Sunday, September 30, 2012

Avoid the One-Shot Marketing Gamble

“A good follow-through is just as important in management as it is in bowling, tennis, or golf. Follow-through is the bridge between good planning and good results.” - Anonymous
The key to effective marketing is to find something you can afford--then use it over and over again.

Sometimes this means repeating your marketing faithfully for weeks or months. Only after your ad message has had plenty of time to sink in will the public begin to notice you and buy from your business.

"Which marketing tool should I use?" people often ask. Use the one that reaches your prospects AND that you can AFFORD to use consistently month after month!

Keep in mind that before anyone will buy from you, they have to notice your marketing messages. Then they must become interested in your message. Finally they have to decide to take action.

Don't get impatient. This three-step process takes time.

One of the most important elements of business success is not contacting prospects and customers to purchase what you're selling – but re-contacting them (Follow-up!). This, however, is precisely what most business people don't do.

They send some sales information to a prospect ... then wait.

They make a single phone call to a prospect ... but never follow-up.

They send a fax to a customer... and hope something happens, but don't send a second one.

Get the picture? It's as if millions of people had decided to stake their fate on a single throw of the dice... on sending one catalog, or one brochure, or one letter, or one fax, or making one phone call.

But this isn't the way to make MONEY!

The overwhelming majority of people do not respond to a single marketing communication... or a single phone call... or a single fax... or a single anything else.

No wonder. We're all bombarded every single day with marketing communications. You can't turn on the television or radio... or open a newspaper... or get a newsletter... or leaf through a trade publication... without getting inundated with one "get this now, this is good for you" marketing message after another. We're an "in-your-face" marketing culture all right.

Yet, in all too many cases, what's missing is the Follow-up – the systematic attempt to break through the marketing "noise" that assails all of us and get your message -- all your message -- in front of just the people you want to have it... and do what's necessary for them to grasp it and take appropriate action.

I can give you a six-word formula for success: "Think things through - then follow through." - Eddie Rickenbacker

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