Continue reading »]]>

* I have not used this product

I have not tried the Ace of Sales software as of yet but it looks interesting.

You should always, without fail, always stay top of mind with everyone that your business interacts with.

I have been studying the art of sales for over 12 years.  One of my first book on sales was “The Sales Bible” by Jeffrey Gitomer the creator of the Ace of Sales system.  He then came out with “The Little Red Book of Selling”.  This has become a classic and I have given it to some of my sales reps because of it’s strait forward and simple advice.

You may be thinking, ‘I’m a small business owner, NOT a sales person’.  If you own a business you ARE in sales because you SELL something.  Every business sells something.

This software is a customer retention and lead nurturing solution.  As soon as I have time to try it out I will post my review here.  Until then check it out here.

Be sure to sign up to the Email notification list below if you haven’t already so you’ll know when it’s up.

Thanks for reading.  I truly appriciate your time and hope that I have helped you in some way.

Continue reading »]]>

Marketing Plan Man

Here at Mark Local we’re constantly working on developing the best content to help small local business owners and entrepreneurs develop and execute remarkable marketing plans.

Sign up for our Basic Marketing Package for the low price of $0.00 per month.  That’s right!  The Basic Marketing Package is free!  Sign up and you’ll get instant access to:

• Premium small business marketing information – the best marketing techniques for local small business is always changing.  New methods are developing daily.  Finding, filtering, and keeping up with all the information can be overwhelming for an already overworked small business owner.  At Mark Local we find the best, relevant information about small business marketing and deliver it to you.  We do the work, you get the benefits.  That’s just what we do here.
• Marketing Plan Builder – Let the Marketing Plan Man help you develop a Marketing Plan for your small business.  We built this online software with the local small business in mind.  Plan it damn it!
• Recommended Marketing Resources & Tools – The internet is full of useful tools and resources that small businesses can use to help them be more efficient, reduce costs, and increase leads.  We find those tools and resources for you.  You’re welcome!
• Marketing Calculators – Find out your Return On Investment (ROI), Number of leads your business needs per month, the lifetime value of your customer, and more!
• Checklists – We’ve developed helpful checklists to keep you on track.
• Email Updates – We understand that it’s not always easy to keep coming back to the website to get new information.  Don’t worry.  Mark Local will send marketing updates directly to you via email.

Fill out the form below to get started!

Continue reading »]]>

Internet marketers are very familiar with landing pages and use them often.  As a small business owner, you may have heard the term landing page before but you may not be familiar with how they work or why you or your business should even care.

I will get to why this is important for your business but first lets look at how landing pages are used.  Internet marketers use landing pages most often when they are doing a Pay Per Click advertising program.  If you use Google, notice the listings that come up on the right hand side of the search results page.  These are ads from businesses doing pay per click advertising.  (I’ll go over how you can use pay per click program for your small business in a future post)  Many of these ads are set up to take you to a special page called a landing page instead of the businesses home page.  The landing page is specifically designed to give you information on what the ad that you clicked on was about.  These landing pages are much more effective in converting a prospect to a customer because they are very specific to what the prospect wants.

Think about most website home pages.  You’ve got a crazy amount of items you can click on.  It can be daunting to figure out what to do.  Most home pages are either confusing or boring.

Even if you’ve never done a pay per click program before for your small business, you should be utilizing landing pages.  Essentially, you should have a landing page on your website for each of your businesses profit centers.    For instance, say you are a plumber.  Some of your profit centers would include Water Heaters, Faucet Leaks, Drain Cleaning, just to name a few.  On your website you would want to have a page specifically dedicated to each of these.  On these pages you give the person no other option except to contact you.  Don’t show your menu of other pages.  Give them the option to call you or send you an email or visit your location.

Now let’s say that the plumbing business decides to run a campaign promoting drain cleaning.  In the promotion material, instead of listing the website address they would list the landing page for drain cleaning.  The web address may be something like ‘www.plumbingpros.com/draincleaning’.

You may be wondering how to add landing pages to your website.  If you’ve had a site built for you, you may need to contact your website designer to develop them for you.  Ideally, you would have a website that you have access to and can make changes yourself.  If you currently don’t have a website or would like to look into creating a new site that you have more control of, contact me and I can give you some options.

Continue reading »]]>

Although the usage of the internet for search marketing is growing, a significant number of leads can still be obtained by using an effective print yellow page ad.  Here are some do’s and don’ts when building your print directory ads.

Yellow Page Marketing Do’s

1.  Do use a benefit driven headline. Your headline is most likely the most important part of any print ad.  You should spend 75% of your time crafting a remarkable headline compared to the design of the rest of the ad.  Your headline will draw your prospect in and get them to read the rest of the copy.

2.  Do use bulleted lists. Be sure to list benefits rather than features.  Be careful not to use industry words and phases that some people may not understand.

3.  Do explain how you are different from your competitors. Prospects looking in a print directory are trying to make a choice.  Help them to choose your business by stating very clearly why they should do business with you.

4.  Do use images in your ad. Choosing the right images for your ad will help attract attention.  Use images that depict the benefit your prospect will receive from doing business with you.

5.  Do use professionals. If you depend on business from the yellow pages, it may be advantageous to hire professionals to write the copy for your ad and to do the layout and design.  You can use a local marketing agency or you can look for a copy writer on Elance.com.  For the design, you can submit a contest to 99designs.com or croudspring.com.  This way you get many ideas to choose from.  You only need to pay for this once.  After you have the professional copy and design, you can have your local yellow page graphic artists tweek it in the future.

Yellow Page Marketing Don’ts

1.  Don’t list more that one phone number in your ad.  More than one number just confuses people.  List one phone number and set up any other phone’s for the business to forward to that number.  If this is too difficult then set up a Google Voice number that will ring to all the numbers at the same time or you can program it to forward to certain numbers at certain times.’

2.  Decide what action you want the customer to take and make it clear in your ad. Most yellow page advertisers want phone calls.  In that case make the phone number large and noticeable.  In some cases, if the ad above yours has a phone number that is small and hidden, the ad with the large phone number below will get the calls from prospects thinking it is one large ad.  Sometimes businesses want customers to come to their business rather than get a call.  Many business owners know that they are much more likely to convert a prospect to a customer if they come into their business.  If this is the case, be sure that you invite the customer to visit and prominently list your address and a map if you can.  In other cases you may want customers to visit your website.  Your print yellow page ad in limited by space, however, you have infinite space on your website to explain your unique business attributes.  Again, make your website address prominent.  Also, you don’t necessarily need to list your main website address in your ad.  See my post on landing pages for an in depth explanation of this technique.

3.  Don’t put the name of your business at the top of the ad. In most cases prospects do not care what the name of your business is.  Yellow pages is not the place to try to build brand awareness.  Save that for other forms of media.

4.  Don’t copy what your competitors say in their ads. It is very tempting to look at the other ads in your heading and feel that you need to list the same items because you provide those things too.  The key is to stand out from your competitors.  You can’t do this if your ad says the same things and just has a different logo.

5.  Don’t forget about the white pages. They say it cost 6 times more to acquire a new customer versus getting an existing customer to do business with you.  Make it easy for your existing customers to find your information.  Business cards get misplaced or tossed in the trash all the time.  Most directories allow you to place ads in the white pages where your listing will appear.  Make sure you include answers to frequently asked questions in your white page ad.  Some of the most common questions would be business hours, location information, and of course list your website address.

I hope this helps you with your local directory advertising.  If you have any questions please leave them in the comments below.

Continue reading »]]>

Business has slowed for many local business owners.  It’s not big news.  You’re probably feeling it now.

Look at the graphic above.  The first circle shows the size of your market before the economic downturn and how much market share your business enjoyed.  The second circle shows the size of your market today.  It’s obviously smaller.  It may be much smaller.

Most businesses in this situation start cutting marketing and advertising.  Then their business really starts to suffer.  At this point they really feel like they can’t afford to advertise.  They blame the economy and start laying off employees or finding other ways to cut costs.  This downward spiral keeps going till they eventually go out of business.

You’re smarter than that.  Mostly because you read this blog but in addition to that you know that even though the market has gotten smaller and things have slowed, you  should maintain your marketing and advertising efforts.  Sure you’ve had to make some adjustments.  You’re spending your budget smarter than ever.  You’re leveraging free advertising on the internet directory sites like Google and making sure that you are getting a good return on any advertising spend.  You’ve got a marketing plan that is going to get you through this.

The second circle shows your market share in the current economy.  Sure the pie is smaller but your share of that pie is larger than you had before.  This is because many of your competitors have downsized or completely canceled their marketing and advertising programs.  Some of your competitors have gone out of business.  You are there to pick up the market share.

As the market in your industry starts to grow again, your business will be in a much better position.

Good for you!

What specific things are you doing right now to gain market share?  Is it working?  Leave a comment below and tell me about it.

Continue reading »]]>

I like to ask clients a very specific question to find out how they consider themselves different from their competitors.  The question is this: “If I called your business and asked you to tell me why should I do business with you rather than one of your competitors, what would you tell me?”

Think about that question for a minute.  How would you answer it?

To stand out in your market, in any economy, you’ve got to do at least one thing better than any of your competitors.  Ideally, this ‘something’ will be very important to your target market.

The most typical differences  are:

• Price (lowest)
• Service (best)
• Speed (fastest)
• Quality (best)
• Value (best)
• Selection (best)
• Reliability (most)
• Expertise (most)
• Creative (most)

No matter how bad you want it, your business can not be all things.  You need to choose and focus.  If you try to excel at everything in the list above your business will implode, or worse.

Honestly, what are you doing differently?  Is your advertising similar to all your competitors?  Of course your logo is different, but do you just list the same things that all your competitors do?  What about how you deal with your customers?  Do they just get the same service they would get from your competitors?  I know; service is what separates you from your competitors.  Unfortunately, that’s what they said too.

Do whatever you can to stand out.  I’m not saying go crazy.  But be different.  Be amazing in your specific area. Give your customers something to talk about to their friends and relatives.

I want you to find ways to stand out.  Tell us what you are doing or what you plan to do to stand out in the comments below.  Need ideas?  Email me at kevin@marklocal.com.  I’ll try to help you come up with some.

Continue reading »]]>

Here are some things that come to mind that you might not have considered for your small business.  Take a look and let me know what you think by submitting a comment at the end of this post.

1.  Always, always, always answer the phone. Your business phone during business hours, should always be answered by a live, knowledgeable person.  Customers do not want to leave a message, and most of them won’t.  They are already dialing your competitors.

Small Business Hackr Tip:Answer your business calls late and on weekends if possible.  Have your business phone forwarded to your cell phone and answer the calls.  Your potential customers will love the fact that they are reaching you at odd hours and will show you by giving you their business.

2.  If you absolutely can’t answer the phone. Be sure you have a pleasant voicemail message.  Do not say “This is Jim leave a message”.  Yes Jim, you are cool, but your customers are not impressed.  Let the caller know what business they have called.  Let them know how soon you will call them back.  No, they don’t care that you are with another customer or  whatever.  They want their problem solved.  Give them your website address so they can check that out and then call them back as soon a humanly possible.

Small Business Hackr Tip: Voice mail coupons.  Let’s face it, if someone hits your voice mail you may have lost the sale already.  To increase your chances, you may consider letting your customer know that since they have to leave a message instead of speaking to you personally, you will give them a discount on services.  Even if the customer does contact a competitor they may hold off choosing until they hear from you since they know they will be getting something extra.

3.  Never, Never, Never send bids in the mail or review them over the phone. Always meet with the customer in person if at all possible .  You will get more business if you are able to talk about concerns and make modifications to the bid or proposal.

4. Set appointments for everything. If you are going to get a bid to a customer as we just talked about, set an appointment before you leave about when you are going to go over the bid.  If you need to follow up with your customer, make an appointment.  Don’t just say that you’ll contact them in a couple of weeks.

5.  Keep your appointments. There is nothing worse than a business that does not keep their appointments.  If the customer misses the appointment so be it but you should never miss one, ever.

Small Business Hackr Tip: Always call the customer the day before the appointment to confirm.  Dentists offices do this and it is a good practice for every small business.

6. Touch base often. If you are working on a project for a client that takes time to complete, send the client updates at regular intervals letting them know what you’ve accomplished.  Don’t make them wonder and don’t make them ask.

Small Business Hackr Tip: Make them feel special.  Your customers want to feel special especially ones that are spending lots of money with your.  It’s easy these days to get a phone number you can use for business.  Google Voice is one way.  Give this “special” number to your key customers and let them know they have special contact privileges.  You should also set us a “special” email address as well.

7.  Ask more questions. When working with customers or potential customers be sure you ask lots of questions.  For one thing it shows that you are interested in their problem.  And they do have a problem because they need you to solve it.  Show them that you understand exactly what their needs are.  You will be surprised how this one change will lead to more leads.

I will (or have) expanded on some of these in future posts (check for links).  What techniques do you use in your business to get and keep more customers.  Leave your thoughts in the comments below.

Continue reading »]]>

I’m super excited about this new service from Google.  I think for small business owners, especially ones that don’t have assistants to answer phones this will be essential.  Of course I am always looking for ways that small business can take advantage of the latest tools.

Here is a review of some of the features that Google Voice offers and how you might use them for your small business.

Voice Mail Transcription – One of the main things I enjoy about Google Voice for my business is the voice mail transcription service.  The transcriptions are saved in your Google Voice account.  You can have the transcriptions sent to your email address and\or to your mobile phone as a text message.  I like this because then a can keep a text record of the voice mails I’ve received from clients or vendors and can file them for reference.

Switch phones mid-conversation – Let’s say a customer called and you answered it on your cell phone while you were driving in your car.  Now your back at the office and you’d rather finish the conversation on your office phone.  You can press the * button on the phone and Google Voice will ring all the phones you’ve set up on the system.  Now you can pick up the office line and continue the conversation.  Same thing if your on your office phone and you need to leave for an appointment.  Transfer the call to your cell phone using the * key and your off.

Screening Calls – Some of us don’t have the luxury of having a secretary to screen our calls.  Every business owner has to deal with the onslaught of sales reps calling day after day.  Google voice can help to some degree.  If Google is not familiar with the number calling you it will ask them to say who is calling.  The name is played to you when you pick up and you can choose to answer or send the call to voice mail.  If you hear the name of the caller but your still not sure if you want to speak to them Google Voice also gives you the option to send the caller to voice mail but you can listen in and if it turns out to be a call you do want to take, you can jump in and answer the call.

If you do get a call from an annoying telemarketer, you can mark the call as SPAM from within the Google Voice application and calls from that number will be blocked from that point forward.  Nice!

Recording Calls - You do have the option to record calls.  The system does alert the caller that the call is being recorded.  I can not think of any business applications for this function but if you have any please leave a comment on this post.

Cell Phone Calls Without Displaying Your Actual Cell Phone Number - If you have a web-enabled cell phone it appears that you call make calls without the receiver of the call getting your actual cell phone number in their caller ID.  If you log into your Google Voice account via your phones web browser you have the option of typing in the number you wish to call and your Google Voice phone number will be displayed instead.  I have not tested this yet but I will update this post when I’ve had the chance to try this.

Tracking Marketing Programs With Google Voice – I am in the process of testing the use of Google Voice as a method of tracking calls from different marketing efforts of small business.  I have obtained several Google Voice phone numbers.  You need a Google email address for each number you wish to acquire.  Currently I have 5 numbers.  I have found that Google does not allow you to forward to the same phone from different Google phone numbers so this is something I am still trying to figure out.  Apparently they will let you share a land line with one other Google Voice number.  Unless your business already has several phone lines this will prove to be a challenge. I have sent the suggestion to Google to allow for multiple Google phone numbers for business users to track marketing efforts.  We’ll have to wait and see what they decide to do.  Until then I will keep searching for work a rounds.

I will keep you updated with whatever solutions I find so make sure that you subscribe to the newsletter to receive updates on this topic.

Continue reading »]]>

Six months ago my wife was a nursing manager working for a small local medical clinic.  At that time the clinic underwent a merger with a large national corporation.  In the blink of an eye she went from being in charge and making most of the critical decisions to having almost all decisions made for her.  She is miserable.

The other night we were talking about why she is so unhappy working for this new corporation.  She makes very good money and she likes her co-workers. (except for the new corporate jerks)  We determined that one thing that is deep in her core is the need for freedom.  She will never be happy when someone else is making decisions for her.

The typical entrepreneur has an overwhelming need for freedom.   Freedom in this case dose not mean freedom from work but more the freedom to make their own decisions and make their own schedule.

I point this out because I feel that lifestyle design is something that every small business owner should consider.  Some entrepreneurs leave their regular job in search of more freedom and realize that they are now controlled by their business instead of a boss.

Design and run your business with the lifestyle you want and need in mind.  The marketing decisions you make for your business can help shape this.  Determine what your ideal life would look like.  Keep in mind that you will not sit down one evening, come up with a new marketing plan, and realize all your dreams in the next week.  You work towards the ideal life.  Knowing what that looks like will help guide your decisions now and hopefully years down the road you will be able to fulfill your dream life.

My wife and I have three kids and of course they are all in activities.  My wife enjoys working hard but would love to be able to be home with the kids more and not be on call 24-7.   We are currently working on developing her own business that will give her back the freedom she is looking for and help her design the lifestyle she wants.

Let your business be the vehicle that helps you achieve the lifestyle YOU want.