silverbullet-blog

Without a clear focus on what you’re selling, how you’re marketing and to whom you’re marketing how do you expect to really become more successful?

This is one of the most difficult things for small business owners that I see which holds them back.

There is so much you need to do these days in your business just to even keep it afloat much less make a ton of money. Are you feeling a bit overwhelmed in this new year?

If your goal isn’t to make a ton of money that’s ok but either way, you need to market more and be very focused in what you’re offering online and in person or people will find it hard to understand why or how you can help them or why they should buy your stuff.

So where do you start to create YOUR Big Picture Plan?

Here are some key elements that your plan might consist of:

How much money you need to make this coming year? – Break down your annual revenue goal into monthly increments so you can then determine how many clients/customers you need to get to reach that goal.

What new programs, products or services do you want to launch and when? – What needs to be in place to make sure that happens efficiently

What personal goals do you have (vacations, time off with family each week, relationship focus, self care, etc)

What marketing will you tweak or add this year to reach more of your ideal target marketHow many clients will you need in order to reach those money goals? Figure it out. Now, what are the steps you need to take to reach those goals? Do you know?

Do you have those plotted out as well? This part is crucial. Some people just write down the goal but then stop there. You want to break each goal into bite size pieces or tasks that you can then do or accomplish every week, month or quarter to reach those goals and make them manageable. Hence, being focused.

Sometimes you will need to focus more on the inner workings of your business and the systems it takes to serve more customers or sell or follow up with more prospects to turn them into customers.

Other times its about focusing more on the marketing and lead generation (once you have those systems in place).

Here are my top 11 Marketing Strategies that you probably want to make sure you are focusing on this year.

Networking in person
Speaking in person or online/phone/radio
Social Media marketing and networking
Being a vendor/exhibitor/sponsor at live events
Co-promoting with other complimentary business owners (there’s a whole bunch of things you can do for free with others to promote each other)
Phone calls (soooo important!)
Video marketing – create tips, a video channel and more
Blogging – good, consistent, keyword rich content drives traffic
Offer freebies/bonuses/gifts, etc. for promos for others, launches and more
Testimonial marketing
Publicity (missed opportunity for most small business owners)

(c) Copyright 2012 K. Sawa Marketing International. Katrina Sawa is an Award-Winning Author & Speaker who’s helped hundreds of small business owners take dramatic steps in their businesses to get them to the next level in business, revenues & their personal life. Get her Free Entrepreneur’s Success Kit at
http://www.JumpStartYourMarketing.com
!