The Competitive Advantage

December 26, 2017

The Top 10 Marketing & Sales Posts of 2017

One of the ways that we support our mission of helping the Market Research industry to more fully embrace marketing & sales is to provide educational and useful content to the marketplace… in the form of eBooks, in-person presentations, webinars, tip sheets and – in 2017 – more than 50 articles and blog posts. To the thousands of visitors who came to our website this year to read that content… “thank you!” And for those of you who are not regular or frequent visitors, here is a list of the Top 10 Posts of 2017…

December 12, 2017

Corporate retreat coming up? Here are 3 key questions to answer there.

It’s that time of year when a business will gather its management team together and head to a secluded location somewhere in the woods or at the beach for their annual corporate retreat – to talk about and make plans for the future of their firm.

I am a HUGE fan of the idea (even doing it when I was a solopreneur: https://www.harpethmarketing.com/competitive-advantage/corporate-retreat-part-1/). In fact, we had this year’s corporate retreat just last week… and I have the pages and pages of flip chart notes to prove it!

As you prepare for your retreat, I believe there are three key questions that must be asked, discussed and collectively answered by the group. They are:

December 5, 2017

5½ [behind-the-scenes] Marketing & Sales Activities You Need To Do in December

This is the time of year when many firms are thinking ahead to next year… creating their sales and marketing plans, establishing budgets, thinking about developing new products or services and so on. And you should be doing that – it’s critically important.

But, there are a number of other important – though not quite as ‘sexy’ – things you also need to be doing in the background so that those plans, budgets and products can have the most impact in the new year. This includes…

1) Analysis. Look back at your marketing & sales from the previous year. What worked and what didn’t? Go through all of your analytics, metrics, KPIs, CRM reports and so on to learn. For example… What kind of Subject Lines got the best email ‘open rates?’ What topics on your blog got the highest readership levels? What kinds of social media posts got the most likes, reposts or comments? What was your conversion rate for bids and were there any commonalities among the winners and losers?

Not doing much in the way of tracking your marketing & sales? Then use this month to set-up those basic tracking systems and use them throughout the coming year – so next December, you’ll be in a position to make smarter decisions.

November 28, 2017

Looking for Growth? Do Just One Thing Differently in 2018.

‘Tis the season! No, not the holiday season. The season for planning for next year.

Have you started yet?  Have you even started thinking about 2018?

Planning is hard work. It requires time, critical thinking and attention to detail – all at a time of year when we are often very busy. And while I genuinely believe in the value of planning, there are a large percentage of my blog readers who won’t do it.

For those who fall into that category… I’ve got your back!

November 21, 2017

Want to Be Successful at Sales? Then Change your Mindset.

I hear these kinds of statements all the time in our industry:

• “I don’t like selling.”
• “I’m no good at sales.”
• “I don’t want to sell.”

I think one of the reasons I hear those things is because of the perception of the profession of selling. Consider this… when I say the word, ‘salesman,’ what sorts of images comes to mind for you? The stereotypical used-car salesman? That guy near Disneyworld selling time shares? Or (for those of you in my generation) maybe Herb Tarlek, the radio ad salesman from the late 70’s sitcom, WKRP in Cincinnati?

I get it. No one really wants to associate with “salespeople” like that.

November 7, 2017

The 4 Reasons You’re NOT Doing Marketing & Sales

We all want to do more business development – more marketing & sales – because we know it’s important for the health of our firms. And yet we don’t.

Why is that? Why are we rarely implementing marketing & sales at a level and frequency that we wished we were? What’s holding us back?

October 30, 2017

Got something to say?

The Top 3 ways of presenting to a live audience

Delivering a live presentation to a group comprised of your target audience – and sharing your insights, perspective or expertise – can be an outstanding way to build awareness for your firm and position yourself as a Subject Matter Expert.

But not all presentation types are created equal. Let’s take a look at the most common ones…

• Presenting at a conference
• Delivering a webinar
• Hosting a paid workshop

Presenting at a Conference

There are likely scores of conferences at which you could present… and in doing so, enhance your reputation, gain exposure and benefit from the credibility of being a speaker at a well-known, established conference.

October 24, 2017

A difficult client… can they be good for business?

One of the services we offer our clients is content development… creating blog posts, eBooks, etc. We have very talented writers on our team – they know the topics and they know how to write.

We also had this one particular client who nit-picked (at least we thought so) all the time and pushed back on our writing until we got it “perfect.” Very frustrating!

Amongst ourselves, we used to frequently complain about this client… that they were just a big ol’ pain in the a**!

But, guess what? We were wrong!