Diana M. Needham is a marketing strategist who helps entrepreneurs, authors, speakers, and consultants focus on the right marketing strategies and position themselves as the authority in their markets. “I’ve worked closely with hundreds of entrepreneurs to take the mystery out of marketing,” Needham says. “What I’ve discovered is that we tend to make marketing very complicated. When we have an advocate that can help us narrow our focus to the top 3 to 5 strategies that really increase the bottom line and stop chasing all the latest marketing crazes, our business skyrockets.”
It all begins with being crystal clear about who the ideal client is, in great detail. Think of one person that, if your client roster reflected 10 just like him or her, business would be booming. Give that person a name to make this more real. Next define clearly the key challenge or pressing problem that is keeping him or her awake at night that your business solves and that they will gladly pay for a solution. When this is clear, marketing becomes much easier. Marketing messages can be specifically targeted and a determination made about the fastest ways to get the message out.
Many entrepreneurs never stop to make time to objectively and strategically define what Needham calls the “fastest path to cash” for growing their businesses. Instead, chasing the latest marketing crazes becomes a practice. This leads to overwhelm, confusion, and frustration, and business growth stagnates. Rather than falling into this trap, consider that marketing efforts are processes that, once learned, can be readily repeated to increase profits.
Jay Conrad Levinson, the father of Guerrilla Marketing, the bestselling marketing series in history, echoes Needham’s statement on the important of creating and implementing effective marketing processes. “Marketing is not an event, but a process…It has a beginning, a middle but never an end, for it is a process. You improve it, perfect it, change it, even pause it. But you never stop it completely.”
Needham teaches that any entrepreneur-even those who are convinced that marketing is hard, that understanding it is impossible, or are exhausted from chasing the latest marketing crazes-can create an effective marketing approach that increases profits and their client roster. It is all about focusing on the fundamentals and taking massive action to get in front of ideal clients, both off-line and online.
By simplifying marketing strategies and focusing on the ones that truly get results, any entrepreneur can expand their business and profits. To find out more about how to break through the marketing confusion, visit: http://dianamneedham.com/contact/.