No more blog posts until next week!  Signing off for the week to hang out with our families, eat good food, watch some football and start Christmas shopping!

We are tremendously thankful for all the troops!  God bless all of you!

As Fort Worth’s only Duct Tape Marketing Authorized Coach, I’m excited to announce a new Coaching Excellence Series with Social Media Gurus John Jantsch and Chris Brogan.  On Thursday, December 11 (Noon, CST), we will hear these two guys discuss a wildly popular and very intriguing subject:

Using TWITTER FOR BUSINESS

Register for FREE and put it on your calendars now!

Follow RANDY on Twitter

Follow DONNY on Twitter

To read the previous post(s) in this series, start here:

Step 1: Narrow Your Market Focus

Step 2: Communicate Your Difference

Step 3: Packaging Your Product

Step 4: Create Marketing Materials that Educate

Step 5: Advertising, Referrals and PR: Your Lead Generation Trio!

Step 6: Website that works 24/7 – Email Marketing

Often times, when we get through with a marketing overview with clients, this is the look we get. It’s often that you see pictures like this associated with the stress of taxes or being overwhelmed by debt. It is our hope that you don’t ever feel the same way about marketing! If you are a like so many other small businesses, you are not alone if you feel like you have so many ideas, you’ve heard of so many tools and tactics and you’ve been informed of what you NEED to be doing – but you don’t know HOW to get it done, WHERE to start, or WHEN to do it all. That’s why we’re marketing coaches – to come alongside and relieve that burden from you.

For the past month, we posted all these important steps to successful marketing. While each step was just an overview (and was loaded with ideas for you to implement), we hope you got a sense of the systematic approach we’re taking. These are principles based on the proven small business marketing system called Duct Tape Marketing. As John Jantsch, founder of DTM, likes say, “just live by a calendar.” Buy a wall-size calendar, and simply start plotting and planning what you are going to do over the next few months. Don’t try and do it all at once. Start back to Step 1 and remember the critical foundation of marketing to your target market!

Managing your marketing and your brand is an on-going discipline – you have to stay on top of things. You don’t have to invest hours each day, but you need to dedicate a significant amount of time each month. For some, you’ll need to take a day to line out all your marketing efforts for the month. Others would rather take a couple of hours at the beginning of each week. If you have a powerful online presence, you’ll likely want to be online regularly managing your online presence.

So now what? We of course wish you success as you take a “do-it-yourself” approach to your marketing – it’s not easy, but we hope to have offered a strong gameplan. But as marketing coaches, we are always available to stand alongside you and coach you through the steps. Contact us and let us put together a marketing coaching package that will enable you to launch a more effective marketing strategy!

- Randy Vaughn – Fort Worth’s Only DUCT TAPE MARKETING Authorized Coach

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All 7 Steps to Marketing Success!:

Step 1: Narrow Your Market Focus

Step 2: Communicate Your Difference

Step 3: Packaging Your Product

Step 4: Create Marketing Materials that Educate

Step 5: Advertising, Referrals and PR: Your Lead Generation Trio!

Step 6: Website that works 24/7 – Email Marketing

Step 7: Live by a calendar – Manage your brand!

To read the previous post(s) in this series, start here:

Step 1: Narrow Your Market Focus

Step 2: Communicate Your Difference

Step 3: Packaging Your Product

Step 4: Create Marketing Materials that Educate

Step 5:Advertising, Referrals and PR: Your Lead Generation Trio!

We’re coming to the end of this series on “7 Steps to Marketing Success” – powered by the proven principles of Duct Tape Marketing.  As the economy wears on and I hear more stories of hardship in people’s lives and businesses, I am convinced that these principles work.   And if by chance, you’re CONSIDERING starting a business of your own, why not do it NOW!   Your mind will tell you that you should wait for “better economic times” – but when will that be?  Do it now and you’ll be glad to have a say-so in your future!  As a small business owner and one who started in n0t-so-great economic times, I am loving the independence and getting to do it with my brother, Donny!  Sure, there’s uncertainty, but it’s alot of fun, too!  Click here if you want to access a great resource from Jonathan Fields – it will change the way you work and live for the rest of your life!

OK – check your website now.  Would you consider your website more “informative” or “interactive“?  The former uses your website to tell everything about you and your store/product/service.  When people come, they have no doubt what you have to offer.  They peruse and they leave.  On the other hand, what about having a site that your visitors interact with?  The key that successful sites have discovered is to convert your site’s visitor to a hot prospect by capturing their email address!

Sites that do not collect this vital link back to their prospects are losing the opportunity for follow-up.  Perhaps someone visits your site because they saw a direct link somewhere.  But, when they arrive, perhaps they are not in the purchasing mindset.  If they leave, you have no way of reaching them again.  But if you draw them into your database, then they have given you permission to send them new updates, information on new products/services, and, voila!, one day when they’re ready, they’ll buy.

Email marketing systems are affordable and pretty easy to manage on your own.  Just put up a sign-up form on your website to collect email addresses.  Most people offer something of value in exchange (recognizing this email address is valuable to you) – perhaps a free report, free e-book, coupons, free sample, something fun or informative, etc…  So create something that your visitors would find interesting and valuable and make it available to them.  Email marketing must be permission based to be effective – no one like spammers.  In this way, your website is working for you 24/7 – this is especially important if you have a storefront where you have limited store hours.  People surf the net at all hours, and alot of your prospects are likely doing it in the evening after their kids are in bed!

Sign up for our FREE MARKETING REPORT just to the right of this post!  Here’s a longer post concerning the power of email marketing – you’ll also find out who we use to handle our email marketing campaigns!

NEXT UP – Step 7 – Live by a calendar – manage your brand!

- Randy Vaughn – Fort Worth’s Only DUCT TAPE MARKETING Authorized Coach

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In order now:

Step 1: Narrow Your Market Focus

Step 2: Communicate Your Difference

Step 3: Packaging Your Product

Step 4: Create Marketing Materials that Educate

Step 5: Advertising, Referrals and PR: Your Lead Generation Trio!

Step 6: Website that works 24/7 – Email Marketing