The “Early and Often School of Marketing”

Have You Marketed Your Business Today?

I wanted to stress the importance of doing some marketing immediately.

Small business owners must market daily even if all the pieces of your marketing plan are not yet in “perfectly” place.

Think Joe Vitale… he markets his books for pre-sale months before they are available at stores and on-line booksellers.

Are his websites perfect — Heck no!

Does he send an eMail Blast to his “Opt-In Faithful” asking them to find the error?

That would be a BIG “You Bethcha!”

How many books does he sell before they are even published?

“Millions and Millions…”

That is why I’m stressing the “early and often school of marketing” to the point of repetition.

Because, everyday, businesses with wonderful products, that fill a need in the marketplace, go out of business, before they make their first sale.

Why?

They ran out of money before their ‘perfected marketing’ plan was fully implemented. All business has a bottom line and the statement is always the same:

Nothing Happens until SOMEBODY sells SOMETHING and GETS PAID for it…a lot and often!

NEVER! EVER let yourself be hypnotized into inaction by the shiny sheen of perfection.

If you have a product or service, a business card and a phone, get out there and sell; and after you have pitched, close the sale, after you have taken ‘yes for an answer’, deliver and take the money. Repeat often.

As SBDC counselor, I saw too many clients, too late. They came to the office for help after they had blown through their start-up capital. Many were trying to arrange a second round of funding through the SBA 7(a) guaranty loan program. Some were the walking wounded who had no idea how they had burned through so much capital so quickly. I’ve held so many business post mortems, I feel like I should have a flack jacket with CSI on the back.

Here are a few composite SBDC case studies…Cautionary Marketing Tales

Cranky SBCD Client

“I spent thousands of dollars on this brochure, and I haven’t gotten a single client from it.”

If spending money guaranteed marketing success, I would not have seen so many “Oncepreneurs™” in my SBDC office wondering what happened to their startup capital. Business marketing is more prudent persistence, than ad agency art and hot media placement.

Buying Print Media

The printing industry calls them ‘leave behinds’ — business cards, rate cards, coupon specials, brochures, trade shows flyers, product spec sheets, capability statements, proposal sheets, sales letter follow-ups and the pocket folder that holds any and all of the above.

These materials are just an introduction to you your company’s products and services. They are sales-tools. Tools require someone to use them. You or your sales person need to follow-up and close the sale.

There is so much to share about how to buy and use print media. If our Millionaire Mind Support Network™ members indicate an interest we’ll do a series of blogs about how small businesses can use print media effectively to build customer interest without breaking the budget.

Our SBDC small business marketing case studies continues with The Fearless Trade Show Warrior and the Enchanted Perfect Sales Letter.

I’m a very capable marketing technician. I’ve been trained to know what to do, and why, to what probable result. Over the years, with Pleiades Publishing Services as Research Analyst and Web Content Developer and as SBDC counselor, I’ve had lots of practice and plenty of lessons learned. Joe Vitale, however is a “Guru status, marketing maven. He knows all of the above and executes with panache. Any marketing book by Joe is a good business investment.

As a retired SBDC counselor, I know where to find business-related information — both online and IRL. In this case my marketing source is years and years as a business counselor and mentor. For individual business support with any aspect of your business contact the nearest SBA-sponsored Small Business Development Center.