“We are one of 15 competitors in the NY area all selling the same product. There are no real differentiators outside of price. Working for a coporate entity — I cannot change pricing.” - B.K.

How you talk about your services, the marketing copy you use can help to differentiate your business from others.

1. Identify your prospects’ concerns.

2. Appeal to your prospects’ emotional needs relative to your product or services.

3. Use your business marketing messages to focus on how you help your prospects instead of some meaningless mumbo jumbo.

Your small business marketing can help you differentiate yourself from your competitors.

Many decades ago Miller beer sales were in the doldrums, hitting new lows. The came up with a new advertising campaign that step by step explained how they brewed their beer. Never mind that other manufacturers did the same thing. In creating an awareness of the what was involved in making their beer Miller was able to become the top selling beer within a year or two.

Marketing, how you talk about what you do makes a difference to your small business results.
- Charlie Cook

“Up until now I have used my business website as a way for referred customers to view my work. I would like to expand my client base by marketing to people in my surrounding area for commissioned work. What’s the best way to do this?” - Kathy Swantee

Currently your web site features your artwork but does little to explain the problem you help prospects solve or why prospects should contact you. You need to start by adding some marketing copy to your web site that details why people might be interested in working with you, taking your classes and how you can help them. You also need to give them a reason to contact you. You might offer some free postcard samples of your work in return for people within your surrounding area filling in a request for a more information about a commissioned work.

Once you have your business web site set up to explain what can do for your prospects take this same marketing copy and put together a one page business marketing handout/ mailer. Then take an edited version of it and create a postcard to use in marketing your business. Of course if you want help with putting together your marketing information let me know.

Call each past client, let them know you are seeking referrals and that you’ll be sending them some information sheets to share with their friends. Then send them the information. Want to discover how to put your referral strategy into gear? I’ve detailed the whole process in The 5 Principles of Highly Effective Marketing for small business .

Do the above and you’ll have a low cost small business marketing strategy which will bring in all the clients you want.
- Charlie Cook

You’ve got a web site, an ad or a brochure and you know it could be doing a better job of attracting prospects and converting them to leads but you’re too busy to fix it. What do you do? You could do nothing and you’d be leaving money lying on the floor. Or you could do something about it and get someone to rewrite your marketing copy so it follows the marketing strategy mapped out in 7 Steps to Attract More Clients.

Recently for a couple of clients I’ve been reworking their marketing copy so it does what they want it to, attract attention and prompt people to contact them. If you’re serious about improving your marketing but don’t have the time to do anything about it give me a call or send me an email describing your goals and the project you have in mind. - Charlie Cook

“How do I create a budget for creating, marketing and operating a web site?” - Arthur Doglione

Here’s a brief overview of what to do to get your web site marketing in gear.

1. Identify the objectives for your site, what you want people to do when they visit it. Map out the steps you want them to take based on how people make purchasing decisions.

2. Identify the problems you solve for prospects.

3. Write your marketing copy, focusing on your prospects concerns.

4. Create a list of the tasks involved in building, marketing and maintaining your site, such as:
- url purchase and annual fees
- paying someone to build “design” your site
- purchase of sit graphics
- maintenace costs (who is going to regularly update the site?)
- site hosting fees
- if you plan to sell services or products include merchant card fees, online transaction fees and shopping card fees.
- if you plan on using a service to help you manage your list building and email broadcasts, include these fees too.
- identify how you plan on attracting people to your site, and the associated advertising costs.

5. Determine which of the above you will be doing yourself and which you plan to pay someone else to do.

Learn how to structure and write your web site to attract prospects, position your products and services and sell more with the manual I wrote for you detaiing how to build or fix your web site so it helps you grow your business. Use this link to order Creating Web Sites that Sell and use your web site marketing to be more successful.- Charlie Cook

“How do I keep the ideas coming so I can continue writing creative newsletters?” - W.L.

My best souce of ideas are my prospects and clients. Prospects send me questions, clients describe their concerns and problems. Each marketing question or problem posed provides the topic for a potential marketing article. Each time I get an inquiry or after talking to a client, I jot down any marketing ideas. Then when I sit down each Wednesday morning to write I have more than enough ideas to use. I may get a question about web site marketing or internet marketing, small business marketing strategy, writing a marketing plan, business networking or increasing sales with their web site. Each has the potential to become a marketing article or in this case the topic of a marketing blog. - Charlie Cook