The way we manage our time is one factor that can make a significant difference in our suc­cess. It can be the deciding factor between becoming a huge success or having an average life.

If you maximize the way you use your time, then you are actively lever­aging your success. Use your time wisely, and you will find that you can reach an amazing level of success. How you manage your time is far and away the most critical decision you will make in business.

One of my clients can never seem to get anything done. He is constantly putting out fires and dealing with issues that his employees have been trained to handle.

Does this sound familiar?

Sometimes my client gets frus­trated and calls me looking for advice. Recently I asked him how often this “putting out fires” happens, and he told with me “almost every day.”  I suggested that he try the following steps to managing his time better.  Maybe they will work for you, too.

Use some type of time planner. A “schedule plan­ner,” whether loose-leaf or electronic, will help you to plan for each day, week, month, and year.  Your time planner should contain a master list where you can keep track of every task, goal, and required action as it comes up. It should also contain a calendar and daily “must­ do” list. If your planner doesn’t have these things, then it’s not as useful as it should be.

Always write and use a list. Make out a detailed list of every single task you will have to complete to reach your goal. A list will allow you to think on paper. You can get organized faster with a list than you can with any other time management tool.

“A man with a watch knows what time it is. A man with two watches is never sure.” – Segal’s Law

Accept 100 percent responsibility for starting and fin­ishing your major tasks; refuse to make excuses or rationalize putting them off.  Be hard on yourself.  It will pay off.

Visualize yourself working with a sense of urgency.
Program your mind by repeating the words “Do it now!” over and over.

What are you doing to organize your most valuable asset?

Chapter 20
Scientific Advertising – A name that helps

There is great advantage in a name that tells a story. The name is usually prominently displayed. To justify the space it occupies, it should aid the advertising. Some such names are almost complete advertisements in themselves. May Breath is such a name. Cream of Wheat is another. That name alone has been worth a fortune. Other examples are Dutch Cleanser, Cuticura, Dynashine, Minute Tapioca, 3-in-one Oil, Holeproof, Alcorub, etc.

Such names may be protected, yet the name itself describes the product, so it makes a valuable display.

Other coined names are meaningless. Some examples are Kodak, Karo, Mazda, Sapolio, Vaseline, Kotex, Lux, Postum, etc. They can be protected, and long-continued advertising may give them a meaning. When this is accomplished they become very valuable. But the great majority of them never attain status.

Such names do not aid the advertising. It is very doubtful if they justify display. The service of the product, not the name, is the important thing in advertising. A vast amount of space is wasted in displaying names and pictures which tell no selling story. The tendency of modern advertising is to eliminate waste.

Other coined names signify ingredients which anyone may use. Examples are Syrup of Figs, Coconut Oil Shampoo, Tar Soap, Palmolive Soap, etc.

Such products may dominate a market if the price is reasonable, but they must to a degree meet competition. They invite substitution. They are naturally classified with other products which have like ingredients, so the price must remain in that class.

Toasted Corn Flakes and Malted Milk are examples of unfortunate names. In each of those cases one advertiser created a new demand. When the demand was created, others shared it because they could use the name. The originators depended only on a brand. It is interesting to speculate on how much more profitable a coined name might have been.

On a patented product it must be remembered that the right to a name expires with that patent. Names like Castoria, Aspirin, Shredded Wheat Biscuit, etc., have become common property.

This is a very serious point to consider. It often makes a patent an undesirable protection.

Another serious fault in coined names is frivolity. In seeking uniqueness one gets something trivial. And that is a fatal handicap in a serious product. It almost prohibits respect.

When a product must be called by a common name, the best auxiliary name is a man’s name. It is much better than a coined name, for it shows that some man is proud of his creation.

Thus the question of a name is of serious importance in laying the foundations of a new undertaking. Some names have become the chief factors in success. Some have lost for their originators four-fifths of the trade they developed.

Chapter 21
Scientific Advertising – Good business

A rapid stream ran by the writers boyhood home. The stream turned a wooden wheel and the wheel ran a mill. Under that primitive method, all but a fraction of the streams potentiality went to waste.

Then someone applied scientific methods to that stream put in a turbine and dynamos. Now, with no more water, no more power, it runs a large manufacturing plant.

We think of that steam when we see wasted advertising power. And we see it everywhere hundreds of examples. Enormous potentialities millions of circulation used to turn a mill-wheel. While others use that same power with manifold effect.

We see countless ads running year after year which we know to be unprofitable. Men spending five dollars to do what one dollar might do. Men getting back 30 percent of their cost when they might get 150 percent. And the facts could be easily proved.

We see wasted space, frivolity, clever conceits, entertainment. Costly pages filled with palaver which, if employed by a salesman, would reflect on his sanity. But those ads are always unkeyed. The money is spent blindly, merely to satisfy some advertising whim.

Not new advertisers only. Many an old advertiser has little or no idea of his advertising results. The business is growing through many efforts combined, and advertising is given its share of the credit.

An advertiser of many years standing, spending as high as $700,000 per year, told the writer he did not know whether his advertising was worth anything or not. Sometimes he thought that his business would be just as large without it.

The writer replied, I do know. Your advertising is utterly unprofitable, and I could prove it to you in one week. End an ad with an offer to pay five dollars to anyone who writes you that he read the ad through. The scarcity of replies will amaze you.

Think what a confession that millions of dollars being spent without knowledge of results. Such a policy applied to all factors in a business would bring ruin in short order.

You see other ads which you may not like as well. They may seem crowded or verbose. They are not attractive to you, for you are seeking something to admire, something to entertain. But you will note that those ads are keyed. The probability is that out of scores of traced ads the type which you see has paid the best.

Many other ads which are not keyed now were keyed at the beginning. They are based on known statistics. They won on a small scale before they ever ran on large scale. Those advertisers are utilizing their enormous powers in full.

Advertising is prima facie evidence that the man who pays believes that advertising is good. It has brought great results to others, it must be good for him. So he takes it like some secret tonic which others have endorsed. If the business thrives, the tonic gets credit. Otherwise, the failure is due to fate.

That seems almost unbelievable. Even a storekeeper who inserts a twenty-dollar ad knows whether it pays or not. Every line of a big store’s ad is charged to the proper department. And every inch used must the next day justify its cost.

Yet most national advertising is done without justification. It is merely presumed to pay. A little test might show a way to multiply returns.

Such methods, still so prevalent, are not very far from their end. The advertising men who practice them see the writing on the wall. The time is fast coming when men who spend money are going to know what they get. Good business and efficiency will be applied to advertising. Men and methods will be measured by the known returns, and only competent men can survive.

Only one hour ago an old advertising man said to the writer, “The day for our type is done. Bunk has lost its power. Sophistry is being displaced by actuality. And I tremble at the trend.”

So do hundreds tremble. Enormous advertising is being done along scientific lines. Its success is common knowledge. Advertisers along other lines will not much longer be content.

We who can meet the test welcome these changed conditions. Advertisers will multiply when they see that advertising can be safe and sure. Small expenditures made on a guess will grow to big ones on a certainty. Our line of business will be finer, cleaner, when the gamble is removed. And we shall be prouder of it when we are judged on merit

There you have it.

The secrets to successful marketing and advertising.

Now I highly suggest you print out all the chapters and read them at least 10 times over the next 12 months.

Each time you read Scientific Advertising you’ll pick up one more idea, and it could very well be the ideas that changes everything in your life.

To your continued success
Sandy Barris

Chapter 15
Scientific Advertising — Test campaigns

Almost any questions can be answered, cheaply, quickly and finally, by a test campaign. And that’s the way to answer them not by arguments around a table. Go to the court of last resort the buyers of your product.

On every new project there comes up the question of selling that article profitably. You and your friends may like it, but the majority may not. Some rival product may be better liked or cheaper. It may be strongly entrenched. The users won away from it may cost too much to get.

People may buy and not repeat. The article may last too long. It may appeal to a small percentage, so most of your advertising goes to waste.

There are many surprises in advertising. A project you will laugh at may make a great success. A project you are sure of may fall down. All because tastes differ so. None of us know enough peoples desires to get an average viewpoint.

In the old days, advertisers ventured on their own opinions. The few guessed right, the many wrong. Those were the times of advertising disaster. Even those who succeeded came close to the verge before the tide is turned. They did not know their cost per customer or their sale per customer. The cost of selling might take a long time to come back. Often it never came back.

Now we let the thousands decide what the millions will do. We make a small venture, and watch cost and result. When we learn what a thousand customers cost, we know almost exactly what a million will cost. When we learn what they buy, we know what a million will buy.

We establish averages on a small scale, and those averages always hold. We know our cost, we know our sale, we know our profit or our loss. We know how soon our cost comes back. Before we spread out, we prove our undertaking absolutely safe. So there are today no advertising disasters piloted by men who know.

Perhaps we try out our project in four or five towns. We may use a sample offer or a free package to get users started quickly. We learn in this way the cost per customer started. Then we wait and see if users buy those samples. If they do, will they continue? How much will they buy? How long does it take for the profit to return our cost of selling?

A test like this may cost $3,000 to $5,000. It is not all lost, even when the product proves unpopular. Some sales are made. Nearly every test will in time bring back the entire cost.

Sometimes we find that the cost of the advertising comes back before the bills are due. That means that the product can be advertised without investment. Many a great advertiser has been built up without any cost whatever beyond immediate receipts. That is an ideal situation.

On another product it may take three months to bring back the cost with a profit. But one is sure of his profit in that time. When he spreads out he must finance accordingly.

Think what this means. A man has what he considers an advertising possibility. But national advertising looks so big and expensive that he dare not undertake it.

Now he presents it in a few average towns, at a very moderate cost. With almost no risk whatever. From the few thousand he learns what the millions will do. Then he acts accordingly. If he then branches he knows to a certainty just what his results will be.

He is playing on the safe side of a hundred to one shot. If the article is successful, it may make him millions. If he is mistaken about it, the loss is a trifle.

These are facts we desire to emphasize and spread. All our largest accounts are now built in this way, from very small beginnings. When businessmen realize that this can be done, hundreds of others will do it. For countless fortune-earners now lie dormant.

The largest advertiser in the world makes a business of starting such projects. One by one he finds out winners. Now he has twenty-six, and together they earn many millions yearly.

These test campaigns have other purposes. They answer countless questions which arise in business.

A large food advertiser felt that his product would be more popular in another form. He and all his advisers were certain about it. They were willing to act on this supposition without consulting the consumers, but wiser advice prevailed.

He inserted an ad in a few towns with a coupon, good at any store for a package of the new-style product. Then he wrote to the users about it. They were almost unanimous in their disapproval.

Later the same product was suggested in still another form. The previous verdict made the change look dubious. The advertiser hardly thought a test to be worthwhile. But he submitted the question to a few thousand women in a similar way and 91 percent voted for it. Now he has a unique product which promises to largely increase his sales.

These tests cost about $1,000 each. The first one saved him a very costly mistake. The second will probably bring him large profits.

Then we try test campaigns to try out new methods on advertising already successful. Thus we constantly seek for better methods, without interrupting plans already proved out.

In five years for one food advertiser we tried out over fifty separate plans. Every little while we found an improvement, so the results of our advertising constantly grew. At the end of five years we found the best plan of all. It reduced our cost of selling by 75 percent. That is, it was four times more effective than the best plan used before.

That is what mail order advertisers do – try out plan after plan to constantly reduce the cost. Why should any general advertiser be less business-like and careful?

Another service of the test campaign is this: An advertiser is doing mediocre advertising. A skilled advertising agent feels that he can greatly increase results. The advertiser is doubtful. He is doing fairly well. He has alliances which he hesitates to break. So he is inclined to let well enough alone.

Now the question can be submitted to the verdict of a test. The new agent may take a few towns, without interfering with the general campaign. Then compare his results with the general results and prove his greater skill.

Plausible arguments are easy in this line. One man after another comes to an advertiser to claim superior knowledge or ability. It is hard to decide, and decisions may be wrong.

Now actual figures gained at a small cost can settle the question definitely. The advertiser makes no commitment. It is like saying to a salesman, “Go out for a week and prove.” A large percentage of all the advertising done would change hands if this method were applied.

Again we come back to scientific advertising. Suppose a chemist would say in an arbitrary way that this compound was best, or that better. You would little respect his opinion. He makes tests – sometimes hundreds of tests – to actually know which is best. He will never state a supposition before he has proved it. How long before advertisers in general will apply that exactness to advertising?

Chapter 16
Scientific Advertising – Leaning on dealers

We cannot depend much in most lines on the active help of jobbers or of dealers. They are busy. They have many lines to consider. The profit on advertised lines is not generally large. And an advertised article is apt to be sold at cut prices.

The average dealer does what you would do. He exerts himself on brands of his own, if at all. Not on another mans brand.

The dealers will often try to make you think otherwise. He will ask some aid or concession on the ground of extra effort. Advertisers often give extra discounts. Or they make loading offers—perhaps one case free in ten—in the belief that loaded dealers will make extra efforts.

This may be so in rare lines, but not generally. And the efforts if made do not usually increase the total sales. They merely swing trade from one store to another.

On most lines, making a sale without making a convert does not count for much. Sales made by conviction by advertising are likely to bring permanent customers. People who buy through casual recommendations do not often stick. Next time someone else gives other advice.

Revenue which belongs to the advertiser is often given away without adequate return. These discounts and gifts could be far better spent in securing new customers.

Free goods must be sold, and by your efforts usually. One extra case with ten means that advertising must sell ten percent more to bring you the same return. The dealer would probably buy just as much if you let him buy as convenient.

Much money is often frittered away on other forms of dealer help. Perhaps on window or store displays. A window display, acting as a reminder, may bring to one dealer a lions share of the trade. Yet it may not increase your total sales at all.

Those are facts to find out. Try one town in one way, one in another. Compare total sales in those towns. In many lines such tests will show that costly displays are worthless. A growing number of experienced advertisers spend no money on displays.

This is all in line of general publicity, so popular long ago. Casting bread upon the waters and hoping for its return. Most advertising was of that sort twenty years ago.

Now we put things to the test. We compare cost and result on every form of expenditure. It is very easily done. Very many costly wastes are eliminated by this modern process.

Scientific advertising has altered many old plans and conceptions. It has proved many long established methods to be folly. And why should we not apply to these things the same criterion we apply to other forms of selling? Or to manufacturing costs?

Your object in all advertising is to buy new customers at a price which pays a profit. You have no interest in centering trade at any particular store. Learn what your consumers cost and what they buy. If they cost you one dollar each, figure that every wasted dollar costs you a possible customer.

Your business will be built in that way, not by dealer help. You must do your own selling, make your own success. Be content if dealers fill the orders that you bring. Eliminate your wastes. Spend all your ammunition where it counts for most.

Chapter 17
Scientific Advertising — Individuality

A person who desires to make an impression must stand out in some way from the masses and in a pleasing way. Being eccentric, being abnormal is not a distinction to covet. But doing admirable things in a different way gives one a great advantage.

So with salesmen, in person or in print. There is uniqueness which belittles and arouses resentment. There is refreshing uniqueness which enhances, which we welcome and remember. Fortunate is the salesman who has it.

We try to give each advertiser a becoming style. We make him distinctive, perhaps not in appearance, but in manner and in tone. He is given an individuality best suited to the people he addresses.

One man appears rugged and honest in a line where rugged honesty counts. One may be a good fellow where choice is a matter of favor. In other lines the man stands out by impressing himself as an authority.

We have already cited a case where a woman made a great success in selling clothing to girls, solely through a created personality which won.

That’s why we have signed ads sometimes – to give them a personal authority. A man is talking—a man who takes pride in his accomplishments—not a “soulless corporation.” Whenever possible we introduce a personality into our ads. By making a man famous we make his product famous. When we claim an improvement, naming the man who made it adds effect.

Then we take care not to change an individuality which has proved appealing. Before a man writes a new ad on that line, he gets into the spirit adopted by the advertiser. He plays a part as an actor plays it.

In successful advertising great pains are taken to never change our tone. That which won so many is probably the best way to win others. Then people come to know us. We build on that acquaintance rather than introduce a stranger in guise. People do not know us by name alone, but by looks and mannerisms. Appearing different every time we meet never builds up confidence.

Then we don’t want people to think that salesmanship is made to order. That our appeals are created, studied, artificial. They must seem to come from the heart, and the same heart always, save where a wrong tack forces a complete change.

There are winning personalities in ads as well as people. To some we are glad to listen, others bore us. Some are refreshing, some commonplace. Some inspire confidence, some caution.

To create the right individuality is a supreme accomplishment. Then an advertisers growing reputation on that line brings him ever-increasing prestige. Never weary of that part. Remember that a change in our characteristics would compel our best friends to get acquainted all over.

Chapter 18
Scientific Advertising – Negative advertising

To attack a rival is never good advertising. Don’t point out others’ faults. It is not permitted in the best mediums. It is never good policy. The selfish purpose is apparent. It looks unfair, not sporty. If you abhor knockers, always appear a good fellow.

Show a bright side, the happy and attractive side, not the dark and uninviting side of things. Show beauty, not homeliness; health, not sickness. Don’t show the wrinkles you propose to remove, but the face as it will appear. Your customers know all about wrinkles.

In advertising a dentifrice, show pretty teeth, not bad teeth. Talk of coming good conditions, not conditions which exist. In advertising clothes, picture well-dressed people, not the shabby. Picture successful men, not failures, when you advertise a business course. Picture what others wish to be, not what they may be now.

We are attracted by sunshine, beauty, happiness, health, success. Then point the way to them, not the way out of the opposite.

Picture envied people, not the envious.

Tell people what to do, not what to avoid.

Make your every ad breath good cheer. We always dodge a Lugubrious Blue. Assume that people will do what you ask. Say, “Send now for this sample.” Don’t say, “Why do you neglect this offer?” That suggests that people are neglecting. Invite them to follow the crowd.

Compare the results of two ads, one negative, one positive. One presenting the dark side, one the bright side. One warning, the other inviting. You will be surprised. You will find that the positive ad out pulls the other four to one, if you have our experience.

The “Before and after taking” ads are follies of the past. They never had a place save with the afflicted. Never let their memory lead you to picture the gloomy side of things.

Chapter 19
Scientific Advertising – Letter writing

This is another phase of advertising which all of us have to consider. It enters, or should enter, into all campaigns. Every businessman receives a large number of circular letters. Most of them go direct to the wastebasket. But he acts on others, and others are filed for reference.

Analyze those letters. The ones you act on or the ones you keep have a headline which attracted your interest. At a glance they offer something that you want, something you may wish to know.

Remember that point in all advertising.

A certain buyer spends $50,000,000 per year. Every letter, every circular which comes to his desk gets its deserved attention. He wants information on the lines he buys.

But we have often watched him. In one minute a score of letters may drop into the wastebasket. Then one is laid aside. That is something to consider at once. Another is filed under the heading “Varnish.” And later when he buys varnish that letter will turn up.

That buyer won several prizes by articles on good buying. His articles were based on information. Yet the great masses of matter which came to him never got more than a glance.

The same principles apply to all advertising. Letter writers overlook them just as advertisers do. They fail to get the right attention. They fail to tell what buyers wish to know.

One magazine sends out millions of letters annually. Some to get subscriptions, some to sell books. Before the publisher sends out five million letters he puts a few thousands to test. He may try twenty-five letters, each with a thousand prospects. He learns what results will cost. Perhaps the plan is abandoned because it appears unprofitable. If not, the letter which pays best is the letter that he uses.

Just as men are doing now in all scientific advertising.

Mail order advertisers do likewise. They test their letters as they test their ads. A general letter is never used until it proves itself best among many actual returns.

Letter writing has much to do with advertising. Letters to inquirers, follow-up letters. Wherever possible they should be tested. Where that is not possible, they should be based on knowledge gained by tests.

We find the same difference in letters as in ads. Some get action, some do not. Some complete a sale, some forfeit the impression gained. These are letters, going usually to half-made converts, that are tremendously important.

Experience generally shows that a two-cent letter gets no more attention than a one-cent letter. Fine stationery no more than poor stationery. The whole appeal lies in the matter.

It has been found that fine stationery and pamphlets lessen the effect. They indicate an effort to sell on other lines than merit. That has the same effect in letters as in ads.

A letter which goes to an inquirer is like a salesman going to an interested prospect. You know what created that interest. Then follow it up along that line, not on some different argument. Complete the impression already created. Don’t undertake another guess.

In a letter as in ads, the great point is to get immediate action. People are naturally dilatory. They postpone, and a postponed action is too often forgotten.

Do something if possible to get immediate action. Offer some inducement for it. Or tell what delay may cost. Note how many successful selling letters place a limit on an offer. It expires on a certain date. That is all done to get prompt decision, to overcome the tendency to delay.

A mail order advertiser offered a catalog. The inquirer might send for three or four similar catalogs. He had that competition in making a sale.
So he wrote a letter when he sent his catalog, and enclosed a personal card. He said, “You are a new customer, and we want to make you welcome. So when you send your order please enclose this card. The writer wants to see that you get a gift with order – something you can keep.”

With an old customer he gave some other reason for the gift. The offer aroused curiosity. It gave preference to his catalog. Without some compelling reason for ordering elsewhere, the woman sent the order to him. The gift paid for itself several times over by bringing larger sales per catalog.

The ways for getting action are many. Rarely can one way be applied to two lines. But the principles are universal. Strike while the iron is hot. Get a decision then. Have it followed by prompt action when you can.

You can afford to pay for prompt action rather than lose by delay. One advertiser induced hundreds of thousands of women to buy six packages of his product and send him the trademarks, to secure a premium offer good only for one week.

There you have it. The secrets to successful marketing and advertising
Check back soon as we reveal chapters 20-21

Psychologists have proven that everybody holds a constant, ongoing conversation with himself or her­self in his/her own head.

These silent conversations are always being interrupted by distractions: the phone rings, someone walks by the door, the kids are fighting, dogs bark, etc.

The point here is that, if you want to get someone’s attention, then you have to create an inter­ruption in his/her “self talk.”

In fact, you have to keep on interrupting them, until you get their total attention.

Your  marketing effort has to stop a prospect right then and there.

If your headline and offer doesn’t get them to pull out their credit card immediately, then likely you have lost the sale.

You have to capture the full attention of a prospect or you will lose the opportunity to make any future profits from him/her.

If someone sets aside your marketing messge without taking any action, (“I’ll save it and get back to it later”) then chances are slim that they will ever see or hear or respond to it ever.

It may get tossed into a save folder, or covered up by other papers or by something else. Eventually finding its way into the trash.

Advertising and marketing are extreme interruptions in most people’s life, so your headline and offer has to get deep into a person’s silent thoughts.

You want your prospect to think silently to him/herself, “I’ve got to know more about this prod­uct/service now.” If your message doesn’t do this, then your marketing effort or headline or offer is ineffective.

Perhaps your prospect doesn’t want what you are selling, or perhaps they simply can’t afford your prod­ucts/services.

Either way their silent, personal, internal conversation will make the final decision. It is up to you to stop them dead in their tracks, make your best offer, and persuade them to make a positive decision—NOW!

What silent “conversations” are your prospects having about your products/ services?

How can you make sure that those conversations are positive?

In 1973, I had some friends who started a rock and roll band and wrote the line above for a song with the same title. The line has stuck with me forever. I may be the only person on Earth who has a cassette recording of that song. But it makes a good point.

As far back as I can remember, my parents and teachers tried to teach me over and over again to be humble, to not brag or boast. I didn’t listen. I have been called egotistical, arrogant, and several other unflattering things in my life. I always make it a point to say thank you to the person that does this name-calling. To quote Will Rogers: If you done it, ain’t bragging.

The point I want to make here is that I don’t understand why people won’t tell the world about their accomplishments. It’s not wrong to be proud, if you’ve produced something good! In fact, it’s very positive behavior to tell about your accomplishments. It helps prepare you to try other things in life. For example, when your marketing effort proves successful, then you will be more likely to try something else.

Optimism, and egotism, will help you to get over the barriers that may appear to be blocking your path to success. Your ego helps raise your self-esteem, and the higher your self-esteem rises, the better you will feel about what you are doing. You may also find that the more confident you feel about yourself, the more confidence other people will have in you. This can lead to greater accomplishments in your life.

It’s vitally important that you believe you can achieve your goals. If you truly believe, then you will not let anyone or anything stand in your way. To act in this way takes a strong ego, and so you need to work to develop and strengthen your ego.

How strongly do you feel that both you and your business will be successful?

The only one who really knows the answer is your former client.

So, why don’t you ask this person why s/he no longer buys from your company? You might get lucky and find a client who is prepared to talk, but keep in mind that s/he has moved on and may not want to talk to you.

Also, your customer probably will give you only one reason, then thank you for your efforts and wish you well.

How much have you learned? Not much at all.

Recently, I lost a client for whom I had created a suc­cessful direct-mail campaign. This marketing effort had produced a nice 1,148.85% Return on Investment (ROI).

Later, I found out from my client she was upset with the slow response that she was getting from me regarding a marketing questionnaire for which she had paid. After answering the questions, my client wanted her market­ing analysis, but we just couldn’t seem to find a mutually convenient time to get together.

Ultimately, I gave her a refund on the questionnaire and we parted friends.

However, to this day I feel that there had to be some­thing more. Maybe there was a hidden “decision-maker,” someone else who had a final say about who my client does business with or who harbored some ill feeling. I felt very bad when I lost my client because I was hoping that there would be a long and profitable relationship for both of us.

Sometimes it’s hard to pinpoint the definite reason why someone chooses to stop giving you his/her busi­ness.

It can be hard to determine what complaints s/he had about you that led to the decision. Oftentimes, you are left with very little information. Working backwards to discover what went wrong can be very difficult.

However, if you are prepared to ask a new client for a lit­tle time after the first sale or, even better, after s/he has been buying from you for awhile, then you probably can determine the things that keep him or her coming back and buying from you.

After the relationship with your client gets past the new phase and is “long-term,” ask him/her why you get his/her business. There will be many reasons, not just one or two. You may have to probe a little, so ask some open-ended questions. I’m sure that it will be worth it.

Build a file or a database of the answers that you get—the reasons why your clients came to you, of course, but also (if possible) the reasons that they stopped using your competition.

Learn from their answers and discover what you can do to prevent clients from going somewhere else. You can benefit by using what you have learned with your next prospect. This information will help you to convert him or her into a new client.

What are you willing to ask your clients about?

It’s a recognized fact that most people get much more done when they have someone motivating them, than they will on their own (sometimes a LOT more).

This is very true with marketing. I have to keep calling and bug­ging some of my clients to get them to do anything. They get hung up on the daily tasks of running their business. They are constantly putting out fires, and so their mar­keting efforts end up on the back burner.

“Don’t fall before you’re pushed.”
- English Proverb

Failing to allocate specific time for marketing (i.e. the daily grind of running a business) seems to prevent many business owners I know from taking the actions that are necessary to market and grow their business in a consistent way.

A trick to keeping on track is to set aside one-hour per day to work on your marketing (and nothing else). Use this time to look for “cost effective” ways to generate new prospects or to develop strategies for increasing sales to your existing customers.  If you have trouble doing this on your own, then find someone who will hold you accountable.

Most of the time, a little external “push” or “kick-in­the-butt” from somebody who is close to a business owner does wonders to get the ball rolling.

“Few things in the world are more powerful than a positive push. A smile. A word of optimism and hope. A “you can do it” when things are tough.”
- Richard M. DeVos

An outside expert can motivate, persuade, urge, and inspire you to levels that you may have never known before. This is very important, because once you get the energy flow­ing, you will find that new ideas come from many differ­ent places.

Find an advisor whom you trust to keep you motivated and on track toward reaching your business goals. This should be someone who is willing (and has the “authority”) to get you moving. If you need someone to help motivate you, give me a call. I will be happy to give you a motivational push.

Do you have someone who is helping you to stay focused, on track, and motivated?

You lose it.

It’s gone, forgotten!

And all it takes is 21 days.

I heard this long ago.

Since then, I have proven it to myself through personal experience.

It’s easy to for­get what you have just read, listened to, or watched on a DVD or the Internet. There are many distractions in life, and it’s very easy to put things aside.

Last week, I received a quote in an e-mail that said,

“Knowledge that’s not being used is like having no knowledge at all.”

If this is true, then it is important to start using what you are learning from these and other blog posts right away.

Try one idea, and then another.

Take notes as a reminder of the ideas and concepts.

Reread these blog posts and the notes that you’ve taken while reading them until the ideas are fixed permanently in your mem­ory.

Jay Abraham, the author of Getting Everything You Can Out of All You’ve Got (Truman-Tally, 2000), says that he has read Scientific Advertising—a self-published book by Claude Hopkins first issued more than 50 years ago— at least 30-40 times. According to Jay, he pulls out a new nugget or different spin on an idea each time that he reads Hopkins’ book.

How much of what you told yourself you should be trying have you forgotten this week?

Sandy publishes a wide variety of tidbits about marketing and marketing plans on a frequent basis here and at: http://www.FastMarketingPlan.com

An “Entrepreneur’s Toolbox” includes things that must be within the prospective entrepreneur’s very person but also; external tools.

First, let’s cover what you — the prospective entrepreneur — must have within yourself, in order to have a productive future.

First-and-foremost, “vision” is an absolute must.

The most successful visionaries normally have a very big picture of where it is that they want to be. (It is easier to scale back to a more practical  – and smaller — overall vision than it is to open your mind to a larger vision; once you have set your mind to something small and simple).

Secondly, you must possess plenty of “Self-Trust”.

Many speak of “innovation” as part of the ideal entrepreneur’s mind. Well, without belief in your ideas and the inner trust in yourself that what you wish to provide is needed in the world, your ability to innovate means nothing!

And, last (certainly not least) an entrepreneur must have a bit of “Intuition“. And, despite some of the ideas that the term ‘intuition’ may bring to mind, the sort of intuition that I am referring to is simply: “Knowing something without knowing how you know it“.

And, while it seems to be an in-borne quality, intuition can be developed.

The purpose of this article is to show you the external tools that can develop your intuition — as well as your vision and self-trust — to its fullest potential; in order to cut your costs and to increase your overall efficiency!

A proper business and marketing plan, devised by an outside, expert source; can help you to avoid the mistakes that many make. (Passion and drive are great qualities but, sometimes they get in the way of the bottom line!).

When it comes to your marketing, it is important to be aggressive but also, to be sure that you aren’t aggressive to the point that you trap yourself into one course of action.

Also, you don’t want to ‘burn yourself out at both ends’. So, a well-tuned Marketing Plan is absolutely crucial. To go along with that marketing plan, it is positively a must to possess a detailed, easy-to-use Marketing Calendar.

As covered in one of our other informational articles, a marketing calendar can also help you to be sure that personnel staffing, budgeting and foresight are already taken care of; with little work coming from you! Therefore, you save money, can dedicate your time to more constructive things than worrying and, have that overall satisfying feeling of stability.

A Budget Plan is very important, alone. And, while it is fine-tuned and worked-around (as well as made to be flexible) within your marketing plan (and calendar), having a realistic, organized and easy-to-monitor budget plan is an absolute must. And, just like your other external tools, a budget that is designed for your particular business and reviewed by objective experts increases the odds of your business being a success.

Just like your Marketing Plan, your overall Business Plan should contain “what if” strategies.

No matter your foresight or intuition, you can never be completely certain what emergencies may come up; nor, can you always correctly predict what you competition is going to do.

Put simply, our Business and Marketing Plans must be very flexible and objective. Being “fixed” in your planning can lead you to failure; in fact, it normally does, for most!

A Strategic Investment Plan is something that you must have ready when beginning your career as an entrepreneur.

While you may know exactly what you wish to invest in and when, just like the tools covered above, you must have plenty of flexibility in terms of your investment planning.

What your competitors do, things that happen in the economy and possible failures of past marketing are all things that may play into your needing a flexible and objective strategic investment plan. And, a common mistake that many make is grouping their investment plan in with their budget plan. When you put some thought into those two things, it becomes apparent that they need to be separate; or else you wind up with too many important factors compartmentalized into one category!

Also, depending on your business, you may be thinking more locally than Globally. Well, the right Marketing Company takes things like this into account from the very start. If you consider yourself as an aspiring entrepreneur (or if you are already an entrepreneur looking to increase his success) we have plenty of essential and proven tools that can help you along your way!

Many businesses complain that their Web sites do not generate enough contacts and sales leads to justify the cost. They want a better ROI for their Web sites.

We were also getting very frustrated because our Web site was generating very little e-mail and/or phone contact information. After testing a few different web design ideas, and finally decided to insert a bright, attractive, attention getting box on each web page.

This box contained our phone number and e-mail contact information.

As a result of this change, we started to receive many more calls and e-mail leads. This simple change made it very easy for anyone to contact us, and made those who did contact us feel more secure and willing to give us their business.

How can you make your business more accessible and available to new prospects and clients to generated many new sales.

As you know form experience, people will leave your Web site if they have to put too much effort into navigating it, or if they run into trouble trying to figure out how to contact you.

When a future client needs more information from you and your contact page is buried somewhere deep in your site, then it may never be found. If this happens — and it does at many sites we all have visited — then the customer is gone, maybe forever.  The sale is essentially lost. Don’t let this happen on your Web site.

What can you do to make it very simple for visitors to your Web site to find your contact information?

Let’s face it, you can’t go a day without hearing about, seeing the effects of or feeling your gut telling you learn more social media marketing techniques to help your grow your business.

Social media marketing (SMM) is everywhere.

You watch a news report and the newscaster gives you their Twitter name and asks you to Tweet them. Your best friend puts up a Facebook page and asks you why you don’t have one yet? Your boss asks you to create a Linked In page for him and to get him connected with as many of your clients, suppliers and prospects as possible.

And, that’s just the tip of the iceberg.
Here are a few mind-boggling social media stats to ponder.
•    200,000,000 — active Facebook users
•    10,000,000  — average daily Tweets
•    900,000 — average number of blog posts in a 24 hour period

Nielsen Online shows that: Social networks and blogs are now the 4th most popular online activity ahead of personal email. Member communities are visited by 67% of the global online population; time spent is growing at 3 times the overall Internet rate, accounting for almost 10% of all Internet time. Wow. And to think it’s exponential. Today, this. Tomorrow?

So, how can your use social media marketing to help grow your business?

1. Social media marketing is a great way to generate traffic to your website. Every time you post anything anywhere, complete your post with your contact information, a call to action and a link back to your Website, landing page or your Blog.
2. ost to your blog every 2-3 days. Post tips, tactics and techniques. Reveal secrets, “how-to’s” and ideas. Keep your content fresh and it will be picked up by the searched engines and served up as valuable information when someone hits on one of the keywords in your blog posts. If you don’t have a blog, see tip No. 3 below.
3. Post comments on other people’s blogs, on message boards, on forums and Facebook posts. Answer peoples questions, Help solve their problems and ask for there help solving your problems too. Post book reviews on Amazon and other book seller sites. Every post will help to build your credibility in that community. Let’s face it, he more credibility you build, the more likely people will click on your signature link to see what else you have to say and offer.
4. Create Pod cast and videos of your content and distribute using the many free and paid distribution services on the Internet. One of my favorites Websites for video distribution is Tube Mogul, a free service that sends your videos in the correct format to 26 different website for video distribution, saving you time. Plus they have great tracking tools to see how far and wide your videos are distributed.
5. Use your public profiles as an integral part of your Social Media Marketing plans and search engine marketing strategy. Everyone searches online, including your prospects and customers. Having strong, keyword ladden, public pages helps people find you fast.  Every time you put up a new public page, or update an existing one, it calls the search engines and let’s them know to come and see the new information. As you create your profiles you are actually build up your name recognition, and making it easier for people to find you, and you want to be found, don’t you?

The benefits of Social Media Marketing are hugely important in their role as a search engine marketing strategy.  The more traffic to your website and blogs, the more connections you make, equals more awareness, leading to sales and higher profits for you and your business.

When will you start your social media marketing plan and kick it into high gear?

Are you frustrated because your ads are not getting the response you thought they deserved?

Here are three tips that are 100% guaranteed to help you improve any ad.

Tip One:
Write a powerful headline that stops your reader dead in their tracks.
Get them say to themselves. “I’ve gotta know more”

To create great headlines, run to your nearest magazine rack. Swipe and use the tested headlines from the most popular publications. Publications like: The National Enquirer, People, Sports Illustrated and Games. They have spent huge bucks testing and proving that these headline work. Headlines get the publishers magazines flying off the shelves. Use them as models to create your headlines.

Tip 2:
What do you want your future client to do AFTER you’ve convinced them that they need what you are offering?

A powerful technique is to take your reader, viewer or listener by the hand and tell them exactly what to do. Tell them to call your phone number now. Come into your shop today. Go to your website and order right now.

Put simply, people want to be lead.
They need to know exactly what to do… or,
they won’t do anything at all.

Tip 3:
Tell stories in your ad.

People are naturally curious.

Since childhood, we love hearing stories.
We also love picturing ourselves in the story.

When you use stories to tell the real reasons why you are offering what you are offering, people trust and believe you. Why? It’s human nature and you can’t fool with Mother Nature.

“The unread story is not a story; it is little black marks on wood pulp.
The reader, reading it, makes it live: a live thing, a story.”
-Ursula K. LeGuin

One of the most important parts of storytelling is being totally honest.
People can smell a fake story a mile away.

Also, when you mention, in your stories a minor problem with what are selling, it keeps you honest and builds trust.

So, there you have it. With a little practice, you’ll use these three tips to improve any ad you are running anywhere. On the web, in the paper, on the radio or TV.

Imagine what would happen if you found more tips like this on this blog.
Some people will find a lot more marketing secrets, strategies and tactics here too.