Small Business Tip – Marketing Offline To Boost Online

Marketing your small business offline is an outstanding method to compliment
your internet efforts. It helps direct people who otherwise may not notice
your online presence. Plus it helps you target people who have
Internet access and e-mail when you include your URL or internet site
address in all of your advertisements.

To help you gain the most from your offline marketing in your small business,
here are a few tips:

1. Encloses – Ask for media kits from print publications that
target your industry subscribers. Determine their rates for ads.
Let their advertising division assist you to produce a marketing
insert for your products and services that targets Internet users
and includes your URL and email address. Make sure you include a phone
number (toll-free, if possible) for those who have technical
difficulties or want to call.

2. Tell To Sell – Your Small business is about some expertise that you have
so why not give affordable (or free) courses at a local
community center or other educational facilities. Share your
knowledge in your field of expertise with attendees. And be sure
to distribute handouts with your complete contact information,
including your website and email address.

Be pro-active and post-active by announcing your classes in a
press release to the local media; radio, TV, print
publications. Be sure to follow up by inviting students to submit
feedback and referrals to your website form after the class is
over.

Capture their contact info, enter it into your database, and
follow through on a regular basis – sending out your ezine and
product / service announcements, both thru email and regular
regular mail.

3. ORGANIZATIONS – Target your offline marketing to groups of
people who will actually be interested in your product or
service; i.e. local affiliations and organizations.

Check out your Yellow Pages and local newspaper for groups near you
and determine when their meetings are. Call before you attend make
sure guests are welcome.

Then go and network at an easygoing pace, not fast. Slowly work your way into the
group and make sure it will be a good fit for you. When you first attend you will want
to give first, then you’ll receive later on. This process may take awhile, but the
contacts you make will be worth the investment.

Gradually circulate your  calling card with your website and
email address on it. Volunteer to teach about your area of
expertise if the opportunity comes up, naturally circulating your
marketing materials with your website and email address on them,
also.

Use caution, prior to rushing to join during or after the first
meeting. Take your time to be sure the group would be
appropriate for you and your business operations. Occasionally networking group
procedures are lacking or suffer due to board member turnover,
the economy, new industry polices, and so forth. So you could benefit from
waiting to join for several months down the road, or checking out another group all together.

So reach out and promote offline to compliment your online
strategy. And remember to include your site and email address
on all of your marketing material.

I am revamping my main website, but so you don’t miss
out go register now  for more very helpful small business info.

Take care,
Blase

Small Business Marketing – Sales Tip

I had a meeting with a client a few days ago, which prompted
this tidbit of information.

I have said for years that the easiest thing to sell is what
someone wants to buy. Sounds simple doesn’t it? Well I can
tell you from experience it’s not for most sales people.

Here is what happened at this meeting. My client had a
presentation that he was going to give to his prospect
and he wanted me to look it over. I read through it and
it was exactly what I thought it was going to be. He
basically backed up the “it’s all about me truck” and
started dumping.

The “it’s all about me truck” contains all of the information
 sales people think a prospect wants to know, like the XYZ
company has been in business since 1892. We have won this
award and that award. Our customers our number one and then
 our next most important asset is our employees. We have the
 best quality, service and price in the galaxy. If you a
buyer you’ve heard it hundreds of times. If you are a
salesperson I really hope you haven’t said it 100’s of
times, but I think a lot of you have.

So I asked my client, “Bill why do you think this prospect
needs your doodad? Does he buy doodads now? Who does he buy
them from? Does he like the company that he buys them from
now? Why does he buy them from that company? What is it about
that company that he really likes? If he could change one
thing about the company he is buying from what would it be?
If he could change one thing about doodads what would that
be? I could go on, but blogs are supposed to be short and
mine never are.

Here is the point. My client never asked his prospect about
his needs so he could tailor his presentation to the
prospect. I know a lot of sales people that do this and
I think they are untaught, lazy, or afraid to ask.

Remember I said the easiest thing to sell is what a prospect
wants to buy? How are you going to know unless you ask what
they want?

Here is how questioning works in action. I was sitting with
the head of engineering and three other development engineers
at a $500,000,000 dollar equipment manufacturing company.

We were discussing building one of the components of their
machine for them. It was a custom design that cost about
$5000 each and we were talking 100’s of them.

The meeting was over and we were all just sitting there
schmoozing so I asked the head of engineering a question?
I said, “Mr. X, if you could wave a magic wand over this
component and make one change to it what would that change
be?” He sat up and thought for a minute, then he looked me
right in the eye and said, “I want it to be smaller, I want
it to be X high and X wide and X deep.”

I looked him back in the eye and said, “Mr. X, if I can do
that for you will you give me the order?” He laughed and said,
absolutely!

After six months of research and development I delivered the
prototype and booked a massive order.

You see the easiest thing to sell is what the customer wants to buy.

If you like this article tell a friend, then go to http://www.gssam.com/
for more information.

Take care,
Blase

Small Business Marketing – What’s Your Package?

Ideas for articles come from the strangest places. Some how I became a subscriber to “Women’s Business” magazine, while reading the last issue out popped another idea.

“The Package”

This is one of those things you already know about, but probably aren’t doing in your business. The article was about a woman named DeBora Bernick. Debora is a very successful entrepreneur in the bridal and prom dress industry. She mentioned in her article that she has an infinite number of competitors so to differentiate her dresses from everybody else she designs purses to match the dress! She also has matching shawls, jewelry, garters, gloves, and even nail polish.

Pretty simple idea, right? What did Mrs. Bernick do here? She put together a great package. She also is providing a huge benefit to the woman that buys one of her dresses.

My daughter went to prom and what a hassle that was, I never knew how important a matching purse was until she went to her prom.

Could this idea be improved upon? In my experience I think matching shoes would be helpful and if the dress store could work out a deal (joint venture) with a local hair saloon, make-up artist, limo service, restaurant, and hotel you would have a goldmine business and some nice commissions or referral fees plus the original sale.

Is this a new idea? Of course not, there are package deals everywhere if you are looking. A little restaurant named McDonalds makes a fortune off of packaged deals. As a matter of fact I find it more difficult to order off the menu than to just order a number 5. They’re selling a package deal and until recently they also used an up-sell, “would you like that super sized?”

So what’s all of this to you? Are you selling any package deals? Why not? It will increase your sales, people are getting a better deal and they don’t have to think. You are making it easier for your customer to do business, you are helping to end the confusion. Why not combine products that go together and that your customers or clients need and make their life easier?

You don’t sell a physical product you say. No problem you can offer a package of services just as easy. Let’s take a dentists office for example, many people don’t have dental insurance. Why couldn’t a dentist offer his own dental insurance plan? He gives a discount to the insurance companies now, why not extend that to his cash customers. This would keep them coming back, probably build goodwill and increase referrals. If my dentist told me that I could buy a package of check ups and cleanings for my family and I saved a few bucks in the deal I’d buy it and I think lots of other people would too.

Tooth whitening is really hot right now, how hard would it be to offer a package deal to a client when they come in for a check up and cleaning to say, “Mr. DesMaris are you aware that we also whiten teeth and as long as you are here today we will do your teeth for 40% off and we’ll take 10% off your check up and cleaning if you do it right now.

Put your thinking cap on, what can you package?
For a whole manual of sales and marketing ideas go to www.GSSAM.com

Take care,
Blase

Small Business Marketing – Research

This is unbelievable.

I have followed Glenn for over six months just
watching how he markets.

One of his methods is giving away lots of very good
information. It must be working because he just came
out with a FREE video that is 90 minutes long and
of course filled with good information, normally you
would have to pay big bucks to hear this kind of stuff.

Here’s the video,
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-6441570332363726861&hl=en

If you would like more information about Glenn’s information
go here, http://www.7stepmarketing.com/cmd.php?af=635367

Now go watch this, it is worth the time!

Blase