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DuctTapeMarketing.com
July 25, 2007
In this issue:
Resource #1
- Duct Tape Marketing book!
Resource #2
-
Great photo,
blog, podcast, video resource list
Main Article
- Strategy Before Tactics
Resource
#3 -
StockLayouts is at it again
Free Magazine -
Free subscription to PRWeek Magazine
Further Reading -
100 Ways to Create Wealth - Steve Chandler
Featured Listening -
Easy Tiger -
Ryan Adams
Add your articles to the
Duct Tape Marketing
Article Directory
Participate in the Duct
Tape Marketing Forum
Coming Soon - Duct Tape Marketing Resource Directory
Duct Tape Marketing On the Road -
see the schedule of
speaking events
You can always view past newsletter issues here!
For those who
keep track of these things the world headquarter for Duct Tape Marketing is
now located at: 916 W47th
Street, Kansas City, MO 64112
I've completely revamped my
blog and moved to WordPress -
have a look
Featured Resource #1
 Duct
Tape Marketing - The World's Most Practical Small Business Marketing Guide
-
foreword by Michael Gerber, author of the E-Myth, afterword by
Guy Kawasaki, author of Art of the Start - Hardcover, 304 Pages, Nelson
Business.
Check out the
book
"John Jantsch has provided small
businesses with the perfect perspective for maximizing all marketing
activities - offline and on. Jantsch has the plan to help you thrive in the
world of business today. Read it, all your competitors will.
--John Battelle, cofounding editor of Wired and author of
The Search: How Google and Its Rivals Rewrote the Rules of Business and
Transformed Our Culture
Featured Resource #2 -
Mashable
resources
Great
photo, blog, podcast, video resource list
Featured Article
Strategy Before Tactics
Don't fall for
the marketing idea of the week, build a strategy and stick to it.
 The
title of today's article captures the single greatest small business
marketing mistake I encounter - and I encounter it every single day.
Small business owners often fall prey to the marketing whim of the week,
chasing every new way to do direct mail or draw web site visitors they
encounter, because they have no real marketing strategy to help them drive
marketing decisions. If I could change anything about the way small business
owners view marketing - that would be it.
Without a strategy firmly in place to use as a filter for where the business
is headed, it’s far to difficult to really analyze whether any particular
tactic or marketing initiative makes sense for a business or not.
By strategy I mean your marketing reason for being, the position you want to
hold in the mind of your customer and, no, “I want to exchange money for
something with anyone we can,” is not a strategy, it’s a disaster plan. Far
too many people think “we want to sell lots of stuff to lots of people” is a
strategy.
The world doesn’t really need another accountant, electrician, real estate
agent, or small business of most any kind, so if that’s what you are, then
you better get a way to stand out that’s based on a sound strategy. The
world, or at least a market segment, will always need the accountant,
electrician or real estate agent that does business in new and different
ways, ways that matter to a specific market.
To develop an effective marketing strategy you must spend some energy
determining two crucial factors: who makes an ideal client for your firm and
how your firm is indeed different than everyone else that claims to be in
your same business.
If is, in fact, quite possible that there are entire subsets of what you
might call a target market that are not at all a fit for your business.
You’ve got to get very clear, and often narrow, about the characteristics of
a client your firm is best suited to serve. If you have clients already, the
best place to look to identify your ideal clients is the subset of clients
that is most profitable and has a tendency to refer business to you. These
folks likely love what you do, are emotionally attached enough to tell
friends, and value the relationship they have to your company. If you can
come up with a crystal clear image of what these folks look like, part of
your marketing strategy should focus on finding more of these and saying no
to the rest
The second half of your marketing strategy involves discovering your firm’s
best chance to stand out and differentiate. You may already do something
that truly is unique and need only communicate it as your strategy. Or, you
may need to find one something that you can do famously, such as dominating
a narrow niche market or packaging your services like no one else in your
industry dreamed of doing.
Once you create a powerful strategy for your business all of focus can turn
to creating and implementing tactics that can bring your strategy to life.
Related article -
Educate Referrals
. ~ ~ ~
 John Jantsch is a veteran marketing coach, award winning blogger and author of
Duct Tape Marketing: The World's Most Practical Small Business Marketing Guide
published by Thomas Nelson.
He is the creator of the Duct Tape Marketing small business marketing system. You can find more information by visiting
http://www.ducttapemarketing.com
You may reprint this article in its entirety if you attribute the article to John Jantsch and include the information about the author above.
Featured Resource #3 -
Stocklayouts Is At
It Again
 My
Oregon based friends at Stocklayouts, Rod and Tami Copper, have just
released a
new
collection of agency quality design templates
that can meet the needs of the pickiest
designer and make a time crunched small business marketer look like a
star. Okay, you can tell I like what that do. There are templates and
there are StockLayouts!
This
new collection, called Volume 6, contains 75 professionally-designed
templates for creating brochures, flyers, newsletters, postcards, ads,
posters and stationery. The 19 new business design sets contained in the
collection cover a variety of business types including professional
services, technology, construction, travel, retail, education,
financial, religious, general business and real estate.
You
can get past collections and even individual templates as well.
Featured Reading
100 Ways to Create Wealth
- Steve Chandler
This very quick read offers great reminders for small business owners that
wealth comes in many shapes and forms if you know where to look.
Make the most of your small
business by making the most from your small business.
Reaching for this type of
motivational book every so often helps recharge the batteries.
Look for Steve an upcoming
episode of the Duct Tape Marketing podcast!
Featured Listening
Easy Tiger
Ryan Adams
In my humble opinion the world of pop country music is a mess, completely
devoid of any originality.
The one exception is Ryan Adams,
and that's probably because he's just as comfortable being classified as
rock and roll as country. He plays country with a Grateful Dead kind of
vibe.
This is one that you need to add
to your collection. He just may make country music worth listening to again.
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Featured Resource - The Duct Tape Marketing Workshops - Does Your
Group Need a Practical Small Business Marketing Speaker?
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