Fuzion Web Blog

Continually ask questions, re-evaluate what you’re doing, and be flexible. If your website isn’t converting the way it ought to be, try to pinpoint its weaknesses and correct them. The same holds true for print ads that are not generating responses. If the solution doesn’t jump right out at you, ask your associates, acquaintances, neighbors, or spouse what their initial gut reaction is to your latest print ad, website landing page, a marketing postcard, or a radio ad. Instead of asking them what they think of it, ask them the more pointed question of how they think it could be improved (and assure them that you won’t be offended by their constructive criticism). Useful feedback can often come from unexpected sources.

Perhaps the single, most important marketing strategy that should be practiced by all small business owners is to make marketing a daily routine. Granted, there may be 101 different priorities vying for your attention at any given moment, but if you neglect marketing on more than just an occasional basis, then you risk losing potential sales, being overtaken by the competition, and placing self-imposed limitations on your income growth. In a challenging economy it’s more important than ever to be known as a company that provides value, dependability, and great service. Without some sort of regular marketing program, your existing and prospective customers may find themselves to be unexpectedly interested in your competitor’s latest offerings — which may have been brought to their attention through a postcard mailing, a trade show exhibit, a blog posting, a phone call, a press release, or a well-written sales letter. (It’s the old “out of sight, out of mind” principle.)

One of the greatest obstacles closing a sale is procrastination - and deadlines are the key to overcoming this. By placing deadlines on your campaigns and advertising collateral, you can work to overcome the natural tendency to deliberate and postpone a buying decision. By using a deadline you are effectively injecting urgency into your ads.

Writing effective surveys is not as easy as it looks. Here are some hints to make your next survey pay off. To begin, let’s take a look at a terrible survey question:

Do you feel happy, helpful or optimistic when completing surveys, and on a scale where 1 is “never” and 25 is “often”, how often would you say that occurs?

Whew! Looks like we have room for improvement. Let’s clean it up a bit…

Simplify It’s important to keep survey questions as succinct as possible. Keeping the sentence short and its structure simple reduces the likelihood of the customer misunderstanding the question — which improves the value of the responses. You can also simplify your questions by following the “one-question” rule. That is, make sure there aren’t secondary questions lurking behind your main question. In the sample above, we have a lot of questions: Has taking a survey ever made you feel happy? Has taking a survey ever made you feel helpful? Has taking a survey ever made you feel optimistic? How often has taking a survey make you feel happy? How often has taking a survey make you feel helpful? How often has taking a survey make you feel optimistic?

Economy of Scale When providing multiple choices, it helps to take the approach of “less is more”. Have you ever seen somebody overwhelmed by the many choices available to them at a restaurant? They agonize over the menu as if they could make a “wrong” choice. For this same reason, you want to limit the options as much as possible. Scales of 5 have become popular because they cover all of the bases — yes, no, maybe (and even maybe-yes and maybe-no) — without allowing for much more beyond that.

Our sample above could benefit from a scale of 5: Never, Rarely, Sometimes, Often, Always

Compact Do everything you can to make the survey easy for your clients to complete.

The fewer questions they are asked, the less time it will take to complete, which will increase the likelihood that they’ll complete it. In our sample survey, we can combine our six questions into three.

Here’s the finished product:

For each question, please select the response that best reflects your experience.

Completing surveys makes me feel happy: Never Rarely Sometimes Often Always

Completing surveys makes me feel helpful: Never Rarely Sometimes Often Always

Completing surveys makes me feel optimistic: Never Rarely Sometimes Often Always

here is no substitute for in marketing testing of new marketing creatives. Try testing your new creatives in market on small scale samples. Real market testing has a major advantage or traditional testing: you can see it an believe it! A product moving from the shelves into the homes of your consumers is far more telling to your higher-ups than a bunch of confusing measurements provided by your market research team. Purchase likelihoods and intentions mean nothing when compared to actual sales.

Many small business owners know keeping in touch with their contacts is an important part of their marketing plan. However, all too often, keeping in touch is a sporadic effort. Sending birthday cards or an e-mail newsletter is something that can be done “later.” The problem is “later” never comes. 

Small business owners need to build a marketing calendar that includes when and how each person (or group of people) is going to be contacted.  The best way small business owners can keep on top of their contact efforts is to have some type of system in place.  The system should be as easy and as automatic as possible. 
   
There are many software tools you can use to organize your contacts.  Microsoft Outlook and Excel are great programs.  With either of these, you can merge with Microsoft Word to create phone lists, mailing labels and personalized letters. More sophisticated contact management programs you can purchase include ACT! and Goldmine.   
  
Marketing Tools for Keeping in Touch 
  
There are a variety of different marketing tools small business owners can use to keep in touch. Here are just a few ideas. 
  
E-mail newsletters are a great way to communicate with a large group of people. There are a number of great on-line resources available for e-mail newsletter creation and management. Use e-mail newsletters to provide product information, announce sales, and promote special events.  
  
Real greeting cards (the kind that come in an envelope with a stamp) are great marketing tools to use at Christmas, birthdays and other times of the year.  In fact, the best time a small business owner can send a greeting card is when there is no real reason to send a card! A card sent in August will be remembered much more than one sent in December.

Savvy business owners know that phone calls, personal visits and lunches are always appreciated. The key there is to remember the marketing message when scheduling those calls or visits. Yes, having coffee with a long-term client is great. But be sure to let the client know that you have a great new product that can dramatically help him or her. Too often business owners get wrapped up in the social aspect of personal visits and forget to ask for more business!

The most important part of any system is using it regularly.  If you are very busy, or have a hard time working with schedules, you are better off delegating or outsourcing.  If you have an assistant, that person can print letters, write e-mails, even sign Christmas cards for you.  That leaves you free to work on other areas of your business.

If you don’t have any help in your office, outsourcing is the answer. There are a number of local and on-line services that help business owners with their marketing. Or, try using a virtual assistant.  The marketing money you spend to outsource these routine tasks will be repaid many time over with the new business you get.

Remember — the key to a successful system is to have it automated as much as possible. The less work you have to do, the more likely it is to be done on time, and the more likely you are to get referrals!

One of the best investments you can make is a 39 cent stamp on a piece of mail making your customer feel special — instead of trying to sell them something.

Make your customers feel as if they belong to something special.  Give them a free gift completely unexpectedly.  Tell them you are doing this strictly because you want them to know how much you appreciate them.  Resell your customers on your commitment to them.

Over the years I have encountered a number of small businesses that do not have a marketing plan in place, despite operating for years. How can you have confidence in the growth of your business if you do not have a plan? A marketing plan forces you understand why you are in business, where you’re headed, what makes you special, and why one marketing campaign over another makes sense for your business.

1. A logo is the very first impression people get of your company - 
   Before a potential client even walks through your door, your logo is a representation of your company. It can make a company appear large, small (whether it really is or not) fun, serious, professional…
2. A logo needs longevity
   Once a logo is designed it will represent your company for many years.
3. A logo needs to be original
   A logo should be designed specifically for your company. A cheap “generic logo” may not reflect your company’s values. A cheap logo may also use clip art which could end up being used by another company.
4. A logo should look professional
   You wouldn’t take a potential new client to Mac Donalds for lunch, in effect this is what is being done with a cheap logo. A logo should give your company a professional image, appropriate to its needs.
5. A logo should reflect the time and thought gone in to designing it
   One of the problems here is that people don’t always realise the amount work that goes into a professionally designed logo:
   • The research - even if the budget is quite small I would expect at the very least to find out who the company’s main competitors are and how they present themselves
   • The brainstorming of ideas
   • The rough sketches
   • The 3 or 4 logo options worked up on the computer
   • The amends, tweaking and further amends
      
6. A logo is the starting point of your whole corporate image
   The colours typography and style of a logo will often dictate the corporate look of the rest of a company’s literature.