Last week, we talked about Face Time and the importance of meeting with people in person.  I made a couple of opportunities to do so.  I met with my Business Referral Group on Wednesday and received a referral for a new website.  I will be meeting with that new client next week.  If you are located in the Grand Rapids area, I’d like to invite you to join us–all the details are on the website.

Today, I want to focus a little on Education.  Whatever the business or organization that you are marketing, you will find that your clients will probably need to be educated about your product.  There are many ways to do this, of course.

• Email or hard-copy newsletters
• Blogging
• Marketing materials
• Email
• Phone
• Coaching
• Personal meetings
• Demonstration
• Webinars
• Teleseminars

Each business will need to figure out which method works best for its niche.  For Dramatic Design, I have found hard-copy newsletters, personal meetings, coaching, and demonstration to be effective.  I will give you an example of one client that I met with this week.

We sat down over coffee at a local coffee shop and I walked her through the process of posting to her WordPress blog.  I took her step-by-step through how to add and resize photos, choose categories, and add the HTML coding for her Paypal button (which I also showed her how to create).  We talked about who her target audience was and how she could best reach them.  We talked about her Unique Selling Point (USP) and how she can use that in her marketing.

Once we had that down and she had taken her notes, I took her to a boutique that would cater to her target market.  I showed her how she could approach the store owner about carrying her product by demonstrating the sales call while she observed.

• The store owner was interested in my client’s product, but expressed concern about the wholesale cost being low enough for her, yet high enough for my client to still make a profit.
• I addressed the concern, discussing numbers between the store and client, then suggested that perhaps it could be a special-order item.
• The store owner told my client to email her some information and pricing, so she could consider it.
• I then arranged for my client to send a sample to the store, so the owner could see the quality and unique design that she has created.

This is an example of teaching by personal meeting, coaching, and demonstration.  Now, this was a very extensive example and this much coaching isn’t necessary with every client.  The key, though, is to enable your client through education.  What’s that old saying?  “Teach a man to fish….”

The wealth of information that my client has to draw from will serve her well, if she puts the education into place for her business!  (I will post her website at a later time, as she is still working through the functionality.)

My goal for this week is to educate my clients in the hard-copy newsletter that I will send out with monthly bills at the end of this week.  For my clients that prefer an emailed copy of their invoice, I will email a .pdf copy.

I’d love to hear what you are doing to market your business this week!

Online social marketing is “all the rage” (wow–do people still use that term?), but there’s a lot to be said for actually looking in someone’s eyes while talking to them and being able to shake their hand.  This week, I would like to encourage you to meet and network with people about your business face-to-face.  A lot of people feel a larger trust and attachment to people they can actually sit down with over a cup of coffee with and discuss their project.

This week, I plan on face time networking with at least one client in person and continuing to develop personal networking relationships with my colleagues at my weekly Business Referral Group.  If you don’t have a group of entrepreneurs that you get together with on a regular basis, I would encourage you to seek one out.  It has been very beneficial to me in so many ways!

I’d love to hear what you are doing to market your business this week!