Manage Your Marketing Time

 

Sat here after another full on day trying to get our website in order....yep it was tired, missing bits and nothing was finished off...I feel rather ashamed that it was in such a mess. I am reminded of friends I have in various trades who are the same. Builders whose own extensions aren't finished,  gardeners whose gardens are suffering from serious neglect, window cleaners who can't see out of their own windows and on and on. Sometimes you spend so much time on fulfilling your customers' every needs and then sorting more customers that you completely neglect your own "future" business. I have now allocated time every day to get our own house in order and sort our own marketing out. Shame on me!

I should know better, after all I spend a lot of time putting other people's marketing house in order I really should know better.  No excuses!

Time to read another book on time management, or maybe just put everything I should do into practice. It's so easily done and running any business involves discipline, as you know, so I am making sure time is set aside daily to sort our own marketing out! Right back to it......customers always come first!

Groups are more fun

 

Facebook Groups can get you places you didn't know you could get to! Yep definitely a place to go if you want to get to people outside of your friends group and outside the small group of page likers that Facebook actually let you get to is a group.

The best thing is it's free! Even better is that if you pick the right groups you can target the people you want to target. Many groups are set up for a reason, be that to sell things in an are or promote business in an area, maybe even to promote an interest to a group of like minded people.

So why not pick a group and start posting? No point falling foul of the posting police, so check out the rules of the group (many are set up by people who like to say say no to this that and the other) but many allow you to promote your business especially if you can do so without actually selling too obviously.

You might want to promote your business to other businesses locally and there are many groups for that or you might think a larger audience might be nice. Just search for groups, check out the rules, join and post away. Suddenly you are reaching far more people than you used to.

Social Media for Dinosaurs

For those of us who grew up in a less than digital age, where TVs were still mostly black and white, telephones had round dials and were certainly not mobile, discos and LPs were trendy and petrol was available in 2, 3 or 4 star, the digital age has been quite an eye opener.

In those dark and distant days if you wanted to advertise your products or services you had to place an advert in the local newspaper. Everyone then read the newspaper so you had a good chance of getting in front of an audience. Another great way of getting the word around about your business was to do a good job and get recommended, that will always be the case. In fact that is where social media can now step in and you can use your on line social network and your customers network to promote your business and to get recommended to new potential customers. Without spending money you can gain followers for your business and generate interest in and enquiries for your business via Facebook, Twitter etc.  With millions of users nationally and internationally it is now possible to reach people globally through clever use of these mediums. You can also target potential customers by location, gender and age as well as targeting special interest groups that contain your prospective customers.

As an addition to more traditional methods of advertising social media can be a great tool, to some it is the only way they advertise their services. Surely as business owners we cannot afford to ignore any medium that has so many potential customers on it and that is free to use.

If dinosaurs like me can get to grips with social media, then so can you, whoever you are and whatever your background. 

If you  need a bit of help with you Social Media why not join us for some training to get you sorted: http://www.getters.co.uk/social-media-day.html

More than Numbers

More than Numbers

So you are tweeting like a mad thing letting the world know what you are up to. Have you ever thought about your audience? An essential part of your marketing twitter is a fabulous tool to engage with potential customers. The first thing to ascertain is who your customers are. If you customer base is local then so should your following be on twitter. It is always nice to be followed so I am quite happy to be followed by anyone whoever they are and wherever they are. It is always worth looking a little deeper and exploring who your followers are and engaging with any followers who are part of your target market.

It really is about more than numbers it is about your influence and about your engagement with your market place, wherever or whoever that is.

Twitter and You

You don't have to be a celebrity to get a lot out of twitter. Many businesses and individuals get a great deal of success from using twitter to promote themselves.

The usual response I get from people who don't use twitter is "I've got nothing to say" or "nobody wants to know what I'm doing". I have met many people through my training sessions who have said this and followed up with comments like I only want to know about Linkedin as that is more professional. Most of these people have ended up being prolific tweeters who I now follow with interest on Twitter as they go about their daily work. When you analyse your life, be it work or play there is often many things you do or see that would be of interest to potential followers. I really don't want to know about you having a cup of tea unless you are maybe enjoying the view of the black mountains from your customer's roof while enjoying it, having just re pointed the chimney. Perhaps you have just left a customer's office having just helped them improve the way they do business or just unblocked a drain whilst eating your sandwiches. Your work may well be uninteresting to you as you do it every day but people are interested in what you have to say when you make it interesting. Our training sessions can help you gain an audience show you all the basics.

Everyone has a tale to tell in 140 characters and that includes you.

Social Media Training Day

Social Media and You

Using Social Media to help promote your business is now essential, whatever size the business is. Everyone from your local window cleaner to major corporations like Coca Cola are using Social Media as a major part of their marketing. A great way to promote your products and services, social media gives you an opportunity to create brand awareness at any level.

To get into a potential customer's living room you used to have to advertise on TV or maybe in the local newspaper if you are a small business. Now major brands are spending a massive part of their marketing budgets on Facebook, Twitter and other social media platforms. So why? Why are they even bothering with social media? Because you can target particular potential customers, social media really can be used by any size and type of business. Social Media really isn't just for kids it is a powerful marketing tool for you and your business. Your competitors are using this to their advantage so why aren't you? One great thing to remember

Our user friendly courses show you how to target followers and build fans creating a fan base for your business of potential customers. The value of the information will become obvious after you have completed the course but if you are not using the major platforms of Facebook and Twitter to woo your potential customers and build your brand this course is a must for you. We provide a basic overview of social media and then follow that with individual sessions on Facebook and Twitter. You can go from sceptical novice through to efficient user in one day with our help. We have done all the research and the hard work and pass on tips to take you all the way from novice to effective user through these sessions.

Launch of Getters Consultancy

To celebrate the relaunch of Getters as Getters Consultancy we are offering new clients the opportunity to use our new graphic design service for free when you purchase one of our web packages.

If you are interested get in touch as this is a limited offer.