Learn how to reach more potential customers by replacing one-to-one sales and marketing activities with one-to-many sales and marketing activities.
One big question I hear over and over is 'how on earth do I find time for marketing and selling?' The challenge of running your own business is that typically you are not only the sales manager; you're also the person delivering the service to your clients.
This is something I can strongly relate to, as I struggled with it myself when I first set up my corporate training business back in 1996.
What made the biggest difference for me was replacing one-to-one sales and marketing activities with one-to-many activities.
One-to-one sales and marketing techniques are just not effective for the small business owner. You can't possibly reach all the people you need to reach, establish their needs, propose a solution, close the sale, deliver the goods and follow up effectively if you are doing it on a one-to-one basis. Trust me, that's a very fast route to burn out.
When things really started changing for me in my business was when I dropped one-to-one marketing and selling and I turned it into one-to-many marketing and selling. What this meant was that I was making offers simultaneously to large groups of people, to both attract them as prospects and then to convert them into paying customers. Without cold calling. Without time consuming face-to-face meetings.
So let me give you some examples of some one-to-one activities that you may already be doing, and show you how you can transform them into one-to-many techniques.
Going to a networking meeting where you meet one person at a time, talk to them and exchange business cards is a one-to-one technique. However, if you arrange to be the speaker at that meeting and provide practical, solution oriented content along with a clear next step and call to action at the end of your talk, you've just turned it into a one-to-many technique.
Cold calling is definitely a one-to-one prospecting technique. There are a finite number of people that you can cold call over a period of a week. Send a well crafted direct mail piece, however, and you have replaced it with a one-to-many technique.
When I started my business, I couldn't afford to hire a sales team, and I just didn't have time to prospect by phone, have the face-to-face meeting AND deliver the training (highly ironic considering my specialty was cold calling) so I started using direct mail to promote my training courses. Suddenly, instead of me having to try 6-8 times to reach the MD of a company, his secretary was calling ME to request a meeting. (This technique isn't for the faint-hearted though, and you need a cracking foundation in direct mail and copywriting techniques before you plunge in.)
Free introductory consultations is a one-to-one technique, but you can turn it into a one-to-many technique by hosting a teleconference that still enables you to connect with people, but in a group setting. I know of one coach who has built a multi six-figure business and he credits this one technique for his success.
Calling on a customer with a box of doughnuts is a one-to-one relationship technique. There are only so many customers you can see, (and only so many doughnuts you can eat!) A newsletter like this one is a one-to-many relationship building tool. For example, it takes me the same hour to write this newsletter each week whether 100 people, 1,000 people or 10,000 people read it.
And I don't have to eat a single doughnut! You do the same amount of work but your results keep increasing. And that's what gives you the edge over people who are stuck using one-to-one techniques.
The main advantage of replacing one-to-one techniques with one-to-many techniques is that you get a better return on your investment of time, because in that hour you're potentially reaching hundreds of thousands of potential prospects rather than just the one. So you need to replace your one-to-one techniques with one-to-many techniques.
If you want to grow your business exponentially and you want to be in a position where your calendar is full and you've got people knocking on the door for your services, switching from one-to-one techniques to one-to-many techniques is crucial.
Put this principle into action now! Write down all the things that you currently do to promote your business. Determine whether they are one-to-one or one-to-many techniques. Then brainstorm some creative ways that you can turn those one-to-one techniques into one-to-many techniques.
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Bernadette Doyle publishes her weekly Client Magnets newsletter for trainers, coaches, consultants, complementary therapists and solo professionals. If you want to get clients calling you instead of you calling them, then get your free tips now at www.clientmagnets.com.
(c) Bernadette Doyle, 2008.
