Your sales force, due to no fault of its own, has become your most expensive and least effective method of promoting and growing your business. None of us has time to see a sales rep unless we have a specific need or problem. The good news is that you can be there at the precise moment your customer or potential customer has that need or problem. To do this you have to connect to the world of customers in a new way and you have to give your website an overhaul to keep these customers coming back.
Facebook, Twitter, and search engine optimization are just a few of the tools and concepts in the new discipline of Internet marketing. Embrace and master these principals and your business will grow. Social marketing and digital branding is the way companies are now connecting and differentiating themselves. The must read book in this area is Six Pixels of Separation by Mitch Joel. Mitch will walk you through the most effective tactics in connecting your business digitally to your target markets.
Mitch can show you how to bring customers to your website .
Once they visit their return will be predicated on two factors. First: your content. Second: your aesthetics.
Content: As the brilliant thinker and business strategist Marshall Thurber teaches, think of your website as “the filter”. Consumers suffer from information overload. If your website can filter the massive amounts of information down to what is relevant and useful to your niche market then you create value and your customers will treat your website as a resource. As such, you will have access to help solve their problems and promote your products and solutions.
Aesthetics: The second element is your website must have the look and feel that entices users to spend time on your site. Aesthetics is critical; as owners and managers we are perhaps the least qualified to create a fresh web presence. Get outside opinions, hire someone to help you revamp your website. For more on how to do this check out a company like New Tricks, or listen to my interview with Judi Knight and Dene Shepherd on Stromquist Radio, “How to Use the Internet to Grow Your HVAC Business“
Embrace and include Internet marketing strategies, and update your website. You will create new customers, leads for your sales force, and your business will grow.
