How do you market your services? If you’re like many small-business owners, you might try a number of things from running ads to sending out postcards to doing some online advertising. Those efforts might produce a client or two, but instead continuing to market their business, they just stop. Instead, they focus their efforts on client work, because after all, that’s what they like to do best. That’s why they started out in business. Soon, however, the work ends and these small-business owners panic when they realize they don’t have any good prospects lined up. Where will they get their next paycheck? So they start marketing all over again.
In other words, they see marketing as a one-time event to drum up business, and when they get business, they focus their efforts elsewhere until they absolutely have to market again.
Marketing Is Like Dating
To be successful, think of marketing as a process rather than a one-time event. It takes several contacts with prospects for them to remember anything about you. In fact, it’s a lot like dating.
As small-business owners, we want people to like, trust, and hire us right from the start. But that’s asking a lot. Imagine if you went on a first date with a stranger and they started talking about how much they loved you and were ready to marry you. You’d probably think that person was nuts. How could they know you were the person they wanted to spend the rest of their life with after just one date?
Prospects go through a similar process when trying to decide on a service provider to help them fix their problem. They see every business is hungry for their money – but how many of those businesses really understand their companies, their lives, and their problems? How many actually take the time to build rapport and demonstrate they understand the prospect’s key concerns, frustrations and motivations before they ask for a signed agreement?
You may think you know what’s best for your prospects, but until they convince themselves that you are the ideal choice for them, you’re just another fish in the sea.
5 Stages of the Client Buying Process
So how do prospects make purchasing decisions? There are five stages to any buying process:
- Awareness – First, your prospect realizes they have a problem that they might need to solve.
- Information Search – Next, they start gathering information to help them decide what they need to do to solve their problem, how much it might cost, what vendors are available, and so forth.
- Evaluate Options – As prospects gather information, they analyze what they’ve collected or learned to see the big picture. What are their options? What is best for them? Do they need to hire someone to help them or can they fix it themselves? How much will it cost – and is the problem big enough for them to justify the cost? Do they really want to fix the problem or is it just a minor annoyance? Do they have the time and resources to devote to this task right now? It’s usually at this stage when people start talking to vendors.
- Make Purchasing Decision – If they decide to move forward – that the problem is big enough for them to solve, that they need help solving it, and that they have the resources set aside to fix the problem now – they now pick a vendor.
- Re-Evaluation – Finally, once they’ve hired a vendor, they’ll continue to re-evaluate their purchase. Was this a good decision? Is the company meeting their expectations? Communicating with them appropriately, etc.?
By understanding where prospects are in their buying process, you can tailor your marketing message so that it’s relevant to their key concerns and frustrations – and not ask them to marry you on the first date.
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