We often get asked by our members how to grow their social media following and how to use their pages effectively to grow their business online and get more sales enquiries. Here are a few simple principles to kick start your campaigns…

1) Ask your friends! Invite contacts on social networks and in person.

2) Include a ‘like’ / ‘follow’ link in your email signature, on your website and on your printed marketing material.

3) Offer an incentive. You could send new ‘likes’ a gift, this could be a guide that shares some of your professional knowledge…this often leads to solid sales leads!

4) Leave comments on relevant company’s Facebook / Twitter pages with your incentive. It’s amazing how many companies don’t engage with their fans, it’s an opportunity glaring you in the face!

Once you start to get more fans and followers, make sure you engage with them. Post regular updates that are inspiring, connective, educative and entertaining.

…by all means ‘share’ this via the social networks and ‘like‘ and ‘follow‘ The Marketing Compass!

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Karen Kimberley

Karen has shared many helpful ideas with me. One of my favourites is The Praise Sandwich. Here is a Tweet which I have just sent out to my 11K+ Followers:

When giving feedback, use “The Praise Sandwich”: Praise – Constructive Criticism – Praise. @kkimberley karenkimberley.co.uk

All too often, we hurt each others’ feelings by being too direct. The client offends the supplier. The manager succeeds in making the staff member clam up and stop asking questions. The boss wonders why nobody comes up with creative ideas.

IMHO The Praise Sandwich should be taught in Primary schools. It should be displayed in large lettering on giant posters in offices. It should be etched into watch straps, printed on the back of business cards and chanted at football matches.

The next time you are giving feedback, remember:

The Praise Sandwich
1. PRAISE
2. CONSTRUCTIVE CRITICISM
3. PRAISE

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Fedora Strings is an ensemble of conservatoire-trained musicians who can be hired for wedding quartets, trios, duos or solos. Each member is an accomplished musician in their own right and has played in some of the best professional ensembles in the UK.

No matter the quality of the ‘product’ it still has to be marketed. Joanna Borrett and her fellow musicians believe in continual marketing. They have recently launched a new website – www.fedorastrings.com – which has a series of recordings which visitors can play, directly from the homepage. These include the Flower Duet by Delibes, I Got Rhythm by Gershwin and an Irish reel (which shows product diversity!)

Joanna blogs regularly, as you can see here: http://www.fedorastrings.com/blog/

Joanna tells us that her Google search engine rankings are doing well and that she is receiving booking enquiries via the site, which was built by www.totosites.com – which specialises in small business websites.

During the website building process, a keyword list was researched. Care was taken to embed the keywords within the website’s meta data, page headlines and text. If you are interested in booking Fedora Strings for a wedding, special event or party, by all means email Joanna Borrett or call her on 07531 363 814. Live music really does add something to an occasion, doesn’t it?

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Generating new ideas for your business should be high on your list of priorities. In a fast changing world, money gravitates towards the innovators. New ideas can add value to your products / services, your brand and your business. Anyone can produce new ideas on demand, as long as they believe that they can.

In the 21st century, we are all busy. This certainly applies to business owners. We work long hours, in order to get everything done. When you are working, your mind produces ‘high energy’ beta brainwaves. When you are relaxed, calmer alpha brainwaves are produced.

It is easy to become a workaholic. You may find yourself feeling guilty, when you are not ‘working’ during office hours. There is so much to do! Replying to / sending emails, handling phone calls and attending meetings are seen as work. Going for a walk or sitting there and not doing anything isn’t.

Interestingly, our most creative ideas arrive when we are not working. They pop into consciousness when we are on holiday, during the weekend or when we are driving. How about you? Does this sound familiar?

In my case, my best ideas materialise when I am least expecting them. For example, I had been searching for a name for what became The Marketing Compass for several months. A few years ago, the Temple family was enjoying Christmas lunch. We pulled the crackers and *Bang!* a small compass fell into my lap. Voila! The Marketing Compass was born.

Include down time in your busy life. Take the weekends off. Plan your next holiday. Don’t work every hour which God sends. Who knows? Your next incredible idea many pop into existence when you are not ‘working’.

Generating ideas and creative thinking has always fascinated me. For 12 years, I taught Creative Thinking at CIM (the Chartered Institute of Marketing). Within The Marketing Compass Manual I have included a series of idea generation techniques, which I have taught to thousands of seminar delegates. Find out more here: www.marketingcompass.co.uk/join

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“How successful will this be?” I am often asked this question by business owners, managing directors and nervous investors. They may be about to launch. Or they may be about to kick their product or service hard enough so that it is, hopefully, propelled into orbit.

The product or service itself is only one part of the jigsaw puzzle of success. Here are some of the other jigsaw pieces:

VISION
Successful people know where they are heading. They know their compass bearing. No matter what happens during their journey, they keep on course. Do you have a clear vision of your future business? If I spoke to you right now – could you describe this picture to me in detail?

BUSINESS MODEL
The internet, rising competition and economic turmoil have disrupted entire industries. The ubiquitous use of technology has slashed costs, made old skills irrelevant and created new opportunities for fast learners. Does your business model reflect these changes?

MARKETING PLAN
Do you have an up-to-date written marketing plan?

CUSTOMER FOCUS
Are you operating a product focused or customer centric business? The second approach is a game changer. If your mind is wrapped around technical issues and features, you are wandering in the dark. There is a cliff edge close by. Quite soon you will be united with it.

COMPELLING COPY
The written word is central to marketing communications. Arguably, it is even more important in a digital age. Can you write flowing text as fast as you can type? Is your copy grammatically correct and easy to read? Does it hold the reader’s attention? How often do you write? Do you love to write?

PROMOTIONAL MIX
You should be using at least ten promotional techniques. How many are you using?

DIGITAL MARKETING
To what extent are you embracing the world of digital marketing? Do you, your enterprise and your products / services appear in Google if I search for them? Are you engaging with the social web? Are you continually learning?

CLOSING THE SALE
Investing your time (and money) in marketing is all very well – but you have got to close that sale. Have you had professional sales training? What was the last book you read on this subject? Do you consider yourself to be a salesperson?

So when I am asked “How successful will this be?” …my mind wanders around these issues. How about you? Are you happy that you are addressing all of these areas?

This blog is the first in a series – based on The Marketing Compass Manual which is part of Navigator membership of The Marketing Compass. The Manual contains over 50,000 words of structured marketing thought. It took me a year to write and it contains the key elements of small business marketing success.

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There are many ways to make your blogs easier to read. If I had to choose one piece of advice, it would be to decrease the length of your sentences.

We recently built a website for Ringrose & Co (they offer advice to companies in financial difficulties). www.ringroseandco.co.uk

I was talking to their MD, Mark Smillie and we were discussing blogging. Here is the feedback I gave him, regarding a draft blog entry he wrote.

Here are his draft words (IP = Insolvency Practitioner):

oooooOOOOOooooo
Our perspective is different to the IP who must give fair and impartial advice to all concerned with the Limited Company, we will give best advice to the client, who can benefit from over twenty years’ of experience in this area.
oooooOOOOOooooo

I suggested that Mark cut the sentence lengths down. This is the quickest way of increasing ‘readability’. So the above could become:

Our perspective is different to the IP. They must give fair and impartial advice to all concerned with the Limited Company. We will give best advice to the client, who can benefit from over twenty years’ of experience in this area.

Having divided the copy into shorter sentences, the following version would increase ‘understandability’:

Our perspective is different to the IP. They must give fair and impartial advice to all concerned with the Limited Company (i.e. suppliers, directors, shareholders). We focus on the client. They can benefit from the two decades of experience that we have gained in this area.

Click here to read the finished blog. Notice that the following keywords:

why accountants should use a pre insolvency service

…appear within the blog headline, the URL (web page address) and the Title tag. All of which is Google friendly.

By the way, if you are interested in talking to us about a new website, you are welcome to email us or call 01628 773128. We combine internet marketing strategy, Google friendliness, an online Content Management System and copywriting feedback in our client websites.

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‘Keywords’ = words / phrases used by search engines to find relevant web pages.

Some keywords are used frequently. Within SEO* these are known as ‘short tail keywords’. As they are so popular, it is relatively challenging to rank highly for them, within organic search results.

Other keywords are searched for less frequently. They are known as ‘long tail keywords’. Interestingly, according to Google, some 20% of the searches they see on a daily basis, have never been used before. It is quite possible to achieve page one rankings for long tail keyword phrases. However, the trick is to stay at the top and also to convert this traffic into business.

Within The Marketing Compass, we recommend that our members have an alphabetical list of keywords. Generally, it is a good idea to have a balance of popular (short tail, or ‘broad’) and less popular (long tail, or ‘narrow’) keywords / phrases within your website. However, your SEO strategy will depend on a variety of factors, including target market(s), geographical reach and the importance of SEO within your promotional mix.

If you have any questions about this topic – as always – just ask.

* SEO Search Engine Optimisation – click here for a brief introduction.

Keywords are also used within SEM (Search Engine marketing or PPC Pay Per Click marketing), i.e Google AdWords.

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David (not his real name) was a client of mine, a few years ago. He was a left brain thinker. An engineer by training, he liked a structured approach, logical steps and processes. He worked endlessly on his marketing plan and talked about the detailed elements of his website and promotional mix. He was never in a rush and preferred to think everything through carefully.

Stephanie (not her real name) was another client. She was chaotic to work with, never wrote anything down and was always moving onto the next great thing in marketing. She didn’t like plans and used to say to me: “What’s the point of plans? They never work out anyway and they take so much time. Let’s get out there and DO SOMETHING!” Stephanie liked to talk about the ‘big picture’. She felt that the greater the number of playing cards you throw up in the air, the greater the chance would be of catching a winning hand.

David is primarily a logical left brain thinker, whilst Stephanie is an imaginative right brain person. Both approaches have their merits.

On the one hand, David was right to have a written marketing plan. Writing everything down takes time and effort and something magic happens, when you do this. You have to think the issues through and commit, in writing, to a particular course of action.

“In preparing for battle I have always found that plans are useless, but planning is indispensable.” – Dwight D Eisenhower

David’s mistake was to become stuck at the planning stage.

Stephanie’s mistake was to rely on Fortuna, the Roman goddess of chance (and fate). It is true that the larger your network of contacts / email marketing list etc., the luckier you become. However, this is only one element of a successful marketing strategy. It is not a good idea to rely on randomness alone. The winds of chance will drive you somewhere – but probably not where you intended.

Do you have a written marketing plan, for your small business? Do you have clear objectives? Do you think in terms of segmentation, positioning and differentiation? Do you consistently use key messages? Do you work with at least 10 promotional techniques on a regular basis?

Strategic issues include your business model, branding, product mix, pricing, geographical coverage, direct versus channel sales and promotional mix. With regards to the latter, there are over 250 ways to promote your small business, divided into 20+ categories. Internet marketing is one of these categories. The sub categories within Internet marketing include websites, SEO, newsletter, blogging, social media and PPC (Pay Per Click) marketing.

Navigator members of The Marketing Compass have access to an online marketing plan template, which they can fill in, via a web browser. They can then ask for feedback, via our website.

Our motto is ‘Small business marketing direction’. We are here to guide you through the complex options which you have to decide between.

As always, we welcome questions and feedback.

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Here’s a tip: don’t start your day by checking your emails. Do some writing, instead. Within The Marketing Compass, some of our members love to write, whilst others find it a challenge. Both groups are busy! It is all too easy to let the writing slip.

Remember that ‘content is king’ for your website. Regular blogs will attract Google, whilst Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter, amongst others, require a regular supply of words. When it comes to writing, ‘little and often’ beats ‘big and infrequent’.

In January 2011, I started writing The Marketing Compass Manual. This has been a busy year, however, I have managed to write over 48,000 words using this principle. Feedback, anyone?

By the way, ‘copy’ = ‘marketing words’, as in ‘advertising copy’ or ‘web copy (i.e. website words). I trained as a copywriter from 1983 – 1986 and I spent three years writing advertisements, brochures, leaflets, press releases, case studies and technical articles. I used to sit in the park with a 6 line text editing device (black letters on a grey background). Happy days!

Image source: www.scribblers.co.uk

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The smallest business should still ‘think brand’.

A brand = a promise. What is your promise to your marketplace?

If your business is ‘just you’ then you are the brand.

Your brand is based on your values. What are your values? Have you thought about them recently? Do your colleagues / associates / customers / suppliers know what they are? Do you have a written list of your values? Do you display them within your website? A member of The Marketing Compass told me recently that a new client selected his company on the basis of their values (as seen on their website).

Successful brands display certain qualities. For example:

* They are clear what they stand for
* They have a marketing strategy, plan and direction
* Their messages are congruent
* They use visual brand identity consistently
* They continually invest in promotional campaigns
* They use a wide promotional mix
* They are creative in their approach
* They stand out from the crowd
* They measure their results and adjust accordingly

Incidentally, your logo, colours and typeface are only part of your brand. Although these elements are the most visible, it is the deeper elements, such as your values, which create a great brand.

How about you? Do you feel that branding is important? Are you building a brand? What steps are you taking to achieve this?

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