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Phil's Past Episodes Episode 15: The 12 Steps To Successful Direct Marketing Direct Marketing is an art form. It's not something to be laughed away, or simple "done because you have to". Direct Marketing takes time to develop, takes discipline to master, and takes strength to endure. The pay off is immense. Countless businesses and business owners owe their success entirely to direct marketing. I've taken the time to put together a twelve step program to get you on your feet in the Direct Marketing world. although these steps cover a wide amount of time, I am sure you can find your place amongst them. Step 1. The Market Comes First So you have an idea. Great. Ideas are powerful. Ideas are wonderful. Ideas alone don't make you any money. In order to know that, you've got to look at the market. The market will tell you if you have a decent idea or not. Talk to people who are in the same (but not competing) fealty as your idea. Are there big players? Would you just be another fish in the pond? Is your idea niche enough to be able to dominate that market. You might have to refine and tweak your idea until it's niche enough to do so. Step 2. Plan, map out things, create deadlines, stick to them As easy as it sounds, this is one of the hardest steps in the process. You need to dedicate yourself to the idea. Make a rough plan on how you're going to get from point A to point B. Map it out - are there curves ahead you didn't think of? Are there pitfalls? Play "Devils Advocate" with yourself. What are the limitations? Can they be over come? Give yourself deadlines, and then stick to those deadlines to get things done. Step 3. Establish and sharpen your USP Your Unique Selling Point is what makes you different from everybody else. It's what sets you apart from the other fish in the pond. It's why people will choose you to do business with over all the others. Once you establish this, you need to refine it. Make it better. Bounce it off other people to get their honest opinion. This should be no more than about a 15 word sentence, and you should be able to say, and explain the whole thing within 30 seconds. Step 4. Develop solid associations with great people When you surround yourself with water, the chances of you drowning are pretty high. When you surround yourself with eagles, the chances of you soaring are equally as high. Find the great people in your area. Meet them. Get to know them. Let them get to know you. Develop that relationship and association with them. They will become the people you go to with ideas, or just to bounce something off of. It's important to know that they know more than you do. Step 5. Learn how to write good copy. Sure, you could spend the money to hire a copywriter to do all of your writing for you. But their heart isn't in the dream. Their dream is to write copy. So, while the copy might be good, it lacks the heart and soul of the product in it. You have to learn to write your own copy. There are countless books, articles, seminars, classes, and coaches available today to assist you in this process. If you already write your own copy, great.... Now make it better. Step 6. Become a great copywriter You have to be committed to the mastery of great copywriting. Nobody makes millions by accident - it's all deserved. You will have to work on your copywriting on a daily basis. The masters of copywriting spend all day doing just that - writing copy. It's a skill that is learned, developed, and nurtured. Of course, have fun with it, but develop it on a continual basis. Step 7. Write the sales letters and follow up materials first This might sound like we're putting the cart before the horse, but we're not. Before you begin any serious product development, use the new energy you have in writing the sales letter and follow up material. What typically happens is people have a dream. They do a little research and decide to move forward with the project. They spend countless hours developing the product. Now they have a product. They're tired. They're hungry. They're worn out. But now they have to actually bring that product to the market place. They have to sell it. Now they have to do more work. When you have the new energy from an idea, use it wisely. Develop the sales letters first. Step 8. Develop an ongoing frontend and backend marketing system. Last time I checked, there were still 52 weeks a year. That means you should have 52 front end mailings a year, 52 phone meetings a year, 52 follow up campaigns a year, and so on. The biggest thing you can get is a solid lead. Once that lead is developed, you need to feed it for it to stay alive. Send them something every week. Talk to them every week. Let them know you're there every week. Ask them for money every week. If you stop feeding them, they'll die. And a dead lead isn't worth anything. Step 9. Work with great suppliers - people you can trust and rely on. You can find a list of suppliers for things in the phone book. You can find the name and telephone number of a great supplier by talking to your associates. They'll let you know who the best one in the market is. Why would you want to gamble doing business with anyone else? You don't. You want the best, and the only way to find the best is to talk to the people that use the best. Step 10. Write new copy and product development every day. Doing this will allow you to become more self disciplined. It will increase your copywriting abilities. Just like working out - when you stop working out, you begin to look like what you did before you started working out. When you stop writing copy, and stop developing back end products on a daily basis, then that too loses it's strength. Writing copy on a daily basis also helps you develop more interesting ideas, new ways of communicating those ideas, and new material to use. Step 11. Harness the power of follow-up marketing This step, above all the others, is where you should always be coming back to. Never give up on a customer until they tell you to leave them alone. Phone calls, letters, emails... They all work - and they work wonderfully. Even a "dead list" of customers will produce magic every once in a while. If you think it's time to throw the towel in, send them another piece. Let them know you still care about them as potential customers. You want their business. They know that. But they'll soon know you won't give up on them, either. Step 12. Recycle old sales copy, promotions, and products. Don't throw anything away. What was once old is now new again. You don't need to reuse 100% of the piece, but you will find that you can use bits and pieces of it over and over again in different campaigns. There's no sense it doing a whole new round of new product development, when what you have from three years ago will work fine today. It lowers you cost, ups your margins, and gives you a greater return. Use these steps in your direct marketing campaigns. Build upon them. Revisit them time and time again. You'll soon find that your personal success, and that of your companies, will increase based directly on Direct Marketing techniques learned here. For MLMEruption.com, this is Phil Foster - The Trusted Voice of MLM. |
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