It can be tempting when things start to slow down in your business to think that your customers or market is losing interest in your product or service. In our attempt to keep our business efforts growing, we might be tempted to abandon our product or try to keep adding products and services to what we offer. However, it might not be new products that we need, but simply to expand our marketing of prospects and reach new customers.
If you have taken the time to create a mission for your business and already have a marketing plan, you may feel more comfortable sticking to the plan and trusting that diligence and continued efforts will pay off. However, if you started out your business with a bang or have had good growth so far and things are starting to lull, you might want to look at your marketing. Have you gotten so involved with taken care of your current customer base or doing daily tasks that you have ceased your marketing outreach? This is incredibly common in a small business since we only have so much time in the day and we might reach a plateau, or something happens in our life to take our energy and focus away from our business and when we get back in the swing of things, we realize we haven’t added any new customers in a while.
Developing a marketing plan can help. This way you have sketched out what you plan to do and assigned dates and a schedule to follow. This way, you’ve done all the planning and organizing in advance so even when things get hectic or distracting, you can still go to the plan and complete the marketing tasks you’ve pre-scheduled. Sometimes, just acknowledging that you have not been focusing on networking, marketing or outreach and turning your focus back to these activities can be all you need to jumpstart your growth and start expanding your business again.
Also: Using the Exclamation Point in Your Marketing!!!