A few days ago, I heard an advertisement for bail bonds on the radio. While I am not sure what radio station I was listening to at the time, I would expect that only a very small percent of people listening were in need of bail bonds or would be at some point in the near future. When choosing to advertise, the single most important thing to figure out is where to find your target market. The most brilliant message and offer is worthless if no one you are reaching is even a ca

In the past two weeks, three prospects have contacted me. That is a lot for me as I do not do much marketing other than networking. However, even a small amount of effort can result in new leads when people understand what you do. All three prospects came to me via referrals, and they are all a good fit with the services we provide. Why is that? Because they really understand what we do: generate leads for service businesses, primarily through Google Adwords. It is clear eno

Next week, two of my nephews have birthdays. They live in Kentucky, so we do not get to see them too often. That makes me want to get them something special, while at the same time, I do not really have a lot of insight into their current interests or wants. What should I do to get them a great gift? Get them something that I think is cool or ask them (or my brother)? This is the same situation that we run into with clients or prospects. We can try to surprise them with somet

While getting marketing projects started is important, it is equally important to know when to quit. And that is a place where many business people have a challenge. They get emotionally involved with their marketing efforts and are reluctant to stop them, even if they are not producing results. One small law firm I spoke with had spent $30k dollars on Google AdWords over 12 months and had only one lead to show for it. However, it took them a whole year to make the decision t

I just got off the phone with a prospect. This was the second time we had talked, and I knew from the start that she was unlikely to become a client (any time soon). She is just getting her business started and is still trying to fit all of the pieces together. So, we figured out some of the questions she needs to answer and she is now focused on answering those questions. The things we talked about were a good reminder of how challenging it can be to put all the right pieces

Earlier this week, I was talking with a friend, who is an expert in pay-per-click advertising. He is trying his hand at selling products on Amazon. He is purchasing products wholesale from China, shipping them to Amazon for fulfillment, and selling them through Amazon. While he is an expert in promoting products on Google and Amazon, he is new to the whole backend of sourcing and fulfilling products. He has found it challenging as he figures out what he does not know. After y

A lot of business people I meet are looking for the “magic bullet” that will change their business. They want to find the one social media tactic, the one advertising platform, or the one referral partner that can dramatically increase their business. And that is what people like to talk about: how John figured out Facebook and grew his business by 250% in one year. However, that is not the reality that I have seen working for businesses. As the saying goes, “He worked 10 lon

If you listen to the messages from most marketing automation companies (from email automation to optimizing pay-per-click results), you would think that automation makes things simple and easy to get better results. I disagree! And based on the discussion we had a couple of weeks ago in my mastermind group, other experienced marketers don’t see marketing automation as an easy solution either. Yes, they can be helpful, but only if you have the marketing fundamentals in place.