There was an email from marketing and technology coach John Jantsch in my inbox this morning. Jantsch is the author of Duct Tape Marketing and Marketing Plan Pro powered by Duct Tape Marketing. The email he sent linked to his enewsletter, his blog, and notably, a PDF of "7 Steps to Small Business Marketing Success," which is an overview of his marketing system.
While not tailored specifically for retailers, Jantsch's seven steps to marketing success can be applied to any type of small business, and are worth reviewing as our industry enters the all important Fourth Quarter. The seven steps are:
1. Narrow Your Focus - Don't try to be all things to all people, he writes.
2. Find and Communicate a Core Difference. His advice includes asking customers specifically why they buy from you, how they found you, what makes them stay with you, and why they refer business to you. Their answers, he says, will tell you how your business is really different and unique.
3. Package Your Business - "People really can relate and attach themselves and be more memorable if they can connect to an image," he explains. Create images for your store new, service features, etc.
4. Create Marketing Materials that Educate - Jantsch recommends developing a "marketing kit." This is, he says, a series of documents and promotional materials that can be personalized easily. "...you don't go down to the print shop and print 10,000 people you want to send it to that day." Number one on his list of promotional materials to create is a full-page piece called "The Difference."
5. Establish Your Lead Generation Trio - Build a marketing plan with three components: 1. Advertising, 2. A referral system, and 3. Public Relations. Business, he asserts, need all three of these elements in their marketing plans if they plan to succeed.
6. Harness Technology - Web sites, e-zines, blogs, social media -- these are all tools small businesses can--and should--incorporate into their marketing plans.
7. Live By A Calendar - "Unfortunately, marketing, which is an extremely important aspect of the survival of a business, is very easy to shove aside by the shipping it, making it, fixing it, that you end up having to do," writes Jantsch. He says to get a big calendar and map out what marketing you're going to do and when you're going to do it. "Carve out a portion of every day, if that's what it takes, and make an appointment to do marketing."
None of this is new, but like most common sense advice, it bears repeating again and again. Maybe now is a good time to review your marketing plan for November and December and into 2011.
