Communication – Marketing
If you want your Marketing to work for you, you are going to need a plan that is fully aligned with your business. When it comes to start-ups and micro-business, there is one marketing strategy that we know is going to work for you.
This can be the case regardless of size and stage of development. It can work regardless of budget, of course, you do need some budget, but it is lean and will not break the bank. I have personally run this strategy on just a few hundred pounds with success. I continue to use it today for certain projects, and it continues to serve me well.
I am referring to the strategy I call ‘Demonstrability.’ It takes into account some of the most important and most basic rules of selling:
- People don’t like to be sold to, but they love to buy.
- Focus on people, not products.
- Create an environment in which people want to buy.
- People buy from people they like.
So the strategy focuses on demonstrating your expertise, demonstrating the story behind the business and your big reason why, rather than what you do. This has the following benefits:
- People learn something.
- They don’t feel as if they are being sold to.
- The process creates relationships.
- The process creates a customer-led buying environment.
The art of Marketing, like many other aspects of running and developing a business, is a skill, and as such, it can be taught and therefore learnt. All you need is the motivation and desire to learn, it is the motivation and desire to learn that lies at the very centre of my business, The Rainmakers Club. The problem seems to be that, like so many other areas of business, those that know or those that want to make a business out of being the expert tend to overcomplicate things which through a process of osmosis filters outward to all the start-ups and micro-businesses leading them to believe that they need to pay handsomely for help! Certainly, help is a good thing, but the key point is to learn about the subject before outsourcing. More on this later.
I have certainly noticed this characteristic over the years. Here are just a few of the areas that people tend to overcomplicate. This often results in the business owner pushing for and even burning money on something they may not need yet and certainly don’t fully understand. I wonder, if they took the time to understand first, how much easier and more cost-effective their lives in business would become? The areas I am referring to include:
- PPC.
- SEO.
- Business planning.
- Marketing strategy.
- Web development.
- Social Media.
As a business owner, you owe it to yourself to understand these subjects. You should at least know enough to make informed decisions and avoid burning money. It is the burning of money that causes failure for so many start-ups and micro-businesses. I, for one, do not want you to be one of those. So let’s stop burning money before we have gained the background knowledge!
Here is something you will certainly agree with, and that is: The better your marketing is, the easier it becomes to sell. If all the pundits who commentate on sales, in particular, are right and nothing in business happens without sales, then it follows that nothing in sales happens without marketing. When I refer to nothing, I mean nothing notable and sustainable.
Of course, there are many aspects to marketing that we will want to and need to consider, like strategy and planning. Still, before all that, there is a model for the start-up, and micro business in the early part of their development is really simple to use. Simple does not dilute its importance in gaining the traction, and the early sustained sales needed.
This is a model I started to develop in my first ever business, and to be frank, I have used it ever since; of course, it has had to develop over the years, as I have learnt lessons along the way. This model is called The 7C’s of Marketing. It is the constant and consistent activity that is required in marketing to gain the results you desire the most. Being active with your marketing is the key to the door to traction and success. The 7C’s of marketing can help to keep you on track, they certainly have done this for me, and again I am still using them as my guide today. These 7C’s of marketing are illustrated to demonstrate their connection with each other.
You will recognise that these 7C’s of marketing fulfil the need to improve the long game so that your short game becomes easier. In other words, work on marketing skills to take the prospect closer to the end game. This means that rather than overtly selling to them, you are turning that part of the business process into something closer to an order-taker than a salesperson. This is good because we all know that, with very few exceptions, people do not like to be sold to, but they love to buy.
I want to clarify that there are only two purposes for marketing, and we will deal with both in this section. You will also find far more material and support in areas such as value Ladders and Sales funnels in the next set of courses called Value Ladders and Funnels.
To be frank, you have already taken the smart move by joining the Rainmakers Club and signing up for the program. This way, you can benefit from the entire process. My promise is that 180 days later, providing you put the time and effort in, your business will not be the same; it will be in a far better position and starting to get the results you deserve and are working so hard to generate…
Back to the purpose of marketing:
Purpose 1 – To understand your market so well, so intimately, that you understand in great detail what it is your customer’s both want and need. So that you can engineer the perfect, or as close to perfect as possible, solution they are looking for. Then you simply make sure they know about you. Make some noise about your story, your why and how you are different from all the rest. As they learn the story, they also learn how your solution will fit them so closely that all you need to do is make sure you are reachable and take the order.
Purpose 2 – To tell the right stories to the right people to inspire the right actions for the right reasons internally and externally. To help create a business capable of producing exceptional and sustainable results and of attracting only those who are passionate about you, what you do and the brand you are developing.
So now I have a question for you…
Is your communication good enough? This is a key question that you need to be asking yourself. I know there is always room for improvement, that is certainly true, but improvement will only come if you are candid with yourself and want to do something about it.
Let us look at this in a slightly different light, ask yourself the following questions, and for each yes you come up with, you are indicating that marketing can and should be improved:
Do you need more quality leads?
Are you struggling to get your message heard?
Is your fan-base smaller than you had hoped?
Are sales lower than you would like to see?
Is your target market still looking for their solution?
If you are answering yes to more than two of these, then there are things you can do right now to change the results you are currently getting. But I want you to work differently than the mainstream and not be lulled into something that will create another problem for you. Sticking to the theme that runs through the entire book, let us get the foundations right first.