John Jantsch has been called the World's Most Practical Small Business Expert for consistently delivering real-world, proven small business marketing ideas and strategies.
http://www.ducttapemarketing.com/blog
Step 1: Narrow your market focus
Look at whom you are currently doing most of your business with. Figure out why they do business with you and what it is about them that is unique. Write one paragraph that describes what they look like and what they want out of life. Take a good hard look at the rest of your clients and customers and decide if they fit that description of your best client. Start saying no when the phone rings and it's not your target market calling.
Step 2: Position your business
Figure out what it is that you do best, figure out what your target market longs for and tell the world that you do that like no one else ever thought of. Maybe it's serving a niche, maybe it's a form of service, maybe it's a way you package your products. Here's a hint: you probably don't know what it is. Call up 3 or 4 of your clients and ask them why they buy from you.
Step 3: Core messages
Create several very compelling benefits of doing business with your firm and find ways to work them into everything you say and do. Just remember it's not a benefit unless your clients think it is. Your clients don't buy what you sell…they buy what they get from what you sell.
Step 4: Marketing materials
Recreate all of your marketing materials, including your website, so that they speak only of your core messages and your target market.
Step 5: Never cold call
Make sure that all of your advertising, including yellow pages, is geared to creating prospects and not customers. You must find ways to educate before you sell. Your target market needs to learn how you provide value in a way the will make them want to pay a premium for your services or products. You simply can't do this in a 3 x 4 ad. Your ad needs to get them ask for more information…then you can proceed to selling.
Step 6: Expect referrals
You must create a referral marketing engine that systematically turns clients and referral networks into 24 hour marketing powerhouse. The first step in the system is to make providing referrals a condition of doing business with your firm.
Step 7: Live by a calendar
After you complete steps 1-6, determine what you need to do to put them into action and then schedule them on a calendar. Whatever it is that you need to pick a month and pledge to get it done that month. The mistake most small business owners make is to get overwhelmed when they realize how much they really need to.
Thanx to our friends at Duct Tape Marketing
http://www.ducttapemarketing.com/
