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I know that marketing doesn’t come naturally to most business owners. Not many people say to themselves - “I am such a good marketer I think I’ll start a business selling something.” No, unfortunately the conversation probably goes like this - “I sure love to work with spreadsheets and do people’s taxes, holy crap, I’ve got to learn how to market.”
When the realization that you are in the marketing business hits, too many people want to grab onto the latest and greatest marketing idea and ramp up the selling machine overnight.
When it comes to marketing, you’ve got to decide that little improvements, metered out every single day are the way to gain a measure of marketing momentum. Don’t freak out and try to do it all today, or next week. Make it a habit. Think Kaizen! Kaizen (改善) is Japanese for improvement. It is a Japanese philosophy that focuses on continuous improvement throughout all aspects of life. It’s a philosophy that is bantered around my management consultants, but it so applies to small business marketing.
I know you want the quick fix, but get over it, that’s not the way it works.
Create a list of marketing activities that, if practiced every single day, would cause continuous marketing improvement. Make certain that about 1/2 of your list makes you uncomfortable just to think about. For some that’s public speaking, calling up really big prospects, asking a supplier to partner or simply asking a journalist to coffee. If you’re not stretching enough to make yourself just a little uncomfortable, you’re not growing, you’re not moving forward. Again, focus on daily sips of improvement rather than the tsunami.
Here’s a little exercise I love to use to check my comfort level. Clasp your hands together, like you might in prayer, interlace all 10 fingers. Most of us have a natural way of doing this - I’m left thumb over right. Now, switch your clasp to the opposite way - so for me that’s now right thumb and all corresponding fingers over left. It feels a little awkward doesn’t it. It’s not painful or really even that sensational, but it usually produces just a slight feeling that is uncomfortable. Try it any time you feel like you are phoning your day in and use it to remind yourself to push just that much every day.
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This entry was posted on Thursday, May 8th, 2008 at May 08, 08 | 10:54 am and is filed under Marketing Calendar, Marketing Strategy, Strategic Partnering. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.
How odd that you’d write about this concept today! I read about it earlier this week. Also earlier this week, I came across a list of activities over at Free Money Finance that talk about increasing your blog’s traffic.
I have a new blog that I’m trying to get off the ground, and I’ve tried finding the “quick fix” that would give me instant results, to no avail. Actually it’s been the daily stuff that has yielded the most results. So I’m definitely going to take this one step further and have a daily list of traffic building activities (ON PAPER!) and run it every single day to see what the results are.
Great timing!
Good sound advice.
Little changes make a big difference.
Mark
Kaizen - I’ll have to remember to use the term as it’s something I talk about a lot with clients.
For a lot of small business owners, the sheer number of marketing options - and the risk of getting it wrong - create a form of marketing paralysis.
Short of having someone to take it all off their plate (an unhealthy option IMO) small daily improvements has to be the best option.
Kaizen - we all need to get that happening in our personal lives as well as our business. Imagine what you could achieve then! D
Just some clarifications - being Chinese, actually the characters 改善 are Chinese characters (in the language of Japanese they also use Chinese characters as well) and we have the same meaning of “improve” (as a verb and noun)…. :p
And yes, I also agree this is a very important concept, esp. for Marketing too!
John,
You’re right. Marketing has to be done everyday. There is no quick fix.
Marketing also requires a plan or strategy. I see many small business owners jumping from one tactic to another and getting nowhere.
I also like your advice about doing what’s uncomfortable. We’re all guilty of doing what we find comfortable and avoiding what we don’t.
But it’s also important to focus on the two or three things that you are good at and making them the core of your marketing - the things that you do everyday.
In time those efforts begin to have a cumulative effect.
Great advice… Get out of your comfort zone, ‘cos if you’re comfortable, you’re stagnant… And thats just a couple steps from decay…
Thanks John…. I know I can depend on Duct tape marketing for a good thought pretty much everyday
@Karen - thanks for the clarification - it’s really a wonderful concept regardless of the language isn’t it?
Mark, you took the words out of my mouth. Learning to do things one day at a time instead of all at once is one of those lessons that has an incalculable amount of ‘cash value’, both in the monetary and William James senses of the term.
I think it is great that you are telling business owners to take it one step at a time, it is easy to become overwhelmed by the big picture.
Thanks for the post — the concept of continual improvement is key to most worthwhile enterprises in life, and marketing is no exception. Nobody jumps straight to the top of the mountain…it can be a process that is more powerful than actually reaching the summit.
Put another way, a little marketing every day can lead to a lot of sales down the road…
Duct Tape Marketing…the name reminds me of racing cars held together with duct tape and silicone…do you guys have anhy idea how many applications duct tape has? Definitely a must for everyone’s toolbox, including an internet marketer, and general small business marketers…if the budget is stretched, patch it with duct tape….ahahahaha
Hi John
What a great article, I especially liked the part about interlocking your fingers and crossing your thumbs to create an uncomfortable feeling…
Thus showing marketers that it will be uncomfortable but it wont kill you!
I will have to referr my list to this blog so they can see how to deal with change and uncomfortable excercises to bring them back to reality!
I Love it…
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Regarding: “If you’re not stretching enough to make yourself just a little uncomfortable, you’re not growing, you’re not moving forward.”
That is the essence behind starting your own business…and boy do you grow and move forward through that!
Great article. That’s exactly what happens. Business owners realize if they want to do what they love to do they have to figure out how to effectively market themselves or they’ll never get to do it.
It’s the actions you take day in and day out that determine your success not the one hit wonders. The only people getting rich from get rich quick marketing schemes are the people selling them.
I like the example with the handclasp. It made it very obvious to me how comfortable I am with routine.
You have to build your business day by day, step by step, this is very true!
Unfortunately nowadays people have less time so they want results fast and easy but thats not the way to go…
I think we need more exercises not to forget the lesson
Great advice!
That worried feeling can drive you, but so can the feeling of you winning a new client or making a big sale!
Great post.
I definitely agree that it’s the little things that will get your business to the next level.
Most people say that you can replicate success by using tried and true methods. It works in some cases but if you want to take your success to a whole new level, you need a big idea.
But, you don’t sit there and meditate and suddenly one big idea comes out…
No, really. It doesn’t happen like that.
There are some who can generate brilliant, problem-solving profit-booming ideas, instantly. However, the rest of us mere mortals need to keep trying and pushing.
You sit down, and generate 50 ideas. Or 100 ideas. Or even better, 300 ideas. And from there, I bet you that at least one of them will be good enough to explode your business to the next level. That’s the foundation –it’s always a numbers game.
Funnel vision is a concept by Jay Abraham, the basic idea of which is this: if you look outside your own field into another domain, whatever is there –their cliches and norms –take them and apply them to your field and your products will soar.
You can generate ideas to boost your business in 2 ways: from the inside looking out, or from the outside looking in.
You can generate a lot of ideas using these two techniques. Listing the norms may take you a while, and just by twisting them you already have 20-30 ideas off the bat.
Ideas to Build Your Business.
Just read this today (Monday morning) and it was the jolt I needed to get moving at work. It’s a rainy cool Monday and my dog and bed are just a staircase away. I was very tempted to get a magazine and just snuggle with the dog — but now I’m going to make my “to do list” and get going.
Thanks!!
PS: Can I uncross my hands now? : )
Thank you for the little bit at a time thinking. I’m currently at a fulltime job trying to subsidize my own stuff. The big plan gets overwhelming and I know that the things I do are compatible with the idea of a steady bit at a time system.
Steady is the key point; remember the tortoise and the hare.
I bet you never thought you’d provide a parenting tool through your blog, did you? I’ve been trying to teach my 10-year-old son about goals and how they need to at least slightly push you or they aren’t worth the time you spent thinking about them. I’m going to try the threaded fingers on him and see if he’ll finally get it! Hey, if mom can build a business surely I can get my 10-year-old to step out of his comfort zone!
Create an amazing day!
@Sundi - Of course I did - all this stuff is just life with different jargon wrapped around it anyway isn’t it?