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Your business's success depends on the customers or clientsyou choose. Sound farfetched? Here's what I mean.
Suppose Jane, Dan and a bunch of friends get together for atouch-football game. Team captain Jane chooses all the best playersfor her side. Team captain Dan gets stuck with the leftovers. Withall the best players, Jane's team wins hands down.
Now suppose Jane and Dan own competing companies. Janeidentifies her best prospects and actively pursues them, winningall the most desirable clients. Dan takes a less direct approach.He puts out a few "feelers" and slowly spreads the wordabout his company. Then he sits back and waits for the phone toring.
While Dan wins a few clients over time, they're smaller,less desirable accounts than Jane's. And Jane's companysprints ahead, just like her team did on the football field.
Successful entrepreneurs choose their best prospects; theydon't wait for prospects to choose them. Here are threeimportant steps you can follow to put this strategy to work foryour new business:
Step 1. Focus on a narrow target. One of the biggeststumbling blocks to entrepreneurial success is a lack of focus. Ioften meet entrepreneurs who tell me their product or service is soterrific, anyone can use it. They're marketing to businesses,children, adults--anyone they think might listen to their message.Instead of producing maximum sales in all markets, theseentrepreneurs get just a trickle of sales in each. Their lack offocus fragments their marketing efforts--not to mention theirbudgets.
To increase your sales, narrowly focus on your best prospectsand use your resources--time and a marketing budget--wherethey'll get the best results.
Step 2. Identify your prospects. You'll identifyprospects differently depending on whether you're marketing tobusinesses or consumers. If you're a business-to-businessmarketer, you need to develop a qualified prospect list. Since theaccepted contact sequence in business-to-business communications iscall, mail, call, this prospect list is the tool you'llwork with day in and day out to contact your best prospects.
First, identify your types of prospects by category. What typesof businesses are they? Hospitals, restaurants and law practicesare a few examples. Select three or four primary categories, whichyou'll fill out with about a dozen prospects in each.
As you choose businesses to put in each of your categories,consider the qualifying criteria important to you, such as theirlength of time in business, number of employees, location and anyother factors that make business prospects more desirable. Usetrade journals, directories, association membership lists and theInternet to compile your list.
Once you've identified about 12 businesses for each of yourcategories, contact the companies and ask for the name of the mostsenior person capable of making buying decisions. Start as close tothe top as possible. For example, a public relations consultantcalling on banking chains would be better off starting with thevice president of marketing, rather than the marketing director ormarketing manager. Start at the top of an organization and workyour way down, because if you start with lower-leveldecision-makers, you can't easily go over their heads to theboss without creating bad feelings.
If your business targets consumer prospects, you'll usemarketing communications--advertising, PR and direct mail, forexample--to generate leads instead of developing a prospect list.Consumer marketers create a customer profile to guide them inbuying the right media. This one- or two-sentence description ofyour best prospects should contain important demographics, such asage, gender and household income.
If you own a computer training company, for example, you mightcreate the following profile: "Professionals aged 25-49 withhousehold incomes of $40,000-plus who live in XYZ ZIP Codes."You could also develop a business-to-business prospect list withtwo categories: colleges and universities, and major hospitals.
Step 3. Meet with qualified prospects. Unsuccessfulmeetings cost you plenty in lost time and money. So it's vitalto pre-qualify every prospect carefully by phone before you set upa meeting. No matter whether you're selling to businesses orconsumers, before you make that qualifying phone call, prepare alist of questions. Then arrange to meet only with the prospects youdetermine are the best qualified.
A qualified prospect has a need for your product or service, canafford it and is willing to pay for it. That's why it'sgood news when you discover prospects who are buying from yourcompetitor. It means that person fits the criteria.
The next time you encounter a prospect who says she'sperfectly happy with your competitor, think of it as your chance toprove how much she'll benefit by working with you instead. Bychoosing your own clients or customers in this way, you ensurehigher profitability and faster growth for your new business.
Reuse, Recycle, Repeat
By Eileen W. Teague
Don't think of pr as shame-less self-promotion. Think of itas simply smart business practice. If you don't put yourcompany's name in the limelight, who will? Get double the bangfor your publicity buck with marketing consultant JoanStewart's tips for recycling PR.
"Climbing the media ladder is a great place to start forpeople who have never had any publicity," says Stewart, whosemonthly newsletter, The Publicity Hound, is packed withideas for getting noticed. "If you've never had anewspaper write about you, don't start by trying to get afront-page story in TheWall Street Journal. The bestplace to start is at the very bottom rung of the media ladder. Tryto get your alumni magazine or a special-interest publication inyour community to write an article about your business.
"Once you've gotten a special-interest publication towrite about your business, take a copy of that story, attach it toa query letter and send it to an editor at the next-highest rung ofthe ladder--your local weekly newspaper. Once you've gotten theweekly to write about you, clip out that story and send it alongwith a query letter to the editor of your local daily newspaper.Keep climbing that ladder until you get to the top.
"Anytime you get a publication to write about you, alwayshave reprints made of the article. You can use those reprints in avariety of ways. Include them along with proposals you'remaking to potential clients. Take them to trade shows. If you havea retail establishment, put them on your counter where customerscan see them. Placing the articles in your media kit helpsestablish your credibility."
For a sample copy of The Publicity Hound, send a $5 checkpayable to The Publicity Hound to Joan Stewart, 3930 HighwayO, Saukville, WI 53080.
