Article Body:
* Attend a networking event and expect it to get business
* Invest thousands of dollars in spam and expect prospects to eagerly call about your services
* Treat your vendors poorly by not paying them on time or not communicating with them during a timely manner
* Misunderstand the differences between advertising, PR, and promotion - and what they will and can't do for your professional service agency
* Underestimate how important it's for your to deal with your clients' PERCEIVED need (i.e., what THEY think they need) vs. what you recognize they have
You're playing chess once you ...
* Understand that there are right clients and wrong clients for your firm, supported where you would like your firm to be in one year, two years, five years - which your definition of "right" will change over time
* Consider what the proper sorts of clients appear as if for your firm then carefully develop a roadmap for all marketing activities that align together with your definition of "right"
* Use a mixture of carefully crafted "touches" to maneuver prospects through your relationship pipeline from Stranger, to Acquaintance, to Friend, to Lover, to Loyal Partner. Are looking six moves ahead, rather than at subsequent move. Whether it's developing your website, deciding what committees or networking groups to hitch , if you ought to invest during a particular piece of selling collateral, or where to publish your next article...chess players see the connections between today's marketing decisions and their impact months and years ahead.For a game decide to avoid checkmate, try these things:
* Consider where you would like to be in 6 months, 12 months, 18 months and 36 months. Identify the large steps to urge you there. I organize my actions by "theme of the month." for instance , within 6 months, i would like to be into developing a web platform to launch subscription-based marketing tools. So January and February are Research Months. I'm attending two related conferences to quickly assess the newest approaches, make some good contacts, and scope the competition.
* some time is precious, so why squander it on marketing activities that do not fill your pipeline with the proper sorts of prospects? Decide how or if to take a position time during a particular action (networking, developing a brochure, sending thank-you notes, writing a newsletter, giving a talk) supported how it aligns with attracting attention from the proper sorts of prospects. I've recently joined a committee because, additionally to loving the cause it supports, i will be exposed during a leadership capacity to my audience .
* When following up after an initial contact or introduction, you're nowhere near making the sale. the sport is simply beginning. Make your goal one among learning more about the opposite person's condition in order that they feel comfortable you're tuned into their needs. Moving from Stranger to Acquaintance to Friend to Lover takes several "touches," including telephone conversation(s), face-to-face meeting(s), email, sending them to your website to dig around (because you've stocked it filled with valuable freebies), seeing you in action as a speaker, or reading about you within the press. Put a predictable system of "touches" in situ and run everyone through it.
* Set an enormous , "unattainable" goal then connect the dots to succeed in it. In 2005, I even have my eye on penetrating specific major organizations and creating partnerships for national distribution of my marketing education schemes . I'm envisioning what these relationships appear as if within the end and am taking much smaller, practical, "doable" steps now to urge there. These include attending conferences where I can meet key contacts that I've already identified (and where I'll get the lay of the land to talk at next time), putting the wheels in motion for a series of books (the ultimate business card!) to create credibility and exposure, experimenting with local prototypes (where the sales cycle is shorter and there is not tons of pricy travel involved to form the sale), and building a solid relationship slowly with VIPs before jumping the gun.
Ready to play chess? Your move!