People often think running a business takes a lot of money. It can but it doesn’t have to. Do you realize every contact your company has is a marketing opportunity? It begins with the simplest elements.
1. The name of your business;
2. Are you selling a product or service?
3. Method of manufacture or service;
4. Color, shape, size of the product
5. Packaging
6. Location of your business
7. Advertising
8. Pubic relations
9. Website
10. Branding
11. Email signature
12. Voicemail message
13. Sales presentation
14. Telephone inquries
15. Sales training
16. Problems solved
17. Growth plan
18. Referral plan
19. Staff
20. Follow-up
21. Attitude
22. Passion for your business
All of the above elements impact your business. Each one of these provides a unique way for you to market your business. It will help differentiate you from the competition by getting people to conduct business with you or repel them away from you.
Everything you do, your staff does and your branding quality impact the perception of you and your business. This does not happen in a single instance, generally. It can take a month, several months or even several years. This is why all of these elements are important. You must be clear that each impacts your brand and it never ends.
There is a plumbing company I’ve enjoyed doing business with. They’re incredibly efficient and honest – a rarity in the industry, especially in Los Angeles. Well, as this company has become more popular and busy, they have lost the quintessential essence of what the brand originally stood for. When in front of the owner, it’s easy to forget it often takes weeks to get him to answer the phone, he rarely returns calls any longer and when he does he’s always mentally preoccupied (making it seem unimportant to converse). As a result, where this was once the plumber of choice, the more difficult it has become to ‘connect’ with him to get him to do jobs, the less I am willing to call him. So, when I look at the factors above for this company, where it once was an A++, they are now no longer rated worthy of my time.
- Product: Not valued. Takes too long trying to schedule work.
- Website: Not functional or kept up to date with current data making it virtually useless.
- Branding: While the owner is always quite personable, his brand no longer stands for integrity because of his inability to connect with all customers. Better to apologize and get back to a customer rather than not respond at all.
- Email: Only emails once he has the business and that’s merely to send an invoice.
- Voicemail: Another useless tool because the owner is vacant most of the time. Truthfully, he’s probably just incredibly busy but better to update the voicemail to indicate that rather than a general message that makes it seem like the guy just doesn’t care about the customer.
- Telephone inquiries: another useless facet where no one responds.
- Problem sovler: The company has a very skillful hand but who wants to deal with someone where you feel as if you are chasing them to give them your business?
- Growth plan: Would not help with any level of growth because it’s currently too difficult to conduct business.
- Referral plan: Company was once part of my personal and professional referral plan as I listed this company as the go-to for plumbing. No longer. As a matter of fact, I won’t even bring the name of the company up with anyone because I now deem them completely unreliable.
- Staff: The staff is golden. Some of the best, kindest people, when they are in front of you. How long it takes to get them in front of you makes all the difference in the world, however.
- Follow-up: They only follow-up to send out invoices. You never hear a from them again. A huge missed opportunity.
- Attitude: Who knows how their attitude is when you can’t get anyone on the telephone in order to converse.
Given what I’ve identified, take a few minutes to review these elements against your business. Ask yourself the following:
- What is my plan relative to each of the elements?
- What do I need to modify and how long will it take me? Chart a time to execute and get it done.
- How do my customer’s rate these elements?
- How do my employees rate these elements?
I think you will gain much insight by completing this exercise. Where the information is not as you would expect, get to work on making any necessary corrections then set out a plan to share those changes with your customers. This is one of the easiest ways to get others enthusiastic about your business AND to help build your business.
