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Best Practices: How To Market Your Small Business Consistently When You Have NO Time

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  • On average, companies with blogs produce 67% more leads per month than those without (Source: DemandMetric)
  • 72% of customers prefer to receive promo messages via email (Source: MarketingSherpa)
  • According to an eMarketer study, the median ROI on email marketing is 122%, four times higher than any other digital marketing channel (Source: eMarketer)
  • 77% of internet users read blogs, and 79% of the US population has at least one social media profile. (Source: TechJury)

You know you need to market consistently. You have the best intentions of doing so, but you find yourself constantly distracted by the phone ringing, email piling up, invoices to send, clients to help, voicemails to return and the paper that is growing out of your desk.

What’s a busy guy or gal to do?

Here are 5 ways you can market your business consistently when you have NO time:

    1. Start your day with a marketing activity before anything else. Most folks I know start their day checking their email, which is a guaranteed productivity killer. Making the simple shift of giving attention to business development BEFORE you get sucked into meeting other people’s demands, allows you to start your day focused on growth. Whether it’s 15 minutes, 30 minutes or an hour, dedicate the first part of EVERY workday to a specific, goal-focused marketing activity and watch how new opportunities begin to unfold.

    2. Use automated email messages – It’s been said that 9 out of 10 people who visit your website will never return. Unless that is, you give them a reason to! Providing a free Problem Solving Gift available on your website (in exchange for a visitor’s name and email address) allows you to build an interest list. Stay in touch with each subscriber, learn about their needs, build a trusted relationship, gather data, pre-qualify leads, sell products & services. You can write a series of 3-5 email messages and set them up to deliver over a specified period of time to EVERY person that opts-in for your free gift. Constant Contact, iContact, and Keap are great tools for this.

    3. Schedule one day each month to create your content & pre-schedule it to deliver to your audience.  Plan your content in advance by choosing a theme for the month and then create ALL of your content around that theme. You can start with a few key ideas and then turn them into various formats (such as email newsletters, blog posts, social media posts, podcasts, etc.). If you don’t feel up to doing all of the writing yourself, hire a writer (we’ve worked with writers on Upwork for as little as $75 per article) or purchase a body of content and customize it to make it your own.

    4. Attend large industry events 2-3x per year. Each year since 2006 I have attended 2-3 large events, both to learn and prospect for clients and referrals partners. These events give me an opportunity to learn and network strategically with pre-qualified leads. (An individual who spends the time and money to attend these events demonstrates they are willing to invest in themselves and their business). The key to monetizing these interactions is to be friendly, generous, engaging and FOLLOW-UP. This formula works EVERY time! In fact, one event I attended last year landed us a new client that generated over $70,000 in new revenue!

    5. Outsource your marketing and have it done for you. Delegating your marketing to a professional that is seasoned and well qualified frees you up to focus on the work you love. Whether it’s email marketing, blog content development, blog promotion or social media marketing, when done strategically and consistently, these engagement tactics are guaranteed to generate results. Work with a Virtual Assistant or an Online Business Manager and let them take your marketing off your to-do list!

Without a doubt, you are terribly busy. But, remember the astounding statistics at the beginning of this article. The results you want in your business (more visibility, more clients and more revenue) are directly connected to how consistently you market your solutions.

If you find it a challenge to stay engaged with the people (or businesses) who need the products and services you offer, focus on ways to eliminate that challenge. You may not be able to add more hours to your day (though PLEASE let me know if you’ve figured that out), but you can make smarter decisions about how you spend your time.

What ONE shift can you make in your habits today?

Great! Now get to it!

Next Steps To Get Results:

    1. End your workday by blocking out time for the following morning. Use that time for creating awareness about your products and services. (Try marketing for an hour before opening your email too!)

    2. Think of 3 mediums that you are not now using to deliver solutions to your target market. (i.e. podcasting, blogging, email newsletter) Determine that you will start using one medium to help the people that you serve.

    3. Research 5-6 events that will help you to expand your network, connect with prospective clients in real-time, and build a stronger business. Budget to attend 1 or 2 within the next 12 months.

    4. Post a comment below to let us know which action step you will put into practice first. We love hearing from you.

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Comments

      • Sammie Mayne-Haslam says

        Hi Sydni, Oh most definitely the marketing activity as a priority. I will then look at scheduling time to create my content & pre-schedule this for the month. Last but not least I will then make a conscious effort to attend 2-3 large industry events for this year.

  5. Colette Freeman says

    Oh, Sydni! Perfect timing for me on this article. Thanks for the tips. With four kids at home, and me working from home as well, time is precious. These will help.

    • Sydni Craig-Hart says

      Thanks for the note Colette! I appreciate that. I totally understand your dilemma. None of us have limitless amounts of time to spend on marketing our business. Which of the ideas do you think you’ll tackle first?

      • Colette Freeman says

        Definitely the first princpal–do marketing first. Even if its only 5 to 10 minutes worth. You’re right about email taking up all the time. And by the time I’m done with the inbox, I’m all out of creativity.

        • Sydni Craig-Hart says

          That’s so true Colette! Email is a creativity killer for sure. One thing that will help is leaving the project on your desk the night before, so it’s the first thing you see when you get to your desk. If you can complete the task(s) without your computer, that’s even better. Give it a try for ONE week and let me know how you make out! 🙂

  6. Thomas J. Kramer, Brand Content Manager says

    OK, I must read this. I have all the knowledge, I know all the tools and then some and failure always goes back to one thing. I am inconsistent. It also does not help that I am a person that likes to learn a lot of things and so I will go gung ho on one project and then burn myself out and will step away from it for 3 months or longer. I hate myself for this. Thanks for the article.

    • Bonnie Marlewski says

      Thomas, I’ll share my secret with you that I think will help you get more consistent… OFFER to help another author promote their work. When you do that, you will make the time for marketing because you gave your word to someone else. You will be surprised by how easy it is to schedule 1 – 2 hours every day to focus on marketing and I think you will find it is actually a very creative enterprise. I am working in the marketing co-op with 6 authors now and I devoted about 2 hours each day to my Peeps (as I like to call them). The only rule is this: for every hour I spend promoting my peeps, I have to agree to spend the same amount of time promoting my own product lines. I am finding the process a lot of fun because it is like a treasure hunt, always looking for new ways to promote my peeps via press releases, blogs, cross promotions, twitter, FB, linkedIn, etc. The more I help my peeps, the more I help me and it is fun.

      I know this might sound unorthodox, but I am one of those people who always puts others first and my stuff always takes a back burner. By agreeing to promote others and making ME one of those others, I am consistently promoting all of us every day and it is working well for everyone.

      • Thomas J. Kramer, Brand Content Manager says

        Funny you should mention this Bonnie. The two challenges, I see is the energy needed to “feed it out” for lack of a better term to multiple sharing sites including bookmark sites. I have HootSuite Pro but sometimes sending it out (only 5 at a time) takes time up. I am finding HootSuite is better for listening than pushing. Over the weekend I installed an excellent plugin that pushes to 95% of the sites I want to push it to including Plurk, Instapaper, Stumbleupon and all the major and minor bookmark sites. It does it upon Publishing. It is better then what is offered in the Jetpack on Wordpres.

        So now I have broken up my marketing efforts to a longer article a week published on my self hosted wordpress blog and then I figured a way to do “status updates” shorter bursts using my wordpress but I installed a plugin where those shorter do not show up on front page but in a category or tag. (still picked up by Google search) That longer article will then be sent out to our email list through mailchimp.

        Anywho, Bonnie, I digress. Regarding promoting an author. I am one step ahead of you (well not a step ahead since you are already doing this) as I just contacted, yesterday, an author of several books and have another book in the works that is in the industry that I am promoting and I want to do a question an answer interview with her and will promote her books on our blog to the audience I already have. Since I also am an Amazon Affiliate Marketer, the win, win is perfect. She gets promoted to an audience she is trying to reach, I offer relevant content to my readers instead of always buy this or buy that and finally I make a little jingle on the commission I get from Amazon for sending people to Amazon to buy her books. (LOL) She has already responded and is all for it.

        Also on a side note, my 17 year old daughter, is writing her first novel, she had a great English Teacher that inspired her and many times wrote on her paper she could be a great writer. You know he must be good because most of her classmates did not like him because he pushed them to be better. On the other hand my daughter loved that he pushed her. She also finished the 50,000 word requirement last November for Nanowrimo even while she was taking her Honors and AP Classes. I would be lucky if I could get 500 words done. Here is the first chapter of her book. My daughter is very critical on some books that are national best sellers as she feels that the writing is poor and feels like if this is a best seller than I feel confident in my abilities to become a great writer.

        OH Yeah, I forgot once I got the distribution channels in place the way I like it. Now it gives me more time to come up with good content. Woo Hoo!

        • Bonnie Marlewski says

          Thomas, Congrats on working with the outside author. JV’s are a great way to help everyone! I once heard someone ask in an interview… how many hours a day do you watch TV? The answer was 3 hours. The next question was… are you willing to give up one of those hours to grow your business?

          When I hear people say they don’t have enough hours in the day to market their product lines, I find myself wanting to ask them the same question. It is all about balance. If you want to be a great baseball player, you better be prepared to spend a lot of hours in the batting cage and if you want to sell a lot of books, you better be prepared to set aside a couple of hours everyday (Sundays included) to make that happen.

          • Thomas J. Kramer, Brand Content Manager says

            Ha, I rarely watch any television, but when I do, it is either Period Dramas, Pride and Prejudice with Colin Firth (btw being an author you should appreciate this dude’s all time favorite book is Pride and Prejudice) Also, I go old school and watch Little House on the Prairie or the Waltons and since my wife and kids watch and cross stitch while they watch it, it makes for good content creation. (Wink!) Since I am promoting my wife’s cross stitch business. We have our patterns in Herrschners Catalog and the wholesale orders are really doing well. Cross Stitch and Authorship (books) I see a JV in the works!

  7. Bonnie Marlewski says

    Sydni, we hear from authors all the time who either don’t have the time or the skill or the interest in marketing themselves and their work. We finally decided to start a marketing co-op in which our team would do the heavy lifting each month but we would also expect each member to do their fair share for themselves and if they are going on the road, to promote other members. We are in the third month and so far, it is going much smoother than expected!! We kept the numbers low so we could focus on each individual. Our target number is 7 and we have already selected 5 outside authors plus our product line = 6. in Feb, we will add that final author and continue to expand the marketing for everyone in the co-op.

  10. Dennis Dilday, D.C. says

    Well said Sydni!

    At some level outsourcing is the only way to make it – you certainly can’t do it all in today’s complex world.

    And there are some things that you can’t NOT do – the stakes are just too high, even though, yes, they cost money.

    You write well and I appreciate your articles, thanks again.

  11. Louise Penberthy says

    Checking your e-mail first thing in the morning is second only to checking Facebook in draining your productivity.

    Starting out the day with something productive is the best way to keep yourself on track for the rest of the day.

    • Sydni Craig-Hart says

      Thanks very much for the note Louise! I completely agree re: Facebook and email. What do you typically do at the beginning of your workday to help you get off to a productive start?

  12. Terrie Gillett says

    Ha! Do work BEFORE checking emails??? Are you kidding???? Such crazy talk!

    I say that tongue in cheek because we are all so addicted to our email in-boxes – not only first thing – but every 3 minutes throughout the day. It’s a Herculean task to do otherwise.

    But I love the idea. Beginning our day with a marketing task makes such good sense; I’ll try it tomorrow.

    Thank you for your post.

    • Sydni Craig-Hart says

      Yes, Terrie! That is EXACTLy what I’m suggesting…SHOCKING I know! 🙂

      I’m thrilled that you’re going to give it a try. Please let me know how you make out tomorrow!

      Warm regards,
      Sydni

  13. Gretchen Ludwig says

    Hi Syndi,

    This is really helpful, sometimes you have to hear things a million times before implementing. Getting on the social media scheduled posts today.
    Thanks again!

    • Sydni Craig-Hart says

      Good for you Gretchen! Keep in mind, it doesn’t take as long as you think. A few minutes spent creating visibility each day can go a LONG way in developing stronger credibility with your target market. 🙂

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