Mistake #7: You Are Not Persistent And Willing To Stick It Out Until Youve Contacted Your Prospect Enough Times To Warrant Dropping Him, Constantly Testing And Trying New Approaches Until You Find The Hot Button That Sells.
Too many businesses rely entirely too much on the hoped success of one advertisement or one direct mailing. Marketing success is not an event…it is a process. Processes take time. Therefore you should never put your faith in one ad, one mailing campaign, or one TV spot.
You must commit to connecting with your prospects a minimum of 7 times in 18 months. If you are not willing to pay that price, then you shouldnt even start to promote to those prospects.
You need to decide that you are willing to connect with your prospects time and time again and hit them with the same benefit packed points over and over again – from every conceivable angle – in a determined attempt to motivate your prospects to take action!
Remember that any single marketing event will not ordinarily produce outstanding results, not now-a-days anyway. It used to be true that a guy could make a fortune off of one ad, one promotion. But today, its just not going to happen very often, and you should NEVER plan on it.
You must know precisely who you are marketing to, what their desires are, and you must resolve to connect with them again and again and again, until they either prove that they are not a prospect, or until they see that you have the best solution for their pressing problems.
Marketing requires persistency to say the least. You must work at it on a daily basis. Some days will be downright discouraging for you. But, you cannot give up. If you have done your homework, and you realize that you have the solution to your prospects problems, if you have focused precisely on your target, then you must not let discouragement get in your way.
It can keep you from succeeding.
If your prospects are not responding then you need to refine your approach. You need to refine who you are trying to connect with. You may need to approach them from several different angles to find the approach that works the best…indeed, you will need to test constantly, always trying to improve your take.
In short, you must persist so that your prospects never have the opportunity to forget who you are, and what you can do for them.
The only way to discover your prospects hot-buttons are to test and to test continually. You see, you cant predetermine what your marketplace wants, what the best price is, the best selling packaging, or the best approach.
As a marketer, you have the obligation to find out from your market what it is that they want. The way to find out what they want is to test one marketing approach against another, one ad concept against another, one headline against another, one TV or radio commercial against another, one price against another, and the list goes on and on! Testing is an ongoing process. You should always be trying to out do your best results. Because you never know when results are at their best!
The point is that you cannot guess what your market will buy. It is something to be discovered by testing one approach against another, and by carefully analyzing and tabulating the results. Once you do this, you will be amazed to find that one approach always substantially outpulls all the others by a tremendous margin.
You must demand maximum return from every marketing dollar you spend. Testing is what tells you where to demand more. Remember, an ad costs you the same amount of space, production time, or air time whether it produces 10 prospects, 100 prospects or 1,000 prospects. It only makes sense that you should test different ad approaches to maximize your investment. You must not sleep at night until you know youre getting better results than last week.
Testing takes persistence. It will pay-off big if you do it.
As I mentioned earlier, marketing is NEVER an event, it is always a process. Keep this in mind when you consider selling something to your market.
Mistake #8: You Have No Marketing Plan To Guide Your Business To Financial Success.
On dozens of occasions I consult with businesses and discover the morbid fact that 90% are flying by the seat of their pants, with no direction for tomorrow, no idea how much theyre going to make in the next 365 days, and no written plan whatsoever. Let me say this as strongly as I can…
Your business will never succeed on any type of a large scale unless you commit to writing a plan that guides you to success.
This is a fact that all too many businesses will never accept, to their own demise. If you dont have a marketing plan, youll never reach any truly substantial objectives.
If youre without a plan. grab a piece of paper and pencil right now, and let me help you get off to a good start. Your plan must include the following:
1) A specific, clear, precise, dollar objective for each year, for each of your products or services. Break this dollar amount down into how many widgets you must sell to reach that amount. Next, figure out how many sales that means you need to make. Next, figure out how many prospects you must connect with in order to sell XXX amount of widgets, based on your past experience. If you have no past experience, use a 20% closing ratio to figure with.
2) A specific dollar amount for each month, for each of your products or services. Do the same things as above, except figure the totals on a monthly basis.
3) An objective evaluation of all of the different marketing alternatives that will help you reach your monthly and yearly goals.
4) An exact indication of which marketing alternatives you have decided to use, why, in what ways, and how often, and how much these alternatives will cost you in money, time and materials.
5) Techniques to use that will help you capture and keep track of your customers and prospects.
6) Techniques to use to help you sell the back-end to a new customer.
Mind you, these are the bare bones basics that you need in your plan. With this information alone, youll probably perform head and shoulders above your competition. If you want to take the plan further, make sure you include precise deadlines for each step. Then take each of these steps and break them down into the action steps that you can take on a daily basis to reach your monthly and yearly goals. The key words here are daily basis. Marketing should be a daily activity for you, like eating and drinking.
Its not a difficult thing to draw up a simple marketing plan like this. I think the problem is that most companies feel like they have to have graphs and charts and demographic specifications and all of this other mumbo-jumbo that just confuses people. That stuff is NOT going to motivate you or help you follow a path to success.
Realize the power of this simple, easy to do marketing plan. Its so easy! And it will bring you success!
Without a specific marketing plan ON PAPER, you cannot expect your business to have massive successes. Yes, you do need to put it on paper.
Why?
On paper you have focus. If you keep your ideas in your mind, youll lose focus on your objectives. Believe me I know, Ive made that mistake before. Get your plan on paper.
Even though its on paper, doesnt mean you cant change it. Be flexible. Understand that as your business grows and succeeds, youll want to update your marketing plan. I re-evaluate my plan on a weekly basis. I ask myself:
a) Is this plan taking me where I want to go?
b) Is there any part of the plan that isnt focused on the desired end objective?
c) What can I do to update my plan to gain more focus on my end objective?
Questions like these on a weekly basis will help you reach your objectives quicker, and in a smoother way. Remember, without a written plan, your success is highly unlikely.
Mistake # 9: You Dont Have Any Idea How To Write Or Produce Persuasive Marketing Documents That Get Your Prospects To Buy NOW, Or To Get Your Customers To Buy Again.
If your car was having a problem, and you knew NOTHING about cars, (except where to put the gas in) would you open the hood and try to fix it? NO!
Why then, do so many businesses try to write their own advertisements, their own brochures, their own flyers, and other marketing communication when they dont know how to do it?
It doesnt make sense. If you dont know what you are doing then you shouldnt be doing it, or else youll mess things up worse than they were before!
The real problem comes, however, when someone thinks they know what theyre doing when in fact, their efforts are usually self-centered and unfocused on the needs and wants of their prospects and customers.
Larger companies have entire design and marketing departments that do nothing but put together and create their marketing documents. Though, in my opinion, most of these Madison Avenue Types do terrible, institutional advertising…I feel that everyone can always learn how to communicate better with their prospects.
No one has all the answers, but I do believe that a company is better off to hire an outside consultant to come in and do the job right. Maybe I only feel this way because I am such a consultant, but…I think its better because the consultant can look at things (usually) from a prospects point of view easier than an insider from the company can.
Because the majority of companies dont know how to put together a persuasive marketing piece, most marketing documents:
1) Focus on the seller, instead of the buyer and the benefits that the buyer gets.
2) Are terribly boring, dull, and uninteresting.
3) Dont excite the prospect to want to take action NOW!
4) Dont ask for any action from the prospect.
5) Dont tell the prospect whats in it for him if he acts right away.
6) Assume that the prospect is as interested in the product or service as the seller is.
7) Brag on and on about product and service features, when all the prospect really cares about is the benefits hell get from the product or service.
8) Try to be creative and clever, thinking that clever sells when actually clever does nothing to motivate a prospect to buy NOW.
9) Try to be professional and worry about their image. When really, the only thing that matters is relentlessly focusing on your prospects desires. You must focus on the benefits that your prospect is wanting you to tell him about. You need to worry about delivering on your promises, improving your product or service…and forget about the professional image.
These are just a few of the problems that youll see every day around you when you look at typical marketing communications going on.
Its terrible. Its a waste of paper, money, time, energy and other valuable resources. Dont fall prey to this game. Find yourself a professional copywriter and designer that can deliver what your prospect wants. Your investment in a good copywriter will be worth more than anything else youd ever spend your marketing on.
Mistake #10: You Dont Determine What It Is About You That Makes A Client Want To Buy From You Because He Cant Get What Youre Offering Anywhere Else. (Establishing Your Unique Selling Proposition)
What advantage is there for your prospects or customers to do business with you? What makes you unique? Your unique selling proposition(USP) is the unique advantage you hold out in all of your marketing, advertising and sales efforts. Its something that a customer usually cant get anywhere else.
Its the philosophical foundation of your business, and its essence should pervade everything you do.
The formulation of your USP(unique selling proposition) depends on the specific market niche you have already carved, or wish to carve out.
Your USP may be that: you only sell the highest grade products in the industry.
Your USP may be that: you sell your products at the lowest mark-up in the industry.
Your USP may be that: you maintain 24-hour, 7-days-a-week service for your customers.
Your USP may be that: you maintain 5 times more service personnel than anyone else in your industry, so you can respond in three hours instead of three days.
Your USP may be that: you provide more information, education, and service than anyone else.
Your USP may be that: you have everything in stock at all time — no out-of-stock, waiting, or back orders.
Most companies are me-too companies. They look just like everyone else. They sell like everyone else. They carry the same products as everyone else. They develop nothing to make them unique that creates a desire in the prospect to have that special uniqueness.
Too many companies are just out there to sell. You need to commit to becoming a company thats dedicated to solving a clients problem. As the great marketing guru Jeffrey Lant states, Dont sell. Solve!
Perhaps that could be your USP!
The USP can carve you out a market so quick you wont believe it! So, figure out what your USP is and start promoting its benefits to your customers and prospects today!
Bonus Tip: Once You Understand The Mistakes In This Report, Dont Go Back To Doing Your Business And Marketing The Same Old, Unprofitable Way.
Change is difficult. Change can be tough. When you try to be different, do things differently, or make waves, people get uncomfortable. Undoubtedly, some of the ideas in this report will warrant a change or two in your business.
Please…change! It will not only mean a heck-of-a-lot more money to you, it will also mean increased satisfaction in knowing that you are running a business that is focused on the customer, and wants to serve.
Dont try to overhaul your business if you are making a lot of these mistakes. Instead, after youve read these ideas, pick out JUST ONE that you need to work on the most. Focus your energy on changing just one at a time. Put up notes to remind you of key concepts. Reread the section over and over again. Call me to ask for further advice. Whatever you do, decide to make the changes thatll better your business along.
Once you think youve got the first change down, determine your next step. Decide what you want to change next. Focus on it, and change.
The toughest thing about change is when it involves other people. Theyre in a comfort zone that theyve gotten used to. Now youre gonna come along and suggest change. Motivating your people to change will be the toughest part. But dont give up. Be strong. Be the example of a successful marketer. With or without your people, you can make your business a success.
CONCLUSION
The marketing mistakes in this report are real. They cause the loss of hundreds of thousands of dollars every year for business. Now that you have the answers, Ill expect to see your revenues go up higher than theyve ever been!
It really can happen for you!