How would you enjoy suddenly having an influx of people “chomping at the bit,” ready to buy what you’re selling? How would you feel about your marketing then?
That’s easy – it would be great!
But what prevents this influx…keeping you from the torrent of clients that you deserve…is something I find common amongst small business owners.
I call it the “marketing / sales disconnect.”
I’ll first tell you about this common scourge of small business marketing…and then I’ll start you down the path of reconnecting and turning on the flow of customers.
The most common causes for this lack of clients all have their root cause in the same two areas that I’ll address later. These are the leading challenges in capturing clients that are faced by the small businesses that I help.
Feast or famine cycle. Customers come in and everything is great! You do the work, perhaps expect more work to flow from it, and all of a sudden your done and don’t have more clients lined up…
Now its panic time…scramble to network, market, send emails, etc. Eventually, you find more clients and the cycle starts again.
90 hour challenge. Small business owners work whenever they want…they pick the 90 hours that they want to work each week. This is prevalent when you know what you do and the value you provide, but you haven’t figured out how to communicate it to prospects.
Instead, you work and work and work trying new things to get more business.
Messaging. If you can’t articulate what you do, the value you provide, why you do it, and who you do it for, your prospects can’t be expected to do it for you. Unfortunately, when this happens, they stay as prospects and don’t convert to customers.
How to turn on the spigot and see customers flowing into your business.
The first disconnect to fix is the typical gap found between marketing and sales. Marketing helps strangers find your company and converts them into prospects. Sales picks up the ball here and works on converting prospects into clients.
Too many people focus on one or the other, but don’t put them together as two parts of a single whole.
You need to have a consistent flow for your prospects to follow to become clients. All of the messaging, contacts, brand elements they encounter need to work in harmony to build trust and lead them on the path to becoming a customer.
Typically there is a huge disconnect between the actions you take and the goals that you set. Too many small business owners work themselves silly on a dozen projects at once. You can’t focus on too many things and expect to do them all well.
Pick the three or four most important ways of marketing that you have and focus on them. Don’t change in a week because the results weren’t what you expected. Have a plan about how long it will take for each to show results and then measure your progress.
Speaking of goals…so many small business owners don’t have goals. They may have broad-stroke goals that are something like “double my revenue” or “be the best xxxx in town,” but those aren’t very good goals. They are also tough to measure.
Goals should be measurable and specific. Put a stake in the ground as your goal and then figure out what it takes to reach your goal. Look at everything you do – is it moving you towards your goal? If you can’t tell, you need to measure better or stop and figure it out.
I’ve put together a 20 minute webinar that goes more into detail about both the challenges and solutions to the “marketing / sales disconnect.” Its free and you can watch it here. Rather than have it at a specific time, I’m making it available to watch anytime you want, just follow this link.
You’ll also find two free ebooks on the top right of the page, these two ebooks are a fantastic guide to getting prospects on the Internet and steps to take to organize your business to use the Internet. Together, they are worth almost $200, but you can grab free copies by filling out the forms. Enjoy.
Here’s to your success!
Michael
877-242-4812
