SMART COMPANIES KNOW AND UNDERSTAND THEIR AUDIENCE

Once you recognize the need for change, you need to do something about it. Immediately!

So What Direction Are You Headed? Once you recognize the need for change, you need to do something about it, right? Otherwise, it’s of no benefit at all. But you can’t just start running down any path to victory you find. After all, what if you are heading in the wrong direction? That’s why you need understand to your targeted niche. In the world of business, that starts with knowing and understanding your audience. NICHE MATTERS A niche is the most important business asset to your company! Above anything else, the one thing you need to protect at all costs is your niche dominance. If a piece of equipment breaks down, your best employee quits, or a competitor moves in across the street, you know they can refocus, adjust and rebuild. But, if you lose your niche focus, you could lose your business. If you think like this and view your audience as the one entity, you will also make better decisions. You’ll begin to view every decision through the lens of “How will this affect my niche?” For example, if a piece of equipment breaks down and creates a subpar part or an employee is speaking to customers poorly, you can and will address it. If you don’t, these could cause you to lose your niche. A niche guides your business direction. Every business owner, understands that people are more than willing to share their opinion about a product or service. The thing you need to determined is: whose voice they are listening to. By knowing and understanding your niche, you know who to pay attention to and who you can ignore because they’re not a part of your target market. Smart companies realize that knowing their niche will save you time, effort, and money because you’re not wasting these precious resources on people who would never buy from you anyway. As Seth Godin says, “Not everyone is your customer. The key to failure is trying to please everyone.” Do You Know Who Your Niche Is? Niche marketing lets you provide customers with products and services they need. By focusing on a niche you end up having an upper hand over the competition because of your niche specific understanding with the perfect products and services. If you are lost in finding your niche give me a call: 1st we learn about your business 2nd we take your list or build you a list of potential customers 3rd we market you into those prospects and hand over to you organized, prequalified people, and companies

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SMART COMPANIES PLAN FOR CHANGE

SMART COMPANIES ANTICIPATE CHANGE

The first step smart companies, all companies need to do is recognize the need for change.   While simply recognizing that need might sound “too easy,” the truth is that there are many in the world today who have yet to take even this first step. Those smart companies take the time to assess things such as: How has my business changed in the last year? What new things am I trying? How am I growing? If you struggle to come up with answers to those questions, you’re not alone. Many businesses hold fast to this idea that doing the same things over and over again will yield different results. No you and I both know you will only get the same results you have always gotten.. So are their answers? Yes but remember it takes changing things and change is hard. It brings with it periods of uncertainty, of doubt, and it seems to inflame even the tiniest of insecurities. But, once those smart companies learned to anticipate and embrace the changes necessary to grow their businesses, they were better (and most likely bigger) for it. If your marketing has stalled out maybe its time to call Larson & Associates In Chicago we have a saying "I got a guy"  In the world of Business to Business marketing you can now say "I got a guy" . 847-991-1294 Make the call to get the marketing guy to make the changes you need, today.

Be The Guy And Sell For Profit

How do you sell, price or service? When going after new clients selling on service alone can can be a hard nut to crack. What do you or can you say that everyone else is not saying? If you don't have a really good hook, you'll be the one yanked off the stage. So is there a way to Compete on Service, Not Price?   I say yes!   Selling by service alone is hard work. What do you or what can you lead in with that everyone else is not saying? Can you pass the "So What?" test? Before you ever give your pitch or fancy Power Point presentation ask yourself So What? If it was me I and I were to tell you: I've been in business for 44 years. You would say So what? I have helped thousands of people succeed. So what? We have great team of people working here. So what? Get the point?    Now ask yourself what you want to be doing. Maybe you are happy selling for pennies on the dollar just to stay busy. If your a printer do you sell at cost just to keep the presses rolling? The problem is when you get busy they still want your low pricing and if you don't the next very hungry salesperson or company will undercut you. That is unless you are THE GUY! When you are THE GUY they will not move your competition on price alone because you are part of their team. They will stay for your knowledge. They will stay for your service. They will stay to keep you part of their team. Are you competing by selling at a lower price or are you getting deserved high profit margins?  That's a tough assignment. My answer is to ask you: What if you mixed in diagnosing and then solving customer problems as an advisor as a way to earn more sales and to differentiate yourself? And what if you grew long-term high profit sales by translating customers' needs to fulfillment from you as an advisor first and a sales person second?  Imagine educating customers to make the right decision. Can't you see yourself as the resource guy. Transforming yourself into the person they turn when they need advice.  Sure you can. The hard thing is to BE that person all the time. You have to actually put the customer 1st , all the time, every time. Do you think that might just create even more demand for your products and services? Can you imagine helping customers improve their outcomes because of you? Coming up with solutions to the problems that keep them up at night. Think of the gratitude. Think of what they will do when you say, “Yes that I can do for you!” You think they will believe you? Do you think they will need "3 quotes"? Do you think they will ask you to sharpen the pencil? No because you have become THE GUY or do you say THE GAL?   They might just start to discover new reasons to do more business with you? Are you now better than your competitors? I think you know the answer.   For instance, let's say you sell marketing services. Think about having classes to teach customers how to improve their marketing focus and in doing so makes them better and more profitable. Who do you think is the person they are going to reach out to when the hard lifting in marketing starts? You guessed it. In this case me.   You design the curriculum to teach your methods to passionate buyers everything from how to redesign their content strategy using email blasting to direct mail, to helping companies to build a multi-targeted multi-channel plan built for growth, created to get over a 38% better ROI. Consider your own business and how powerful it would be to define what your customers should know, at what pace, and why. Imagine being that close to the person who makes the decisions, and if they are already hungry to get better at what they need to do in your area of expertise? OMG! Think of the power but remember with power comes responsibility. Responsibility to do what is right for the customer even when they would or might follow you blindly.   Do you sell insurance? Is your opening line to a prospect that you to a FREE analysis of there current policy. Really? Can you get much more lame that that? You and a thousand other agents in the city want to do that. Say that and you will never be THE GUY. Let’s pretend you sell automated CRM software. You are up there doing your thing teaching customers all about the ins and outs of how to organize and run an effective sales program with CRM software. Your curriculum includes teaching customers how to write good sales letters then work the calendar for scheduled call backs. Even if you're selling products like painted canvas for needle pointing or replacement batteries for sump pumps, think about how you can bring out the educational aspects of your product, and think about how you can do this as a long term (marketing) project. Clients need continued advice and education and how they could benefit from continuous informational interactions with you. Remember education is good but don’t waste their time.  So sit down with a cup of coffee (or do you do tea) and think in terms of your business. What are the little-known facts, tricks and tips of information that you may take for granted but customers might find empowering and use? Write them down and ask yourself, "What are the three major obstacles preventing our customers from selling more to their customers? This question works for my company, you have to think of a specific question for your industry.  How can you be helping them address the challenges that from your expertise day in and day out are able to educate, help and when necessary put into action. Making Good Businesses Great and Great Businesses Even Better Should we be helping you? We know and understand business to business marketing plans weaving together. emails, direct mail, trade show, content development and blogging and how to put it all together and cement it up tight with a follow-up phone call. If you need targeted lead generation marketing help I would be happy to talk about our approach. What we do and how we do it is not for everyone.  If you want to be great or you only want to be better than great we are  YOUR GUY Larson & Associates 678 N. Eagle Land     Suite 201 Palatine IL 60067 847-991-1294 howard@larsonassociates.ws www.larsonassociates.ws