An elevator pitch is a brief way of introducing yourself and your business. It’s great for making connections and getting your key points across in a succinct manner (no more than 30 seconds).
The reason it’s called an elevator pitch is because 30 seconds is roughly the amount of time you’d spend in an elevator (lift) with someone going from floor to floor. Once you have your pitch ready, it’s great for networking events, or anywhere you meet people for the first time, and they ask what you do. How would you describe yourself and your business in that short amount of time?
How does it work?
First, an elevator pitch is not about making a sale or closing a deal. It’s about being engaging and friendly, clear, concise, and informative. Quite a lot to get into 30 seconds. It’s just about capturing the attention of the person you’re talking to – and you can finish by giving them a business card or flyer.
Get started.
Introduce yourself, ‘I’m Cindy and I’m a marketing coach and copywriter for small creative businesses.’ Don’t waffle, just say it how it is.
Next, is your mission – a clear understanding of what you do. ‘I share how to create engaging content, understand marketing tactics and how to promote their business online.’ Now you know who I am and what I do – very basically!
Then, it’s value proposition time. What makes your business stand out? What value do you offer your customers? ‘Through 1:1 coaching, we work closely together to understand their business and how it works. I teach them the tools and skills to manage their marketing themselves and support them through the whole process.’
Finally, it’s the hook – what will make them remember you and want to know more? This could be a fascinating fact or statistic about your product or service to keep your listener engaged. ‘My clients tell me that after each session, they feel super motivated, feel they can get to grips with their marketing and are raring to go to put the things they’ve learnt into practice and watch their business grow.’
Now, put it all together and read it through. It might need tweaking here and there. Time yourself, so you know it’s no more than 30 seconds, and you’re good to go.
“I’m Cindy and I’m a marketing coach and copywriter for small creative businesses. I share how to create engaging content, understand marketing tactics and how to promote their business online. Through 1:1 coaching, we work closely together to understand their business and how it works. I teach them the tools and skills to manage their marketing themselves and support them through the whole process. My clients tell me that after each session, they feel super motivated, feel they can get to grips with their marketing and are raring to go to put the things they’ve learnt into practice and watch their business grow.”
I timed myself reading this and it was almost exactly 30 seconds!
How to use it.
You can use your pitch on your website, in the social media ‘about’ section, or even as a post to remind people of what you do. You can put it on flyers or promotional material. You could even use it at a job interview, if you adapted it for that purpose. That’s the good thing about a pitch – you can adapt it to different situation and scenarios. For example, if you wanted to use it to try and get more business or sell your products, you could add a call to action at the end of your statement, asking them if they’d be interested to hear more, or if they’d like a call at a later date.
You don’t have to learn your pitch, word for word, or it will sound stilted and rigid…it’s just designed to help you, so you’re clear and don’t stumble when you’re next asked, ‘And what do you do?’
I hope this has been helpful and if you would like help with marketing or content creation for your business, drop me a message at cindymobey@outlook.com
Using a poll is great way to understand what your customer wants. The answers you get can give you an insight into what your customers think of you and your business; what kind of service they want; and it gives them a chance to share their perspectives with you. If your survey or poll is engaging, then your customers are more likely to participate and spread the word about you.
What is a poll?
A poll is a fun and interactive way to ask a question. Your followers must choose from a set of answers, you can choose that they can give one answer or several – it’s up to you. When they tap on the answer they want, they can see how the voting has progressed so far. Here’s an example:
Question – Marmite – love it or hate it?
Answer 1 – love it.
Answer 2 – hate it.
Answer 3 – I’ve never tried it!
What are the objectives of a poll?
Conducting a poll can just be for fun, to help you engage with your followers, as per the example above. Or, you can use a poll to gain information you’re your followers or target audience.
You might ask opinions on a new product idea you have.
If you’re a blogger, you could ask what subjects they might be interested in – giving a list to choose from.
You could get feedback on something – for example, your website or shop, such as, Is it easy to navigate? Can your customers find what they’re looking for? Is there any product they’d like to see you offer?
If you’re thinking of setting up an event, a poll is useful to find out what kind of event people like before you invest your time and money.
You can use a poll to spark a conversation. Ask a fun question about your products or services. For example, if you sell cakes you could ask, ‘What do you think of putting vegetables into cake, such as Chocolate and Courgette cake?’ Then give some generic answers, and add an ‘other’ option. This could give you ideas for posts later that week – take it out of the poll and into a conversation or debate on your social media page.
What are the benefits?
Polls give you instant answers, so it’s a really quick and easy way to gauge opinion on something. They’re good in that followers don’t have to think of an answer, they just have to tick a box – although you can choose to have an ‘other’ option where people can give their opinion.
It takes minimum effort from participants.
Polls stand out visually on your page.
It gives your page increased engagement and can help grow your customer base.
It helps you gain valuable feedback or market research for your business.
If you have an ‘other’ box with free text, you can ask for permission to quote someone’s reply, which leads to personal engagement with that person.
Polls can help you identify and solve issues or pain points for your customers.
It can help generate leads.
It can give you new ideas for your business or for products or services.
It helps you build your community.
I hope this has been useful and given you some food for thought about how polls might be able to help you and your business. If you do a poll with a purpose and not just for fun, don’t forget to do a follow up post, giving details of responses and any observations – and don’t forget to thank your followers for taking part.
If you need help with polls or any other forms of marketing, drop me a message or email me. I offer a free 30-minute discovery call.
I’m always seeing quotes or posts telling people in business to be consistent:
“To be successful, you have to be consistent” Unknown
“Consistency is the key. If you can’t be consistent, then you can’t be anything” Tony Gaskins
“If you want to be successful, you need consistency and if you don’t have it, you’ve got no chance.” Paul Merson
That’s great then, just be consistent and you’ll be a success, you’ll be able to do anything you like, and you’ll have a chance! But what does it mean to be consistent? How can you be consistent?
This week’s blog post takes this fabulous ‘buzz word’ that we see everywhere – and finds out about it in a bit more detail…
What is consistency?
The Cambridge Dictionary defines consistency as ‘the quality of always behaving or performing in a similar way, or of always happening in a similar way.’
That sounds straight forward, right? But to be consistent in business takes time and effort. To be consistent you must constantly replicate positive behaviour or performance every day, until it becomes second nature – until it becomes a habit.
How to be consistent?
Being consistent in business isn’t just about posting every day on social media, it’s the whole performance of your business. It’s about being organised and working on things that work best for you and your business.
Here are some ideas to get you started:
Use a planner
Use an online planner, a diary, or a notebook to plan your day. Write down the times of meetings
Keep a to-do list – things you MUST do today, and things that it would be good to do today. Work through them one task at a time. Multi-tasking can be distracting and time consuming, and very often, none of the tasks get completed.
Jot down any ideas that spring to mind during the day
Include time to eat and time to do something for you – it might be a short walk at lunchtime, or yoga or meditation time before you start work. Whatever you choose factor this into your day.
At the end of the day, write down the most important tasks that you must complete the following day. Put them in order of importance/urgency, so when you work through your list, you are doing the most important task first.
I have gotten into the habit of planning my content (roughly) a month in advance. I then know what blogs I will write and what posts I will want to do to compliment the blog.
Have a schedule
When you work for someone else, your day has structure, and you work to a schedule. If you get into the habit of doing this when you work from home, you will get more done and be more consistent.
Have a set time to work and a set time to have lunch or rest. And always try to have a cut off time, so you’re not working stupid hours into the evening or at weekends.
Many of us want to work from home for ourselves so that we get more work/life balance. Often you will find you have less of this, and more stress, so it’s important to keep to a routine that works for you.
Ensure your goals are SMART
When you are setting goals for your business, make sure that they are SMART.
SPECIFIC – MEASURABLE – ACHIEVEABLE – RELEVANT – TIMELY
You can find out more about this in one of my previous blogs – click here.
Focus on one thing at a time
I’ve mentioned this briefly already but try to focus on one task or goal at a time. Don’t make things harder for yourself by trying to do too much at once. If the goal you’re working on is too much or too overwhelming, cut it down into smaller, more manageable chunks and work on those, one at a time.
Get rid of distractions
When you’re trying to concentrate on one task, particularly if the task is really needed but a bit dull, it’s easy to be distracted. If you recognise that you are easily distracted, try to remove those distractions.
For me, email and social media are my biggest distractions. If I can see that someone has messaged me or that I’ve received an email, I can’t resist ‘just’ looking at it to make sure it’s not important. So, when I’m writing or working on something that needs a lot of concentration, I switch off my emails on my desktop (which is where I work) and put my phone/iPad on silent and put it away from where I’m working so I can’t see it…or I just switch them off. I also unplug my landline as I get too many cold calls and find them so irritating, they become a distraction.
Now I can concentrate as I won’t hear the ‘ping’ of a new message, nor will I see one.
Personally, I like silence when I’m writing or doing something that needs me to really concentrate, but when I’m doing the more regular stuff that I’m used to, or something that is almost second nature, I like to have music in the background. You may be different and may need noise to concentrate. Just do whatever works best for you.
Be comfortable
You might think that this is strange one if we’re talking about consistency, but if you’re hungry, thirsty, or uncomfortable, you won’t be able to concentrate on your work.
Choose a comfortable, light space to work in.
Eat at regular times so you’re not hungry.
Have a bottle of water handy, or your favourite drink, so you can just reach for it if you need it.
Automate when you can
I’m talking mainly about social media here…and for me, blog writing. I tend to batch create my posts (and those of my clients), for the following week. I usually do this towards the end of the week. It takes me a couple of hours to plan the following week’s messages and posts, decide what I’m going to post on what platform and what day, then create the posts.
Then I spend some time scheduling the posts, so I don’t have to worry too much about them during the week. I only schedule one a day, but sometimes I think of something else during the day and I’ll post that manually.
I do the same for blog writing – I tend to write a couple at a time, and I always have one in reserve in case something happens, and I need to post something quickly or change the blog post I’d planned.
Celebrate every win!
No matter how big or how small, celebrate those wins. Celebrating your achievements will make you feel good about yourself and your business and give you a well-earned boost. And shout about it – share those wins with your followers. Happiness and enthusiasm are contagious and you’re sure to brighten up someone’s day – as well as your own.
Along with this comes….
Forgive your failures
We’re all human and none of us is perfect. Being consistent isn’t easy and does require time and effort. If you fall off the wagon from time to time, don’t fret about it. You will get tired, you will sometimes feel like you can’t be bothered, but that’s OK. It’s normal to feel like this.
However, what WILL keep you consistent is recognising this, taking a deep breath, and getting back on track as quickly as possible. Forgive yourself and move on!
Conclusion
These are just some ideas to help you become more consistent and stay that way. Consistency breeds trust: people recognise that you are dependable and to some extent, predictable (in a good way!)
Above all, look after yourself. Make sure you eat and drink regularly – and take a break to get some fresh air every day.
If you need help with any aspect I’ve talked about in this post, feel free to message or email me. I offer a free 30-minute consultation.
When you think about marketing your product or service, most people think about marketing the features, as opposed to the benefits. But it’s the features that sell whatever you have for sale. This week’s blog post looks at features versus benefits, why both are important and how to market these things separately.
One of them looks at what your product or service does and includes everything that you’ve worked hard to develop and bring to market. The other looks at HOW your product or service will improve your audiences’ lives.
What is a feature?
Let’s look at a very simple example…a slow cooker. So, you’ve decided you want to buy a slow cooker. The first thing you’ll look at is the features – this is the description that you will find about the product. For a slow cooker, this could be:
A choice of sizes and capacity to suit your family
Glass bowl or ceramic bowl
Oval or circular shape bowl? This will depend on what you want to cook in it.
Digital settings with a timer
What are the settings – usually low, medium, and high, but some only have low or high.
Easy to clean
Sturdy handle
Versatile – can cook a huge range of foods
All these things describe what your slow cooker can do, what it looks like and how it works.
What is a benefit?
Again, let’s look at the slow cooker as an example. The benefits are the outcomes that slow cooker users will experience.
It saves you money
It saves time in the kitchen
Less preparation time – you can get it ready and leave it to do its thing
If you set it in the morning, you have a hot meal to come home to in the evening
Less clearing up, you only have one pot to wash, not several
Less chance of burning food
A slow cooker gives off less heat than a conventional oven, so not so hot in the kitchen
As food cooks slowly, meat falls off the bone and the food has more time to infuse with herbs and spices, so can be tastier
Ideal for the busy person who doesn’t have time to spend hours preparing and cooking in the evening
If there are several of you in your household, you don’t have to all eat at once – you can leave it on low and people can eat when they want to
It’s not just for soups and stews – you can cook a variety of dishes – even bake bread or make jacket potatoes, cook cakes, and even rice pudding!
Marketing your features and benefits
When you set out the features and benefits of a product or service, as I did with the slow cooker, it seems obvious, but it can take ages to think about this when you have your own product or service you want to sell.
Marketing is hard; just because you know why your product or service will make your ideal customer’s life better, doesn’t mean that they will. You need to carefully examine what your features are and what your benefits are.
Let’s face it, when we’re trawling the internet looking for that special something we want to buy, we don’t care about the business, how long it took to make or produce; we don’t necessarily think about the person behind the business who must make the trip to the post office to post the item. All consumers really care about is what’s in it for them? Why should they buy your product or service compared to others on the market?
When you are pulling together your marketing strategy for your business, its products, or services, you need to keep in mind ‘what’s in it for your customer?’ This should be the question you continually ask yourself.
Try using a feature/benefit matrix
A feature/benefit matrix is a great way to address these things and make you think seriously about each of the features your product or service has – then produce three things that are benefits of that feature.
Once you have these set up, you can think about the messaging you will use to illustrate those features and benefits to your target audience. And what call to action you will use to help you get your message across.
Feature
Benefit 1
Benefit 2
Benefit 3
Message
Call to action
Feature 1
Feature 2
Feature 3
Feature 4
Below is a couple of examples using this matrix for our slow cooker.
Feature
Benefit 1
Benefit 2
Benefit 3
Message
Call to action
Digital timer
You and your family can eat when they want to
Your meal will be ready when you get home from work
Saves time on preparation and cleaning up
Great for busy households. You never have to worry about making sure all your family are home at the same time ‘or their meal will be cold or burnt’
Buy now – check out our different slow cookers
Easy to clean
Food doesn’t burn
Dishwasher safe
Digital touchpad easier to clean than knobs
Saves you time and effort. Just one pot to clean, not loads of washing up.
Buy now – link to website
Versatile
Cook soups and stews
Bake cakes and desserts
Bake bread
All in one option. It’s not just for soups and stews. You can make cakes and desserts, perfect for entertaining.
Download your eBook with over 100 recipe ideas
You get the idea! There are lots of phrases I’ve heard that illustrate that from a selling perspective, it’s best to focus on benefits:
Features tell and benefits sell
Sell the sizzle, not the steak
This really tells you it all. Whilst the features tell people about the product or service itself, the benefits are what people are really interested in – the ‘what’s in it for me’ part.
Whilst the steak is important, it’s the sizzle that will sell – what it smells like, tastes like – evoking that emotion in the buyer to entice them to buy. It’s the description of what it’s like to eat the steak that will sell it – not just the picture of a steak on a plate.
Conclusion
I hope this has helped you to distinguish between the features and benefits of your products/services. Now it’s your turn! Take one of your products or services and think about the features – then make a list of the benefits that feature brings to your ideal audience – and use that in your marketing to sell your item.
If you need help with your marketing strategy, and how to best sell your products or services, using the feature/benefit matrix, or just don’t know where to start with your messaging, give me a shout. I can help you see things clearer, so you can focus on your target audiences’ what’s in it for me question.
If your business is on social media, no matter how big or small it is, you need to have a social media strategy.
A social media strategy is simply a list of everything you are planning to do and what you want to achieve on social media. It helps with your action plan, and you can measure what’s working and what’s not.
Many small businesses find the whole strategy thing overwhelming and simply don’t know where to start. But the success of your business hangs on having a straightforward strategy that you can fit to your resources and your goals.
This week’s blog post looks at how you can create your social media strategy, with a simple step by step plan that will work for you…and help you avoid that overwhelm.
Know your audience
I know that I bang on about this constantly, but to create the right kind of posts and give your audience what they want and need, you must know who they are. The easiest way to do this is to ask them! Find out where they hang out and what their pain point are. The more you can find out about them the better. So, identifying your audience and finding out what they want is your first task.
Have clear goals
What is the purpose of you having a social media account for your business? What do you hope to achieve? The most important goal is probably that you want to highlight your products or services to persuade people to buy from you or employ your services.
You might want to use social media to advertise the events you attend, increase your brand awareness, or get people to visit your website or sign up to your email newsletter.
Whatever it is that you want to achieve, write it all down in a list.
Make sure that your goals are SMART, (Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant and Timely).
Conduct a social media audit/measurement
You can either do this yourself or pay someone to do this for you. This gives you the chance to see where you are now and how your various posts, stories, reels or whatever are working for you. Check out your insights and make a note of what kind of people engage with your posts, where they are in the world, what posts work best, when the best time to post is for that particular channel etc. You can gain a lot of insight from your ‘insights’ – hence the name!
It’s also worth looking at your page with a customer head on. Does your profile immediately let someone know what you do? Are your images clear and appropriate? Do you have a good cover photo? Is there a photo of you – the business owner?
Does your profile say what your business is and what you do in a clear, easy to understand way?
Conducting an audit isn’t done just the once. It is a form of measurement that will help you decide what works and what doesn’t. I change the wording on my profile regularly, along with my cover photo and profile picture. It helps to keep you on track, so that you know that what you are doing is right and working for you.
The right channels
Make a list of the channels you use for your business. For example, I use Facebook and Instagram. I do have a LinkedIn account but tend to use it to keep in touch with previous work colleagues and to keep an eye on some of the market trends.
Do you have the right channels for your business? Are you spreading yourself too thin by trying to be on too many?
Look at each one in turn and decide if it’s working for you or not. Do you get engagement on your posts? Do you get sales or work from that channel? Does that channel help you with what you want to achieve?
Stick with the channels that work best for you, and ones that really help you engage with your target audience.
The Brand factors
If you have a website, a blog, and a newsletter, as well as several social media channels, look at them all in turn.
Your brand is NOT just your logo. It’s about the look and feel of everything you do and needs to be consistent across everything you do. So, does the tone of voice you use for your website content, blog etc., match with your social media sites? Do you have a consistent colour theme? Would someone who knows your social media pages well, know it was your website without you telling them?
To enhance the experience that your customers, or potential customers, have with your business, you need to have a positive and consistent presence. They need to know where they stand with you and be able to trust that what you say is true. If you get comments or questions on your sites, answer them all, even if you think they might be trivial. Customers like to know that someone is there, someone is listening to them and reacting to them.
Engagement
No social media strategy would be complete without talking about engagement. This is one of, if not THE, cornerstone of social media interaction with your audience.
I’ve previously said that it’s important to reply to customers’ comments and questions…even if that comment is just ‘Love this’ or ‘This is so good’ or just a list of emojis. To encourage more engagement, ask a question. Now, I’m not saying that I do this all the time, but I know that when I do, I build a much better rapport with that person.
For example, you’ve posted your latest craft item, let’s say it’s a winter knitted hat. You state that it can be bought on Etsy and post a lovely photo of your hat on a happy looking child.
Someone posts, ‘this is so cute.’ Your instant reaction is to probably reply with a simple ‘thank you.’ But if you do this, you’re missing a trick. Instead, give a bit more information, ‘Thank you, yes it really is. Did you know we also do winter hats for adults? If you were to choose one, what colour would you like to see?’
Now, you’ve not only thanked them for their comment and agreed with them, but you’re also giving more information about other products you sell. And you’re asking them a question that they really need to answer. ‘What colour?’ When they reply…if you do the hat in the colour they’ve said they like, you could reply with a link to that product telling them you have that colour. If you don’t do that colour, you could thank them for their choice and say that you’ll have to think about adding that colour shortly.
This shows you are listening to them and you’re striking up a conversation.
Engagement on social media, as I’m sure you are aware, isn’t just about engaging on your page. It’s also about engaging in conversations on other peoples’ pages. It’s worth spending half an hour a day reacting to posts from accounts you follow, make comments, ask questions, or have a short conversation.
Networking groups are also worth their weight in gold when it comes to meeting other like-minded people, getting your business name out there and getting sales, making friends, and finding things that you want to buy yourself. I spend around an hour a day on networking groups, sometimes more and sometimes less. I’ve met some lovely people, bought some wonderful products from small businesses, get the most amazing support, and have even found a few customers.
Engagement is about you giving some of your time to build relationships with customers and potential customers. It gives you the opportunity to show your personality and get to know what it is that your customers want and need.
And…did you know? The algorithms take note of the interaction you instigate with other businesses, which helps to push your content to more people.
Social Media Content Strategy
This is slightly different to your overall social media marketing strategy. This is about your content. Without content you won’t be able to engage your audience, attract new customers, show off your products or services, or measure your performance.
There are lots of small businesses who don’t plan their content – they just run with whatever comes into their head, or just continually post photos of their products, without giving it much thought.
But there is a strategy to it. For me, and this is what I recommend, it involves lists! For those of you who know me, you’ll know that I just love a good list!
But seriously, this really works to help you plan content.
Take each of your social media channels in turn…
What is the average age of your followers on that channel and what do they do? For example, I know that the average age of my followers on Facebook is between 35-65. I also know that my business page followers are mainly small businesses, crafters, artists, writers…generally people who create things for other people. However, on Instagram, my followers are mainly in the 18-45 age group. They are mainly people who do a similar job to me. So, I learn a lot from their posts, in the same way as they learn a lot from mine. I get asked a lot more questions in DMs on Instagram. So, think about the different audiences and age groups you have for each channel and write it down. This will help you when making your content.
Know when the best time is to post – you can find this out on your insights. You can also find out what day of the week you get most interaction on.
Have a list of hashtags that you use – research new ones as you don’t want to use the same hashtags for every post.
I always suggest the 80/20 rule. 80% of your content should be a mixture of educational, engaging, entertaining or inspiring posts. Only the remaining 20% should be selling posts. If you only ever post sales posts, you will lose the interest of your audience. XXXX
The content that people find attractive changes constantly, but generally, here are some tips… Facebook – People are starting to prefer video on FB than ever before. But they also like good images, funny or inspiring quotes, and information. They love ‘how to’ videos or videos that you’re your working environment or how a product is made. Instagram – stories are the most popular on this channel. If you have a shop or website where you sell your products, shoppable product posts are also popular…where you show your product and tag the product directly to where it can be bought. Carousels are also popular, where people scroll across a static post to see more information. Twitter – Images and GIFs work well as this is fast moving and tweets get buried very quickly. You must post many times a day to keep your business in peoples’ minds. TikTok – a young audience, very fast paced and video based. Trending dance videos, decent music tracks and very current. LinkedIn – a single image or video get most views. You also need to really interact with groups and post your content in groups to be really noticed. Pinterest – this channel is about sharing images and infographics that people can share. Users want to see vertically orientated images and expect each pin to link to a website or more information. Particularly good for blog posts and for getting traffic to your website. These are only the basics for those platforms. I only use Facebook and Instagram, so I am not an expert on the other channels.
Repurposing content is something that you can include in your content strategy. If you write a blog, you can make various posts for your social media from just one blog post. For example, video, list of tips, e-book, checklist, infographic, story – the list is endless.XXXX
-Make a plan – have a calendar and plan in advance. I plan my content a month ahead, so I know what blogs I’m going to write and what content I am going to use for my social media posts. -Check out what special days will appear in the next month, for example, Halloween or International Dog Day. Plan to write posts specifically for just that day, or a series of posts leading up to that day – make sure you choose occasions that are relevant to your business. -Batch make content – I make a week’s worth at a time. And schedule posts wherever you can. This not only saves you loads of time, but it also saves you the worry of ‘what shall I post today?’
If you do regular posts, such as quotes, or shoutouts to other businesses, now is the time to plan them for the month to be inline with the rest of your content.
If you have an event, plan that into your content – and don’t forget to factor in advertising the event in posts leading up to it.
If you use paid ads, make sure they are planned to link in with other relevant content.
As you all know, the social media algorithms are constantly changing as is social media in general. But if you plan well, and stick to the basic marketing tactics, it will work for your business, and you will see results. I really hope that this blog has helped you. As always, if you have any questions, please feel free to email me or message me on social media!
How is it nearly the end of August already – and what a weird, hot summer it’s been. For most of us, it’s also meant rising prices, fuel costs going through the roof and everyone seems to be tightening their belts.
The summer slump is a real problem for some businesses, and usually this simply means that time in summer when business seems to drop off. You don’t get so much engagement on your social media pages, sales disappear, and generally, everything seems to grind to a blinding halt.
The main reason for this is that in general, people just stop paying attention to the things they normally do. The children are off school and need to be entertained, the weather is nicer so they’re thinking about BBQs and social gatherings with family and friends. They are also thinking about going away on holiday, (especially now the restrictions of Covid are virtually over). Add to that the rising cost of living, and for some, the slump has been more of a reality than usual.
This year, more than ever, small businesses are telling me that they are experiencing a real slump in their sales.
So, do you just wait for things to pick up by themselves? Or do you want to be proactive and do something about it? There are still some things you can do to ensure that your business is still being seen.
Here are some things that might help:
Don’t stop doing what you normally do
This seems obvious, but it’s important to still have your business out there. If you post once or twice a day on social media, continue doing that. Be consistent, just like you always have.
If you publish a weekly or monthly blog, do it, even if you don’t get much engagement.
If you send out an email newsletter, absolutely still do this. The tips that follow will help you with the sort of things you can talk about.
Look at starting a new inbound marketing campaign
What do I mean by this?
Create a new campaign on your social media or email, to attract customers. You do this by tailoring your content to what they need, problems they need to solve, and forms relationships with your followers.
The old way of mass marketing just doesn’t seem to be as effective anymore. Things like pop-up ads and the hard sell are more likely to put people off these days. So, it’s a softer approach you’re after.
Get going with educating your current and potential customers about your products or services. Use email, direct mail, and social media posts/stories/reels/video to teach your audience more about your products or services and how you can help solve some of their problems.
Go ‘live’
Hold a live event or a series of events highlighting what you do best. Include details of your best sellers, and don’t forget to include testimonials or case studies to help you. Success stories always sell.
Focus on your customers
This is a good way to look at how you can serve your existing customers better. Look at whether your customers use your product or service to its full capacity. Look at feedback to find out if there are any needs that your product isn’t meeting that could be tweaked in future. You can do this simply by messaging your customers and asking for their opinion. People like to be involved, so ask if there’s anything you can improve on, or if there is anything you don’t yet provide that you could provide in future.
Ask for referrals
This speaks for itself, but whilst you’re quiet, you can ask for a referral – and maybe offer a discount if the person they recommend buys from you.
Ask for testimonials. You may get regular testimonials, but some people just don’t think to give them, so there’s no harm in asking.
Join a networking group
There are so many groups on social media that you can join. It just takes a little bit of time to engage with the other businesses in the group. Look at other businesses, engage with their posts by commenting. You might find something you’d like to buy. This is a great way to build genuine relationships with other like-minded people.
If you have any local in-person networking events, try to get along and introduce yourself. Face-to-face events are great for networking in real time. Make sure you are armed with a stock of business cards to give out and ensure that you listen to other businesses and what they have to say, as well as talking about your own!
Share your schedule
If you are going on holiday in the summer, tell your clients about it beforehand. Encourage them to place orders before you go, so they get their orders in good time. Scarcity sells, so don’t miss out on this one.
If you know that you have customers who buy Autumn items from you, such as Halloween products, contact them early and show them your range, asking if they’d like to order early to beat the rush.
Invest in you
When your business is quiet, it’s a good time to learn new things or develop new skills. Or, just to brush up on what you already know. Book a coaching session to help you with a specific part of your business, sign up to a few webinars, or look at a short course that will help you grow your business further.
If you have sales material, presentations, case studies, welcome pack, an automated email newsletter, or a website, now is the time to review them and update them, so they are all current and nothing is out of date.
When you have done that, you can do a couple of launch posts to show your new-look website or landing page.
Update your Facebook cover and your profile photo. And spend some time thinking about your brand and how you can better show your brand in your social media posts.
Conclusion
These are just a few ideas to help you beat that summer slump. Doing some of these things will make you feel more proactive, and you’ll be raring to go once the summer is over and we are into autumn.
I hope that you have all had a fabulous August, have enjoyed time with family and friends, enjoyed the gorgeous weather, (even if it was a tad too hot at times) and are looking forward to launching into autumn with renewed vigour.
The one thing that most small business owners have in common is the dream about what their business has the potential to grow into. They want it to be a success and know they can do it if they work hard.
However, sometimes it’s hard to focus on what is important and you sometimes lose the focus on the future and how to keep moving forward. How many times do you find yourself wondering if it’s all worthwhile? How often do you feel like just jacking it all in and doing something else?
You know that in this digital age, especially since Covid raised its ugly head and everyone had to find more innovative ways to reach their customers, that having quality content online that engages your audience is crucial. But that really is only half the picture. You also need to ensure your audience is exposed to this content, and that means building a successful content strategy beyond social media posts.
This week’s blog looks at how you can work ON your business, NOT IN your business, and take it from mediocre to marvellous.
Resolve your mediocre marketing
Mediocre is quite a depressing place to be in marketing. Lots of businesses pay more attention to how they look than what they’re saying, or how they’re saying it. I’m not saying everyone does this, of course, but instead of focusing on what makes us unique, we are all guilty at some time or other of saying what people expect us to say or do.
So, what can you do to resolve your mediocre marketing?
All small businesses have lots of balls in the air. Not only do lots of you have a family to look after, but you also have everyday things to keep on top of too. Some of you are running your small business as a side hustle, as well as holding down a full-time job, and you can find yourself being pulled in all directions. This can lead to a mindset of ‘hoping for the best,’ which in turn can lead to you being unproductive – and it’s exhausting!
One of the answers is to work smarter instead of harder. Here are some things to think about:
Have a plan
If you read my blog regularly, you will know what I’m going to say; you need a marketing plan.
At this point, you might just switch off. Is it because you find the thought of having to plan a bit overwhelming? It’s probably the last thing you want to hear…again!
But not having a marketing plan makes your job harder and juggling all the harder to handle.
If you have a marketing plan, you can focus on the things that are necessary. In ‘The Trend Report: Marketing Strategy 2022, reported by CoSchedule, it was found that people who have a plan to market their business are 313% more likely to report success than those who don’t.
And, although it may seem very overwhelming, it really isn’t.
What should a marketing plan contain?
For starters, it doesn’t have to be 100 pages long – that won’t help you at all. It needs to be clear and short, realistic, and repeatable, as well as easy to understand so you can tweak it as you see fit in future months.
It needs to show:
Your Vision/Mission statement
The four Ps – products, pricing, place (where you’re going to sell what you do), and promotion (how you’re going to sell your products or services).
Market analysis – look at your competitors
Target market – who you are aiming your products/services at
Your goals or objectives
Your promotion strategies
What budget you have if any
How you’re going to measure the success of your plan
If you would like a simple to follow marketing plan, sign up to my email and receive your free ‘Marketing your small business workbook.’ This will help you get on the right track.
Don’t try to do too much
Trying to do too much can also cause you to do less. For example, I know businesses that are on five or six social media channels. It’s good if you have the time to manage them all, but my experience is that you’re likely to lose your motivation and abandon them one by one.
Trying to be seen everywhere is not easy to maintain long term, especially if your business is just you. So, I would always advise to focus on just a couple of social media, or online channels and do them well.
Be consistent, add plenty of value to your customers and have a goal – what you expect to achieve from your social media activity.
One of those online channels doesn’t have to be social media – it could be email marketing. To build a lucrative email list, it’s advised to have a lead magnet that entices people into subscribing to your email. I realise that email isn’t for everyone, but if your business is steadily growing, you engage with your audience regularly online, (and may be finding this is taking up too much of your time), the next option is to create an email subscription, where you can talk directly to your customers every week or month.
Not everyone is your audience
I know I’ve posted about this recently on my social media pages, but one mistake that lots of small businesses make is to try to sell to everyone. Not everyone is your target audience, and by trying to target everyone, you risk selling to no one.
You need to know your audience, build a couple of buyer personas and tailor everything to them.
Don’t spend too much money
The word ‘budget’ is something guaranteed to send fear into most small businesses hearts. It’s not one of our favourite words, but it is important. Having a budget, no matter how small, can help your business.
There are so many digital marketing apps it is all too easy to keep subscribing to new apps. But while they might be individually cheap, they add up.
Look very carefully at what you spend your money on. Do you spend a lot on app or analytics tools? I do subscribe to Canva, and it’s worth every penny as I use it every day, but I have recently stopped subscribing to a few, as they were just a waste of money.
It is worth spending money on things you will use and will help you make your business more successful.
Here are a few ideas on what you can spend your marketing budget on:
A website (some people prefer to spend on things like Etsy or Shopify rather than a website as lots of the marketing can be done for you, but I feel it’s better to have your own website with built-in e-commerce, as you own it yourself
A registered domain
Training – so you learn more about things associated with your business
Paid ads – this needs very careful consideration to get the right kind of ad
If you are service based, you might want to invest in scheduling and measurement tools
Hire some professional help, such as a marketing coach, someone to help you with your business/marketing/social media strategy, or someone who can build your website, write blog posts, or set up your email marketing.
Don’t forget about your existing customers
Did you know that your existing customers are your biggest sales opportunity? Happy customers are loyal customers and are five times more likely to buy from again, and four times more likely to act as referrals.
Looking after your existing customers is worth the effort as losing customers who are no longer engaged or hear from you, are more costly. It’s harder to find new customers than it is to keep existing ones.
Keep your customers engaged with your business by offering them gifts, or discounts, listen to their feedback and act on it, or maybe think about creating some sort of loyalty programme.
Stay up to date with technology
This is a hard one, but most of what you do as a small business will be routine. There will be some daily tasks that need to be done to keep your business running smoothly. The more effective you become in completing these tasks, the more time you must work more on your business. For example, instead of physically posting on social media every day, batch make your content for the week and schedule it. You then only have to do this once a week.
Keeping up with the latest tools you can use to help you can ultimately save you time and money.
Mix up your marketing activity
Check out your insights on social media to find out what kind of posts work best for you and what doesn’t. Change the type of posts you do, try, and include things like reels and video, as well as short and long posts. Post your blog articles, and remember to use posts that entertain, educate, engage, and inspire your target audience, as well as selling posts.
Take a step back
In this article, I’m not telling you what to do, but what I am trying to encourage is to take a step back and look at the bigger picture. It gives you time to assess what works and what doesn’t work for you.
It’s very easy to fall into the trap of doing the same things, just because that’s the way you’ve always done it, or because that’s what everyone else does. But in business, time is precious and it’s good to remember to:
Create a clear marketing plan so you can focus on essential activities
Only concentrate on the social media platform that you love and that you enjoy
Sell to a targeted audience rather than trying to sell to everyone
Make your budget work for you in the most efficient way
Make your existing customers your priority. They will be the ones to buy more, give reviews, and are more likely to refer you to their friends and family
This is basically what a marketing strategy is all about and will help your business go from mediocre to marvellous! If you need help in pulling together your strategy, please feel free to take advantage of my free 30-minute discovery call, where I can give you some tips to help your business
You have a small business, you write beautifully crafted content, you engage on social media – but you’re still not selling. Why?
When you have a business, the ultimate decision about whether they are going to buy from you or not lies with your customers or potential customers. You can do as much as you possibly can to persuade people to buy your products or services, but without a strategy that provides personalised experiences for your ideal customer, you’re not likely to make many sales.
When you know who your target audience is and have a comprehensive understanding of who you’re talking to, you can create the right kind of content to attract that target audience. By having your own small business, you are competing with hundreds of other businesses who do the same as you, so having a marketing strategy is imperative to stopping your messages falling on deaf ears!
Why does your target audience matter?
I’d say that knowing your target audience is the most important part of your marketing strategy, for these reasons:
If you’re talking to everyone, you’re talking to no one. You don’t want to appeal generally to everyone out there, you need to appeal strongly to a specific group of people who are likely to want to do business with you…people you have a connection with.
If you know exactly who your audience are, you know what their pain points, or problems are. You can see their problems from their perspective and what obstacles they need to overcome to solve those problems. Then you can think about how your business can provide those solutions with your products or services.
Knowing your audience’s problems, you can work out how to market the solutions you have to their problems. You can show them how the features and benefits of your products/services can help them and why you are best suited to do that.
When you are creating content and forming new relationships with potential customers, you need to be able to speak their language. By this, I mean using the same terms and phrases that they use to describe their problems. Then you can build relationships by using that language to show that your business can solve those problems.
You target audience can also teach you how you can create better products and services that suit them best. You can use the understanding you have of their problems, along with any feedback
How do you identify your target audience?
Identifying your target market is all about three things: Demographics, Geographics and Psychographics.
Demographics
What is their age and gender?
Are they married or living together?
Do they have children?
What do they do for a living?
If you know what they do for a living, what is their rough income?
Do they own their own home?
You can usually gain demographic information from your existing customers by simply talking to them. Social media accounts can also give you relevant demographic information. If your customers are on Facebook, for example, you can usually see information like date of birth, relationship status – people seem to love to share about their lives on social media, so you will probably see if they have children or grandchildren, what they do for a living etc.
You could also get this information from feedback you get. For example, if you make and produce quality rag dolls, you may have feedback that says, “Love your product, my daughter/grand-daughter loves her doll and hasn’t put it down since she received it.” This tells you that your customer is a Mum and Grandma and that she likes buying things for her grandchildren.
Knowing the demographics of your existing customers makes it easier to tailor your marketing accordingly.
If you’re not sure who your target market it, go to Google and research some of your competitors, people who do the same as you, and look at their marketing techniques. Who are they targeting and how? What are the messages they are sending out? What images do they use? What media do they use to advertise? You will then have an idea of what direction you should be aiming for with your business.
Geographics
This is the simplest – where do your target market live? Are they local to you? Just in a particular region? In the same country, but miles away – nationwide? Or international – in other countries?
Psychographics – why customers buy what they do
If demographics look at who your customers are, psychographics take you a bit further into their lives to find out why they buy the things they do. What motivates them and what makes them tick.
Psychographics include things like:
Interests
Activities
Religious beliefs
Attitudes
Personality
Spending habits
Lifestyle choices
If you combine the data you collect on the demographic and psychographics of your customers, you can paint a picture of what your potential buyer (or your buyer persona) will look like and who they are. Let’s have a look at one example …
Buyer persona
Let’s say you’ve done your research, and this is what you have discovered…
Demographic data
Female, aged 40 – 55
Married with children
Household income around £45,000
Stay at home Mum who works part-time
Psychographic data
Interested in health and fitness
Likes to be eco-friendly
Is an active member on Facebook and Pinterest
Likes socialising with her small group of friends
Loves cooking
This demonstrates the difference between the two sets of data and why it’s important to gain both – you have more insight into what your customers might like. Then you can look at your products to see what would interest this kind of customer.
How do you make this relate to your business…and therefore your marketing? I’ll share some examples…
If you have a crafting business, for example, and your crafting activities were soap making or candle making, you’d know that this customer likes natural ingredients that are environmentally friendly and safe for children, so that could be part of your marketing angle.
If you are in the catering industry, making cakes or preserves, she might be interested in special birthday cakes for her family or in your preserves and pickles that use natural ingredients.
Her children are likely to have birthday parties and her friends are likely to have children of a similar age, so anything you make from a crafting perspective may be of interest – bunting for parties, toys, jewellery, etc. And as she enjoys socialising with her small group of friends, she may be interested in hosting an at-home party to buy your craft products.
Where to find her
Once you have this data, you’ll also know where to find her and this is especially important. She may attend local fitness clubs or gyms; she may visit a local spa; she will enjoy lunches out at restaurants or bars with her group of friends. This is where you could leave your flyers and business cards.
Now you know what your customer looks like and what she’s interested in, you can tailor blogs to suit her, you can make products you know she’ll like, and you can find out if she has any particular problem that your products can solve.
How do your customers like to buy their products?
These days, I would hazard a guess that most of your customers will want to look at products/services online before they buy. They have such a wide choice that it’s important you make yours stand out. People spend their commute to work, breaks, lunch hour, evenings and weekends online, usually browsing through social media sites or looking for something specific. If you are not on these platforms then your products/services will not be found.
Selling online
Social Media is a great way to promote your products or services and to advertise what you do. But you also must bear in mind that not everyone is on social media. If your target market is in the older age bracket, they may prefer not to be on social media, so you will have to reach them another way.
Even though they don’t do social media, your target audience probably still uses the internet to search for things they want. You could set up an online shop.
A website is a crucial business tool – you can link it to your Social Media sites and vice versa. A website can help you reach a wider audience – it gives you a shop front that is open 24/7 – you can even sell when you are sleeping, and you can sell to anyone in the world!
You can put more information about yourself and your business and products or services that you can on social media and, if you have an online shop, you can point your customers to that site. Whatever you choose to do, there is always a marketing technique to support it. If you have a website, you can also choose to add a blog, which could also be a fabulous tool to write about your individual products or services … just another way to get your name/business out there.
I hope this article has given you the inspiration and information to dig deep into your target audience in more detail. I know that once you have all the relevant information, you’ll stand a much better chance of marketing your products or services in the right way…and get those sales.
Share this post to help other small businesses just like you.
What is the art of persuasion? It is the ability to get others to see things as you see them, and it’s a key need for businesses of any size. From encouraging your customers to buy your products or services, to showing how your products or services are NEEDED by your target audience, the power of persuasion is key. And this is where marketing your business comes in.
I’ve recently read an article about Dr. Robert B. Cialdini, who wrote a book called ‘Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion’ in 1984. This feels like a long time ago now, but the ideas and principles he talks about in his book are even more relevant today, from a business perspective, than they were back then. In fact, the book and its principles has been hailed as crucial to marketing, especially around the area of converting people to customers. So, I thought I’d investigate this further, as I’d never heard of him.
Cialdini’s ‘6 principles of influence’ are:
Reciprocity
Commitment/consistency
Social proof
Authority
Liking
Scarcity
Do some of these sound familiar? Social media wasn’t a ‘thing’ back then, but we all know the term ‘social proof’ these days from our dealings with social media.
More than 30 years after publication, these six principles have been adapted to Internet Marketing, specifically around conversion rates. So, let’s dive in!
Reciprocity
This is about giving something to get a little something in return. According to Cialdini, this first principle of persuasion states that human beings are wired to return favours and pay back debts – to treat others as they’ve treated us. For example, if someone sends us a Christmas or Birthday card, we feel that we have to reciprocate – it’s almost a sense of social obligation.
But it is possible to use the desire to reciprocate to influence the behaviour of others. To do this, you need to give someone an unexpected gift – the value of the gift is unimportant, it’s about the act of giving. So, how does this work in business?
I’m not suggesting that you give all your customers a gift and expect something in return, it’s about the principle. For example, you have an email that you want people to sign up to – if you offer an incentive, some sort of gift or freebie, this will encourage them to sign up. If you write a regular blog and give really valuable information to your audience, when you put a call to action at the end asking them to sign up to your email, they are more likely to do so as they enjoy your blog and would like to hear from your more regularly.
Similarly, if you share consistent, regular, useful content, then when you launch a specific course, publish a book, or talk about your coaching, people are more likely to sign up.
Commitment
This is around people wanting their beliefs to be consistent with their values. For example, if someone thinks of themselves as a healthy, fit person, they are more likely to eat and do things that would be deemed as healthy.
So, from a business point of view, if you can convince potential customers to act a certain way, or think a certain way, they’ll be more likely to do that again in the future. For example, if you take cake into work for your co-workers and get a huge, positive response telling you how delicious it is, you’re likely to do that again – and eventually become known as the ‘cake baker.’
You can do this with business. I’ll use the email example again. If someone signs up to your email newsletter to get the freebie that you are offering, they will receive your weekly or monthly emails. Once they have signed up, they’ll likely start seeing themselves as customers and will eventually convert to a customer. All I would say about this is that it’s very important you don’t take advantage of them and manipulate the situation.
Consensus – Social Proof
This is evident on social media. It’s about feeling validated based on what other people are doing. We are all basically unsure of ourselves and identify with the people around us. If you work in an office and your co-workers offer to stay late to help with something urgent, it’s very likely that you’ll do the same.
If you see a restaurant advertised by a photo of their food photographed by one of your friends, with a caption saying how lovely it was – it’s extremely likely that you’ll want to try it too.
We humans are social by nature and generally feel the need to conform to the groups we belong to. This can also be used in business.
Here’s a great example. Hotel guests have the right to clean towels every day, but the cost of laundering is huge, so hotel owners would prefer it if their guests reused their towels. It has been found that a simple sign that says, ‘8 out of 10 hotel guests choose to reuse their towels’ is more effective and persuasive than a sign that says, ‘Reusing your towels helps the environment.’.
Authority
Generally speaking, it’s the tendency of humans to obey figures of authority – even if they’re not right. If someone wears a uniform, it’s even more likely we’ll accept what that person says – for example, police officer, Dr, nurse.
That’s why a lot of big brands bring in celebrities to advertise their products or services. Celebrities are influencers – they have an influence on the fans that follow them. And you’ll see toothpaste advertised by someone in a white coat pretending to be a dentist – but we don’t challenge that, we just accept it.
People who are authoritative, credible, and knowledgeable experts in their particular field are more influential and persuasive than those who are not. Cialdini recognised that the reason for this is that authority and credibility are some of the core building blocks of trust, so when we trust people we are more likely to follow them.
From a business perspective, building trust and credibility with your customers is crucial, but it’s also possible to build some of that authority and credibility through the recommendations of your satisfied customers. So, always a good idea to ask for a recommendation or review. And if you give them a recommendation, it’s very likely they’ll reciprocate and recommend you!
Do you see how that works?!
Liking
Does it really matter if you like someone or not? According to Cialdini, it affects the chances of you being influenced by that individual. It’s human nature that we’ll be much more likely to like people who pay us compliments, or like those who have similar interests to us.
This is something that marketing campaigns definitely take advantage of. The people they use in their ads are specifically chosen to appeal to their target market. The more the potential customer identifies with and likes the person, the more likely they are to be influenced by them.
To make this work in business, you simply need to be liked by those around you…networking helps with this, and we do it without even thinking about it. We see small businesses that we like and automatically pay compliments and start building relationships. But this does take time, you need to nurture and build those relationships before you can try to influence anyone.
I think out of all six powers of persuasion, this was the one that, once analysed, I was most surprised by! This is something most of us do in normal everyday lives.
Scarcity
Scarcity is about believing something is in short supply…so you want it more.
We’ve probably all been taken in by this one at some time or other. It’s that FOMO thing (fear of missing out). We’re more likely to buy something if we’re told it’s the ‘last one available’ or if a special deal is about to end soon.
Companies use this all the time. I’ve seen it most recently on a popular airline site. I was persuaded to buy my seat now, as the prices are likely to go up later – a kind of ‘lock into this price now’! It’s a great marketing ploy!
However, I would avoid doing this if it’s fake. Customers will see through you if you’re offering limited supplies or expiring discounts if you do this often.
Conclusion
These six principles that illustrate the art of persuasion can help us with small, practical, and even cost-free changes that can lead to big differences in our ability to influence and persuade others in an ethical way – so long as they are not abused!
If you’re planning to create an online course, or even if you’ve already created your online course, you will need to have a robust marketing strategy in place to help you promote it to your target audience.
Before you create your online course
The first strategy really comes into play before you create your course. It’s important to know who you are aiming it at (your target market). So, how do you know this? Think about your ideal client and create a buyer persona.
So, you know who they are and what they do, how old they are, what motivates them and what interests do they have?
Create as many as you need as there may be different types of customers that you have in mind for your course.
You can refer to these buyer personas when you’re creating your marketing content – it helps to know who your ideal client is, so you can tailor your content specifically to them.
What is your USP (unique selling point)?
Go into Google and look at courses that currently exist, that are based around the subject matter that you want to cover in your course. Make notes of what is included in those courses and how they are presented. Is there anything that they’ve missed? Are there any aspects that they’ve included that you wouldn’t?
Is there anything in the courses of your competitors that you think you could cover better or add more value to? Can you add in extra topics that your competitor doesn’t cover?
Putting a course out there means giving loads of value to the people that sign up. They want it to be jam packed with value, so they know that they’re not wasting their time and money.
Doing this kind of research will lead you to your USP…what is your USP? What is it that you do different to your competitors? What is the one thing that makes your business better than your competitors?
Once you know what that is, you can add it to your marketing messages. And the good thing is that when someone asks you what makes your course so special – or different to XXXX’s course, you have the answer!
Get information up front
Before you start making your course, you need to know if it is something that your audience want! It might be something you want to create, or something you think people will want. But, until you ask them, you don’t really know!
The best way to find this out is to ask! If you have an email list, or an audience on your blog, you can ask them what they’d be interested in learning about – you could send a survey to your email list. You can also ask people on your social media sites, or in the networking groups you belong to. Then create your course around what they want – not what you think they want.
Get to work
Once you know who your audience are and what they want, you can create your course. There’s just a little bit more research to do – what keywords or phrases will people type in to look for your course? You can research similar courses to yours, or you can use a keyword tool to look at the most popular keywords related to your subject. Then you can include those keywords in your title.
Once you are armed with all this information, it’s time to think about preselling your course. You need to treat your online course like a product launch…because basically that’s what it is.
Coming soon!
You want to try and create a buzz around your course, and one way is to create a ‘coming soon’ page. If you treat it the same way that you would treat a new product, you can’t go far wrong by building excitement and a buzz around the launch. You could just do a ‘coming soon’ page on your website, without giving away too much information…just the basic information! Then say that more details will be posted soon.
You can also use your social media pages to start some teaser information about your course. Don’t just talk about yourself and the course though – make sure that you give some valuable information to get your audience’s interest. For example, you could give away a checklist or cheat sheet that is linked to the information in your course.
You could set up a ‘sign up to show your interest’ page, either on your website, or on a hosting site, such as Mailerlite. When someone signs up to show interest, they get your freebie and an email that tells them a little bit more about the course. Then you have their email and can send them more details about the course as they become available.
If you run your own Facebook group, you can promote it there too.
You might send links to interesting articles you’ve found online about similar subjects to yours – you don’t have to just use your own content.
Start a podcast
You could start a podcast to highlight your expertise in your subject and talk about things related to your course material. Podcasts are great for interviews, so if you have done a course before, or have been running a pilot course with a targeted group of people, you could interview one of them to ask what they got from it.
If you do a podcast though, in the same way with anything that you give away, make sure that you don’t use the same information/subject matter that you’ll be using in your course, as they won’t be happy if your online course that they pay for, is the same content as the stuff you’ve been giving away for free!
Connect with your audience via an online webinar
In the same way as you can create a podcast, you can also run regular webinars…or even a one-off online webinar. You can pre-record these and cover some of the things you know that your audience struggles with – and give a solution to some of their pain points. Again, make the subject matter different to the course content you’re creating.
Running these kind of presentations gives your audience an idea of what you’re like to work with. You’ll no doubt get questions, which may give you ideas to include in your online course. It will also give you feedback, which you can use to show the value you give your audience. This all helps give credibility to your business.
Into the launch phase!
Now you’ve done the ‘coming soon’ stuff, which may have gone on for a couple of months or more, now is the time to promote the course date and more details.
You can still use all the things you used pre-launch, such as podcast, social media, your blog, or email newsletter, or even a webinar. Now is the time to ramp up the communications.
Paid Ads
Paid Ads can be an effective way to advertise your online course. Even a simple Facebook post boost can help with this kind of content. You can target them to a specific audience, they don’t have to cost a lot and you can track their success. I can’t specifically say, with hand on heart, that paid Ads are worth it or that they work, as I have never felt the need to use them myself. But it is something I will try when I do decide to create my own online course.
You just have to make sure that you factor in the cost of these Ads, as they can be quite expensive. Just make sure that whichever platform you use for Ads, that it is a platform that your target audience uses.
Team up with others
Another good way to get your course out there is to team up or buddy up with other businesses…preferably not businesses who do the same as you, but those that you know and like – you need to like or be interested in the kind of things your buddy posts in order for this to be successful – otherwise it’s just the same as doing like for like, or follow for follow, which really doesn’t work.
So, ask people who you regularly interact with and agree to like, comment on, and share their posts or stories, as well as doing shout outs to each other.
This helps you, but could also lead to partnerships in the future, especially if the business you partner up with does something that complements your business. They may even be able to be a guest speaker on your course, or be an interviewee on your podcast, blog, or webinar. The possibilities with partnerships is endless.
Teaser Mini Course
Earlier I talked about a teaser on social media for preselling. Another idea would be to create a mini teaser course, just a few weeks before your main course goes live.
This is a free short course that gives people a taste of what you do and the value you give. At the end of the teaser mini course, you can give the option to sign up to your paid course, where they can find out much more and get even more value from you.
The other thing about creating a mini course, is that the audience that sign up will realise how little they actually know about your niche and will be wanting to know more.
Offer a discount
You can also use a discount offer to entice people to sign up. For example, the first three people to sign up get 50% off – or whatever figure you decide to go for.
Create a sales page
You’ve done your ‘coming soon’ page; now it’s time to create your course sales page or landing page. A landing page is a page on your website, or on a hosting site like Mailerlite, that is dedicated to purely selling your online course. This is where you can go to town with advertising what, specifically your course will cover.
Talk about the benefits of the course – what’s in it for your audience? What problems does your course solve? What will your audience go away knowing that they didn’t know before? How will it help them or their business in future?
Include testimonials from those who did your mini course or those who have listened to your podcast, read your blogs, or have commented on your newsletter. You may have feedback from the survey you sent out that you can use. Just remember to always ask permission from the person who gave the feedback if you’re going to use it to advertise your course.
Make sure that the content of your course is really clear, so your audience know exactly what they’re signing up for.
And, don’t forget to include a CTA (call to action), such as a button saying, ‘YES, SIGN ME UP NOW!’ Always make it short and snappy and make it sound urgent, like you mustn’t wait to sign up – do it now!
Passive Income
Courses
Your online course may be a course where you are very hands-on and run individual sessions over a period of weeks or months. However, if you record a course with individual modules, you can put it on an online hosting channel, such as Udemy, which is an online learning platform (a marketplace to sell and buy courses online). You make money on this platform by uploading your course and selling it. It’s a free service for those uploading courses and can help you achieve passive income. It won’t make you millions, but it will help give you credibility and the possibility of a regular passive income.
Students on Udemy generally take courses to improve their job-related skills. I have used it several times for course on various social media channels to help me understand them better. The good thing is that you can upload a course on any subject you can think of. I’ve seen everything from cupcake decorating, to car maintenance, interior design to computer skills. There’s something for everyone and courses start from around £15. I’ve even got courses free of charge and have had some great deals during January sales.
eBooks
As well as making passive income from your online course, you could also write a related eBook and sell it on your website, or even upload it to Amazon or a similar book selling site.
Conclusion
Now it’s time for you to get started! Do your research, do a presale ‘coming soon’ campaign, choose the best strategy for you and just do it!
Let me know if you found this post useful and, as always, if you have any questions, please feel free to contact me.
The Write Way 