Articles

Which Marketing Activities Should You Be Doing?

Charlie Cook   |   © In Mind Communications, LLC, all rights reserved.

The key to growing your business could be in your answer to the following question. Are you the captain or the crew or both?

Your business is like a ship. Whether you’re a physician, a lawyer, a realtor, a web entrepreneur or own a handful of physical therapy clinics the purpose of your business is to take you where you want to go, whether you’re headed for riches, want to have fun doing what you love, or both.

Are you at the helm setting a steady course, or are you trying to be the crew, the cook and the captain of your business all at once?

Whether you sell products or services you need to know how to create a small business marketing plan that works and how to implement it. You need to know how to make use of advertising and PR and how to follow up on all these activities to increase the number of prospects that become clients and repeat clients. And then there are all the activities involved in actually providing services, billing for them, keep your accounts up to date, etc.

Marketing, managing and delivering your products and services is way beyond multi-tasking.

For your marketing alone to succeed, you’d need to be expert at developing marketing strategy; writing compelling marketing copy; designing ads, brochures and your web site; collecting testimonials; search engine optimization and managing pay-per-click advertising campaigns, and writing and distributing articles and press releases.

Are you trying to do all of this on your own or with a very small staff? Are you leaving out critical activities because there just aren’t enough hours in the day to get it all done?

The sooner you get the expertise you need to run your marketing effectively, the sooner you can get back to being the captain and plot a course for greater profitability.

You may be saying to yourself, “I’ll hire a marketing consultant/ copywriter/Virtual Assistant when I reach my sales target for the month and start bringing in more money.”

Aren’t you already working at 100% or more of your capacity?

With the existing time in the day and your existing expertise you’ll achieve the same results you have in the past. If you want to take your business to the next level, you’re going to need help, whether it is with your small business marketing strategy, search engine marketing, copywriting or simply making follow-up calls to prospects.

Mary from California understands this well. When she called to order my book, “Opening Doors with Your Articles“, she had two follow-up questions. First, she wanted to know if I would recommend someone to write articles for her. Second, she wanted a recommendation of someone to distribute the articles online.

Mary’s objective was to pin down her strategy, understand how to apply it and then get the help she needed to implement it. That way she could stay focused on delivering her services and making a profit.

Take a Good Look At Where To Get Help
Are you ready to improve your marketing and grow your business? Start by doing a quick analysis of your marketing tasks. Make a list or a spreadsheet with three columns.

List the marketing tasks that only you can do in the first column. In the second, list tasks that you can delegate to a qualified employee. In the third, list tasks that you or your employees need expert assistance with.

Expert Marketing Resources to Get You Started
In order of importance, I’ve listed resources you can use to get help and take your business to the next level.

Marketing Strategies – Discover the 5 marketing principles you can apply that will generate a steady stream of clients. Click Here >

Web Site Marketing – Use this roadmap to increase your online sales by 1000% or more. Click Here >

Marketing Messages – Find out the fastest way to get attention and business. Click Here >

Marketing Copywriting – Find the words that will prompt prospects to contact you. Click Here >

Using Articles to Grow Your Business – Discover how and where to distribute your articles to get free publicity. Click Here >

Distribute Your Press Releases – PRweb is easy to use, inexpensive and a great way to get your press releases found and picked up by the media. My most recent PR release generated over twenty thousand reads the first day! Click Here >

How to Create and Promote Your Small Business Blog – Get attention and traffic for your site with your blog. Click Here >

Gain Credibility – Use Audiogenerator to collect testimonials like the compelling ones at MarketingForSuccess. Click Here >

Automate Your Online Business – This is the system I use to manage my opt-in newsletter, email broadcasts and online sales.

Virtual Assistance – Hire a VA to do your mailings, make follow-up calls, collect testimonials etc. Hire help when you need it for the particular tasks you need done, so you can focus on work that is profitable – and enjoyable! Here’s a collection of directories to use to find a VA.

Search Engine Optimization – Pay an expert to put your site at the top of the search engines. Contact me to be referred to a reputable firm.