One of the most important elements of profitable marketing is often the most difficult for solo service professionals to maintain. That is sharing your solutions consistently.
To keep your pipeline filled with ideal clients who happily and readily pay for your solutions, you MUST market your business regularly (meaning EVERY week…YES, that often).
I find though, that many service professionals feel that they don’t have time to do so. It can be easy to become so consumed in serving the clients you do have and running your business that your marketing efforts may unintentionally be pushed aside.
If you’ve ever found yourself having “fallen off the wagon” when it comes to your marketing efforts, you’ll be happy to know that a quick and easy tune-up can get you right back on track.
To tune up your marketing systems, you’ll first want to do a quick assessment of your business and ask yourself the following questions:
- What’s working great in my business? – Review the activity in your business over the past 6-12 months. Taking stock of what is going well and what you have achieved will boost your confidence and inspire you to put forth the necessary effort to make any needed changes.
- What marketing strategies have been most effective for connecting me with ideal clients? – Have you gained a number of hot leads from your breakfast networking group? Is your email newsletter generating consistent inquiries about your solutions? Are your blog posts consistently driving traffic to your website? As you determine what has worked particularly well, take steps to increase your efforts in that area.
- What needs to be improved? – As you come across aspects of your marketing that aren’t running as smoothly as you’d like, or aren’t generating leads and income, make a list of these and the reasons why. Can these strategies be tweaked or improved in some way? Or is it time to let them go in favor of what’s actually working?
- What’s keeping me from marketing my business on a consistent basis? – Be honest here! Is it that you don’t manage your priorities as well as you could? Do you not have the know how to pursue a particular strategy? Do you have trouble staying accountable to your commitments? Whatever the reason, don’t beat yourself up over it. Acknowledge it! Own it! And make the decision to do things differently from today forward.
- What limiting beliefs do I have regarding marketing my business? – Do you tell yourself, “marketing is too hard?” Or “I don’t have the money to market my services?” Maybe the excuse is, I’m too busy for marketing.” Each of us has limiting beliefs that requires effort to breakthrough. Whatever your particular issue happens to be, I can guarantee you two things:
- You can choose to ignore it and take action in spite of how you may feel. (Successful people take imperfect action and focus on results.)
- The success you’re looking to achieve is right on the other side of that limiting belief.
Remind yourself of these two affirmations the next time a limiting belief steps into your path. Acknowledge the thought, but keep taking action! Remember, we’re shooting for consistent effort. Even “small” steps will keep you moving forward towards your goals.