This article “How to Market Your Small Business for free” is for every small business owner and independent professional who wants to make a success of their business marketing. designed to be your own pocket marketing consultant. It is there to help you when you need a quick injection of inspiration and when you want to plan your marketing strategy.
Also, it’s structured in a way to enable you to think about the ideas presented and then apply them to your own business. Starting at the beginning with some of the vital thinking you need to do before embarking on the creation of your marketing plan, you will be guided step by step through the maze.
It will enable you to create a marketing plan that is exactly right for you.
Maybe you are wondering if there is a secret to making your marketing work . . . if there is a special system . . . a key to success . . .
Imagine if I told you that the answers you are looking for are inside your own mind and all you really need is the right system, the right questions and the right guidance to enable you to unlock them.
As a successful marketing consultant and business coach, I have been amazed by the people I have worked with over the years and how much they have found they already know when stimulated by the right set of questions.
This simple process begins with where you are right now with your business, product, or service and takes you to exactly where you want to be. Every step you take will add a vital piece to your ultimate marketing plan of action.
At the end of the process, you will have a marketing plan that you have created yourself. You will know which marketing strategies are going to offer your particular business the greatest leverage and you will know exactly what you need to do to apply them.
If you need to revive the enthusiasm for your business and bring back the passion you had for it – reading and working through this book is the stimulant you need right now.
When was the last time you stopped and took a deep breath and asked yourself this question? It is an important one to ask. Under pressure, it can be easier to start explaining what you don’t want.
All that does is reinforce the negative. In order to be able to move forward, you need the stimulation of a vision, a goal, and a glimpse of how you would really like things to be. It is a bit like thinking about your holiday plans before you get on the plane.
It makes you feel good, motivated, excited. Much better than a good old moan about how you don’t want this and you don’t want that. Have you ever noticed how that can prompt feelings of the exact opposite to the ones that would help you to move forward and actually get what you do want?
So our very first ‘Special Response Question’ is the most important one:
Describe this in all its glory: your business, your work, your lifestyle, your relationships, the way you live your business life, the money you are earning, how you are spending it, what you are doing with your spare time ^ really let yourself dream.
Now imagine yourself five years on, having achieved what you want and looking back on yourself today; ask yourself this important question:
What were the most important things you did that enabled you to get where you wanted to be?
Did these questions make you ‘think’? Notice how easy it is to shift your mind to a better place when you ask yourself the right question. You may be working hard in your business right now and haven’t had time to really ‘think’ about how you could be growing and developing your business.
It might take all your energy just to keep going and get what needs to be done, done.
Questions challenge your thinking, they challenge what you are doing and how you are doing it, they stimulate and most importantly they help you to change things.
Making mistakes is part of the learning process. Recognizing them is the first important step. Madness has been described as continuing to do the same thing whilst desiring a different result.
This is like running an advert week after week in your local publication that never provides a response or reaction and doing nothing about it, whilst at the same time hoping to get a result. There are many examples like this and we are probably all guilty of some of them.
If you have mentally ticked ‘yes’ that is me in any of the above you are being honest with yourself. We have all been there. You learn by first getting some awareness of what is not working. It is only then that you can start to move forward.
Also Read: 4 Methods of effective Internet marketing
A marketing plan is your guide to exactly how you are going to action your business marketing. It is the ultimate outcome of your thinking and decision-making. It is your commitment on paper, your route to success.
It is common practice among many small business owners to spend a lot of time doing as opposed to planning. You may have a plan in your head that you have not yet committed to paper.
Getting out there and making things happen is vital to the success of any small business marketing; it is important, however, that they are the right things. You can spend a lot of time and waste a lot of energy doing things the wrong way or simply just doing the wrong things.
A simple marketing plan that you can create yourself using the ideas in this book will keep your business marketing on the right track.
Also Read: Growth Hacker Marketing
Your challenge is to take the following nine-step plan with their accompanying think marketing questions and create the notes for your plan
HERE ARE YOUR NINE STEPS TO A SUCCESSFUL PLAN
Each step contains a set of questions that you will need to be able to answer to complete your plan.
From where you are to where you want to be
Your existing customer base
Where do you want to be?
Your market
Your competition
Your target customers and strongest niche
Creating your value proposition
Attracting hand-raisers and building a list
Also Read: What is Attraction Marketing
Getting your sales systems in place
You are where you are now as a direct result of the actions you have taken and the decisions you have made along the way. Where you will get to in the future will be a result of the choices you make, starting now. Imagine today as the first day of the rest of your business life.
It is important to assess exactly where you are now before you embark on your journey. Many people are so busy doing that they rarely take the time out to take stock and reflect.
It is vital, from time to time, to take that vital step back from the cut and thrust of your daily workload. If you keep on doing what you have always been doing, you will always get what you have now.
You will need to be honest with yourself and focus on the facts. This may involve some detail that you haven’t paid attention to for a while. You will need to be disciplined as you gather this information.
Don’t rely on guesswork or gut feeling. Get the specifics as it is these details that will form the bedrock from which you can move forward. If you want to grow your business you will need to know exactly where you are starting from.
YOUR BUSINESS NOW – SPECIAL RESPONSE CHECKLIST
Your business
Turnover and profit margins
Customers
Business strengths
Your attitude towards your business
Having answered these questions you will have some specific facts, thoughts, and feelings to work with. You now have a starting point. This is where you are now.
Marketing is everything that you do to communicate your business to both your existing and potential customers. There are many different ways that you can market your business. Most people use a combination that works best for their particular business.
If you are spending money on marketing your business it is vital that you know what works and what doesn’t. There is no point in investing money when what you are doing is not bringing you a good return. So how do you know whether it is working or not?
Your challenge
Your main challenge is continuing to test and measure your marketing efforts. Relying on gut feel is not enough. You will need some tangible feedback.
Try the following checklist indicating what you have tried and whether it was successful or not. Note down any tangible evidence that you have to support your definition of success.
Have a look at this marketing evaluation checklist and evaluate how successful you consider your marketing efforts have been to date.
You can do this in a number of ways.