Everywhere you turn, business pundits, bloggers, or magazines are encouraging you to replace traditional “interruptive” outbound marketing methods with contemporary “permission-based” social media techniques. There is a lot to be said for what you can learn from even a minimal social media effort.
But, if you’re like most marketers, you probably use some combination of SEO, display advertising, and email marketing. These tactics have fueled your business with sales and leads for years. Is it not a bit hasty to suggest that we all ditch these proven methods in favor of a Facebook page or a Twitter feed? READ MORE
In today’s super budget conscience business environment everybody’s trying to figure out how to connect with new potential customers without increasing costs. After all, any new money can only come from one place – directly out of profits, or more accurately for small business owners, directly out of their pockets. So, as a small business owner, it’s to your benefit to take a close, hard look at how you are spending money on marketing and what is the return you’re getting on that investment. Let’s look at two traditional areas where marketing investment takes place: 1. Out-bound communications ie, Advertising, PR, or Direct Response or 2. supporting direct sales via a sales force. Here are cost estimates per contact for these two different kinds of activities: READ MORE
The next eight points offer some ideas that you may not have thought to use LinkedIn to do. But they are very effective and ofter some time savings.
1. Fill out your LinkedIn profile:
First, some people search profiles for keywords, so make sure the words you hope people are seeking when they think of you exist inside your profile. Use real captivating words up front, not like a resume or CV, but instead, like an advertisement for you, because that’s what LinkedIN is!
2. Ask and answer questions:
Using the Answers feature brings your name and profile around to people you’re not exposed to directly. This means more opportunities for someone to recognize your authority in some field, and to reach out and contact you for something further. It means sharing the fruits of your networking with others, and potentially connecting 3rd parties to each other for something bigger. This comes in handy when it becomes obvious that you’re also a good connector.
3. Increase freelance work using LinkedIn:
If you’re a freelancer, or you want to be, getting work can sometimes be a challenge. Or perhaps you get a lot of work, but you want to focus more on quality work that gets you the highest pay per hour. Set up a profile that shows what you can do, your experience, what you have to offer. Link up with others you know, and you’ve got a free way to market your services. READ MORE
Recently we put together 15 reasons why using LinkedIn is an effective tool for small business marketing. Today we will post the first seven.
How to get most out of LinkedIn:
1. Increase your LinkedIn visibility:
By adding connections, you increase the likelihood that people will see your profile first when they’re searching for someone to hire or do business with. In addition to appearing at the top of search results (which is a major plus if you’re one of the 52,000 product managers on LinkedIn), people would much rather work with people who their friends know and trust.
2. Improve your connectability:
Most new users put only their current company in their profile. You should fill out your profile like it’s an executive bio, so include past companies, education, affiliations, and activities. You can also include a link to your profile as part of an email signature. All these would help you increase your connectivity.
3. Improve your Linkedin profile Search Engine ranking:
LinkedIn allows you to make your profile information available for search engines to index. To increase your Search Engine ranking do this, create a public profile and select “Full View.” Also, instead of using the default URL, customize your public profile’s URL to be your actual name. To strengthen the visibility of this page in search engines, use this link in various places on the web. READ MORE
I was talking with my wife, and business partner, Paula the other day. I was upset because I’d heard that several business owners, that we know personally, are having a really hard time with their businesses. The Christmas and end-of-year selling period are over and they are being confronted with another slow-down in their respective businesses.
As we were talking it became clear that none of them were actually working from a marketing plan. They were just “spitballing it”. Thrashing around in hopes of bumping into some idea or situation which would cause their sales to pick up.
One of them was waiting for his sales people to start generating new business. Another was thinking of lowering prices, as if losing more profit was going to help stimulate sales. A third was just going to try praying harder.
All of these business owners are suffering from a distinct lack of an action plan for marketing their products and services. Here are seven danger signals that you should be aware of. READ MORE
This is an interesting article that I read today. Students are failing English because of SMS (abbreviations like l8r) and using incomplete sentences. It seems that we now have a second language! Are you versed in both? Can you switch between texting your child and writing the report on revenue projections? To me, it says that as an older adult I may try to “fit in” with younger generations by using the informality of social media – but I better not let it slip into my day today work activities! You can read more about the study here http://www.socializedpr.com/students-failing-english-due-to-twitter-facebook/.
Summary: This case study was derived from an actual program used by a high-tech test equipment firm during their initial two-year start-up period. The business had no established brand recognition or customer base.
The company management worked with outside communication resources to develop strong support materials and to manage a small business marketing program of tradeshows, targeted emailing and a strong push into social media to match their target audience profile.
The social media allowed them to distribute “thought-leadership” content and build on-line relationships with key influencers within their prospect base. The media channels they used were: a company blog, LinkedIn Groups, Twitter, Face Book, YouTube, flickr, Marketwire, Pitchengine, and email.
Their commitment to an on-going investment in a steady but relatively low-cost program paid off. By January 2010 over 50 % of their meeting requests came from in-bound web leads. Their 2009 revenues tripled over 2008 despite facing the same economic downturn as everyone else in the B2B market. READ MORE
Creating opportunities to sell
Marketing is an organizational discipline with a distinct creative component. It’s much like cooking. Unfortunately, we have come to believe – anyone can cook, right? All you need is a cook book. This compendium is filled with recipes, the organizational structure for cooking.
It is this line of thinking that has many small business owners convinced that they can cook up their own marketing. After all, one only needs to follow a simple recipe – right? Any one can cook a meatloaf but how many of us know how to prepare braccioli or what to serve with it?
Without a well planned, adequately financed and consistent marketing effort most small business owners are reduced to sporadic selling. With little activity to generate selling opportunities most business owners begin to be haunted with the specter of “cold calling” one of the most dreaded of all of the marketing tools. This is where selling goes bad.
If you have questions or comments about this or any information we post please take a few minutes to contact us by posting or emailing or calling us at (704) 542-9104.
Actually, I don’t hate selling. I hate having to create opportunities to sell.
When you examine what drives the success of a business you’re sure to find a successful salesperson. For many small business owners, who work on their own, it will be their success as a salesperson that will make or break their business. But, it’s not selling skills that make those people successful. It’s how good they are at generating selling opportunities.
I know there are many shy people who don’t like talking to strangers. And, it’s not unusual for shy people to own a business. But, even shy people are proud of what they do, what they know, and what they sell. Once they start talking about their business they can easily explain the benefits of what they do or offer. They believe in what they are saying. READ MORE
I just finished an online course about social media that is produced by Duct Tape Marketing. What really struck me is that we all run around trying to get into everything…Twitter, Facebook, Facebook fan pages, LinkedIn, Blogging… the list is endless, and if one did them all, there would be little time for anything else! So to me, the best comment made in this program was “if you don’t have the time to do more than one, don’t. Find the one that will give you the most return for the time invested.” At least, that’s how I heard it!
There are so many levels to each of these platforms, and so many ways that you can use each one, why not take baby steps and go as far as you can with one before starting the next?
