iStock_000003351439SmallAlthough you may like to think you are creatively captivating your consumer with your communications, allow me to drop a mind-blowing bomb…  Did you know that your current marketing messages are falling on the deaf ears of approximately 98% of your prospects?

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sleepNot that long ago, I received a 15-page sales letter from a self-proclaimed  small business marketing expert trying to convince me to attend his latest seminar. I was  actually blown away at how bad the letter was… and how mind numbing.

Part of what struck me as both humorous and shocking was that he claimed to  be an expert in neuromarketing (and small business marketing). Ironically, there is a vast amount of  neuroscientific research that proves the average human attention span is  incredibly short and that all decisions are dominated by the oldest and most  primitive part of the brain – the old or reptilian brain.

So if the decision-making part of your brain is incredibly hasty and  primarily driven by survival instincts, what are the chances that either you or  I would wade through 15 pages of self-indulgent copy to decide whether or not we  want to attend a seminar? Odds are slim, aren’t they?

What Do Successful Small Business Marketing Professionals Do to Compel Prospects to Say  “Yes”?

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If you are interested in more articles to help you boost the effectiveness of your small business marketing today, then you will definitely want to read the following blog posts:

Is There a Better Way to Find More Customers?

Snagging more customers with a good small business marketing message doesn’t have to be tedious, expensive and stressful. Amen, right? So, let’s break it down. When you’re hungry, which would you prefer: (1) to run to the fridge and grab a tasty snack; or (2) grab your fishing pole, and head out back to catch your next meal?

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How to Know Which Half of Your Advertising Budget is Wasted

John Wannamaker may not be a household name but he opened the first department store in Philadelphia in the late 1800’s and is believed to be the inventor of the price tag and the seasonal sale. He was the first retailer to place a half-page newspaper ad, and also the first full-page ad five years later. He is widely considered to be one of the fore-fathers of advertising and credited with the famous phrase: “Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is, I don’t know which half.”

Why with all we’ve accomplished in the last one hundred and twenty years, is this quote still relevant and significant to you (and to all small business marketing professinals) today?

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puppetSnagging more customers doesn’t have to be tedious, expensive and stressful. Amen, right? So, let’s break it down. When you’re hungry, which would you prefer: (1) to run to the fridge and grab a tasty snack; or (2) grab your fishing pole, and head out back to catch your next meal?

Obviously, most entrepreneurs would favour the fridge. Why is that? Simply put, it’s all about convenience. In today’s modern world of technology, we all live for “the now.” From our smartphones to our iPads, we can chat, shop, message, and search with ease.

Ultimately, it’s time to give ‘cold calling’ (the messy, expensive and hard way to do business) the boot, and adopt an easier, more cost-effective way of captivating, engaging and attracting more customers and qualified leads online. So, let’s take a quick look at eight simple ways you can find more leads and more customers for your business online:

SEO

The creative art of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) involves integrating keywords and phrases into your webpages, making them easier to locate for your potential clients who are combing the web right now, looking for products/services to cure their #1 source of pain. It is essential to weave keywords into your web content strategically (without overusing or “keyword stuffing”), in order to optimize your search engine hits and traffic.  Google is currently making updates (known as Penguin and Panda) to their search algorithms, to ensure that the websites that rank the highest, contain the most relevant and valuable content to readers.

Advertising

Reaching more customers is the ultimate goal of advertising. You want to get as much bang for your buck as possible, so research and highly targeted pitches are crucial. It is more important to intimately know your consumer base than it is to stress about which channels to market your message through.  The worst thing you can do is try to appeal to everyone – for you will effectively reach no one.  In fact, 99% of the people who currently see your ads right now, don’t respond.  If you want more customers, you must first create a message that captivates and inspires your ideal prospect.

Webinars

A webinar can be viewed by thousands of potential customers simultaneously from different locations in real-time and it can be recorded and shared/sold at a later date on your website.  This is a great low-risk and low-cost way to share valuable information with your prospects and consumers and build your database up very quickly.

Pay Per Click Ads

Pay per click advertisements are a skilful way to snap up more customers as they search Google (and other portals) for solutions to their pressing problems. These advertisements are easy to spot as they often appear in shaded boxes at the top of search engine results or in display ad slots on high traffic sites, portals, forums and blogs. Using pay per click ads allows you to strategically route targeted traffic direct to a landing page that is designed to convert more customers (who find you) to take up your offer. Since you have to pay for each click on your ad, care must be taken to ensure that your landing page converts a large percentage of the traffic. Bear in mind, that statistics show the average eCommerce site converts only 2.2-4.0% of its pay-per-click traffic.

Blogging and Content Marketing

Blogging and content marketing are both great avenues to deliver insightful and up-to-date information to your prospects and targets via the internet. Blogging is the perfect vehicle to keep visitors coming back on a regular basis and it helps boost your search engine rankings – Google and other search engines give preferential treatment to websites that update their content on a regular basis and have strong social following. It also allows you to post valuable content on other sites, social media platforms and customer forums which can help more customers learn about you, make an informed decision and build backlinks that bring even more traffic to your site.

Mobile Optimization

We live in a technologically mobile world, so it’s time to ensure that your company’s website is “mobile-friendly,” too. In the last 2 years there has literally been an explosion of mobile searches and purchases from smartphones and tablets.  It is estimated that nearly 35% of all web traffic originates from a mobile device which means it is imperative that you have a user-friendly mobile version of your web content.  Not only will you be rewarded with increased website traffic and retention, you will also reap more enquiries and more customers who pay for your solution.

Social Media

Connecting with prospects and customers through various social media platforms is a skilful way to cultivate interest while also creating an open 2-way channel of communication with existing customers. Choose a social network that best suits your business model. Whether it’s Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin or Pinterest, posting up-to-date and informative content is sure to boost your brand awareness, feedback, following and…ultimately sales.

PR

Public relations is the ultimately the steering wheel of your informational boat. Your PR department must eloquently regulate the ebb and flow of company content that is passed along to your targeted consumers. It is imperative to keep your public relations positive, current, and professional, utilizing as many different resourceful tools as possible. The likes, shares and comments also allow your posts and website to rank favourably with the major search engines – which is another great reason to start attracting more customers via PR.

Finding more customers online doesn’t have to be messy, expensive or difficult.  Take your pick from these eight great methods to create your own practical and powerful strategy to find more customers online and avoid the nasty trap of feeling that you have to cold call to find more customers and sales.

 

 

 

retain existing customersAll of the leading experts recommend that you spend 75% of your budget to retaining existing customers (and re-engage them). Yet surprisingly, most companies do the exact opposite. Even large corporations like Coles, Woolworths, Max Factor and Target (not just the little SMEs) make the mistake of spending too much chasing new customers (or ones that have left) and often ignore their existing ones.

Several years ago I held a senior commercial role at one of the largest retail businesses in the country and I can confirm that they spent <20% to retain existing customers. They, like 95% of businesses out there, spend the bulk of their budget on chasing new customers or attempting to re-engage those that have left and gone to the competition.

And therein lies the biggest mistake you can make as a business owner…

Every dollar spent on direct marketing to retain existing customers is actually worth 50x the equivalent amount spent chasing new customers. With above the line advertising, it is very hard to capture the attention of new customers, embed your message in their mind and compel them to act. It is much easier (and cheaper) to reinforce your message with an existing customer and encourage repeat visits.

So, if everyone knows it is easier and cheaper, why are most businesses NOT focusing the majority of their attention and budget on their existing customer base? The answer to that question is unclear. But what is clear is that there are 4 Simple Strategies that you can use today to boost sales and retain existing customers.

1.   Spend 75% of Your Budget on Existing Customers – The bulk of sales and marketing efforts should be focused on direct communications and NOT on social media, newspapers, PR, magazines or pay-per-click advertising.  For those of you who are established and have been in business for a few years, this is going to free up a lot of time that has been wasted on chasing new customers.

2.   Do Your  Homework to Maximize Return on Investment (ROI) – I recommend that you take the time today to analyse your existing customer data:

–   What are they buying?

–   What could you introduce them to which would increase gross profit margin?

–   How can you drive frequency (visits)?

3.   Frequency Lifts Sales by 75% More Than Upselling – It is much more effective and profitable, to focus on getting customers to return to your website or business, as opposed to trying to sell them one more thing while they are there.

4.   Focus on Customers Within a 10km radius – Customers who have moved outside a 10km radius of your business can be particularly tricky to re-engage. In research conducted at one of the largest retailers in the country, we discovered that 82% of the revenues were attributable to customers that lived within a 10km radius. And in my experience working with hundreds of small-midsized businesses, this statistic still holds true. If your customer has moved outside of this radius, it does not make sense to waste any of your budget trying to reactivate them.

Even though it’s important to appeal to and attract new customers, it’s absolutely crucial to your business’s survival that you retain and nurture the customers that have supported and shopped with you to date. Everyone knows that is cheaper and easier to garner incremental business from existing customers but what separates the truly successful entrepreneur from the pack is the ability to put this knowledge into practice by allocating a large portion of your budget and focus to existing customers.

 

Get More Customers to Your BusinessToday I want to share with you 2 things that you should never do/include in your sales or marketing message, if you want to get more customers to your business.

To prove my point, I’m going to share with you two examples of what NOT to do.

I saw a billboard recently on a major freeway.  It read “Texting While Driving KILLS”.  Then down below in fine print were the words “For more driving tips, text ‘SAFETY’ to 79191.”  Now I’m sure you are probably laughing or at least smiling right now because this is an obvious case of sending a mixed message.  And you’re right, I’m sure it is very clear to you why this message is ineffective.  But the sad part is – this type of miscommunication or presentation of conflicting ideas is seeping in and polluting your sales and marketing materials every day.  To get more customers to your business, you have to stop making this costly mistake.

Take for example your website, your eNewsletter or your brochure/catalog.  What exactly are you asking your prospect or customer to do?  Did you make the mistake of trying to cram 3 or 4 competing requests onto one page?  Did you ask them to buy your product, join your database, visit your blog and watch your latest video? Chances are, you got really excited about what you do and you wanted to share everything you could on just that one tiny page.  And I can understand why you got excited but you confused your audience and most of them walked away because what you wanted them to do wasn’t clear.

Now what you did may not have been as blatant as “For more driving tips, text ‘SAFETY’ to 79191.”  However, the end result was the same.

If you want to get more customers and prospects to your business, you need to focus on communicating one clear message.  If your message is clear and there is only one action that they could take, you will find that the number of people who step forward and take that desired action will go up dramatically.

Now that brings me to my second point.

The second mistake I don’t want you make is to use words or sentences that are confusing.  Take for example this sign I saw outside a motel – “Free Wifi Starting at $59.99”.  I think the motel owner who put up this sign was either in a rush or ran out of space because he forgot a few important words.  What he probably meant to say was “Free Wifi.  Rooms starting from $59.99”.  He only forgot two small words but those simple words made the difference between a message that was clear and one that made absolutely no sense at all.

Now you may not be offering free wifi but I bet you may have used or at least seen terms like “scalable architecture”, “a customer-centric model”, “ holistic approach” or “results-based focus”.  These words mean nothing to the reptilian brain (the part of your customer’s brain that decides and takes action).  That part of the brain is 45million years old and it struggles to process and understand complex words, numbers, unfamiliar symbols and graphs that contain too much information.  If you want to speed up the decoding process and make it easier to get more customers to your business, you need to make your message simple. Choose words that are clear and easy to understand.  Complete your thoughts and sentences – don’t make it difficult and give your customer the excuse – “I need to think about it”. If your customer has too think too hard to decode your  message, he simply won’t make a decision

Now I want you to be honest with yourself – is there a chance you might be sending mixed messages to your potential customers? Are your sales/marketing messages clear and succinct?  If not, now is the best time to go back and re-write your materials.  If you want to get more customers to your business, you need to simplify what you are asking them to do and use language that is easy to interpret.


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