In 2016, network marketing based home businesses had an 80% higher success rate than regular brick and mortar businesses. Customer prospecting is the best way to achieve that success rate.
Are you struggling to pull in new clients to start the new year? Then take a look at these 12 amazing customer prospecting tips to kickstart your marketing efforts!
Set Realistic Goals
When setting up your annual projected budget, you will have an idea of how much you can project to make after prospecting potential customers. However like with any business, you don’t want to set yourself up for a major failure and go over your expenses budget.
If you project to make 10 sales of your product for every week, and it takes 25 contacts to make a sale, you are looking at 250 sales calls per week.
However, if you budget to make 20 sales per week and don’t achieve those numbers you may have to play catch up to break even in the following months.
Having the in-depth knowledge of your finances will allow you to set achievable goals for the business and not put yourself in a hole.
Create an Action Plan to Gain New Customers
Effective customer prospecting can’t start without knowing your ideal customers. Do a thorough analysis of the competition in your local area. This will give you insight into what your competitors are focusing on when marketing to prospective clients.
Piggybacking off of good ideas can make a major difference on your bottom line because you can save time tapping into a proven method that is already working.
Once you have a list of ideas that will work, putting a plan in place is the next step. You will want to incorporate a variety of marketing techniques both online and in print media.
Another helpful tip is to have your action plan available on multiple devices, including your phone and tablet. The reason for this is to make sure any changes you make on the fly will be available at a moments notice.
Your Brand Name Means Everything
One way to do around the clock customer prospecting? Have your brand name everywhere it can possibly be. Your social media accounts, business cards, any email signatures you use, anywhere you frequently communicate with people should have your business info attached to it.
If your information is everywhere from an online standpoint, potential customers will eventually check out your products and services that you have to offer. You can also give out business cards to local businesses.
When visiting the businesses it helps to have an information packet, along with small items with your brand name on them (pens are cheap and easy).
One out of the box method? Get your brand name and website advertised on your car with a car wrap. This will give your business exposure wherever you go! If you do a lot of traveling you can quickly gain business simply from driving.
Small Ads Bring a Better Return On Investment
Purchasing an online or print ad can cost a pretty penny. When you look into buying advertisements should you invest in a number of smaller ads or one big ad?
In theory, purchasing a bigger advertisement may seem like the better investment because it will be a larger print in the publication you are advertising in. However, having a number of smaller ads in more publications will be better for the long-term growth of your customer prospecting.
Here’s an example to put things in perspective:
You have 6 advertisements at a cost of $100 in 6 monthly publications, which results in half a year of advertising for your business. The other end of the spectrum has you putting a full page ad for $600 in one specific month of the publication.
Even if it is one of the most popular months to advertise in that magazine or website, you are still selling yourself short in terms of long-term brand awareness.
Attend Networking Events
One excellent way to achieve better customer prospecting is to go to local and regional events in your area. These events don’t have to necessarily be in your field of expertise (although that is a great way to learn from your peers).
When you attend an event you may have a few options for better customer prospecting at your disposal.
The first is simply be an attendee of the event. Have plenty of business cards handy! You will have the opportunity to gain new clients and may pick up a few tips from leaders in your industry.
The second option is to become a vendor at the event if it is available to you. Most trade shows will let you purchase space to set up shop for the duration of the event.
This not only can showcase your business to your peers, but also bring in customers who you may not have been able to meet or speak to simply by attending the event.
Create a Joint Venture with a Local Business
This is one customer prospecting tip that can have long-term growth of your business if done right.
Setting up a local joint venture should be beneficial for both parties involved. You both should be able to gain customers from each client base, as long as promoting is done property on both sides.
What’s a good example of this? A hotel can set up a promotional package with the local mall or shopping plaza. The package would include items that benefit the customer from both parties.
The hotel will provide room accommodations and items that can be used at the mall (gift cards, movie tickets, etc), and can display free advertising throughout the mall promoting the package, but also possibly gaining future revenue from repeat guests.
So when looking for a business to cross promote with make sure their customer base falls in line with your target customer. It doesn’t make sense to venture with a business whose client base won’t be interested in your product.
Use your Website to Grow Your Customer Base
There are a number of ways you can use your website for customer prospecting without costing an arm and a leg.
Your website should be considered the main hub for your business and brand name. It will also be smart to keep a link to your website in all of your signatures and online interactions on your social media pages.
The most common way is by creating a blog. Having a blog can gradually grow your client subscriber list which can lead to greater income down the road.
Creating an e-commerce store is another way to sell your products can produce income quickly if you have physical products that you can sell.
Your website should also have links to your social media accounts and now we will discuss how to use it for customer prospecting.
Social Media is Your Friend
Today everyone has at least a few of the four main social media accounts (Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, Instagram). Simply following accounts and making a comment or retweet here and there will not be beneficial to your customer prospecting plans.
The first thing you should do is find a groups or accounts that fall in line with your target customer base. Interacting on a daily basis will quickly grow your brand name if the groups or accounts are active.
One method that is growing? Creating videos as an add-on to your written online content. Many big-time marketers will add videos to their email as a part of your email marketing campaign.
This is an excellent way for your customers to see you in a more interactive way, and setting up a video series can quickly spread your brand name through word of mouth, while also giving you the opportunity to attach them to all of your social media accounts.
Free One on Ones
Some marketing pros may scoff at the idea of doing something for free because in their eyes you don’t see a return on your time investment. This can be a great way to gain insight into markets you normally would not be able to tap into.
If you offer a handful of free consultations to potential target customers (or repeat customers for that matter) you can show off your expertise in a 20-30 minute setting without making the meeting a sales pitch.
The customer can come away so impressed that they want to work with you in the future or recommend you to other people with positive references.
One on Ones are a great way to help a local business while also sharpening your skills in a quick presentation setting.
Host a Seminar
Creating a seminar can not only be a money maker in the short term, it can be an amazing way to bring in repeat business for months to come. When you think of a seminar you may instantly have visions of a Multi-level Marketing scam or a “flip this home and make millions!!!” meeting.
This isn’t the norm. Many industry leaders use seminars to pass on their knowledge in a particular subject, while also doing valuable customer prospecting in the process.
If you want to host a seminar it will be smart to advertise in the media (radio, magazine, newspaper if affordable), and finding a hotel in a good location so your customers don’t have a hard time getting to the seminar.
During the seminar, you will want to provide your potential customers with all the information about your business, while providing excellent knowledge and insight into ways they can use your techniques to help themselves.
The Local Media Can Be Your Friend
Having a friend in the media, whether it is print, television, or radio can be highly valuable to your customer prospecting efforts. Having a friendly and close relationship with the media can start through a referral from a mutual friend, or something that you grow organically.
When it is time for a major announcement, a radio segment on a popular local show can be a huge push to your business, as the segment may be heard by thousands of people at once.
Setting up a Q&A with callers that regularly listen to the show can be extremely beneficial in the bottom line of your business.
If you are lucky enough to have a friend on television a quick 5-minute segment can be seen by thousands of people in a number of towns, but the video may also go online and can be viewed a number of times on the website.
Hold a Contest Offering Your Services
When you have a subscriber list with a few hundred or more people, a contest is a great customer prospecting tool. One example would be to offer a free copy of a cold email template you may use when pitching prospective clients.
Another would be to offer a month of weekly phone calls to the person that generates the most email subscribers to your account through affiliate marketing.
Coming up with different ideas to increase brand awareness while also customer prospecting at the same time can quickly become a recipe for success.
You don’t want to overdo it with the contests and promotions as that will oversaturate your brand name and if you give the farm away for free why would anyone purchase your services?
Customer Prospecting Like a Boss
So let’s recap the 12 things you can do to make your customer prospecting for 2018 go off without a hitch:
- Set realistic goals for prospecting
- Create an action plan
- It’s smarter to use small ads a few times than one big ad
- Attend as many networking events and trade shows as possible
- Venture with a local business to cross-promote and gain a new client base
- Use your website as a valuable tool for online content and product selling
- Have a variety of engaging social media accounts
- Offer a few free consultations each year
- Hold a seminar to explain your business and show its value to potential clients
- Find a way to generate a local buzz through the media
- Hold affiliate marketing contests for your current customers to grow your client base.
Are you ready to kickstart your customer prospecting plans for the new year? Contact us to see how we can help you get the process started!