Don’t Stop Planning

09.10.2019 by Elizabeth // Leave a Comment

Don't Stop Planning I had a meeting the other day with another small business owner. They mentioned that they have a few potential clients that could come through and then their next few weeks would be really busy so they weren’t really looking for new clients right now.

But, um, no.

The thing about having a healthy sales pipeline is that when times are GREAT you can start to book clients out a few weeks (or months). During the campaign I managed last year I decided not to take on any new clients in Q4. And guess what? I had new clients ready to go in January when I was ready for them. I gave them work to do so I had everything I needed to start when I had capacity to take them on, and they knew that they weren’t going to get pushed aside through the end of the year.

Not every client is going to come through right away. Instead of looking at your plate as completely full, don’t forget to look ahead at what the next few weeks have in store. No I can’t take on 3 new clients in a month but if I have 4 potential clients that want to get started soon, then you can tell them – I have space for 2 new clients this month and I have talked with other folks who are interested, just an FYI. When they lallygag and get back to you in 3 weeks, that’s great. We can get started next month.

“Hurry up and wait” isn’t a great business model. Constantly filling your pipeline and knowing your capacity so that when clients say YES you are ready to GO, or they have to wait until your schedule allows it, is a more anxiety reducing approach. The right clients are willing to wait to work with you when the time is right. This also means you aren’t taking on projects to pay the bills, but working with the right clients at the right time.

You Have to Be On It

06.12.2019 by Elizabeth // Leave a Comment

You Have to be on It I was talking with a client the other day about their ongoing marketing efforts. Thank you notes, holiday cards, phone calls on birthday’s – they are ON IT. As we were talking about what’s working and what needs to be kept up, they reminded me…

You Have to be on It

Always.

This is one of the hardest things I see for business owners. There’s so many different hats you wear as a business owner, and yes your marketing efforts are one of those hats. I often see people drop their marketing efforts when business gets busy. It’s the worst thing you could do. Why? Because it won’t always be busy and you’re going to need more clients – cultivate them when you have them so they’re ready when you’re ready.

Continue to have good marketing habits throughout the year. Go to your networking events, schedule that call or coffee meeting, even if you don’t think they’re ready to hire you. Send your newsletter, do your follow up, engage on social media. Run your business. Continue to blog (this one might just be a reminder for me…)

Having systems and schedules in place makes your life a whole lot easier. If you haven’t downloaded my free Monthly Marketing Calendar – I give you a good place to start and make sure that you’re considering all the marketing efforts out there and available to you. They’re usually FREE and with some setup it won’t take you much time. You’re busy running your business, keep doing it. And don’t forget to keep on it along the way.

List Size Matters

04.09.2019 by Elizabeth // Leave a Comment

I was listening to Pod Save America the other day and they were discussing Joe Biden’s imminent 2020 run. Dan Pfeiffer mentioned that one concern the campaign may have is the size of Biden’s list. The BIG news out of 2020 is that when Bernie Sanders launched his campaign and Beto O’Rourke they both had HUGE first day donations. And they were a lot of small donations adding up to insane amounts of money. Biden is concerned he doesn’t have the list. He hasn’t run since 2008 and he didn’t run after 2016 so he hasn’t had to work on building his list in over 10 years. And 10 years ago fundraising was VERY different than it is today.

On top of that, one of the rules of entry into the Democratic Primary Debates is to “Meet the grassroots fundraising threshold, which requires obtaining 65,000 unique donors and a minimum of 200 donors per state in at least 20 states.”

Writing a big check from a couple of donors will no longer cut it folks. So why do I think you as a small business owner should care about this?

Your list matters

Continuing to cultivate your list matters. Biden is in a pinch because he ignored his list for 10 years. If you had something big to announce (a new program, book, service, etc,) would you have the list to get your version of 65,000 unique donors?

So what do you do?

Have a Welcome Series – give people something when they join your list & welcome them to your community
Talk to Them Regularly – don’t let them forget who you are (I feel like I say this every time I have a blog post about lists but it obviously needs to be repeated)
Don’t Just Ask for Money – In politics this is common. The daily donation request. But in business I see this happen all the time too. Your newsletter is just a sales pitch for your latest product or service. Educate me about your awesomeness and then down the line ask me for money. Don’t start out like this.

Your list, and your communication with that list, is an important piece of your marketing tool kit. Stop ignoring it.