Marketing Your Work |

One simple thing consultants can do to grow their businesses faster

January 24, 2012 By Margaret Adams 1 Comment

Get them to sign up!

Most consultants are looking to grow their businesses.

Most consultants who have been in business for a while say it’s harder now to get business than it once was.

When consultants start to work with me they often say their problems have nothing to do with them and the way they manage their practices. They say:

“It’s the economy.”

“It’s the cutbacks.”

“It’s the level of competition.”

Well, I’m not sure I agree.

When I start working with a consultant, one of the questions I ask in our first meeting is:

“How many sales meetings did you have last month?”

I often get blank looks. Then I get lots of information about the one-to-one meetings and the discussions following on from networking meetings and the lunches and breakfast meetings the consultant has attended.

I take notes. It’s fascinating to listen and to work out how much time and money consultants spend on these activities.

In the end it turns out that quite a few consultants don’t have any sales meetings at all.

They have meetings where they talk about what they do. They have meetings where they present proposals. They have meetings where they discuss options and possibilities. They have exploratory meetings.

They don’t actually have meetings where they say:

“This is what I am offering and this is the price. Now, when can I start work on your project?”

That’s the main reason why they’re not making sales. They just never get around to asking for the business.

How to make sales

If you’re going to do business you need to make sales.

We’re now into week four in the Business Start-Up month, which is why I’m writing about sales. In week four in The Solo Success Start-Up Guide I concentrate on sales and doing one very important thing to get sales.

What is it?

It’s asking for the business.

If you don’t make sales, your business is doomed. Yet, when you delve into the way lots of consultants work, they never actually ask for the business. That’s their biggest problem.

Do you ask for business?

Think carefully.

Have you asked for a piece of business in the last month?
Have you asked a customer for a start date for a project?
Have you asked in plain and simple terms that the customer makes a commitment to work with you?
Have you asked when you can submit your first invoice?

If you haven’t, then you’re missing out on business.

Often customers are just waiting for you to ask them for their business. They want you to ask. If you don’t, they won’t offer to put the first meeting in the diary. They won’t ask you about the best time to run that workshop. They’ll let you walk away from the meeting empty handed.

You can improve your business if you make a point of asking for the business every time you make a proposal of any sort.

What have you got to lose?

They can only say no.

Over to you . . .

Be honest. Do you ask your customers for their business?

If you don’t, what gets in the way? Let me know in the comments.

If you like this post please “like” it on Facebook and tweet about it using the hashtags:

#startup

#smallbiz

#entrepreneur.

Writers’ Marketing Mistakes (5) – Purposeless marketing

July 9, 2010 By Margaret Adams Leave a Comment

This marketing mistake is a real marketing blunder, but it’s a mistake that lots of writers make.

It’s often the result of that guilty feeling you get when you know you’re not doing as much marketing as you should. Therefore, you decide to do something. Often the task is chosen more to salve your conscience than to achieve any clear marketing objective.

That’s the point. Successful marketing will have a purpose. Many writers’ marketing attempts don’t.

What purpose could you set for your marketing?

Many people – including writers – don’t have a defined and concrete purpose for their marketing efforts.

Of course, they want to do more business or to sell more books. They want to make more money from their books. However, these are aspirations.

You may wish to sell more books, but there are lots of factors outside your control that help to make sales. This means that noting how many books have been sold each time you check your royalties doesn’t really help you to work out how effective your own marketing efforts are.

You need to set some objectives to give your marketing purpose. You could begin with statements like the following:

I’m doing this marketing activity (specify) to help me to get more people to visit my website.

I’m doing this marketing activity (specify) to help me to get more sign ups for my newsletter.

I’m doing this marketing activity (specify) to help to get me more speaking opportunities (and the opportunity to make back-of-room sales etc).

The above statements are quite different from vague statements about selling more books – even if a number of sales is specified. They are beginning to define a purpose to your marketing, but there’s still more to do.

How will having marketing objectives help?

Once you say that you want more visits to your website you can ask a very specific additional question.

How many visits do you want over what period of time?

When you come up with an answer, that’s the point at which you can congratulate yourself because you’ve set a metric for your marketing.

You can now measure what you actually achieve against a defined target.

To begin with you’ll probably pick numbers out of the air. Later you’ll know better.

After a while you’ll know how many visitors you need to attract before one of them takes the desired action. (This could be to click through to an on-line bookstore. It could be to read a review of your work. It could be to take a look at the services you offer. It’s your choice.)

When you know that you need twenty, or two hundred, visitors to your site to get one click through to the next stage of the sales process, you have a much better idea of the volume of traffic you need to generate.

This knowledge will affect the marketing activities you plan. It will help you to make your marketing more focused and more relevant. It will help you to judge the success of your marketing.

How do you give your marketing purpose?

To give your marketing purpose try setting objectives which it is in your power to achieve.

For example:

I want to sell five copies of this book when I speak at the ABC exhibition on Thursday.

I want to sell five copies of this book when I give a talk at the DEF writers’ group on Friday.

I want ten new people to visit my website each time I have an article published in XYZ magazine. (You can set up a special landing page for readers of XYZ magazine so you will know that only magazine readers are visiting your chosen page.)

What all of this means in that your marketing now has purpose.

Measure your marketing success

Now you can measure your success with your marketing and work out if it is worth your while speaking at exhibitions such as ABC exhibition and so on.

It really is true that if you can’t measure something you can’t manage it. In the case of your marketing, if you can’t measure the results of what you’re doing, you’ll struggle to give your marketing purpose.

So the next step is clear. Decide what you can control in terms of your marketing and see how successful you can be when you set yourself measurable objectives that you can monitor and review.

You’ll be more likely to complete your marketing activities if you work in this way because now your marketing has purpose.

Writers’ Marketing Mistakes (4) – Outsourcing marketing

June 17, 2010 By Margaret Adams 2 Comments

Getting rid of the marketing is a dream many writers share. When success comes to a writer, marketing will be the first thing to go. Someone else can do it. Someone else can take the responsibility.

Here’s how the argument goes.

“Today we’re encouraged to outsource everything. No one can do everything. People need to focus on what they’re good at, and get others to do the remaining tasks. Therefore, just as a person who doesn’t know much about accounts outsources book-keeping and accountancy to someone else, so the same should be done with the marketing.

Agreed?”

Every time a writer says this, there’s hope in his or her eyes. Unfortunately, the premise is wrong.

Book-keeping and marketing are different

You can outsource book-keeping and accountancy. It makes sense to do so unless this is your field.

Giving a brief to an expert in book-keeping or accountancy is not that difficult.

There are rules and regulations to follow. Accounts are set out in similar ways. There isn’t a great deal of scope to do things differently. Therefore, you can outsource these tasks knowing that they will be completed in much the same way whoever you engage. You’ll see profit and loss accounts. You’ll see cash flow forecasts. You’ll see your company accounts set out in a particular way.

There’s a lot more scope to address some accountancy tasks in more individualistic ways, but the basics are completed according to the same set of rules.

Marketing is individual

When you come to think about your marketing there are lots of ways to set about the task and lots of different marketing styles. There are also lots of different objectives you can set yourself.

You can aim to build your reputation. You can aim to get yourself known. You can aim to make book sales or sales of associated products. Then you can focus on off-line or on-line approaches to marketing, or you might give precedence to face-to-face marketing. You can choose to advertise. You can choose to use article marketing strategies. You can blog your way to success. You can tweet and use social media as your major marketing strategy.

You know which ones suit your business, your circumstances and your budget. That person you want to outsource the marketing work to doesn’t know you well. He or she doesn’t know your aspirations and so on. If you want someone to take responsibility for your marketing, you will have to spend a lot of time briefing that person and then monitoring the work. Even then there will be things to be done that only you can do.

Someone might get you an interview on a radio programme, but you have to do the interview.

You need to work out for yourself what your marketing will cover and how it will fit in with what you’re trying to achieve.. You need to know what your principal objectives are. You need to know which successes are you aiming for. You can’t let someone else make these choices for you.

Outsource tasks

You can, of course, outsource specific tasks, once you have your marketing strategy in place, but you shouldn’t just hand over responsibility for your marketing to someone else.

You can bring in someone to help you with your social media strategy.
You can bring in someone to help you to blog more effectively.
You can ask a public relations agency to help you with all aspects of media relations.

What you should avoid doing, however, is handing over control of your marketing to someone outside your business.

You’re in charge

You know your business, your personal brand and your objectives best. You know your audience – or you should. You know what works in your industry and with your audience and what doesn’t – or you should.

You know the history of your marketing activities. You know what you have tried and what you haven’t attempted yet. You know what works.

You’re the best person to sell yourself and your products and services. You really are the expert in yourself. That’s the real reason why you can’t outsource your marketing successfully.

Interview with Emma Wimhurst, author of BOOM!

June 11, 2010 By Margaret Adams Leave a Comment

Emma Wimhurst

Emma Wimhurst is a successful businesswoman, motivational public speaker,business turnaround expert and author. She has been defined as: “the original kitchen sink entrepreneur”.

In fact, Emma grew a start-up cosmetics company to a business with a multi-million pound turnover in just four years.

Emma now applies the approach she used to build her cosmetics business to her work with all the businesses she helps to succeed – or boom!

BOOM! – which is the title of Emma’s book – enhances her consultancy and business mentoring work. It’s also succeeding in its own right.

I spoke to Emma towards the end of May about her success as a businessperson who writes.

What did you want to achieve with BOOM?

I wanted to introduce people to the seven disciplines I think are really important for business success. These principles help people to control, grow and add impact to their business.

I wanted to write a colourful book, a book that’s easy to read, but still has substance. I’ve been put off by a lot of business books I’ve seen. I wanted to use a different approach. I also wanted to make an impact.

I’ve developed the seven disciplines over a number of years. I used them to build my own start-up business. I use them in my mentoring work and when I speak, as well as in the book.

Why did you choose BOOM! as the title for your book?

BOOM!

I wanted a short title, a one-word title.

BOOM is about energy and impact, but the boom on a boat is the place from where you control progress and set the direction you’re travelling in.

BOOM is explosive, but it’s also about control. That’s why it’s a good title.

What made you decide to self-publish?

I had a conversation with a publisher, who was interested in the work, but I wanted to get the book out quickly, so I decided to self-publish. I set up my own publishing company: Diva Publishing, and published BOOM! towards the end of 2009.

Self-publishing’s not a bad thing to do.

When you self-publish you’re in charge. For example, I chose the cover design and the book layout. I got what I wanted because BOOM! is my book.

I aimed to sell the book myself when I spoke and to have it available on Amazon and also via my websites. BOOM! is part of my portfolio. It’s part of what I do.

However, I have now been approached by the publishing industry. BOOM! is being promoted by publisher Harriman House. This means I’ve got access to their distribution network, even though I’ve self-published..

Why is BOOM! important to you?

It’s part of my story.

I inspire, motivate and enable people to transform their business from a whisper to a boom.

That’s what I do. I’m passionate about what I do.

I didn’t realise how much of an impact BOOM! would have on me. I’m pleased with the success, the sales, the revenue and so on. The impact BOOM! is having on people is very important to me, too. Lots of people have told me they’ve enjoyed it. There’s been a lot written about it. I never imagined this would happen.

What advice would you give to someone thinking of writing a business book?

I’d tell them to sort out their own brand – their personal brand – before they do anything else.

Think about it.

Brand is really important. People identify with a brand. If you think about me, I’m very colourful. I’m often referred to as “the lady in red”. BOOM! is colourful, too.

If you’re interested in writing a book, create a brand that’s honest and reflects you. That’s the first thing to do.

That’s my advice.

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You can read a review of BOOM! by Dee Black, a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Marketing, here. You can also subscribe to Emma’s blog on the same web page and sign up for BOOMbytes! – weekly inspiration from Emma.

Filed Under: Uncategorized Tagged With: Getting published, Making money from your writing, Marketing your work

Writers’ Marketing Mistakes (3) – Token marketing

June 7, 2010 By Margaret Adams 1 Comment

Token marketing is something that lots of people in business do. They know they need to market. They know they ought to market. They know their business success depends on their commitment to marketing.

They feel guilty when they fail to market – and yet they’d rather not. Their solution is token marketing.

Are you guilty of token marketing?

Do you force yourself to do some marketing? Do you dabble with marketing, promising yourself that one day your agent or your publicist will handle all this for you? Do you do a bit of blogging every now and then, or add a page to your website occasionally, when you feel you really must do something? Have you had a postcard or a bookmark printed to promote your book, but you haven’t given them out?

If this is your approach to marketing, then you’re definitely involved with token marketing.

Token marketing rarely works.

You already know that token marketing doesn’t work unless you’re very, very lucky. You know that your efforts won’t pay off, because you’re only putting in a very small amount of time and effort. You only do any marketing occasionally, and your heart just isn’t in the job.

If you’re honest with yourself you’re actually rather relieved when your marketing doesn’t work because you can now say:

“I tried ………….. and it doesn’t work.”

You don’t want it to work because you don’t want to spend your time marketing.

You’re the marketing manager

Unfortunately for your writing business you’re the marketing manager. If you are only undertaking token marketing you’re not going to make progress with developing your writing business. You’re not going to achieve the success you’re looking for.

Therefore, you need to change your approach to marketing.

Instead of token marketing think about the results you want to achieve. You want subscribers to your blog. You want visits to your website. You want people to attend an event at which you’re speaking. You want to sell books at an event you’re taking part in at your local library or at your local bookshop.

These things don’t just happen.

Think about your token marketing strategies and be honest. If you put in twice as much time to making them work, would they deliver the results you want?

What else might work better than the approaches you’ve used thus far?
If you were to use two or three additional approaches to marketing what could you achieve?
If you applied your efforts consistently to your marketing, what might you achieve?

You probably know the answer.

Stop token marketing. Start effective marketing.

Marketing for beginners

Here’s the list of things to do.

Allocate a budget of time to marketing.
Set a target for your marketing achievements.
Choose two or three marketing methods to try out. Be prepared to add to them.
Start a marketing “campaign” that will last for at least two months.

Do the marketing and give it the same level of commitment as you give to your writing.

Then check the results. How much better are you doing with your new approach to marketing . . . and what else could you try now?