What most aspiring marketers will unwittingly do, is sabotage their own entrepreneurial success. Who or why first of all, would intentionally do that. What many will do when starting out, is pay little attention to the long term lifeline of their venture.
This means having an effective doable marketing plan for their business that works.
They also fail to work on human development, to become a better functioning person themselves. As that’s the engine that drives their freedom.
The intent is there however, as they’re running ads on the Internet to their sales funnel, which may be pulling in leads or customers.
They’re also regularly contributing content to their blog, to become perceived as an expert in their industry.
Their focus however is scattered, as what’s lacking is a fundamental plan to guide their prospects.
They’re doing the majority of the marketing process properly, so how then are they sabotaging their success.
The entire marketing plan needs to be completely air and water tight, otherwise the land sharks will attack.
What Many Fail To Develop Is A Marketing Plan
What a plan on paper does, is completely focuses all of your efforts to a roadmap. This allows you to maximize the most of your marketing budget.
What’s easy and common however, is many will continue their online marketing without one.
What a marketing plan allows for, is having a disciplined strategic method of attack, especially when things go wrong.
Yet, most will proceed sporadically, or their original plan becomes altered or ignored, once things go wrong. Then they jump on the next new “shiny object.”
The key becomes making the most of your marketing efforts and budget. What’s needed is a daily plan, as well as a short and long term plan.
Your Goals Need To Be Written Down
What successful business owners will do, is take the time to write down their goals and objectives.
This on what they’re wanting to achieve, along with every marketing activity they do. It may appear mundane, but it’s necessary.
What’s known is those who put their goals into writing, essentially making it a commitment, have a higher success rate, than those who don’t.
There’s no way you can develop a feasible plan, unless there are concrete objectives.
What’s needed, is a clear concise vision to follow, a target to aim for, and the commitment and discipline to follow through.
There’s no possible way of knowing what type or how much marketing is needed, if you have no idea what you’re aiming for.
A Limited “Short Term” Attitude
Most who don’t succeed are reactive in nature, while on the surface it appears they’re doing plenty of the right things.
Where they fail, is not being consistent or doing it long enough while easily getting discouraged and will quit, to make an impact.
Running a few ads on Facebook for instance, and then giving up when there’s no immediate results, is worse than doing nothing at all.
The reason being, if you do nothing it doesn’t cost you any money, while giving up too soon becomes expensive.
What’s known for certain, is it takes anywhere between 3 to 8 exposures of a marketing message, for the average consumer to take some type of action.
It’s entirely possible your intended audience, was just starting to take notice of you, right when you decided to stop.
You Don’t Know Your Unique Selling Proposition (USP)
What’s thought to be one of the worst ways business owners will sabotage their marketing efforts, this without even realizing it, is by not having an Unique Selling Proposition (USP).
The greatest marketing plan in the world won’t be effective, if there’s no clearly defined reason why someone should buy your product or service.
Why they should buy yours, instead of the other similar products that are available to them on the market.
So you need to figure out an angle why your product is better, more unique than your competition.
You need to find a better way of communicating this in everything you do. You can market to your hearts content, but you’ll be wasting your time and money otherwise.
10 Ways To Improve Your Marketing
1.) – Always develop a marketing plan, which should be your number one priority, this on a daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly basis
2.) – Write down at least one objective, that states what results you want in your business over the next 12 months. Write down one objective, for every marketing activity you undertake, stating the results you want
3.) – Stay on course, this by checking your progress towards your objectives. Do so once every several months, while giving your plan at least 9 to 12 months for it to work
4.) – Know what your Unique Selling Proposition is , and make sure it’s presented in a clear concise way, this in everything you do
5.) – Never attempt to be “everything to everyone.” Just focus on a few specific benefits, along with a specific niche audience to begin
6.) – Keep track all of your marketing activities so you’ll know exactly what’s working, and what’s not working at the moment
7.) – Never rely on just one marketing activity. Use several proven marketing and traffic techniques and methods, to reach more segments of people
8.) – Develop a system, which helps you keep track of your marketing activities, this daily and every month, which helps you plan for the ones that work
9.) – Create a realistic budget, this based on a percentage of your projected revenue, or how much you have available for marketing, and then stick to it. Marketing is a calculated investment for your business. You need to make progress, while also being able to financially support it
10.) – Understand your environment, which includes the economy, your competition, the nuances of your particular industry, the situation your prospects are in. This will help you tailor an effective plan, to overcome obstacles and take advantage of opportunities
Just Take Action And Start
What’s needed is following a specific guideline, which gives your business a greater chance of success.
What all these activities does, is combines to make a better marketing plan, for any business to succeed.