Twelve Simple Steps To Marketing Success
How To Get New Business in 90 Days... and keep it forever!
Wendy Evans Book Review
Another Great Day In Africa - Chapter 17
E-Book by Trevor Nel – 1996 - 2020 copyright protected
One of my greatest joys in life is meeting with those few people who truly practice what they preach. And... this week I was treated to another of those special occasions with a visit from Wendy Evans - internationally renowned marketing strategist, professional speaker and author of How To Get New Business In 90 Days.... and keep it forever!
Our 30 minute informal introductory meeting easily stretched into a two-hour mutual admiration session, as we began to realize that we had each approached our business strategizing and consulting from a very similar foundation of admired Role-Models, reading material, and practical business experience.
Which is why I had absolutely no difficulty in flying through her very easy-to-read publication and transcribe her simple pearls of wisdom for you to enjoy and apply in your own life and business.
Wendy Evans came to write her wonderful book from a desire to fully understand why she had been so successful in her sales and marketing promotions for high-profile corporate clients such as Proctor and Gamble, British Airways, Saatchi & Saatchi, Johnson & Johnson, and Thomas Cook.
For 15 years, Wendy had honed her techniques to perfection, and actually proved that they could work all over the world, with successful campaigns in Australia, Hong Kong, London, New York, Washington and South Africa.
She discovered and perfected just 12 simple steps to marketing success that, if applied consistently, could double or triple your sales through adopting a specific on-going strategy to prospect for new-business in whatever industry you’re in.
During her travels, she learnt invaluable lessons from her mentors which she shares as one-liners in her introduction. Juicy tidbits such as... “It’s not what you think the product is; it is how the buyer, the person who parts with hard-earned money, really benefits from it”.
And, a warning to impatient entrepreneurs and marketing managers... “The fact is, however, that the outside world can - and often does - take three to five years to notice that bright new product or service, assuming that there are enough funds to promote and advertise for that period”.
When I read practical insights like this, I know I have found someone that really knows the real world of business.
So many entrepreneurs and corporations never, ever, make it because they do not have the ability to hang in there!
Wendy’s practical experience continues to shine through as she warns of the importance of telephone skills. “A great deal of new business involves the telephone”.
And she has learnt that you “never sell on the first phone call... only open up the opportunity of a meeting”.
One of her mentors taught her the valuable lesson that persistence pays... “...if you make three times more new-business calls than your competitors, you are four times more successful”.
And from Saatchi’s she learnt that “the more noise you make, the more attention you get”.
That’s just her introduction... can you see why I am excited about this book?
So, let’s move on to discuss her 12 simple secrets for success in your business.
Step 1. Develop A Strategic Business Plan
Say’s Wendy: “You must have a set of goals with actions and costs for the future, a strategic plan by which to guide your business and promotional plans for your individual product or service”.
Like myself, Wendy has a high regard for Stephen Covey’s simple principle... “Begin with the end in mind”.
Her advice is for you to project yourself into your personal vision of the future. At least... to three years from today. Even better, if you project your vision through to five, ten, and even fifteen years.
How do you want your business to look at this future date?
What do you want to have achieved during this chosen period of time?
Ask yourself: What will it cost and what will it take? Because... it IS going to to take time, money and effort to achieve your dreams.
So, plan you must!
In establishing a business plan, Wendy adopts one of my favourite and proven techniques - simple SWOT analysis.
In order to lay a foundation for the future it is imperative to analyse where your business currently stands. SWOT analysis allows you to identify your key business Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats.
Wendy offers a very practical guideline template in her book which any business-person can follow. Although, in my experience, I must add that the exercise is better conducted with an outside facilitator who is not emotionally tied to the business.
Once you have a clear vision of where you want to go in the future, and absolute clarity of where you are today, you can set about strategising your overall Business Plan, your specific Marketing Plan, and your Personal Plan.
Wendy does a great job here with some more excellent analysis templates for you to follow.
You will be led into writing down clear goals with specific time frames for achievement.
You will develop action plans to meet those goals and you will learn to budget for estimated costs.
Says Wendy, “I have found one unchanging rule: whatever budget you set, it always cost twice as much”. This is true experience talking.
Another comment I enjoyed in this section is... “Most of all, it doesn’t matter what you do so long as you get out there and do something”.
Step 2. Build A Broad Base Of Prospects
Every business succeeds or fails on its ability to generate new sales prospects. Wendy describes an exciting process of gently nudging new prospects into doing business with you. She points out that building new business is much like developing relationships in our private lives. With someone you love, perhaps a family member... “We might send them a magazine cutting. Meet them at an airport. Buy them a book we found of value. Send a postcard. Remember their birthday. Invite them to our Christmas or New Year party. Without quite knowing how, we have stayed in touch because it is easy, pleasant, and rewarding. You need do no more in your nudging of prospects”.
With this system you don’t have to worry about getting a “no” because your prospects really mean “not now”. When they are ready you’ll get the business because they know you are always there when they need you.
But, the trick lies in finding enough good new prospects!
Step 3. Research Your Prospects
The very best new-business prospects should match the profiles of your “existing best clients and the best clients of your competition”.
Wendy has designed an excellent Commonality Survey to help you identify the clues you can get from your current clients that will help you identify new prospects with similar needs.
She advises that you should... “constantly research your clients, customers, and new prospects for their needs, and meet those needs before your competitors do”. Very similar to my own first simple secret of business - find out what people want or need and give it to them at an excellent price.
Two gems I enjoyed from this section were : “The prospects that are nearest you can be the richest mine of your life”, and that, if you are an established business, you should perhaps... “see how your existing products can be modified to meet a market need, rather than create totally new products for which you have no known reputation”.
Step 4. Establish A 90-Day Contact Cycle
Once you have identified who your priority new-business prospects are then you can apply Wendy’s stunning business secret - “...keep in touch regularly and relentlessly within ninety days - more often if you wish, but never let ninety days go by without contact - which is approximately sixty working days”.
I love it! It makes fantastic sense and none of your competitors will be doing it. I am absolutely convinced you will stand out as an exceptional entrepreneur with this system.
For example, let’s say you have 180 new-business prospects that you are going to contact in sixty working days. That makes just 3 new contact calls per day. It’s just so simple!
But... what if when you phone they’re not in? Don’t fret!
Wendy’s simple solution is to send a “... greeting card, a letter, a relevant PR piece or your brochure and a note saying you will be in touch again within three (or two or one) months. And do it!”
Your new prospects will love the special attention! No one else does it, so you will be very different.
Step 5. The “Single-Minded” Proposition
Can you answer a simple question for your new-business prospects? In one sentence... what do you do?
What will your product or service do for the buyer?
Wendy offers another great idea to help you work this one out.
She says to... “Imagine that you have paid for a huge highway sign at the cost of a million dollars a day. Passing motorists have one second to see your message and come and buy because of it. Now write (your message) to make that million dollars work for you”.
To enhance the value of the exercise she recommends a three-step process in finding that critical “single-minded” proposition:
Ask your clients how they benefit from your business; link the common theme as a tag-line to your company name; and test the tag-line with clients and non-clients. “If it makes sense to them, you then use it in all types of written communication”.
Wendy gives her example of a good “single-minded” proposition as being the bill-board message by an office equipment supplier which reads... “Minolta. We understand offices”.
Step 6. Look Like The Company You Want To Be
Appearances are everything! Do you want to look solid and stable, or new and exciting? It’s all in the image you convey in your office decor and written materials. This is where Wendy excels. From laying out the contents of your letter to selecting the right colors for your image, this section is essential reading for every business-person. Listen to this classic example: “The location of your wording and graphics is important. Place them on the right side of the front cover of your corporate brochure and you’re seen as powerful and long-lasting. Put the same wording or graphics on the left side and you’re seen as young, snappy and fresh”.
See what I mean? She’s hot!
Step 7. Sound Good Too
Nothing puts a potential customer off more than a poor impression over the phone. Wendy builds on this important theme of sounding good with a great section on telephone etiquette. I was particularly impressed to learn that “it makes a difference whether you listen to a caller with your right ear or left ear, believe it or not!”
If you want to evaluate complicated facts you need to hold the phone to your right ear, because it communicates to the analytical left side of your brain.
For sympathetic listening hold the phone to your left ear which communicates with the emotional right side of your brain.
Another excellent tip is to “always start with the head of any corporation with which you want to do business. You can get passed down an organisation but not up”.
Step 8. Be Consistent
Wendy warns that the secret of great marketing and prospecting is consistency. No matter how bored you might be, “never give up on your basic central message. Stay with it”.
You will be the only one regularly contacting your clients every 90 days with the same regular message.
Coca-Cola has done it for decades, so why not you?
This section also deals with the art of writing press releases and articles. “Why pay for press advertising when you can get it for free?”
Step 9. Maintain A Competitive Edge
Here Wendy discusses the importance of making effective and continuous special offers to stimulate and bring forward the decision to purchase. She has had great success with promotional offers that include the wording “two for the price of one”, or “free gift with purchase”, or “buy one get one free”.
When it comes to the art of negotiating a contract, Wendy points out that “closing the sale is often not closing the sale at all, it’s just the beginning of many such negotiations”.
In this chapter Wendy also touches on the importance of establishing win-win relationships with your clients and suppliers.
Step 10. Keep Yourself Organised
The problem of effective time management affects almost every entrepreneur I know. Wendy advises you to manage your time to meet your business plan objectives. Does whatever you are about to do help with meeting your chosen goals? She warns that your new-business contact calls are high-priority, because... “if you are not growing your business you are standing still and... if you are standing still you are going backwards”.
Step 11. Persistence Pays
As far as I am concerned, this is one of the essential ingredients of success in life and in business - PERSISTENCE! Says Wendy, “Almost anyone can put these steps into place, but not many people will keep on keeping on for days, weeks, months, years afterwards. Nothing replaces persistence. Persistence is what makes the other steps so powerful”.
She points out that... “The commitment time is a minimum of two years (in three-monthly cycles), a fairly standard time period given the the average closing-the-sale cycle is between fifteen and eighteen months”.
Wendy discovered that... “it takes around one hundred enquiries to convert five pieces of business over about a year. New business takes time”.
With persistence you can phone and/or mail three to five new business prospects per day, and come up trumps.
Five new-business prospects every day for sixty working days translates to over 300 people you are “phoning, sending cards to, faxing, following up on, and sending articles to over a three month period”.
Do this, and no one will touch you in business!
Step 12. Learn To Understand People
Wendy identifies the four main personality styles you will come across in marketing your business. The enquirers (analytical types); the aspirers (entrepreneurial types); the admirers (administrative types); and the inspirers (visionary leader types).
The trick is to understand what personality type you are, and when you understand yourself you will understand how to relate profitably with others.
Only when you can adapt your Personal Communications Style to that of your audience will you begin to transfer information about your business effectively.
In this section we learn that “we humans have three different styles of learning”. Sight (visual stimulus), sound (auditory stimulus), and feeling (emotional stimulus).
“Forty percent of people hear by seeing pictures as you talk to them” in highly visual language.
“Twenty percent respond best to auditory words” and... “forty percent of people respond to feeling words”.
A great tip from Wendy is to use all three styles together by saying: “How do you feel about my coming to see you and talking through your needs”.
If your customer can see, hear, and feel how your business can benefit them, then you are well on your way to business success.
Wendy closes her excellent production by pointing out that “it is not hard to stand out in a crowd. If you want to be a market leader in your field, it only takes common sense and good manners”.
Bibliography:
Evans, Wendy. “How to get New Business in 90 days... and keep it forever”
Revised edition. Publ. The Directors Collection.
Points To Ponder
1. It can take 3 to 5 years for the outside world to notice my product.
2. Persistence pays. Keep on keeping on.
3. Get out there and do something.
4. If I am not growing I am going backwards.
5. The average closing-the-sale cycle is between 15 to 18 months.
Ends.
(cont.) Chapter 18 - Ten Priceless Principles For Sales Success
First produced in 1996. Review Update by Trevor Nel – January 2020
This chapter from the e-Book: Another GREAT Day In Africa
Click here for the Introduction Home Page & Contents
Regards
Trevor
Trevor Nel
CEO
FOURWAYS Community Chamber of Commerce
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www.fourwayscommunitychamber.co.za/
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