Month: April 2017

I make stark raving fans.

Well, at least I try to. Sometimes it’s out of my control. But as far as it goes with me, I try my best to meet and exceed my customer’s expectations. When I am able to make customers into fans, I am able to create a base of people who want me to succeed as well as pay me. It’s a great combo.

How do I do that? I am still figuring it out, but here are some thoughts:

Deliver:
Make it happen. Everytime. Sometimes you land the plane with no sleep or in the Hudson, but you still land the plane. When it comes to delivering on a project, you need to be willing to move heaven and earth to accomplish something you said you would do. Failing to deliver is not a way to make stark raving fans.

Being willing to say: I don’t know or that I was wrong.
I make mistakes sometimes and sometimes I don’t know the best solution for my client. I am willing to refer people out to a better solution. (Most) People appreciate honesty. I tend, to be honest enough to lose business sometimes and so far it’s worked out really well.
When you make a mistake, be willing to take a hit financially as well. If I screwed something up, I am willing to take a hit financially and have. But offering your customer a discount or a refund on a mistake is treating the customer right and that is a great way to make a stark raving fan.

Answer the phone/ talk with everyone:
I love learning about other people’s businesses. Because of that and general human decency, I talk to everyone who wants to meet with me. This can be time-consuming, but you never know where the next meeting might lead.

I also answer the phone. Let me be clear when I say answer the phone, I mean I call everyone back. My phone is almost always on silent and especially during times of focus, I leave my phone out of reach so I can get some work done. So I will call all my customers back in a timely manner, every time, every day. Communication with customers is a key component of building stark raving fans.

Don’t nickel and dime people:
I quote things by the project. This pricing allows me to take care of everything people need and not has to keep coming back to them for more funding. So when I give them a price for social media content creation and management, that includes photos and video. When we build a website that includes content creation and strategy.

This also means going above and beyond the contract sometime. When it’s needed sometimes you need to do that extra thing, beyond the original scope of the project. But it is that kind of effort that can make start raving fans.

You can read part 1 of this series here and part 2 here.

 

Every chance I get to share my expertise I take it.

Click here to read part 1 in this series.

I believe strongly in the positioning as an expert branding technique. The more people who understand that I know what I am talking about when it comes to marketing the better. How do I do this? I tell them about it. This serves to purposes: 1. It puts me in front of people and expands my network. 2. It helps build my position as someone who is worth paying money for marketing.

How do I do that?

CO: communicate: I co-host a monthly event on social media at theCO with Austin Thompson of Thompson Industries (This also doubles as work toward the first portion of my marketing scheme). Each month we give away for free knowledge about how to use social media for business. While I expect none of these students to become customers, what it does is helps position me as an expert on small business social media in Jackson. This is a long term play for sure, but I believe it will pay off.

Speaking at Community Events: Anytime I am invited to speak at a function, I take it. Every chance, I get to speak on marketing or entrepreneurship, I see it as an opportunity to further grow my influence. Even if this is just to students who are looking at marketing, I dive in! You never know what will come of an opportunity you have available. Just this week some potential business came from a community event from over a year ago!

The ROI on this is hard to determine sometimes, but it is there!

That being said, if you need someone to come and talk about marketing or entrepreneurship, I would love too! Just drop me a line!

Click here to read part 3 in this series. 

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This month’s social media win comes from an unlikely source, a utility company. A utility company at first blush is not an exciting venture: generate power and delivering it to people’s homes. Most people think about a utility company about as much as they think of a long snapper in football, which is usually only when they mess up.

That is why this social post caught my attention. It was doing really well and had 158 thousand views from a video put out by a utility company. The video is a 360-degree video of a helicopter delivering someone to the top of a power structure. That lineman then climbs off the helicopter and onto the structure. It also had over 1000 shares which is a great engagement stat!

It’s pretty awesome. Watch it here. 

It led to some great comments from people who were reminded that they are glad someone else does the dirty work. Including the lineman’s mom, which is super sweet!

This is a great example of documenting instead of creating content. This shows us that even conceptually boring industries can create compelling content!

 

Great job TVA!

 

 

To be honest, the idea of writing this post seems like a bad idea. But I know that ideas are free, it is the execution costs. I invest lots of time and money into doing these and these ideas won’t work for everyone. So here is week one of my three pillars of marketing myself:

(ALSO NOTE: While some of this may make me seem pretty mercenary in my actions, this is only one of the many motivations behind my actions. Other things factor into my decision making besides business, like my faith in Christ.)

Be a Great Community Member.

It is easy to start a business and just take, take, take. But as part of my personal philosophy and part as a marketing strategy, it’s a great thing to give back to the community and to be involved.  I love it when you can kill two birds with one stone. But there are limits to what someone can do and I regularly tell people, no. Because I want to do the things I am committed to well. Here is how I work out being a great community member as I think about allocating my time:

Be a great CO Member: I love theCO. I will tell anyone who will listen that theCO is a great place. I owe a lot of my success to the referrals and relationships I have built through theCO. So because of that, I want to invest back in theCO. I teach classes, give tours, help out new members, even move tables and chairs every once in a while. The relationship I have with theCO has been beneficial for both of us and I will be ever grateful for the crucial role it has played in my success.

Be a great Chamber Member: The Chamber of Commerce in Jackson is a great organization and a great customer. This has come after lots of time invested and some dollars (member fees and event fees). By showing up to events, being an asset to their staff, and even serving on the Leadership University board, I have built relationships that have helped lead to business and referrals.

Be a great Board Member: One of the best things about being self-employed is the flexibility in schedules and priorities that if offers. This has allowed me to dedicate a good amount of time to being a great board member at Madison County CASA over the last couple of years. By taking on this responsibility and doing well at it, it has helped be build new relationships in the community.

Click here to read Part 2 and Part 3.