each individual service or key products... then have a ‘landing page' for each campaign. The sole purpose of the landing page is to capture the prospect details, give them something that is relevant, useful and valuable to them, in exchange for their details.

This week's Action Points...

These two strategies can fall in the too hard basket time after time; I know I'm guilty of not doing enough in these areas. You have the choice, ask yourself this question; "do many people that need my products and services use search engines to find a provider/supplier/retailer?"

If the answer is yes, make a start with the basics described above then get a pro involved, better yet if you have $500 - $1000 a month budget get a pro involved right away. You could start to either of these strategies for that budget using a professional consultant. I've got the details of a couple I believe can add value, if you're interested eMail me and I'll send through their details.