MARKETING ALONG THE PATH OF LEAST RESISTANCE
MARKETING ALONG THE PATH OF LEAST RESISTANCE
Marketing is not a one-size-fits-all endeavor. You have to find your own unique path, the one that works best for you and your business. To make marketing easy, that path needs to be the one where you will encounter the least resistance -- both from the marketplace and from inside yourself.
Here are six steps to put you on the road to effortless marketing:
1. Be willing to let go of struggle. You may believe you want marketing to be easier, but stop and think for a moment. Is there some part of you that is attached to making things difficult? Is there a secret payoff you get from trying so hard? Whenever you find yourself struggling about marketing, pause and ask yourself, "How could this be easy?"
2. Market to the people you like, and who like you. A colleague once told me I would never earn a living marketing my services to solo entrepreneurs. "You have to focus on getting corporate clients," she said. "Then you can afford to work with entrepreneurs once in a while."
Thank goodness I didn't listen to her. Maybe that was the formula that worked for HER business, but it's not where my heart was. One of the reasons I became self-employed was to spend more time working in non-corporate environments. If I had followed her advice, I would have failed miserably.
3. Start with the people who are ready for your message. Yes, there is an entire population out there who would hire you if only you could make them understand what it is you offer and how you can help them. You can make educating those people part of your long-term mission. But in the meantime, you need to make the car payment.
Seek out the customers who are most likely to already understand the value of what you do. If you are a reflexologist, you need to be speaking at the Whole Life Expo instead of at the Chamber of Commerce. If you offer a workshop on corporate ethics, network with members of Businesses for Social Responsibility instead of the Millionaires Circle.
4. Choose marketing strategies that match who you are. I'll be the first to admit that I'm a mediocre cold caller. It just doesn't fit my personal style. So I focus on the strategies that are natural to me -- speaking, writing, and networking to build referrals. I've consistently maintained a full practice that way for over ten years now.
One of my clients is also a business coach who targets solo entrepreneurs. Her business is identical to mine, but her personality is completely different. She loves to cold call, and has been able to fill her practice that way. Speaking and networking don't come naturally to her at all. It's a good thing she didn't try to copy me.
5. Find people who can pay what you need to charge. If you persist in marketing to people who can't pay your fee, you will encounter not just resistance, but a brick wall. Don't give up because it seems that no one in the population you want to serve has any money. You have to look for the intersection between your chosen market and people who have enough resources to hire you.
Colleagues have told me that people suffering from life-threatening illnesses, or recovering from substance abuse, can't or won't pay for professional coaching. But I have had several people in these situations as full-fee clients. The intersection is that they were also entrepreneurs. People say you can't make money working with teens, but I have had many clients who do -- as life coaches, private tutors, psychologists, and professional speakers. The intersection they found was teens with well-to-do parents, or schools with funds obtained from grants and corporate sponsors.
6. Pay attention to how people respond to hearing about your business, whether or not you are marketing to them. A client of mine used to be a computer skills trainer. When she talked about her work, people nodded politely. But what she really wanted to do was teach public speaking. When she began to talk about that idea, her listeners got excited.
The difference wasn't in the content of her message -- public speaking can be just as dry a topic as computer software. It was her own enthusiasm for the work that attracted such a positive response. If you really want your marketing to be effortless, you need to be in a business that excites YOU.
C.J. Hayden is the author of Get Clients Now! Thousands of business owners
and salespeople have used her simple sales and marketing system to double or
triple their income. Get a free copy of "Five Secrets to Finding All the
Clients You'll Ever Need" at http://www.getclientsnow.com
MARKETING ALONG THE PATH OF LEAST RESISTANCE - To learn more about this author, visit C.J. Hayden's Website.
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Do you find marketing to be a constant struggle? It doesn't have to be that way. The most successful marketers make it look easy because they have found a way to market themselves that is effortless. Perhaps you have tried to copy what those successful people were doing, and it didn't work for you. Here's why.
Marketing is not a one-size-fits-all endeavor. You have to find your own unique path, the one that works best for you and your business. To make marketing easy, that path needs to be the one where you will encounter the least resistance -- both from the marketplace and from inside yourself.
Here are six steps to put you on the road to effortless marketing:
1. Be willing to let go of struggle. You may believe you want marketing to be easier, but stop and think for a moment. Is there some part of you that is attached to making things difficult? Is there a secret payoff you get from trying so hard? Whenever you find yourself struggling about marketing, pause and ask yourself, "How could this be easy?"
2. Market to the people you like, and who like you. A colleague once told me I would never earn a living marketing my services to solo entrepreneurs. "You have to focus on getting corporate clients," she said. "Then you can afford to work with entrepreneurs once in a while."
Thank goodness I didn't listen to her. Maybe that was the formula that worked for HER business, but it's not where my heart was. One of the reasons I became self-employed was to spend more time working in non-corporate environments. If I had followed her advice, I would have failed miserably.
3. Start with the people who are ready for your message. Yes, there is an entire population out there who would hire you if only you could make them understand what it is you offer and how you can help them. You can make educating those people part of your long-term mission. But in the meantime, you need to make the car payment.
Seek out the customers who are most likely to already understand the value of what you do. If you are a reflexologist, you need to be speaking at the Whole Life Expo instead of at the Chamber of Commerce. If you offer a workshop on corporate ethics, network with members of Businesses for Social Responsibility instead of the Millionaires Circle.
4. Choose marketing strategies that match who you are. I'll be the first to admit that I'm a mediocre cold caller. It just doesn't fit my personal style. So I focus on the strategies that are natural to me -- speaking, writing, and networking to build referrals. I've consistently maintained a full practice that way for over ten years now.
One of my clients is also a business coach who targets solo entrepreneurs. Her business is identical to mine, but her personality is completely different. She loves to cold call, and has been able to fill her practice that way. Speaking and networking don't come naturally to her at all. It's a good thing she didn't try to copy me.
5. Find people who can pay what you need to charge. If you persist in marketing to people who can't pay your fee, you will encounter not just resistance, but a brick wall. Don't give up because it seems that no one in the population you want to serve has any money. You have to look for the intersection between your chosen market and people who have enough resources to hire you.
Colleagues have told me that people suffering from life-threatening illnesses, or recovering from substance abuse, can't or won't pay for professional coaching. But I have had several people in these situations as full-fee clients. The intersection is that they were also entrepreneurs. People say you can't make money working with teens, but I have had many clients who do -- as life coaches, private tutors, psychologists, and professional speakers. The intersection they found was teens with well-to-do parents, or schools with funds obtained from grants and corporate sponsors.
6. Pay attention to how people respond to hearing about your business, whether or not you are marketing to them. A client of mine used to be a computer skills trainer. When she talked about her work, people nodded politely. But what she really wanted to do was teach public speaking. When she began to talk about that idea, her listeners got excited.
The difference wasn't in the content of her message -- public speaking can be just as dry a topic as computer software. It was her own enthusiasm for the work that attracted such a positive response. If you really want your marketing to be effortless, you need to be in a business that excites YOU.
C.J. Hayden is the author of Get Clients Now! Thousands of business owners
and salespeople have used her simple sales and marketing system to double or
triple their income. Get a free copy of "Five Secrets to Finding All the
Clients You'll Ever Need" at http://www.getclientsnow.com
MARKETING ALONG THE PATH OF LEAST RESISTANCE - To learn more about this author, visit C.J. Hayden's Website.
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Stephanie RobeyStephanie Robey is President and CoFounder of Pivot Positive, LLC - an Internet marketing business focused on helping people start work at home ventures. Previously, she was employed at The Search Agency with over 20 years experience in graphic design and 10 years experience in online marketing. She was responsible for launching the Conversion Path Optimization (CPO) unit where she and her team have conducted hundreds of optimization tests for online companies across multiple verticals. She is a successful entrepreneur having started and sold 2 companies and remains on the board of directors of the third, PhotoSpin.com Stephanie began her career in the direct marketing realm creating and producing direct mail for many of the major cable television companies and directly attributes her understanding of Internet marketing to those early offline experiences. Stephanie is a graduate of San Diego State University with a BFA in Graphic Arts and also holds an Executive MBA from the Graziadio School of Business and Management at Pepperdine University. Read Steph's Blog Meet Steph and Dave Sign up for our Free 7-Day BootCamp: Self Employed & Rich - Visit Stephanie Robey's Website |
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John PowerJohn Power, founder of Biltmore Franchise Consulting, has extensive experience developing and marketing franchises and business opportunities. He has been in and around franchising for over twenty years. From 1980 through 1990 he conceptualized, organized, and developed the American Video Association. He grew AVA to 2,000 national members, before selling the company it 1990. It was later merged into another home video marketing company. From 2000 to 2005 he worked as a contract marketing and human resources consultant to several local and national companies. In 2005 Mr. Power began working as a franchise development consultant on a full-time basis. Since that time he has helped more than three dozen companies initiate and develop their franchising program. He notes that there are many companies interested in developing a franchise program, and who need his specialized assistance. Mr. Power is a “hands-on” franchise consultant. He said, “I am the ‘nuts and bolts’ person who tends to the details for my clients.” Mr. Power holds a B.S. degree with a major in Marketing. See: www.biltmorefranchise.com You may contact Mr. Power at: jpower@biltmorefranchise.co - Visit John Power's Website |
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Dave KurlanDave Kurlan is the founder and CEO of Objective Management Group, Inc., the industry leader in sales assessments and sales force evaluations, and the CEO of David Kurlan & Associates, Inc., a consulting firm specializing in sales force development. Dave has been a top rated speaker at Inc. Magazine's Conference on Growing the Company, the Sales & Marketing Management Conference and the Gazelles Sales & Marketing Summit. He has been featured on radio and TV, including World Business Review with General Norman Schwarzkopf, in Inc. Magazine, Selling Power Magazine, Sales & Marketing Management Magazine and Incentive Magazine. He is the author of Mindless Selling and Baseline Selling – How to Become a Sales Superstar by Using What You Already Know about the Game of Baseball. He created and wrote STAR, a proprietary recruiting process for hiring great salespeople, and he writes Understanding the Sales Force, a popular business Blog and is a contributing author to The Death of 20th Century Selling and 101 Great Ways to Improve Your Life, Volume 2. - Visit Dave Kurlan's Website |
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Jeff FosterWebBizIdeas.com is a Minneapolis website design company founded to help people start an internet business by providing them with website, business, and internet resources that help foster the growth of successful online businesses and develop innovative Internet business ideas. We specialize in internet consulting & internet marketing. - Visit Jeff Foster's Website |
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Joe DagerJoe Dager is President of Business901, a progressive coaching company providing no-nonsense direction in areas such as Lean Six Sigma Marketing and organized referral marketing. What others say: In the past 20 years, Joe and I have collaborated on many difficult issues. Joe’s ability to combine his expertise with “out of the box” thinking is unsurpassed. He has always delivered quickly, cost effectively and with ingenuity. A brilliant mind that is always a pleasure to work with.” - James R. If you want to learn more about Business901, start a conversation with us. We can be found @ Web/Blog: Business901.com Web/Blog: FundingYourNonprofit.com LinkedIn Profile Follow me on Twitter - Visit Joe Dager's Website |
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David AchesonDavid Acheson is the founder of DCJA Consultancy. DCJA Consultancy is a management consultancy business specialising in B2B sales consultancy. They offer bespoke and packaged sales consultancy including Sales Optimisation Review, Interim Sales Management, Sales & Marketing Review, 1:1 Sales & Management Staff Analysis, Management Training, Solution Sales Training, Creation of New Pay Plan, KPI's, run Customer Feedback Campaigns, assist with Recruitment, Coaching, Appraisals and set up Strategic Marketing Campaigns. David spent his early career in accountancy and then moved into sales in 1982, working in Office Equipment, IT, Advertising, Training, Outsourcing and Consultancy. He has held many Senior Positions in SMBs and Global Organisations including Head of Sales Operations & Head of Business Development. His knowledge, skills and great experience of the Sales Industry has led to David making keynote speeches and running educational sessions to key businesses through organisations including The Chamber of Commerce and Business Link. - Visit David Acheson's Website |
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Jay Kubassek(Jay's Full Bio: EvanCarmichael.com/jaykubassek) In five years, Canadian-born entrepreneur Jay Kubassek went from selling mufflers at a Midas franchise to revolutionizing Internet marketing with the 2004 launch of CarbonCopyPRO, a online marketing education company, now worth over $20 million with customers in over 160 countries.
As an independent film producer, his upstart film fund Aliquot Films is currently producing a films with Spike Lee and Abel Fererra (starring Ethan Hawke and Dennis Hopper.)
Jay's entrepreneurial spirit is irrepressible. He’s the owner of five companies, a professional speaker and trainer, international real estate developer/investor, extreme sport enthusiast and emerging philanthropist. Jay resides in NYC with his wife Jamie, son Milo and dog Cooper. Visit Jay's official website: www.JayKubassek.com - Visit Jay Kubassek's Website |
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John AlexanderJohn has taught keyword research and SEO skills to small groups of business owners and Webmasters from over 80 different countries world wide since 2002. John is also the Director of Search Engine Academy ; Co-director of Training at Search Engine Workshops offering live, SEO Workshops with his partner SEO educator Robin Nobles, author of the very first comprehensive online search engine marketing courses at SEO Training Online and the SEO Workshop Resource Center. I look forward to hearing from you! - Visit John Alexander's Website |
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