The Marketing Mix | official blog of the Marketing Mentor community

If you want more control over your business in 2012....

If you permit me to be a bit philosophical during this quiet week...here's what I'm thinking about.

There is very little in this life we can control. As a self employed creative professional, you have more control than many but the truth is, we can't control our business. There are so many other people involved that often we feel at the mercy of everying, including our clients, the economy, the weather....etc.

But even though we can't control our business, there is plenty we can do to guide it. And it seems to me that, if we do it properly and diligently, with a little bit of luck, we can move it in a positive direction of growth. That is my intention.

What I have both seen and experienced personally is that marketing gives a sense of control over my business. It allows me to say, "Here's what I want and here's what I'm going to do about it." The act of doing marketing, the email messages sent, the events attended, the LInkedIn connections made -- regardless of the effect or result of each effort -- is almost a self-fulfilling prophecy while it slowly fills my pipeline.

That is what is so beautiful to witness when I work closely with clients.

So if you want control over your business in 2012, I recommend making a commitment to make it a habit this year. (And if you need help with that, I, of course, am available. And our Marketing Plan Bundle can help too.)

One design firm’s whirlwind year

In our recent interview, Jennifer Neal from K9 Design describes which marketing tools her firm used in 2010 to increase their business by a whopping 30% and move out of the home office into their own building! She talks about how she:

• Overcame the fear of focusing on one industry (publication design)
• Gained national exposure as experts in that industry
• Strengthened their position in the Canadian magazine market
• Finally got the clients they’ve been trying to get for years
 
Hear it all in this 14 minute interview on the Marketing Mentor Podcast.
 
BTW: If you want to learn the tools that can grow your business in 2011, I have one spot left in my Advanced Marketing Group that starts Jan 28th. Here’s a blog post Jennifer did about what it’s like working with Marketing Mentor: http://www.k9designco.com/blog/2010/11/thank-you-to-a-wonderful-mentor/

The right attitude for marketing...

Every day, I get reinforcement after reinforcement that, no matter what the economy's doing from day to day, the creative professionals who are getting the work and the ones doing their marketing -- come hell or high water -- every day (or at least a few days a week).

In yesterday's Quick Tip from Marketing Mentor, I wrote about Martha Retallick of Western Sky Communications, who is definitely one of those. She told me recently about her daily "Prospecting Hour." 

"I don't know about the rest of this planet, but here in my studio, taking  whatever comes along is a recipe for failure. I can't depend on business coming to me. I have to be a go-getter and go get it. That's why the first hour  of every workday is The Prospecting Hour. That's when I make calls and  send e-mails to cold and warm leads.

"I've  been in the design business for 15 years, and I've never had the luxury  of depending on word of mouth. Instead, I've had to pick up the phone  and ask strangers for their business. And, in my case, cold calling has  led to the most lucrative clients I've ever had."

When we spoke in August, Martha had made an amazing 3081 phone calls, 80% of which went to voice mail. Of those, 99 prospects had expressed some level of interest (approximately 3% positive response).

In our 20-minute interview (link below), she describes her target market and her simple process to find and reach them. She explains how she tracks her calls and actually recites her no-BS phone script. (She's just finishing an ebook about her process, which I'll be reviewing here soon.)

But what's most impressive about Martha is her attitude (which you can hear most clearly in the interview).

Listen here or download the mp3 here.

And feel free to comment here on the blog...what do you think of Martha's attitude and her effort?

And if you want to cultivate this attitude and the confidence that is the foundation, I have one spot open in my Beginning Marketing Group that starts next week.

Share your non-linear marketing story

In my latest Quick Tip, How Marketing Really Works, I talk about how marketing is never linear and it takes multiple marketing efforts -- over time -- to get the project. (And how sometimes, you don’t even know how it all happened.)

Here's that tip and some more details about how it actually happened.

Recently, I wrote a recent blog post called, Should I Friend My Mom?, and I asked my client Jonathan Cleveland of Cleveland Design, to read it and comment. It was a few days later when he did, by which time another post was first up, World's Best Subject Line, by another client, copywriter, Conrad Winter.  So he read them both.

Why was Conrad’s guest post on our blog? Because the day before, he had sent out his email newsletter, called the World’s Best Subject Line, and Deidre (our Mix Mistress) read it and thought it would perfect for the Marketing Mix, and she asked Conrad if she could post it.

On the day that Jonathan read the post, one of his big, big clients asked him to find a copywriter for a big, big project. Because he had just read the post, Jonathan thought immediately of Conrad, called him, connected him to the client and within a day or two, Conrad had the project.

Here’s what Conrad had to say about all of this:

I had met Jonathan almost two years ago at HOW, but hadn't stayed in contact. I didn't want to pester him, and I just assumed he'd remember me if he ever had a need. The reality is that I wasn't on his radar at all until he saw my post. It's a good lesson to me that you have to do people a favor and remind them that you're out there.

If that’s not enough of an example of non-linear marketing in action, take a look at what Kathleen Giarrano from Giarrano Design sent in response to my Quick Tip:

Last week I ran into a friend at a tag sale and gave her one of my fun marketing postcards. Later she ran into a friend at a school sporting event who needs a Web site. She gave her friend the card. We had a meeting on Monday and I just sent off a proposal to design a Web site for her start-up Belgian chocolate and party favor company. Weird but true.

Has this happened to you?

If you need help getting your marketing efforts on track so they can produce some linear, or non-linear results, join my next Marketing Plan Group. It starts on May 6th. Details here or fill out this form.

How I got over perfectionitis

Do you have perfectionitis too? I often talk about the quest for perfection in my blog posts, and how even though I know it's impossible to achieve, it still drives me crazy!

Check out this fantastic guest post from freelance writer, Jean Feingold, about how she cured herself of perfectionitis:

In Deidre Rienzo's blog post, she mentioned her difficulty with perfectionitis, the fear that anything written down that wasn't perfect wasn't worth writing down. I used to have that problem when I first started my professional writing practice. Every article I wrote was edited, scrutinized, rewritten, and tweaked multiple times, sometimes so much so that all the life in it drained away.
 
But that was in the days when I had little work and was overly eager to establish myself. The solution to my desire to have every word and phrase be perfect was spending time as a correspondent for United Press International wire service. This was rewrite work, taking news from local sources and putting it in my own words in their desired format. I was expected to write 1,500 to 2,000 words daily, seven days a week. Pretty soon I learned how to recognize writing that was good enough. Even when I could tell it wasn't perfect, there was no time to dwell on it. Not only that, what they were paying, if considered on a per word basis, was far too little to justify perfection.
 
As a result, after doing this work for a few years, I became a very fast writer, composing at a rate of something like 30 words per minute. I had learned how to get to the essence of the topic, tell the story, and move on. This skill makes it possible for me to say "yes" to every freelance assignment I am offered and to volunteer to take on more because I know that once I get the information, the articles will almost write themselves.
 
The only time when the temptation to do more than is needed creeps in is when business is slow. I find myself editing too much out of some misguided desire to impress the client. What I have to remember is this - if the clients could write it themselves, they would not have hired me!

Jean Feingold is a freelance writer whose Gainesville, FL-based company, Business Communicators, is celebrating its 20th anniversary. Her work has appeared in trade publications in varied industries in the U.S. and Canada.

Why you should never give up

After hearing Ilise talking about the importance of follow-up in marketing, and specifically the point that she never gives up on a prospect, I decided I would follow up "one last time" with one of my own prospects. 

In the past I had always felt people would call me if they were interested or that if I had spoken with them once that was enough. Yet Ilise makes a good point: Just because people are busy and not calling back doesn't mean they aren't interested in my services.

So I did the experiment and in this case I called my prospect back with a special I had been offering online to Twitter followers. He took me up on it! I got a new client! You could have pushed me over with a feather! I couldn't believe this worked, and yet, of course it did. I'm so excited to have finally found a way to market my business professionally and consistently.

Jennifer Palais is an L.A. based Personal Organizer who engages her clients in creating high-functioning, liberated spaces in their homes and offices.

Back to the future

Here's a note I got recently from Jean Feingold, a writer, who has been following along with my weekly audio tips, Sound Advice. And be sure to read to the end for her "happy ending."

Confession time - I signed up for your marketing plan and have done almost nothing you've recommended. I have listened to most of the short messages and enjoyed them. If nothing else, you are an inspiration.
 
But let me tell you what I am doing that may be of help to other long time freelancers. It's what I call looking to the past for future work.
 
Over the years, I've had clients come and go. Some I dumped because they were not worth keeping; others happily disappeared just as I was about to say goodbye to them. But others have left for reasons completely unrelated to my work, perhaps a change in jobs or other life circumstances on their part, or a change in their publications that removed the need for freelance writers. These were folks I always enjoyed working with and missed when they went away. I have long made it a habit to say "hi" every few months by e-mail to editors I haven't heard from in a while and to offer them my services. Sometimes this has gotten me work.
 
Today I spent some time going through old records and cleaning out unneeded paper. This reacquainted me with people I had written for or about several years ago and had lost touch with. I made a list of their names and started searching for them online to see if they had new e-mail addresses or affiliations. One I found is now associated with a writing and PR service, so I wrote to see if they might have some overflow work. When she wrote back, I learned this website represents not a company of folks sitting in the same building but a group of freelancers all over the country! So maybe there will be some work here for me or with one of the others I have yet to contact.
 
The point is, good former clients and contacts are worth finding. If they liked your work once, they will either like it again or be willing to recommend you to someone who might. While I don't have any assignments yet from this latest effort, I've just started this e-mail program. I am optimistic it will produce the desired results.

-----

There's now more to the story - the happy ending. My former client with the PR and writing service has more work than she can handle and I will soon be working for the service as well. The content areas it covers are ones with which I am quite familiar, so the learning curve will be short. 
 
What Ilise tells people about asking for work is right on. What's the worst they can say - "Sorry, there isn't any"? But maybe they will say "Not now, but later"  (an answer I've gotten from other former clients), or "Yes, we need your help now." You'll never know if you don't ask.

Growing Your Business with Marketing, Week 16: Marketing on the go

This is Week 16 of a 52-week project/experiment in DIY marketing. Armed with nothing but a copy of the 2009 Grow Your Business Marketing Plan + Calendar and my bare wits, I'm applying the skills you need to grow a business in real time, day by day, and reporting on them week by week. I'll provide a topline of my experience here every Monday; see my companion blog, A Virgo's Guide to Marketing, for the full story, additional links and other marketing-related goodness.

It was a jam-packed week of travel and planning for it that had me thinking a lot about about marketing—my definition of it, how it worked and what it was really about.

Back in January, a professor from my alma mater invited me to sit on a panel about social networking as part of the university's annual Entrepreneur Celebration. Cornell has made a big commitment to fostering and supporting entrepreneurship both at the university level, where there's now an entrepreneurial track, and amongst alumni, via the Cornell Entrepreneur Network. (I've attended numerous events and spoken at a couple, and they've been fantastic for building my own business network in L.A.)

I hate to say it, but in the sometimes-grind of keeping one's marketing machine running, it can be easy to lose sight of the "why" behind it. Meeting some incredible entrepreneurs during my couple of days here and, on the way out here, reading the awesomely inspiring story of what one entrepreneur is doing to change the world, really reinvigorated me. At its most basic, marketing is about telling the stories that connect people to products and services and other people; done right, it can be a tool for helping to change the world.

To read more about this week's lessons, please join me at the Virgo Guide to Marketing.

Everything is negotiable

The other day I was heading to the airport to catch a flight. Although normally I take a taxi, I decided to save some money and park my car at the airport.  I usually park at one of the airport lots for about $12.00 per day but after getting stuck in traffic and worrying about missing my flight I decided to park in one of the airport-adjacent hotels that offers valet parking.

I pulled into the lot of the hotel I would normally park at and a uniformed attendant greeted me with a smile. I asked him what was the valet parking fee and he said $28.00 per day. I grinned and knew my money savings strategy was shot.

I looked at him and said “wow, that’s kind of high isn’t it?”. He replied “hold on, I’ll be right back” and quickly disappeared behind the valet booth in search of something.

A few minutes later he returned and handed me a discount coupon that brought the parking down to $12.00 per day. “We know times are tough so hopefully this will help”.  Without even asking for a discount, I got one.

It made me think that everything these days is negotiable. Even valet parking. Our struggling economy is creating new rules for selling. And I’m liking it. You see, I was born and raised in Israel, part of the Middle East, where negotiating is part of everyday life there. In fact, some vendors would get insulted if you don’t negotiate. It’s part of how we buy and sell.

So how does that relate to your business? You can expect your clients to negotiate with you now more than ever. Be prepared for that. And be open to the experience. Go into the selling process with “negotiation in mind”. Even if your fees have been the same for years, your clients may now expect some kind of a deal or discount because of our “struggling economy”.  So rather than lowering your fees (which you don’t want to do because that send a message that you are desperate) you can offer your clients incentives, something extra if they buy from you.  Throw in something extra.  Help your clients feel like they are getting a good deal.

My voice in your ear

It started as an experiment. But then I got into a groove and I kind of liked doing it.

That's when the flattery started -- they liked what I was doing. (And who can resist a compliment, much less a slew of them?)

So I kept going. And now I'm hooked.

What is it?

Audio.

My voice in your ear (on an iPod or even through the speakers on your computer), twice a week, telling you over and over not to stop marketing your services (because repetition is key when developing a new habit) and exactly how to do it.

That's the crux of my still-unnamed audio tips. And 354 people (that I know of) are receiving them and hopefully listening to them. (If you want them, too, listen here and sign yourself up.)

But that's not all. I'm learning a lot about marketing from this experiment. Audio is proving to be one of the most effective, least expensive marketing tools in our toolbox. You know why?

Because when people can hear your voice, it makes you real. That's why I keep harping on my clients to make those cold/research calls and leaving voice mail messages when you don't get through to your prospect. They need to hear your voice. It makes you oh so human (especially when you make a mistake or fumble your words -- try it as a "technique") in a world that is becoming more and more virtual and isolating and, in my opinion, inhuman.

If you want to add audio to your own toolbox, check out the service we use, Audio Acrobat. (Colleen insists I tell you that's an affiliate link.)

And I'm thinking of offering a new group to help you do that. So if you're interested, send email to ilise AT marketing-mentor DOT com with "audio group" in the subject line and I'll come up with some details and get them to you.