What ever success you are looking to achieve you need to have a strategy to get there. Once you have your strategy on how you are going to attract and get new clients you need to implement at least portions of your plan. Many businesses have failed for lack of commitment to their overall strategy.
For an example let’s say that you have a local business and you have decided one of your strategies will be to put up flyers, in public places that may cater to your clientele. Now let’s say that you have a business that does custom drapery. Knowing who your clients are and how much a person will pay for your custom drapery will determine where you will post your flyers. Where are the most effective spots to get specific clients for your business? Probably home shows, or expos, home stores like home depot, or Pier One (if they allow you too), upholstery shops, or dry cleaners etc.
When you have a strategy to put up flyers, it has to be week after week, and month after month. You don’t just put up a flyer one time and then wait to see what happens. I have discovered that it takes about three months of flyers to get a customer. Now let’s say that you also have a strategy to contact interior designers, specialty craft people, and furniture builders, house or condo builders, showroom designers and other related service providers. Again you need to commit to sending, following up, and making sure that they have enough of your flyers or information. It is not their job to make sure that you are restocked.
Another possible strategy that you may have is to advertise on the internet. Where will you have the best results? Probably on sites that also offer similar custom services, or home sites, or commercial real estate sites that offer living solutions to their traveling clients. You could make partnerships with such companies that every time someone is looking for custom drapery they refer clients to you.
These are good strategies to build business but you have to be consistent and follow through. You will have to keep updating your ads on the internet or in magazines or targeted niche newsletters. Like “Custom House” or “Design on a Dime.” You will have to keep replacing your flyers, you will keep faxing your information to prospects, and you will have to keep getting new names of new house buyers and so on.
That is working your strategic plan. On your plan you could have 10 or more steps of how you are going to grow your business and then you need to take consistent action towards that overall plan. Testing is very important as well. When you test you then know what actions are working and what is not.
Most times you have to trust your instinct as to whether your steps and plan will get you to where you want. For an example: I want an online business that is bringing in clients and that is making money for me whether I get up in the morning or not. The steps of my plan is creating articles for an e-zine, to plan an year long e-mail campaign of information that I will send out, to set up an auto-responder to send out the newsletter, and to create a membership driven website with tons of content that has audio and video features, and to advertise the newsletter and website once I’m finished. So right now I’m not making money. But I believe in the plan. I have written nearly sixty articles and I’m submitting them to the web. I have already reserved a domain name and I have the web host in place for that final moment when it all comes together. The e-zine is nearly done for a year out, and I will now start loading the contents into my auto responder and working on creating audio content for the membership side of the website. Even though the website is not even built yet if I follow up on all the steps of my strategic plan I feel that I will get my goal of an online business that can thrive on automatic pilot.
If you work your plan too you will achieve your over all goal of where you would like to take your business. Don’t give up. You have worthy goals and they deserve to be completed. Break it down into steps and work the steps and you will build an empire.
Katheryn Hoban is the publisher of R-U New to a
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