LEAD GENERATION is the fastest expenditure to dry out the entrepreneur’s pocket if you are not careful. I have met many business owners who have lost more in 1 year, than 3 years of salary expenses put together. The problem is, many entrepreneurs do not know what to expect from Marketing. One must first understand what it means.
Marketing is about generating leads. Leads mean that people have expressed interest, and have given you their name, and email address. They only agree to receive more information from you, but not an agreement to buy something. More conversion would be needed, from this point on, right up to the sale.
So how do you stop losing money from marketing? Let me rephrase, lead generation and marketing require investment, so I am not saying you do not have to spend money on marketing to get leads. You absolutely need to spend, in order to get more leads. Problem is, entrepreneurs are losing way more money, with poor returns! How do you stop losing money from marketing?
- Test & Sample Smaller Campaigns
When you test something, you take a small amount and try it out first. Many a time, entrepreneurs fall into the trap of not testing. They are caught up by the “good deal” offered by media companies to buy more ad space, or they are simply not clear with how the process works, like how social media ads work. Some people spend a great deal of money on building a good-looking website, that does not serve the functions they need for sales, digital marketing & operational needs. These are all linked. Test first, and measure the campaign, and if it works, invest further. That way you will not be losing such huge amounts of money.
- Generally, Understand the Process from other Entrepreneurs
It is imperative for you to hear from other business owners about running campaigns. The last thing you want to do is ONLY hearing from the service provider. Why? Service providers won’t be able to give you information that is impartial. The above-average providers might. You need to hear an unbiased and neutral view, and what you need to watch out for. Hearing other entrepreneurs, or even speaking to a business advisor or mentor, about running campaigns. You will hear the good, bad, and ugly of a marketing campaign.
- Ring-Fence and Measure Each Campaign
Some entrepreneurs do not pay enough attention to ensuring they ring-fencing their marketing results. All they care about is that the phone rings and email inquiries are coming in. But you want to know EXACTLY where they are coming from. If you do not know that, you will not know which advertisement, offer, or product are attracting prospects. This applies to both online and offline campaigns. For example, if you are sending brochures out to 10,000 houses, the cost of printing, designing, and distributing is not a small cost. Ring-fencing the brochure campaign means that you know if any positive response is from this campaign. You might need a different phone number specifically for that brochure, or encourage walk-ins to bring along the brochure for a special gift. These extra initiatives are not “nice-to-have”, it’s a “need-to-have”.
The same goes for online campaigns, but these seem easier as most online marketing tools are readily collecting data. If you execute an email campaign to 10,000 emails on a list, and on your email, you leave your phone number, website, and event registration link, firstly – this might confuse the prospect with what to do, but if inquiries come from the website, you will not know if they came from the email marketing campaign, or did a search on Google and found you.
This imperative to capture the right WHERE data, and where you continue injecting money. This sounds simple and regularly overlooked by business owners. When we build campaigns with our clients, this is an important discussion, and measuring a campaign is as important, as building a successful marketing campaign.
STOP LOSING MONEY UNNECESSARILY IN GENERATING LEADS.
This is one of many principles, but I talk much in detail on how to overcome the hurdles of an average business, in this article. Check out my article “Are You Tired of Running a Mediocre Business: Seven Success Principles that Differentiate GREAT Businesses from Mediocre Ones”
I cover these in detail accompanied with real examples and how to build profitable campaigns. Click here to find out more.
