The Competitive Advantage

May 16, 2017

Content marketing stalled by writer’s block? Here’s what I did.

For the past five years, I have posted a blog once a week, virtually without fail. As a provider of content marketing services, we not only have to talk the talk… we also have to walk the walk. But after nearly 250 posts… I hit a wall. For the first time since we started Harpeth Marketing, I had writers’ block.

It’s not that I couldn’t come up with any good ideas for posts, I couldn’t come up with any ideas… period! It was truly frustrating.

May 2, 2017

Measuring Sales… it’s Not just about Revenue

In my first sales job after college (many, many, many years ago), my first Vice President once said to me, “I don’t care how many sales calls you make… as long as you hit your sales goal.”

And for him – because he was being judged on revenue – that makes perfect sense. But for the day-to-day management of salespeople, that’s a bad way to manage. Let me explain…

While the end goal is, of course, to generate revenue… it’s the steps in the process they get you there. Make no phone calls, send out no emails, deliver no capabilities presentations… and you’ll generate no revenue. So clearly, sales activity is critical to sales success!

April 18, 2017

Former Clients + Coffee = New Business Opportunities

This morning, I met a former client over a cup of coffee. Though we haven’t done business together in a couple of years, we have stayed in touch… first, because he’s a recipient of our firm’s on-going marketing efforts (emails, social media posts, etc.), and second, because we take the time for an occasional meeting over a cup of coffee (once or twice each year).

April 11, 2017

Using webinars for marketing? Follow these 4 guidelines.

Webinars can help you achieve a number of marketing objectives… building awareness for your firm, positioning you (the presenter) as a Subject Matter Expert and, of course, generating sales leads. We like webinars so much, we started our own program this year.

And as we’ve gotten into this program, we’ve learned 4 key lessons that can be helpful to anyone with webinars in their marketing & sales plan.

April 4, 2017

The 3 Cardinal Rules of Building Awareness

A simple fact: Potential buyers can’t buy from you if they don’t know you exist… or if you never come to mind for them.

So, whatever your marketing & sales plans, strategies or tactics… it all starts with being known. That is, it all starts with building awareness. Period.

March 27, 2017

7 Selling Behaviors Seller-Doers Must Employ to be Successful.

Our industry is full of sell-doers. You know, those independent consultants, owners of small firms and executives at large firms who spend part of their time serving as a sales rep for their business.

Do they want to be selling? Generally, no… but without a dedicated salesperson on their team, the responsibility falls to them.

And why don’t they want to be selling? Primarily, because they did not get into market research to sell, they got into it to do research. Selling is often a task they’re uncomfortable with, not trained for and just don’t like to do.

March 21, 2017

Why is ‘thank you’ so often ignored?

I was in Memphis this past weekend. My son-in-law, Wade (that’s him with the cheeky sign), is wrapping up medical school… and it was “Match Day.” During Match Day, graduating med students from all across the country “open their envelope” at exactly the same time to find out where they will be doing their residency.

Wade ‘matched’ in orthopedics at the Medical College of Georgia… he and my daughter are very excited. And it’s at this point that the story gets interesting.

March 14, 2017

“Why should I care?”… the question your website visitors are asking!

Your clients don’t care about what you can do… they care about what you can do for them.

We’re working with a new client who has developed a unique market research methodology. It’s really very interesting and kind of heady stuff – with a lot of science behind it. And that’s exactly how it’s described on their website. Which is fine.

In fact, that’s how most firms describe their products and services on their websites in our industry: “here’s what we do”… “and it’s really neat”… “and we’re really great at it!”

Meanwhile, your website visitors – a.k.a. potential clients – are reading that copy and asking themselves, “So what?! Why should I care?”

And they’re absolutely right… why should they care? You haven’t given them a reason to.