What is the biggest marketing challenge that you have in your business? According to a survey by Marketing Sherpa, 78% of businesses say that their biggest marketing challenge is generating high quality leads.
In my work as a contract Marketing Director with small businesses I see this challenge on a daily basis. Interestingly enough many small businesses make the same mistake in addressing this problem.
That is, assuming that there is just one marketing strategy as a surefire way to generate high quality leads. Usually that “way” is the newest marketing fad, as in the case of Facebook marketing. The mistake is in assuming that the newest marketing fad is a one size fits all answer to a universal marketing problem.
The truth is that for most businesses, there is no “one way” to market your business, but many ways. Now feel free to disagree with me here, but let’s face it. Your surefire marketing strategy today can be gone tomorrow due to circumstances beyond your control. When then happens then what?
That’s why I teach that just like we need to have multiple streams of income, we also need to have multiple streams of marketing, using many marketing tools at one time to generate the results we desire.
So how do we know which tools to use? It depends on your business- the product or service you sell and your maximum capacity to sell it without straining your current resources.
For example, if you own a restaurant, what is the maximum number of meals you can sell per day with all available resources? The business capacity for a restaurant will be different than the business capacity for a real estate agent, or a consultant, or an internet business. The simple question is: How many sales per day do I want?
Now that I know how many sales per day I want, I need to figure out how many prospects I need to get those sales. Let’s do a very simple calculation. I know that I have a capacity to service 5 new clients per week. And I know that for each signed client I have to give 5 proposals (conversion ratio), and to get 5 proposals, I need to reach 200 prospects.
So I would need to reach 1000 prospects per week. 5 sales x 200 prospects per week= 1000 total prospects per week.
Your total number of prospects needed per week (reach) factored with the demographics and psychographics of your buyers as well as the frequency of touches needed will help determine what marketing tools will work best for you. In part two we will discuss reach and frequency in small business marketing.
What are your thoughts on the sales funnel? How many prospects do you need to reach per week? How do you reach them? What’s working and not working as far as marketing your business?
Related Posts:
- 4 Crazy Myths About Marketing
- Building Your Marketing Plan, Who’s Your Ideal Client?
- What Happens to Your Social Media Marketing When the Person Who is Running it is Gone?
Wendy Kenney is the best selling author of How to Build Buzz for Your Biz, Tap into the Power of Social Media, Publicity and Relationship Marketing to Grow Your Business, available on Amazon.com. She has been featured in the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, USA Today, and Newsday. For more information go to http://23Kazoos.com.
