Archive for March, 2009

My friend Richard, who has a blog at http://rddinmv.blogspot.com sent me this beautiful and timely quote today.

I will be like the rain drop which washes away the mountain;
the ant who devours a tiger;
the star which brightens the earth;
the slave who builds a pyramid.
I will build my castle one brick at a time for I know that small attempts, repeated, will complete any undertaking.

– Og Mandino

When we realize the power of consistency, we can do anything we set our mind to.  When you decide that you really are devoted to growing your business, it will be by focusing on doing the right things every day, every week, every month and every year. 

Before you know it, you’ll have strong marketing muscles and a booming business.

Are you part of the Orange County Duct Tape Marketing Group yet?  Our March topic is Blogging for Business!

If you’re not blogging about your business, you are missing out on one of the most effective and affordable ways to promote your business online! Blogging is the foundation of social media marketing, providing fresh conversations. In this meeting, you will learn why blogging is should be a foundational part of your marketing mix. We’ll also discuss:

• Why blogging is an extremely effective marketing strategy for small businesses right now.
• Finding keywords that will bring the most traffic from search results.
• How to develop persuasive, compelling content in just minutes.
• Leveraging your blog to influence friends in online social networks.
• How to develop persuasive, compelling content in just minutes.
• Etiquette, tips and tricks that make you look like a pro!

Why should you attend?

Blogging is an easy and fun way to promote your business – BUT if you don’t have your blog set up right, you won’t be getting the full business benefits.

Register to learn about Blogging for Business

MEETING AGENDA:

5:30 Welcome and Networking – Appetizers Served
6:00-7:30 Marketing Meeting
7:30-8:00 Wrap Up

Come mingle with other small business owners, marketing and sales professionals as you learn how to apply Duct Tape Marketing’s principles to your business. Veteran marketing professional, Adrianne Machina of Tornado Marketing, an Authorized Duct Tape Marketing Coach, will facilitate a discussion on the practical steps you can take to market your business affordably and effectively.

Microsoft Convergence has become a can’t-miss event for many.  Microsoft Convergence is Microsoft’s premier customer event, and is preceded by a Microsoft Dynamics partner day.  I’ll be headed to Sage Insights in May and can’t wait to see how their event compares to Microsoft’s. 

Now I know many of you can’t afford to put on an event on the scale of Microsoft, but who can?!  Everyone has to start somewhere.  The first Great Plains Stampede and Great Plains Convergence had only a handful of people - but they built from there. (Great Plains Software was acquired by Microsoft in 2001.)

With more people looking to get referrals and build their business through word-of-mouth, now is a great time to think about hosting a small, locally-based user group.  If that’s something you are interested in trying, let me share some lessons I’ve learned over the years from attending Microsoft Convergence. 

1.  Make sure your top executives are actively participating in your event.  Although your clients (hopefully) love your staff; they want to know they are important, and that they are being heard at the highest levels of your organization.  They want to understand the direction your company is headed. 

2.  Make sure your information is educationally-focused.  In past years, I would hear sporadic complaints when a conference became too “sales-y” only talking about an upcoming product releases.  Make sure you provide value that can be used TODAY, not just in the next version of your products. 

3.  Provide plenty of socializing and networking time.  All work and no play make for a dull event.  Build in some time and ways for people to get to know each other.  If you have partners, this might be a great opportunity for them to sponsor part of your event.  Microsoft Dynamics GP partners and customers have come to look forward to Rock-n-Rave  year after year.  Their party at Harrah’s this year was as phenomenal as ever!  With their clever marketing efforts to drive booth attendance, this event is both a great socializing event and a great marketing tactic.

4.  Communicate.   Microsoft had a website.  They Twittered. (http://www.Twitter.com/MBSconvergence.) They created a FaceBook group.  They created ways for people to find each other and connect online before the conference.  Once you arrived at the event, they had handouts and signs.  Partners also reached out to their clients to host dinners and cocktail hours.  All of these efforts helped to make attendees feel confident that they were in the right place at the right time.

5. Take care of the details.  Everything was meticulously planned.  The food. The meals.  The hotel rooms. The signs.  I can’t even imagine running logistics for an event of that scale!  In past years, they even had signs on all the doors, the floors and in the lights.  The devil’s in the detail, so make sure you put a highly organized person in charge.

One last thing.  Microsoft Convergence attendance was down (I heard @ 15-20%) from prior years.  Paying $1500 for a conference, plus the hotel, airfare and dinner costs for travelling across the country to attend, PLUS the out of office time was too much for many people at this time.  There wasn’t much Microsoft could do to react.  Contracts were signed long before the economy tanked, so their costs were fixed.  But if I was putting on an event today, I’d keep affordability as a top-of-mind issue.  It doesn’t have to be free, but the value has to be clearly communicated.

Last week, one of those “famous” internet marketers sent me an email.   He was mad because people were taking too long to see the value of his product.   His readers would hem-and-haw before making a purchase.  I’m sure his email was meant to be some type of psychological ploy to get you to buy his info-product.  But it sure backfired on me. 

I wondered how much this guy could really know about marketing. So here’s what I wanted to say to him.

Dear Internet Marketer,

I know you think you have a fabulous product, but if there’s anyone you should be mad at, you should be mad at yourself.  You obviously haven’t done a great job of communicating the value of your product. You are being defensive instead of understanding that people are wary and you need to assuage them and prove to them that your book is different. It’s not that they wouldn’t (or don’t) invest in their business. It’s that there are a lot of internet marketer snake oil salesman out there promising something for nothing.

I work primarily with professional service and technology companies and hear that same indignation all the time.

“I can’t believe they bought from that shmuck when we’re a jillion times better…we take over their unhappy customers all the time.”  I know.  It DOES HURT when someone doesn’t see your value. It hurts your balance sheet as much as your ego.

As you may well know, ‘building a better mousetrap’ is only step one of building a successful business. Communicating how and why that mousetrap is better (a.k.a. MARKETING) is the key to blowing out your sales.  For all of you who are out there feeling under-appreciated and a best-kept-secret.  You have two options.

1.  Call and cry on someone’s shoulder. 

(Net effect: You’ll know you have friends who care and you’ll temporarily feel better.)

2.  Improve your marketing so that your product or service looks as good as it actually is. 

(Net effect: Pretty soon you’ll be selling more and attracting more of the clients who value you.)

Simple, huh?  So which path will you choose?