No time for marketing? So what’s your excuse? Busy with paperwork? Troubleshooting complaints? Chasing after suppliers? If you don’t put the day-to-day stuff on the back burner and get some marketing done, you’ll be digging your business an early grave.
And it’ll be your fault.
Here are my top three ways to carve out some time for marketing in your work day.
Take a Flying Leap
First of all, you have to decide that marketing is something that you want to do. Perhaps it’s not high on your list (it should be!) and possibly you’d rather visit the dentist than actually work on a marketing plan, but marketing is part of life in business.
No two ways about it – you need to get stuck into target markets, segmentation, online marketing, offline marketing and anything else that will help you grow a successful business.
Sometimes, the hardest step is that very first one. So don’t take it. Take a flying leap instead and make time for marketing.
Think of it this way: Imagine you’re on a cliff. It’s windy, and there’s a lot of turbulence in the air. And you’re teetering on the edge.
You have three choices:
1. Go Back – take a step or two away from the edge. It’s safer there. Not nearly as potentially productive, but definitely safer.
2. Stay Where You Are – don’t move. It may not be the best place to be, what with all the gusts of wind poised to blow you over, but hey, you’ve been here for a while and at least you know where you stand.
3. Take a Flying Leap – jump off the cliff. Just do it. One of two things will happen. Either you’ll land in the sea (not so bad if you can swim) or you’ll discover you’ve got a hang glider strapped on to your back and you’ll take off. And if you start to hit the right air currents your perspective will change and you’ll really start to fly.
And taking that flying leap will have been worth it.
Change your view of marketing and you’ll find time for it. I promise.
Just Say No
Take lessons from a toddler if necessary. Learn to say no. That’s NO.
No. No. No.
No, you can’t talk to that wholesaler. No, you’re not interested in the latest gadget guaranteed to rocket your business into space. And no, you’re not spending the next hour and a half listening to your best friend’s woes.
Go Incommunicado
Do not pass go.
Do not collect $200 (in whatever currency you choose).
Do go to jail.
A little solitary confinement will do you good. What you need is the time, space and quiet to think about your business. It’s time to work on your business, not in it. So let others run things for an hour or two while you get started back at the beginning.
What’s your business about? Where do you want to be with the businesses in six months? A year? Five years? If you don’t know where you’re headed, how will you get there?
Tomorrow morning schedule a meeting with yourself. Turn off your phone, don’t bother to switch your computer on, get a pen and a pad of paper (you do still have those, don’t you?) and start brainstorming some ideas so you can jump off that cliff.
