Feature Article

9 Ways to Make More from Your Most Valuable Marketing Asset

by: Jennifer McCay Web site

A colleague of mine recently approached me to find out how to increase her income from her small business. She's a talented designer with a portfolio full of samples from the industry she specializes in, and she has done a wide variety of work for an impressive number of marketing firms since she went out on her own.

Although her initial concern was with finding new clients, after a short discussion I realized she was overlooking her most valuable marketing asset: her current client roster. Like my colleague, if you are not marketing to your previous clients, you are very likely missing out on an important source of income.

There's gold in your current client list

Let's face it — these are folks that have already gotten past their initial fears of working with an unknown entity, have seen you in action, have learned to trust your work and know that you deliver excellent results.

Why would you simply forget about them when you have the opportunity to get in touch with these valued clients and potentially bring in a lot more business?

Here are 9 tips on how to get more business from your clients right away ...

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1. Send your current customers special offers that you don't extend to "just anyone."

Your clients are special, so treat them like royalty! Why not offer a package deal for a percentage off or give them first dibs on a new service that you know will book up fast.

One ezine publisher I know sends a newsletter only to paying customers when new products launch. In it he includes a link to a discount page that features prices lower than his twice-yearly "blowouts" to his main ezine.

2. Postcards mailed monthly or quarterly help you stay in your clients' radar.

The best thing about postcards is that they are inexpensive to produce, inexpensive to mail and your clients don't have to open an envelope to read them. You can use them as coupons or simply to announce a new service you provide.

3. Start a customer loyalty program.

Customer loyalty is a big concept thrown around by large corporations, who develop complex systems to keep customers coming back for more of what they have to offer.

The good news is, when you have a smaller client base, it's a much simpler undertaking to show your customers how much you appreciate their business. You could create a membership program just for loyal clients that gives them a break on your rates if they buy in bulk (you may already have seen one of these in action at your chiropractor's office or the local Starbuck's competitor).

Another way many businesses handle this is to send clients a card and a gift a couple times a year — say, for their birthdays and an end-of-the-year gift (unless, for example, you know for a fact that your clients celebrate Christmas, in which case you can use that holiday as your reason for giving if you so wish). I personally like non-seasonal gifts because they don't have as much to compete with, and besides, it's more fun to get gifts when you're least expecting them!

One mistake many small businesses make is to assume that gift items must be costly or will take away too much of your profit to be financially viable. I recommend that you plan ahead and find a way to include the small extra amount in your regular fees in order to be able to afford such a program gift.

When you realize that it can cost 5 times more to generate new clients than to do more work for your current client base, that small gift item begins to sound less and less pricey.

4. When you see an article that you feel a particular client could benefit from, clip it out and mail it to him or her with a brief note attached.

That's it. Even a sticky note will do in a pinch as the "stationery" for your note. Just let your clients know that you care.

5. Use your blog to mention new services you offer.

Don't have a blog yet? Not sure how to get started? Not sure what a blog even is? For starters, take a look at the Avenue East blog, which is written by yours truly. It will give you an idea of how they work; notice the (mostly) short commentary related to the main topic of the Avenue East site, links to other blogs that I recommend and the buttons that let you subscribe to my newsfeed using your favorite news readers.

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If you'd like to know more about the power of blogging, Debbie Weil's Business Blogging Starter Kit is an excellent resource. Debbie's one of the foremost blogging experts and really knows her stuff, and her kit explains the major benefits of blogging and how to get rolling smoothly.

6. Make it a point to follow up with clients about a month after your last project.

If you work with a small number of clients on a given basis, this might be as simple as adding a reminder in your calendar program to follow up a month after project completion with a brief e-mail or phone call to see if they need additional help.

If you're dealing with more than about 20 clients in the course of a year, however, this would get tedious. There are a couple ways to handle this.

a) Create an autoresponder. Autoresponders are automated services or computer programs that automatically send emails to your clients at prescheduled intervals. You have to be careful with them because you would never, ever want an autoresponder to appear to be a canned message, nor would you want to spam anyone.

However, done right, autoresponders can be invaluable follow-up tools. The main autoresponder vendors are: Get Response, AWeber and KickStartCart. I recommend AWeber if you're just starting out.

b) Rather than correspond with each client on an individual basis, you can also ...

7. Start an ezine to stay in touch on a regular basis.

An ezine is an excellent way to stay top-of-mind. If you're reading this sentence, it's working right now, now isn't it? Every issue I have received inquiries about Avenue East's services, and even though the newsletter is not limited to paying clients, it only requires writing 1 issue to speak to many, many people (some of whom are, yes, clients).

8. Not the ezine type? A print newsletter might also do the trick.

Although ezines are definitely less expensive for communicating with a large group of people, a short print newsletter updating your clients on what your company offers and providing valuable tips will keep clients coming back again and again.

9. Build follow-ups into the services you currently provide.

Let's say, for example, that you offer management consulting that focuses on employee productivity. As part of your service, you could include a "Month in Review" follow-up that has you reviewing the results your clients have achieved and determining next steps to take. Just by getting back in touch, you may find that the initial consultation was not enough, and your client wants more of your help!

If there's one key lesson to learn in all this, it's that if you aren't staying in touch with your previous clients enough, it's time to start right now. It can and will bring in more business.

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Jennifer McCay, author of The High-Concept Brand Bible, helps small business owners like you find more clients more easily using big-business tactics that really work. Sign up for her free Avenues to Marketing Success Newsletter today at AvenueEast.com

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Second Article

Take Charge Of Errant Files And Folders!

by: Brandon Doyle Web site

If you are like most people, you have hundreds of important files spread all over your hard drive. It seems that there is not a universal way of handling these files and folders. Luckily there are a few simple things that you can do to manage and organize all your work.

1. Keep it simple. If you have multiple customers/clients/patients that need extra information stored about them outside of your usual database, create a file folder for the information and use the same naming conventions on all the files. For example: You could use the first three letters of a last name followed by 01.

2. Numerical files can be sorted numerically. When dealing with numerical files, make sure to add an initial zero before the number 1 or 2. For example: If you have one file named customer10 and another file named customer1, the customer10 file is sorted first if you sort by name. This can be really annoying. However, if customer1 is renamed to customer01 it will take care of the problem.

3. The amazing Windows Run command. If you have Windows 95 or higher, you have access to the nifty run command. In our testing, the run command will open any folder or file in the Windows folder and any other folder locations specified in your Autoexec.bat. These are known as paths. Common paths are the Windows folder and system folders. Paths can also be C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office. This means that in the Run window, you can type 'excel' and Microsoft Excel will open. You can also open folders. Just type the name of the folder and it opens right up. If you type 'calc' in the Run window and press Enter; Calculator opens. Very cool! Poke around and see what else you can do with the Run command. You can access Run by clicking on Start and Run.

4. Working with Microsoft Excel spreadsheets. Speaking of Excel, it is easy to work with different sheets inside the same Workbook. Think of the Workbook as the single *.xls file. When Excel starts a new Workbook, you have Sheet1, Sheet2, and Sheet3 on the bottom of the screen. You can right click on any of these sheets and rename them to something else. Simply left clicking on the Sheet takes you to that Sheet.

5. Working with Microsoft Word Documents. It is easy to add revision remarks and page numbers to Word Documents. Revision remarks are important if you are working on a Document that needs to be seen by multiple people multiple times. For example: A small to medium project. Developers use Version numbers to track their software; the same should be done with Word Documents. To open the Header or Footer of a Word document, click on 'View | Header and Footer'. Next, click on the 'Switch between Header and Footer' button to switch between the two. Click on the 'Insert Page number' button to automatically add page numbers to the Document. (It would be embarrassing to give a technical presentation without page numbers. Your audience would lose confidence in your presentation, not to mention your word processing abilities.) Next, you can add revision remarks. Simply type 'Rev. A' below the line that has the page number OR whatever remarks you want.

6. Finally, have you ever been inside a folder and you can't find a sub-folder or a file? Well, it is very easy to get those folders and files to shape up. Click on 'View | Arrange Icons By' and choose an option. This will get those wandering folders and files to get back in line!

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Brandon Doyle www.doylesoftutah.com

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