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Archive for the ‘Planning’ Category

Do You Have A Written Plan?

Wednesday, September 2nd, 2009

Learn how having a written marketing plan can help you earn 10 times more than the competition.

Real business growth comes from writing out the goals you plan to achieve – and then putting the things in place to achieve those goals.

Many times we get so caught up in day to day survival we can only take things one step at a time. Although that may get us through the day or even the week, it’s simply surviving. It’s not growing your business.

My standard answer when asked the single greatest thing a business can do to separate itself from the competition is to have a written marketing plan with established goals, strategies, tactics, and measurements. It’s been estimated that less than 3% of the population has written goals and they earn on average 10 times more than the rest.

If you truly want growth and improvement in your company or career, take the time to develop a marketing plan. Then, hold yourself and your company accountable for that plan and its objectives.

Quit taking things a day at a time. Have a plan.

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8 Steps to Better Marketing

Monday, June 22nd, 2009

Here are 8 easy steps to better marketing results.

Steps to Marketing Success

#1: Have a realistic goal.

Define what you want to achieve and why.  Be specific and realistic.  A big part of the process is to define what you are willing to do to accomplish the goal – you may need to change some behaviors.

#2: Get a support system.

It’s important to include co-workers and possibly vendors who can help you achieve your marketing goals, as well as like minded business people with whom you can swap ideas.

#3: Think positively.

Put your energies towards proactive steps that will take you towards your goals.  Focus on your positives and tone down destructive thinking.

#4: Learn about internet marketing.

Educate yourself about internet marketing.  No matter how good you are at what you’ll do, you’ll struggle and maybe even fail without strong internet marketing.  A great place to learn more about internet marketing is http://righton-nobull.com/internet-marketing-webinars/.

#5: Focus on marketing each business day.

Make marketing an every day process in your business, not an event getting attention only every once in a while.  Steady, consistent effort is what produces the greatest results.

#6: Watch for positive change.

Don’t get IMMEDIATELY hung up on sales.  Look at other key performance indicators (KPI) concerning traffic, time spent on site, conversions, etc. as well.

#7: Don’t expect miracles.

Sustainable and healthy sales growth isn’t a quick fix process.  It’s a process shift, one that offers tremendous rewards beyond sales increases.  As you refine your process, you’ll keep customers longer and understand them better.  Sales will increase and your marketing will start to feel automatic.

#8: Get help when you need it.

If you aren’t making progress, get our help.  You may unaddressed obstacles or need specialized expertise.  We are here to help you.

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Posted in Offline Selling, Planning | No Comments »

How Online Testing Can Make Your Company Earn Like Google

Friday, June 19th, 2009

How you can follow Google’s testing strategy to make your company prosper.

Key to success

Wouldn’t it stink to be in the home sales business right now?

A friend of mine used to drive by a billboard every day that said “New Home FINANCE Center.”

Not a good thing in this down cycle but with the change of just a few letters this company ensured their survival in a down economy.

The billboard now says “New Home RELIEF Center.”

This is smart marketing and smart marketing always stems from a complete reality check.

That’s why Google is so dominant.

By adopting a “we don’t know it all, let’s test it attitude,” Google did the near impossible.

In less than 8 years they grew from nothing to the world’s most valued company.  They became more important than IBM…a bigger media player than all the TV networks COMBINED and put Microsoft back on its heels so far Bill Gates devoted his life to charity.

Through it all Google stays REALITY based.

They test every new business idea.  They test and re-test all aspects of their marketing to make sure they get maximum impact from all of their sales and marketing processes.

The first thing most small and mid-size service and retail companies should do is correctly set up an online advertising campaign on Yahoo or Google and then test it with your website (or special landing pages) to find out what converts traffic to sales in profitable fashions.

Take your time when doing this and do it correctly.  Every part of the process teaches you what works and what doesn’t and it’s this trial and error that will ultimately lead you to marketing success.

Why should you use search engines for this testing rather than other media?  There are lots of reasons but my favorites are as follows:

 

  1. Search engines deliver a consistent, somewhat predictable flow of traffic

 

  1. We can totally control how much we spend

 

  1. We get more marketing and customer data from this source than any other option

 

  1. We have more control of the testing process

 

THEN and only when it is working on our Google or Yahoo test do we break it out to our other marketing channels, in this preferred order:

 

  1. Search Engine Test (Google or Yahoo)

 

  1. Search Engine Optimization of Website

 

  1. Other Search Engine Advertising

 

  1. Email Promotions and Newsletters

 

  1. Blog tagging, podcasting, videocasting and other online channels

 

  1. Affiliates

 

  1. Press Releases

 

  1. Direct Mail

 

  1. Print Advertising

 

  1.  Other Media, if used

 

We test on search engines first because we can best control the conditions of our efforts while minimizing the expense.  Get it right there FIRST and then carry the messages forward to other lead generation channels.  Don’t let other more expensive channels offering less information be your test dummy.  If it works on the search engine, it most likely will work everywhere else.

Using this technique has the same effect water has in growing grass.  For a very small percentage of your ad budget you are getting valuable information from people that are your potential customers.  When you are ready to move to items 2-10, you’re doing so with valuable information that will explode your revenues, oftentimes 5-40 times as much as those not using such practices.

I want you to have a consistent recipe for generating traffic that converts into your desired business actions.  I want you to be able to use this recipe at will and have it do what you want at very minimal risk.  All the time, every time.

Test and make great things happen.

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Posted in Internet Advertising, Planning, SEO | No Comments »

10 Things for Marketing Success

Thursday, March 5th, 2009

The 10 most important things you can do to make any marketing campaign successful.

There are 10 things that really matter for success in marketing for smALL business:

  1. Develop through persona profiling a profile of your ideal customer – write down all you can about your ideal customers and keep your marketing focus on attracting and selling more to those customers in ways that appeal to them and avoid the others that don’t fit your profile


  1. Identify and promote value based differences – you must clearly answer why customers should spend money with you over the other guy


  1. Have a marketing plan and include measurement metrics – write it down and measure your progress with actionable analysis


  1. Utilize the power of the internet – the internet is the number one place people turn to for information and to find things and you must learn how to utilize the power of the web


  1. Test-test-test – the internet eliminates the guesswork in marketing, allowing you to cheaply test approaches, prices and processes to find out what works best…make sure to use all that’s available to you


  1. Implement a multi-channel lead generation system – your audience can be anywhere in today’s fragmented era and you must utilize many methods to reach your target audience


  1. Use direct marketing concepts and practices – focus on obtaining a name, making a singular offer in all advertising and marketing, have a strong call to action and more


  1. Have systems to convert leads to sales – let marketing materials do the grunt work when possible and make it easy for prospects to address their needs and problems


  1. Deliver what you sell at high levels of satisfaction – make sure customers would always refer your business to a friend


  1. Communicate using profit path planning principles to customers, prospects, employees and other relevant audiences – use automated messaging systems to up-sell, cross-sell and retain customers for improved lifetime value


As always, if you need help in applying our Right On – No Bull Marketing system to your business, please tell us how we can help you by calling (877) 837-8803.

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Posted in 10 Step Plan, Planning | No Comments »

12 Steps for Implementing a Successful New Business Development Strategy

Tuesday, November 18th, 2008

1. Write down where you want to be. Set targets for customer growth, revenue, profits, sales to existing customers and employee attrition.

2. Take a factual look at where you are at in each of the areas listed in step number one.

3. Look at the gaps that exist from where you are at to where you want to be. Analyze the gaps the gaps using an adaptation of an old method developed by Dale Carnegie:

i. What is the gap?
ii. What are all the causes of the gap?
iii. What are all the possible solutions?
iv. What is are best solution(s)?

4. Clearly understand the impacts to the organization by closing the gaps that exist between desired outcomes and current results. Identify the benefits and measure impacts in terms of revenue and profit. Identify how desired results provide long term stability to the company and its employees.

5. Set short-term, intermediate and long-term goals and establish evaluative criteria and evaluation times. You must know what you want to hit, when you want to hit it.

6. Clearly establish inspection intervals for evaluation and corrective actions when needed. Know what key performance indicators you are going to measure and how you are going to measure it. Establish how you are going to evaluate company and individual performance and how often you are going to inspect results.

7. Write down all of the critical organizational actions necessary to achieve your business development objectives as outlined in step one.

8. Involve Employees. You must determine your initial program roll out and on-going progress communication methods and intervals to employees. Let them know what you are doing, why it is important to them (people are always more interested in how something impacts them) and how you are going to measure results. Discuss rewards to the business and its employees, if rewards are part of your program. Communicate consistently to employees at frequent intervals concerning program progress. Tie results to employee compensation and bonuses whenever possible.

9. Implement the program. Nothing happens without action. Usually things get worse with inactivity.

10. Monitor the progress of your program and adapt your practices based upon measurement and actionable analysis.

11. Communicate your results to critical stakeholders.

12. Ensure that new customer acquisition in profitable ways becomes an integral part of your business culture and practices. Make it a focal part of all new employee orientation. Include it as part of your regular management and employee meetings. Tie program objectives into employee compensation plans.

Posted in Customer Retention, Email Marketing, Internet Advertising, Joint Venture Marketing, Lead Generation, Online Conversions, Planning, RONB News, RONB Stuff, SEO, Search Engine News, Social Media, Social Networking, Training Programs, Uncategorized, Up-Selling | No Comments »

 
  
 

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