Reasons to work from a marketing plan:

1. Track your goals and objectives-Many small businesses just do advertising when a local rep walks through the door or when they think about it…Never. By having a plan to review and work from, it gives you or your marketing team vision, check points and a light at the end of the tunnel.

2. Create a budget and spend it-Sit down and look into your crystal ball(Facebook)…Now stop stalking your X and focus on 2010. We need to be realistic. If you don’t spend any money on marketing and advertising how do you expect to create leads, donations or sales?

3. Start the conversation-If Noah had tried to build his Arc in a few days, his ship would have sunk. Sitting down with the decision makers can be a stressful and even aggravating experience, but you have to do it. Start explaining social media, the importance of marketing and how the people who increase their marketing/advertising budgets are the ones who will survive the coming flood.

4. Your competition is cutting marketing. If your competition cuts their marketing then it opens the door for you to their clients. If they are not willing to fight for each new lead, then it makes it that much easier to sway new clients to your company. Don’t give in to the dark side and use the force(marketing) already!

Nick Footer Facebook, Marketing, Social Media advertising, Marketing, plan

For the past few days I’ve been going over my favorite websites and judging them on the need to update or construct a complete overhaul. So far, about 50% of all the sites that I’ve rated have been acceptable. Some have broken links, horrible pictures and for the most part way too much copy. This led me to think about this post.

If you are a small business and can only afford to create your own website with free software it’s a good start. BUT…how many leads are you gaining from the site and how many people are turned away when they find you, but your site is broken. I’m completely for taking the reins of your business, but with so many people going to the web first to find businesses, people or information you have to have a strong presence. Hubspot has a great website grader that and they do it for free. If you don’t believe me check it out. My hope is that I can help one small business owner to create a new portal to its customers. With the economy starting to turn around, we all have to work a little harder to find more qualified customer and give a little more to keep the ones we have.

This is my blog grade from Hubspot:

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Nick Footer Social Media Blogging, hubspot, improvement, website

First of all, the Long Tail idea has been around for the past 50 years, but Chris Anderson coined the phrase in 2004 in a Wired magazine article. He explains how selling to a niche market is useful to companies such as Amazon or Netflix who sell a lot of unique items. They found that a demographic of people who would buy more of the non popular “non hit” items. From this the Long Tail was formed.

Social Media has helped many companies reach their customers in ways that they never realized was possible. New ways of connecting and marketing are being created everyday to reach more and more of the long tail of products and services. As these new ways of interacting with customers evolve and grows it takes some of the traditional market. The days of TV ads is dying due to services like TiVo, E-mail marketing is eliminated by spam blockers, direct mail gets thrown away and online advertising gets looked over or eliminated with RSS readers. We have to start changing with the times. The days of interrupting us over dinner with a phone call or commercial are not over, but dying.

As social media gets bigger at some point doing old school marketing will actually become the Long Tail, the way of reaching the minority. I’m not saying it’s today or even tomorrow, but in the coming future these two markets will swap. There will never be a time where advertising, direct mail or telemarketing will completely fade off the scene but pretty soon we will be putting it on life support.

Now you may be asking what can I do? We have many of the products available above and have a team of designers at our fingertip to create and mold your marketing vision. If you want to take things into your own hands I would suggest starting by creating a LinkedIn account, Facebook fan Page, and start Twittering. These are all great tools to start you off in social media that will help you get to the Long Tail of your customers. Now these all take your time and energy, but what would you rather part with, your time or your money. The way the market is now, I sure hope it’s your time, but if it’s not be sure to call us and we’ll gladly help with you with your money.

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Nick Footer Books, Social Media Facebook, LinkedIn, long tail, Social Media, Twitter

1. Cutting your marketing or advertising budget.
2. Spend $5 on a cup of coffee.
3. Not track ROI for your marketing efforts.
4. Go to Nordstroms (Unless it’s the half yearly sale!).
5. Loose track of prior customers.
6. Spend $7 on large pop corn at the movies.
7. Give poor customer service.
8. Spend $3 on a bottle of water at dinner or anywhere for that matter (You shouldn’t do this even in a strong economy!).
9. Pay for inefficient yellow page ads.
10. Spend $30 to get your nails done (You can get a perfectly nice pedi for $20!).

10 things not to do….Priceless…and…kinda depressing.

Nick Footer Life Update, Social Media down economy, Marketing, ROI, yellow pages

Sign Up-Go to Twitter and sign up for a free account

Fill Out Your Profile-Fill out everything and include a picture. Part of Social Media and Twitter is making real relationships with real people and a picture helps.

Pick a Twitter Program-I suggest Twirl or TweetDeck. I use Twirl at work and Tweetdeck at home. I like both because one is extremely simple and the other is extremely complex. I would start with Twirl.

Find Some Fellow Tweeters-If you read any blogs, see if they Tweet. Many of them do since it is such a huge traffic builder. Search for people using the Find People tab on your twitter home page.

Listen-Watch your Twitter stream for 1 week. This lets you see what is acceptable conversation and how to interact with your fellows. As you listen to others, see who they are responding to and follow them if they interest you.

Respond-Start Retweeting others content and answering questions that others have through the @ feature. Begin to add different links you like into your twitter stream. If you blog, add some of your posts.

Connect-This is the all important mother load. I have made many connections with people that I otherwise would have not had the ability to. Lisa Hoffmann, Scott Hepburn, Jesse Liebman, Kirsten Wright, Mike Volpe and many more. Now I have only met one of these people in person, but each of them have helped my company or my person growth.

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Nick Footer Social Media, Twitter Connection, How To, Social Media, Twitter