Quiz: What Takes More Planning – a Wedding or a Business?
August 2, 2010
Your daughter announces she’s engaged. What’s the first thing you do? Plan the wedding. There are wedding venues to visit, flowers to order and cakes to taste…
You’ve just booked your next vacation. What do you do? You start planning what you’ll wear, what you’ll pack, where you’ll go, what you’ll see…
You’re a small business owner. You’re out of leads. Business is slow. You need more revenue. What do you do? Start planning? (Or turn to your marketing plan for direction?). Nope. If you’re like many business owners, you panic. Like a sailor overboard you latch on to the first advertising salesperson who walks into your business like a life preserver and spend hundreds or thousands on advertising. Thinking, “This one will be different”. The ads hit. You wait. The phones don’t ring. And you wonder why. Just more proof that marketing doesn’t work.
The problem is: there’s no cohesive, well thought out strategy. No plan. It would be like waiting until the day before your daughter’s wedding to order flowers, book a caterer and find a venue. Instead of getting the flowers your daughter would love, a caterer that serves the type of food the bride and groom like, and a venue that reflects the taste and values of the family, you’d end up settling for whatever is left and then wondering why your daughter didn’t have that fairy tale wedding she always dreamed of.
Here is what a marketing plan will help you with.
1. Uncover your Core Marketing Message. Answers the question: “Who are you and what are you going to do for me?”
2. Discover how you’re different. Answers: “Why should I choose you over the other 50 companies that do what you do?”
3. Who buys what you sell and why. Potential Customer???: “I hate widgets and I’ll never buy your widgets, why are you wasting your money advertising to me?”
4. Where the heck do we find them? Potential Customer: “Hey, over here!!!! Hello…. I’m your best prospect. I love widgets, I need widgets, I’ve made the decision to buy widgets and I have tons of money to buy widgets. But I don’t know about your widgets because you spend all your money advertising to the guy who hates widgets.”
5. And, what prompts them to buy? Potential Customer: “10% Off? Ha, that’s not worth my drive all the way across town. I’ll just wait. “
Don’t know where to start? Well, you can check out the free report on the home page of this site. Or call us to schedule your FREE marketing audit!
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+Carolyn Higgins, President of Fortune Marketing Company
- Carolyn Higgins, President of Fortune Marketing Company specializes in helping small to medium sized businesses get the customers they need to sell more, increase profits and achieve all of their business and personal goals. We do this by implementing and managing marketing systems based on data and strategy - there is no guess work. For more information visit us at: FortuneMarketingCompany.com. We'd be glad to help!
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