Overcoming Your Biggest Marketing Obstacle

By Charlie Cook
Posted Monday, July 12, 2004

At times, no matter what you do your marketing is stuck and you're not attracting new clients quickly enough. It doesn't seem to make a difference how much time or money you put into it, its like you are driving in slow motion. You just seem to be spinning your wheels and not getting any traction to move your business forward as quickly as you'd like.

What is it that's keeping you from growing your business and your revenue?

IS THE ECONOMY LIMITING YOUR BUSINESS? Possibly but unlike many large corporations that get hammered by economic trends, independent professionals and small business owners don't need mass movements of clients to be successful. Most small businesses need a few hundred or few thousand clients to do very well. You just have to do a better job of marketing than your competitors to bring them in.

IS THE LACK OF MONEY TO SPEND ON MARKETING LIMITING YOUR BUSINESS? The most successful independent professionals spend very little on marketing relative to profits. They utilize email, referrals, and other marketing tactics to get attention, build trust and attract clients.

IS THE LACK OF TIME THE PROBLEM WITH YOUR MARKETING? If you run your own business, there is never enough time in the day to accomplish everything you need to do. But the people who make the time for marketing see their businesses grow.

Let's face it; your biggest marketing obstacle is you: your perceptions/ attitudes, behavior and organization.

Common problems that may be holding your marketing back:

* Not enjoying marketing yourself and your business.
* Not having a marketing strategy or plan
* Not integrating marketing into your daily schedule.
* Taking over two minutes to describe how you solve clients problems.
* Spending too much on promotional campaigns without testing your copy or inexpensive tactics first.
* Talking too much and not listening to prospects.
* Not giving away helpful ideas to prospects in order to build trust and establish yourself as the expert who can solve their problems.
* Not regularly contacting prospects.
* Forgetting to provide prospects with offers they can't refuse.

Are you stuck by your own thinking, your behaviors or your perceptions about your marketing and what is or isn't possible?

GIVE YOUR MARKETING A CHANCE

The good news is that if you are your biggest marketing obstacle you can easily become your biggest marketing asset. Take the following steps to change your marketing behaviors and perceptions and give your marketing a chance.

Goals - Write down goals for your business and for your marketing. Studies show that people who commit to written goals are more successful, often making ten times as much money as those who don't.

Knowledge -Leverage all you know about your business to provide prospects and clients with a steady stream of ideas they can use. In this way you demonstrate your expertise and stand out from the competition.

Money - Spend as little as possible on marketing, but do expect to spend money relative to the returns you anticipate. For example if you are an independent consultant and want to grow your business to two hundred or three hundred thousand dollars in revenue per year you will need to spend some money on your marketing effort.

Time - Schedule a meeting with yourself every week to review your marketing strategy, look at what is and isn't working and write your next ad or article. Your most important job is to market your business and then to deliver the services and products. Make sure the way you spend your time reflects this.

Get out of your own way to improve your marketing and attract more clients. Change your marketing actions and perceptions. If you don't have it, get the marketing knowledge you need and make good use of the time and money you do have. When you remove the obstacles to your marketing you'll find your business gaining traction and clients.

About the Author
Charlie Cook, helps service professionals and small business owners attract more clients and be more successful. Visit (http://www.charliecook.net/).