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In some ways this is the easiest. When it comes to marketing you should definitely exercise a bit of minimalism, particularly if you are doing your own marketing. You should choose the channel that is working and focus your energies there.
Social media might be part of your marketing strategy but it is not marketing. There are many other options for marketing including email lists, B2B channels like Linked in particularly if your ideal client is a family lawyer, and focusing on your Google/SEO strategy.
"Marketing is profitably using the results of studying short term and long term needs of those who can pay for a one-time, or in most cases, a steady flow of service or product placement. " Wikipedia.
profitably - I know you have already heard it but, followers and likes do not equal sales or dollars
using the results of studying short term and long term needs - study your own data to choose one channel, then start collecting further data so that you can see which channels are working and which posts are working into the future
In the previous posts we covered getting information from your own records, about your own users, and how they came to you.
There is plenty of information out there about the many marketing options, and I have included some summaries and links in the worksheet for the specific channels you might be thinking about. The main thing I want you to understand from this blog post is - doing one channel well is better than managing four channels with the same amount of time you have to devote to the one channel.
Surely it is more complex than that?
Actually, yes it is. A proper marketing plan is more complex than what you will get if you read all of these blog posts and go through the checklist and put your strategy into place, for instance I have not touched on brand, point of difference or sales.
However 97% of the #diymarketing that I see lacks a clear direction, a clear strategy that is naturally communicating the values and personalities of the business it seeks to promote.
Business's are full of people. Even if your business only has one person, the fact that it has a person at all makes it difficult for anyone outside of your organisation to fully understand or define your business. Stop taking other people's advice on what works for your business and what your clients want, start collecting your own information. If something works, do it again and collect more data, if it doesn't work then stop doing that and try something else. Finding what works in real life for your own business is far more important than all these surveys and statistics.
While I mostly cover off the channels in the checklist, I want to say something here about word of mouth.
A word about word of mouth
The most common mistake that I hear when I am talking to people who are doing their own marketing is "My marketing happens through word of mouth", often said in defence of my question "What is your marketing plan?" If you take one thing away from this whole entire blog series I hope it is this - word of mouth does not mean that you stop marketing. Word of mouth means that you market to your previous users.
Now that might feel counter-intuitive, either because it is a waste of time (they don't need you anymore) or because they are already talking about you, right?
Well sure some of them are, but if that is what is working (word of mouth) then you should lean into that and get more of your ex-users talking about you. Why? Because marketing is as much about data as it is about technique. It is about trying something and seeing what works.
If a party has used you before then you have their email address. Start an email list. Start an email list about things that are of interest to them now.
This will remind them that you exist and keep you front of mind so that when a friend is going through a separation they might say something like "You know, when John and I split we really wanted to keep it as peaceful as possible, and we found that Rebecca really helped us to do that. I am so glad we got our agreement in writing it has really helped."
If something is working then that is what you should keep doing. So marketing to your ex-users, particularly thinking about information that is relevant to your ideal client, is where you should invest your time and strategy if most of your work is currently coming through word of mouth.
Your next step is all about the data, you can read more about that here.
If you want to get my worksheet that steps you through the above steps, and then helps you to come up with a strategy based upon the data that you collect then please complete your details below. My worksheet includes how to market if your clients are coming to you through Facebook, Instagram, Google, an existing email list or business referrers (so B2B). It also includes steps you through questions to help you to properly identify with specificity your target market, and then their needs and wants, and then some prompts to help you to keep your marketing on-message and directed to those needs and wants.
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