Like our roads, the marketing channels are becoming increasingly congested. Every day each of us is assailed with marketing messages: On the radio when we wake up, on the roads, on the train, even at work. So how do you compete with professional marketers with huge budgets to get your products or services noticed? Not by copying the big guys, that's for sure.
A paradox of the marketing world is that the most expensive form of promotion i.e. advertising is the least effective. Advertising can generally only be used to create awareness. Here's how it works: A financial advisor advertises every day in the local evening paper, on the same spot on the same page, month in, month out. Mrs G comes into an inheritance and needs financial advice; whose jumps into her head? Even if she can't remember his name, she knows exactly where to find it. Because she has seen that ad hundreds of times, the name seems familiar and safe to her. There is no logic to this, but she wouldn't look in the Yellow Pages and pick out the first financial advisor she came to. But...if she looked in the Yellow Pages and saw the name of the advisor who advertised every day in the local newspaper, it's him she would probably ring. So does a one-off ad work? No it has to be part of a continuous campaign.So don't advertise unless you are prepared to commit to a long term strategy. The exception is when the ad is creating awareness of another more effective marketing strategy such as a free seminar on avoiding Inheritance Tax.
The best strategy for the SME is referral building, generally through networking. This is usually very effective, but it does take time. Remember your strategy is NOT to sell your services to the people you meet at networking events. This is too limiting. The same people turn up to networking events week after week. You want them to introduce you to their own clients and contacts. Your objectives are:
1. To have impact and stand out from other people they meet.
2. To have a clear and memorable 10 second introduction that they can pass on to their contacts.
3. To form relationships with people so that they trust you.
4. To get them to pre-sell you to others.
After the meeting you must follow-up with a letter a call or email to reinforce your message. Then perhaps a meeting over coffee ot lunch to explore mutual benefits of referring one another.
Remember the basis for winning clients is KNOW, LIKE and TRUST. Advertising will only get you the "know" part. You have to meet them before they will "like" you and you need to have built a relationship to form the basis for "trust". So networking isn't all about exchanging business cards with everyone in the room. Most of them will end up in the bin or languishing in a drawer or entered into a database to become the (legitimate) target of the other person's direct mail.
However if you use networking to meet people to build relationships, you will develop know/like/trust relationships with others who will refer you as a trusted colleague to their own network of people who know, like and trust them. How does that sound? How many big organisations get beyond the know stage? There is your advantage as a small business.
Mike Smith
Marketing &Strategy Coach
email: mike@getclientsnow.co.uk
www.getclientsnow.co.uk
www.aldington-associates.co.uk
posted by Get Clients Now! @ 4:21 AM
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