I spotted a book by this title and realized how this perfectly describes the marketing strategy of most small and medium businesses I’ve dealt with.
When I ask business owners or those in charge of growing the business and ask them what their plan is to get more leads, to generate more business, they often begin to stammer. They have no plan.
When I ask them how they get their customers, they hesitate for a moment as they think back through their latest customers and say things like, well I was at a restaurant and a person overheard me talking about my business to my wife, a friend of mine at church asked me what I did and he became a client, one of our installers was talking to his cousin. It is usually an amazing collection of haphazard circumstances that lead customers to their business.
If you have not read the book The Emyth or The Emyth Revisited, you should stop what you are doing, go down to the local bookstore and not go to sleep until you have read through the book, twice.
It isn’t that the book is about marketing it is about systemetizing your business so it can do things better and better.
Then think about how you can systematically improve your lead generation.
Don’t take the approach that a prospect has to virtually threaten you at gunpoint in order for you to do business with them.
Hope isn’t going to cut it.
Here are some ideas:
- Advertise - both on the Internet and off the Internet
- Network - hang out at networking meetings or other places where prospective customers might hang out
- Give speeches - I’ve landed hundreds of thousands of dollars in consulting contracts from giving free speeches
- Write articles - one of the best ways to attract customers is to have them read useful and interesting articles about your products or services, just don’t make them advertisements
- Use press releases - let editors know you have a new product and the problem it solves, you have a new special report which gives people new insight into issues they are dealing with
- Ask for referrals - your existing satisfied customers are likely to know others who would be interested in your products and services
- Use direct mail - with all of the marketers going online, the mailbox has become more effective. Find a list of prospects and send them a letter describing a problem that can be solved by your product or service.
- Resell or cross sell your customers - it is five times easier and cheaper to sell more things to your existing customers than it is to get a new customer…yet we often neglect them.
I can hear you now:
- We’ve tried that before and it doesn’t work
- I don’t know how to write
- I’m afraid of giving speeches
- I’m no good at sales
- I’m not sure what to say
If you want to listen to your excuses and take counsel in your fears, then you can go back to relying on ‘hope’ to get new customers.
If you want to grow your business and get out of the just breaking even mode, they you will have to make some changes.
If you personally can’t do any of these, then find someone who can and pay them to do it.
These strategies don’t cost an arm and a leg.
Not doing these things can cost you everything. You can lose it all if you don’t systematically work on getting new business.
Pick one or two strategies you think would work best for you and then either learn how to do it well or pay someone that knows how to do it well.
Peter Drucker, the famous management consultant said, “The haphazard is too important to be left to chance.”
Don’t leave the future of your business to chance, systematically find and close new customers.
You’ll be happy you did.