“I’m out on Facebook and Twitter, but it seems like a waste of time. I don’t get any business from it.” “I attend networking events, get business cards, but it never leads to any business. Networking doesn’t seem to really work.”
The above statements are examples of common responses I get from small business owners when I ask about their current marketing plan. I’ve learned to read between the lines and simply ask better questions. When I do, I find out the real reason most marketing strategies are not working: No solid benchmarks and no tracking of results. (Defining Target Marketing also plays a key role, but I will save that for another time.)
How do you know if you are achieving success if you have not actually defined what success looks like? First question I require all of my clients to ask for every marketing strategy they implement is “What is the end result I want to achieve with this strategy?” By working with the end in mind (Thank you, Stephen Covey!), you can now move backwards to develop the strategy to reach that goal. You also have now set yourself up with something to achieve that can be tracked so when you reach the end, the data will drive whether the strategy was a success or did not live up to the expectations.
{ 2 comments }
