Most businesses never follow up with people that have contacted them. In fact, the overwhelming majority of companies, especially small businesses, do not even follow up with a customer who has used their product or service to see if everything is alright.

Following up with clients or potential clients should be second nature in the world of business, one might think. But it simply does not work that way. Think about businesses that you buy products and services from. How many of them call you on the telephone, send you a card, email you, or have some other way of doing routine follow up. My guess is that few, if any, of the businesses that you frequent are thinking about you once the transaction is completed.

That is exactly why you can do things differently in your business. When someone new inquires about your product or service, follow up with a call or email. After they have completed a transaction with you do the same thing. If you have a recurring service, such as oil changes, haircuts or something else that falls into that category, send postcards, make calls, or send emails to remind people to use your service again. This seems that common sense and good business practice, but it just is not that common. If you sell a product, notify your customers when you come out with a new product. They just might be interested in it. You won’t know if you don’t ask.

And that brings me to my last point. Ask your customers and prospects what they want. They will tell you. When they do tell you exactly what they want, do it and they will be loyal customers forever. I left my old dry cleaners because they were extremely busy and had only one line for us to pay. If they would have asked me, I would have suggested having one line for people paying by check and cash and another for those of us on a monthly account. I now go to a cleaner that makes it easy for me to get in and out. The quality is the same, the price is the same, but the extra time I had to spend in line made me go away, forever. Don’t let this happen to you. Ask and follow up.

About the Author
Connie Ragen Green
To learn more about these and other marketing tips that will put money in your pocket visit http://www.SmallBusinessUnMarketing.com To download two free writing templates and learn how to write articles like this one to drive traffic to your website or blog visit http://www.WriteArticlesWithJeffHerring.com

When you review your marketing plan is there a connection between your brand strategy and your marketing plan?

Getting clear about your brand is one of the first steps we need to take as we develop and grow our professional services practice. But without a focused marketing plan, we certainly will not be able to realise the benefit of investing in developing our business strategy nor will we build a distinctive brand.

Here are 3 steps you can use to evaluate how brand centric your marketing plan is:

1. Bring your vision to life

As you develop your marketing plan, do you have clarity about the vision and mission for your business? With an inspiring vision that is clear and compelling, you will have a road map against which you can chart your progress in building your brand.

Ensure that your vision for your business is documented and understood by your team members and business partners. Engage them in the part they can play to bring the vision to life so that you connect their roles and accountabilities to the overall direction of the business.

Evaluate your marketing plan against your vision – does your marketing plan support the delivery of your vision? What changes do you need to make to ensure that you are on-track and bringing your vision to life?

2. Build your brand from the inside out and the outside in

Your brand is not a logo, a tag line, your marketing materials or the colour or style of font that you use. Nor is it your advertising or marketing communications plan.

Yes these are ways to express your brand, however strong brands not only embrace how you the brand owner wants to position your brand; they also embrace what your customers, consumers and potential clients think and feel about doing business with you.

As you consider your marketing plan, consider if the actions you are proposing will support or detract from your brand essence. Does your marketing plan help you build your brand in the hearts and minds of your ideal clients? Or will it leave them bemused with the actions you are taking rather than building an aligned community around your brand?

3. Chart your success

We all know the power of goals and charting our progress towards them. So why is it that we find it a challenge to determine our goals for our business?

Very often we can get consumed with day to day activities and before we know it another quarter of the year has passed.

Determining key metrics for your business, ideally on one page, so that it is easy for your recall and review each month to track your success. As you determine the key measures, make sure that they support your brand strategy.

Then review your goals every 30, 90 and 180 days using a simple traffic light system so that you know what is on track (identify these areas green) and where priority action is required (identify these areas as red).

Evaluate your marketing plan against these three steps to ensure that it is going to support you in building your brand and delivering your business strategy.

Then consider what one action you could take in the next 30 days that you demonstrably enhance your current success.

Do you want to learn more about this and similar strategies? Then join me for my no-cost branding and business development teleseminars.

Register today at: http://www.bizgrowthlive.com

Want to get started immediately? Then visit http://www.bizgrowthnews.com for immediate access to free resources, articles and audio tutorials and bring your corporate brand, employer brand and personal brand to life today!

About the Author
Krishna De is considered to be one of Europe’s leading branding, business blogging, corporate podcasting, marketing and media experts. You will find Krishna building her brand online at http://www.krishnade.com where you can also access her content rich branding and business development ezine, bringing you strategies, inspiration and tips to attract more clients in less time with less stress.

Niche Marketing, it is one of those things that is so simple that it is complex. The understanding of the niche market and the customer that fits the profile for that market is one of the main reasons why small businesses excel, yet the lack of understanding of it one of the top reasons why small businesses often fail. Many people do not understand 1. what it is or what it means and 2. the power of it when paired properly with your target customer and leveraged with the business brand.

So what is a Niche?

It is a specialized product or service for a special profile customer. i.e. a Doggie Day Care. It is a day care only for dogs and not for pets in general and the only people who could benefit from such a service are people who own dogs.

People may think to themselves, why would someone want to ‘limit themselves’ or narrowly define their market? But think of it this way.

How ‘Big’ is Your Small Number?

If you are in the clothing industry (t-shirt business) for instance think of the two ways you are likely to make money. First you could mass produce t-shirts overseas and sell them for a high mark up. Think of selling t-shirts on street corner stands in popular tourist cities and the Wal Marts across the nation. They sell for less but you can sell them in mass quantity. Or on the flip side you can sell limited edition products. Sell less shirts that market to a specific gender, race and income profile person. This is a niche.

Think of this, by our very nature, we often start small businesses with a niche in mind. Say you have worked in a certain type of corporate industry for many years and you get that entrepreneurial bug. You say to yourself, ‘The people who run this company are clueless. They are missing a big opportunity by not offering our clients XYZ service or product’. So you go off and incorporate your business and you start your business with that niche offering in mind. But then between getting sidetracked by trying to learn the business of running a business which you were totally not expecting and getting your marketing collateral and website in place, you realize that now 3 months have already passed and you haven’t even been soliciting new clients. Now you are worried that your 3-6 month savings is going to run out, so you go into panic mode and start getting goofy and desperate. You tell everyone you meet you can do the same services that your other company provided but for a cheaper price.

Yes, perhaps you can do all that stuff, but the question is: Why would you want to overwhelm yourself like that? And better yet, why would you devalue yourself at the beginning. When you offer a niche service, it means you are an expert in a specialized field, hence you are worth more. Even though capitalism is the way of the U.S. the people who are most successful in their respective niche markets did what they had a passion for doing and learned how to solve a problem. Although many businesses understand what their niche is from the beginning but the disconnect is they don’t usually understand how to position or market their niche or how to find their ‘target customer’. So instead they start expanding their business model and begin offering too many services and products that ultimately their target customers get confused and begin to compare them to the likes of their former employer or companies that have a stronger presence and credibility and store front. In order to avoid getting lost in the sauce, you have to focus on a smaller market not a larger one. You can either be the big fish in the pond or the little fish in the sea.

How Do I Figure Out My Niche?

1. Do something you love and the money will follow. Do not think of popularity of a trend or something that ‘can make a lot of money’. Do what it is you really like to do, whether it is offer one specific product or service. In the end if you truly love doing that thing, on the days you are not feeling so upbeat about business, your love for that thing you do will help to keep you inspired and motivate you to find a way to make it work out. (this is your niche)

2. Solve a Problem. Think of the problem you solve for the marketplace by offering their product or service. People don’t like to be sold, but they love to buy based on something that brings value to their livelihood or solves a problem. (this is your value add)

3. Identify who could benefit from this product or service: Detail everything about the profile of your target customer including gender, age, race, socio-economic background, the color of their shoes, whatever common things you can think of regarding your customer. (While some of these factors may vary from business to business, this more or less becomes your target or profile customer).

Note: 1, 2 and 3 essentially make you your elevator speech.

4. Wherever They Go, There You Are. Think of the places those specific customers congregate, socialize, interact. Think of the publications they read, their online and offline shopping trends and habits and start spending more time in those places. You should know as you have spent a great deal of time with this type of person. They should all be found in common places. If you are struggling be more specific about #3. (This becomes your short and long term marketing strategy).

5. Empower people. If you want to become a powerful person, you must empower others. People often think when they ‘give away’ important and valuable information or resources that people will use it ‘against them’ and they will become powerless. On the contrary, both your customers and your competitors will see you as a resource and ultimately they will build trust in you.

About the Author
Shonika Proctor is a 14 year wireless personality and creative thought leader. Support the creative economy, kill your tv and do this instead.