1. Begin with the customer in mind.
Remember, everything begins and ends with your customers. Try to imagine being them. Mentally take a stroll with them, talk to them and share their wants and frustrations. Try to feel what's going on in their minds?
2. Now, craft a solution in the form of benefits that will satisfy those wants.
Now that you've entered your potential customers' minds, can you see those wants? Can you feel how satisfying it would be if the perfect set of benefits were to be offered at the right price. Now write down those benefits.
3. Create or offer existing products or services that match those benefits.
Once you've found potential customers and determine their wants and how to satisfy them, it's time to create a product or service or find an existing product or service that will satisfy those wants. I remember my first time out, years ago, when I created a product before doing any market analysis. It was a disaster. It was too expensive to reach the market and worse of all, the price the market was willing to pay would have reduced my profit margin to near zero. I cancelled the whole project after almost a year of working on it. The lesson learned is to always begin with the customer in mind.
4. Create the sales medium and message using those benefits.
Put together a convincing message that incorporates the benefits of your product or service. Those benefits should extinguish your customers have. You don't have to oversell. There are times when customers are not aware of their wants so in those cases the marketing message should identify those wants and state that you have the solution to them. When those prospects come in contact with your sales message you could restate those wants and explain the benefits you offer.
5. Craft your marketing message and design the campaign literature.
Marketing is all about informing the market about your solution to their wants. It's not about selling; it's about providing information- useful information. The message should be the same whether you use an article, an e-book or other devices as a vehicle.
6. Alert your target audience.
There are several approaches to alerting your market but one of the most potent is to write a set of articles then contact publishers who reach the target market. If you'll be relying on online publishers it's more efficient to use an article distribution service such as www.articlemarketer.com, www.articledashboard.com and www.goarticles.com. Once you've published a series of article you may want to publish an e-book or begin using paid promotion.
7. Capture your prospects contact information using incentives.
Your prospects have become excited and interested in your offer, because you did a good job with your marketing message. Though they might be interested in your offer not everyone will commit to a purchase right away. Some people like to delay, others want to build a relationship first (just like a date) and some will be so excited by your solution they'll commit immediately. For those who won't commit on first contact with your sales letter, provide them with an incentive in exchange for their contact information via a free gift or free advice.
8. Test whether the solution to your customers wants met or exceeded expectations.
You might craft what you perceive to be the best solution- whether in the form of a product or service - for your prospective customers. But you can only be certain if you ask them. So once you get a representative sample of customers, send out a message with a series of questions asking whether your product or service satisfied their needs. One of your questions should be: if a respected friend of yours could use this product or service would you recommend it to him or her? This is an important question since a positive response means you've given your customers what they were looking for and probably more.
9. Treat your customers just as well or better than how you treat your prospects and they will take care of you.
Many marketers don't care much for their customers. Once the sale is made the only time they contact those customers on their list is when they have another item to sell them. You know those offers: Something like, since you bought xyz product I'm giving you a 50% discount, but you have only 48 hours to act before the offer expires. But do you know if these people even like your first product enough to trust your word again. Have you stayed in contact with them since the first sale? Do they even remember who you are? A few questions to ponder.
10. Repeat the process to grow your company. The second time around you should be much better at this process. Make the necessary adjustments and improvements then repeat the process.
Windsor Pennicott created the free ebooklet Power Sales And Marketing Innovations That Automatically Convert More Prospects. Get your copy at UsefulBizTips.com
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