I often partner with so called “marketing agencies” or “marketing consultants” (note: topic for another day).  When I partner with these folks, I normally spend the majority of my time fighting one problem.  The Forgetting of Process.  For instance, I’ll get a marketing consultant who sends me the content for a page pitching a particular program and the writing or graphics will be spectacular.  However, they forget how the client will be coming to that content.

You should always map out the process of bringing the client from first impression to end of sale follow-up.  Then write the content or put the pieces in place to match.  Read more... (159 words, estimated 38 secs reading time)

I sure do love fall.  The weather is the best of the year.  When the air is cool but the sun still warms your skin.

This is also the time of year to gear up your marketing and create business cash flow for the next couple of months.  There are usually only two extremes businesses experience this time of year.  Feast or Famine.  Read more... (289 words, estimated 1:09 mins reading time)

Check out this graph showing the burst in searches for “auto body repair” in the OKC Metro area on Google around the time of this spring’s storms

Do you treat returning customers and new or potential customers the same way?  If so… Why?

Both people are important but they need to hear different messages and have a different experience.

We’ve all been to a restaurant when the server asks if we’ve ever been there before.  Only about half of the time does that make a difference in the presentation.  Why did they ask if they weren’t going to tell me anything different or offer an incentive for turning my guests into patrons.  What different messages need to be told in your business?  Read more... (189 words, estimated 45 secs reading time)

For most people, hiring someone to build their website is as confusing & stressful than buying a car, and more important than who to hire to answer the phones.  I’ve created a short list of seven simple facts that web designers don’t want you to know.  The days of web design being kin to rocket science are over.  But, web designers don’t want you to know that. They’ll charge extreme prices for simple tasks just because either they haven’t upgraded to newer more efficient methods, or, they hope that keeping you in the dark will place a pair of  “golden handcuffs” on you and force you to put up with the poor customer service and worse attitude they throw at you.  Read more... (241 words, estimated 58 secs reading time)

Many business owners deal with this dellima. If you were to ask most business owners who is more valuable, they’d of course say that taking care of existing customers is more (or at least equally) as important as attracting new customers. However, does the company budget and time allowances reflect that? In most cases, the answer is no.

Why is investing in current customers harder for companies to do than spending their funding and time to attract new clientelle? There are many things that factor in but a few are:  Read more... (301 words, estimated 1:12 mins reading time)

• It’s easier to see a dollar value spent = dollar returned with new clients

This is an idea that’s been bopping around in my head for a while now.  Will it work in your industry?

When we stake a price on our goods or services, that’s it.  That’s what we’ve said it’s worth.  Customers pay that and only that.  I don’t know anyone who’s gone to the local car wash, slid their card through the machine twice so that they could pay $20 for a car wash priced at $10 because of the great job this particular system does.  However, all day long, people will pull up to a group of teenagers and hand over twenty bucks for a wash that takes too long and is mediocre at best.  Read more... (280 words, 1 image, estimated 1:07 mins reading time)

For those of you asking yourself this question.  Here’s a video posted to YouTube by SocialManiacs09.  It has some good numbers to get you thinking.  If you’re not using the power of social media to market your business, you’d better start.  Caution: Make sure you go about it correctly or you may do more harm than good.

Here’s how most marketing companies sell their media to advertisers:

A sales rep would walk into a business, pull their data and plans from a bag and begin to explain why they had the only option that made sense for every business in town.

This soooo wrong.  In soooo many ways.  What works for one, is not so good for another.  I often run across people who’s business would be dis-serviced by Pay Per Click marketing, which is the main staple of what my company AFH Marketing offers.  In fact, just last week, I talked to a client in the moving business, and suggested him find other ways of marketing their business.  You see, the cost per click for their industry, was out of proportion with their Return On Investment (ROI) per potential client gained.  Read more... (203 words, estimated 49 secs reading time)