This is the last post in this series about marketing for the newly promoted. Here is what we have covered so far:
- How to talk about what you do
- Understanding what your customer really buys
- Understanding your customers buying process
- Cross selling – spotting other opportunities to help
- Giving Referrals
- Knowing which customers \ business to turn away
- Networking
- Marketing vs. Sales and knowing which role you are in
Today I want to wrap up by talking about planning and tracking marketing activities.
The starting place for your marketing plan should be your personal goals. A lot has been written by people a lot smarter than me about goal setting, so I just want to make two quick points that have made a difference for me. #1, write them down. Plenty has been written about the importance of writing down your goals. Just try it. Take 5 minutes, write down your goals and put them in a place where you can find and review them in 6 or 12 months. You’ll be surprised, I promise.
#2, make sure you set your goals, rather than having goals assigned to you. Just because a partner assigned a goal for new business, doesn’t mean you can’t set your own goal, one tied to your personal aspirations. The more meaningful it is to you, the more likely you are to achieve it.
When it comes to business and marketing planning, I’m a big fan of Tim Berry, who often writes about how the value from planning comes from the planning process, rather than from producing a document. As Tim says, “the plan is never right”. Whenever you create a plan, it is based on assumptions using the best information you have at the time, so it is important to review and adjust your plan on a regular basis. For example, when you start planning, you may decide to attend 2 networking events per week. After a while, you may find out that 2 is too few, or maybe too many, or maybe 2 events are fine, but you need to be attending different events. Don’t let these unknowns keep you from doing the activities. The plan is never right, so get started and adjust the plan accordingly.
Tracking your activities will also help you make better decisions about how you should adjust your plan.In the past, I’ve written about what I’ve learned about tracking things you have control over, namely, your behaviors rather than raw results. If part of your plan is to ask for referrals, set your goals and track your progress around the number of referral requests you will make. You could also set goals related to the number of referrals you will give. You don’t have control of if and when someone will refer you, but you certainly have control over your own behaviors.
When it comes to tracking your behaviors, the simpler the system the better. If you try to wait until you have the ultimate CRM system in place, you are going to end up working on the CRM rather than asking for referrals. Keep it simple but collect enough data to know how much input goes into producing a result – how many requests for referrals do you typically make before your receive one? How many connections at networking events lead to one-on-one meetings? How many one-on-one meetings lead to clients? This is the information that will help you adjust your plan.
It will also give you a heads up when things start to change. If you suddenly have to go to twice as many networking events to get a meeting, what does that mean? Do you need a new networking group? Are you hiding in your comfort zone and failing to meet new people? Is there a change in the economy? Figure out the real reason for the change in your numbers and adjust your plan accordingly.
To recap, here is your 4 step process for planning and tracking your marketing activities:
- Set your goals (In order to meet my personal goals, I need $X, which translate into Y amount of new business)
- Estimate the activities needed to achieve those goals (number of calls, number of requests, etc.)
- Track your performance of those activities
- Review and adjust on a regular basis
That wraps up this series of posts about marketing for the newly promoted, at least until I remember something else I wanted to add <g>. Hopefully you have found some helpful tips in this series, even if you are not newly promoted. If you have other tips that you have found helpful, please leave a comment and share them with me.
