By Howard Partridge
What comes to mind when you think of the word marketing? For some, it’s advertising. Others might think of networking, branding, or the idea of getting your name out there. Yes, marketing includes those things but marketing is actually everything you do to attract prospects to your business. Phenomenal marketing delivers a meaningful experience that educates, engages, and entertains. A phenomenal marketing system is a group of working parts that duplicates results consistently.
What kind of results? Enough of your perfect target prospects to reach your sales goal consistently. A phenomenal marketing system consistently produces your perfect target prospect. If you are attracting the wrong kind of prospect, your marketing isn’t working. If your sales are up and down because you don’t consistently implement marketing, then you don’t have a system. Too many business owners spend lots of time and money getting their name out there but have no real system of attracting prospects consistently. Most often, a small business owner’s marketing is a gamble more than a planned effort. Congratulations for reading this article. You now have the opportunity to be one of the few who escape that trap.
Regardless of the type of marketing you do, it must increase sales. Of course the sales process will determine whether the prospect will actually buy but it also depends on the quality of the prospect you are attracting. When you attract the wrong kind of customer (because your marketing isn’t what it needs to be), it doesn’t matter how great your sales process is. You may even close the sale but you won’t build the kind of business you want.
The Only Three Ways to Increase Sales
Regardless of the type of business you are in, there are only three ways to increase sales under the sun:
- Increase Sales from Existing Clients
The first and possibly easiest way to increase sales is to get your existing clients to use your services (or buy your product) more often or to use more of your services (or buy more of your products). This can have a dramatic effect on your income. If you are not already marketing to your existing client base, you could literally double your business with this strategy alone. This is assuming that you have something compelling and valuable to offer your past and existing clients. Marketing to your past and existing clients is one of the most important marketing activities you can do and not marketing to your past clients is what I call “The biggest marketing mistake of all!”
Most people are unaware that it costs approximately 500 percent more to gain a new client than is costs to keep an existing one. The client already knows you. You already know them. They have already paid your price. They are the most likely to do business with you, assuming that you have a repeatable service, other products, and you want referrals from them.
- Increase Number of Clients
Speaking of referrals, the second way to increase sales is to get more clients. This is the one that people usually think of first. Most small business owners say that 85 percent of their business comes from repeat and referral business. Yet they don’t have a system in place to maintain and increase repeat and referral business. Most small business owners say they build their business through word of mouth but they don’t have a referral system in place. There are many ways to get more clients but the best way is through referrals.
Next month, in Part 2, I will share how to put your word of mouth marketing into a phenomenal system, what experiential marketing is, and the third way to increase sales for your business.
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Howard Partridge, President of Phenomenal Products, Inc. and International Business Coach, is the author of 7 Secrets of a Phenomenal L.I.F.E. and 5 Secrets of a Phenomenal Business. You can contact Howard by phone at 281-634-0404 or visit his website at www.HowardPartridge.com.
