Lead Follow Up Campaign

Here is my follow up campaign that I created for following up with my leads. The key is to scheduling it and making sure you have the materials ready when you want to send out the campaign. Make it Automated!

Follow Up Activity #1: Send thank you email the day I met the prospect and include free report: “10 Free Tips to Kick Start Your Marketing”

Follow Up Activity #2: Follow up meeting and email with a phone call 3-4 days after initial meeting. Schedule the phone call in planner. (If meeting is scheduled skip activities 3-5 and put on new client marketing schedule.)

Follow Up Activity #3: Mail prospect sample marketing portfolio

Follow Up Activity #4: Email prospect about marketing plans Automated Marketing offers

Follow Up Activity #5: Final Phone Call follow up to prospect

I ask for a business card every time I meet a new prospect. Then I ask them if I can add them to my email list. It is very important to write an email newsletter to send to prospect and clients–more on that in future post. This is my 5 touch point follow up schedule– what’s yours? If you need help with a lead follow up campaign let me know, I can help!

30 Day Marketing Challenge: Day 3

Today’s & Yesterday’s Tasks (I worked on Sunday and it was fun!)

1. Visited open houses to meet Real Estate Agents

When I was originating loans I went to open houses all the time to meet new Realtors and try to drum up business. I thought it would be a great idea to do it with Automated Marketing, and my guess was that it would be better received by Realtors a lot more then it was when I was a Loan Officer. I was right and it was fun! All in all I met 7 new agents from 5 different companies and I got my business name out there to new people. (Remember my goal is to get my name out there right now) I took with me the new brochure that I made and it seemed to impress the agents I gave it to. One important thing that I did when I met these Realtors was to ask for their business card and most importantly ask if I could add them to my email list. Everyone said yes which is great for future marketing opportunities. Now the key to drumming up business from this event is to follow up….

2. Created a follow up campaign for leads

Consistency is the key to making any marketing effort work and for generating sales. Follow up is apart of consistency and critical when you get a new lead. Research says it takes up to 5 contacts to a person before they decide if they will buy from you. Based on that information I created a 5 week touch point campaign today to follow up with the Realtors I met on Sunday. I will post it in a separate post. I did week one of the campaign today which was a follow up email thanking them for their time on Sunday.

3. Get costs to advertise in 4 local newspapers

Wow is this expensive! I knew it would be. I avoided the big papers (Star Tribune and Pioneer Press) and looked at This Week Newspapers, The Sun Newspapers, Tidbits and Coffee News. I personally think that the best route for my business will be to look at Coffee News to start. I made my list so when I am ready to do newspaper advertising I don’t have to spend the time doing it then. I also haven’t completely decided if I think newspaper advertising is effective. The jury is still out on that one. I think direct mail would be more effective and I am more likely to put my advertising dollars there first.

4. Determine local business places to put up business cards

I made a list of all the Caribou Coffees in Apple Valley, Lakeville, Eagan, Burnsville, Bloomington and Southen Edina. (Minnesota suburbs for those of you not in Minnesota). My goal is to put business cards plus a postcard about my services at these particular Caribous. I even took it one step further and ordered Card Cues to put my business cards in on the bulletin boards. This will make my business cards stand out and hopefully generate a positive response. The bonus is that the Card Cues hold 40 cards which means I don’t have to go back and constantly check to make sure I have cards left at the coffee shop. Another bonus– Business Owners, Realtors and Loan Officers hold a lot of meetings at coffee shops. I believe I am hitting my target market right where they do their business.

5. Post to this Blog

I am pretty proud of myself with this blog. I knew it would be hard for me to be consistent and I was very worried about what I would say. So far so good and I have come up with a lot of ideas to write about.

How’s your 30 day Marketing Challenge going? I would love to hear about it!

Success Story #2

I think I have applied for about 15 different marketing projects or jobs that I have found on Craigslist and today someone hired me to help them with their marketing!  I am very excited about the opportunity to be working with this new company.  I applied for a job creating a logo for a new company in the Twin Cities.  I simply replied to the post on Craigslist, my new client called me and after a few questions offered me the project.  The great news about this kind of advertising is that it is free and so when you make money off of it the entire dollar amount is yours– no expenses have to be taken out.  There of course is also the potential with any new client that this will lead to more business in the future.

The moral of the story?  One of my marketing tactics worked and that is a win-win for all involved!  That means I will keep applying for projects on Craigslist because my return is worth it!  Try it and see what you come up with!

Marketing Success Story

I thought it would be fun to create posts whenever a marketing tactic that I do creates a new lead. Hopefully over the next 30 days my marketing challenge will spawn quite a few of these posts.

So yesterday I wrote about how I applied for marketing projects on Craigslist. I had one person email me back who is interested! I know it’s not a done deal or a new client by any means, but for me it is always exciting when someone contacts me from one of my marketing efforts. This person is starting a new business in the trucking industry and is looking for help creating and promoting his new business. He was looking to hire a marketing assistant so I emailed him about Automated Marketing letting him know we could do the marketing projects for him and that Automated Marketing is more cost effective then hiring an employee. I am excited and hopeful that this marketing effort will turn into a mutually beneficial relationship for the client and me!

30 Day Marketing Challenge: Day 2

Today’s Tasks

1. Make a list of networking groups in Minnesota

13 Groups! I came up with a list of 13 different networking ideas that I am going to explore. The best way for me to get my business “out there” is to let people know I am here. So what’s better then going to some meetings and meeting new people and potential clients and partners? Plus working at home can be somewhat isolating so it will be good to go out and meet new people. Next is to schedule time to go to the meetings….will put that on next week’s list. By the way if you are looking for a networking opportunity check out BNI (MN), UpSwing, and Creative Networking Professionals. These are just a few on my list.

2. Advertise on Craigslist

If you are not advertising on Craigslist I ask you why not? It is FREE! This is some of the best kind of advertising there is. You write an ad and post it to their website under your category. Or if you are like me you submitted ads under 2 categories: Small Business and Real Estate. I had someone tell me that Craigslist advertising is “cheesy.” I completely disagree. Any time you can get your business out there for free to a bunch of people is worth it to me. Plus it’s easy to do!

3. Search for marketing jobs on Craigslist and Domystuff.com

If you didn’t notice I left out Guru.com and Getafreelancer.com and I have two good reasons. Number 1: The sites seemed fishy to me. People bidding super cheap on jobs and the people are overseas. Number 2: If a site seems fishy to me I don’t want to have anything to do with my money and those sites. Anyway, I found a few marketing jobs on Craigslist that I applied to and will post if I hear anything back.

4. Post on this blog

Yup, did it two days in a row and I have one more post today– a success story!

Next week begins a full week of marketing from the trenches and promises to be a lot more exciting and a lot more work then the last couple of days. Next weeks’ activities include phone calls (yikes!), cold calling in person (easier then phone calls to me), my first press release and yes more Craigslist advertising. Have a happy and safe weekend…I personally am ready for the break!

30 Day Marketing Challenge: Day 1

Here is the list of things that I finally accomplished today. I’ll explain the finally in a bit.

1. Search for Marketing Projects on Craigslist, Domytuff.com, Guru.com and Getafreelancer.com

Okay so I accomplished two of the four but tried hard for three out of four. It took longer then I thought it would on Craigslist and Domystuff.com because I went back to the beginning of March looking for potential projects. I found great stuff too on Craigslist! Basically what I did was look for people that were looking for full and part-time marketing assistants. I then emailed the contact to let them know more about my company as an alternative to hiring an employee. Two of the contacts I mailed a letter and brochure (more on that later). Domystuff.com didn’t really have anything and I am not too sold yet on the validity of that site. Guru.com is down right confusing and I need to spend more time figuring that out which is on tomorrow’s list. Guru.com has options for paid memberships and I am not ready to check that out until I can figure out my free membership. And with all of the above (and below) I didn’t even get to Getafreelancer.com. But now that I am caught up on my first two sites it will make it easier to figure out the other two sites tomorrow.

2. Create a Brochure

Okay so I wanted to create a brochure to hand out to potential clients and to include with sales letters. For some reaosn this project took forever! Isn’t that the way it always goes with projects– they always take longer than you think they will (except if you hire me of course!). Anyway I am really, really picky about design and how I like things to look. I should have known that creating this brochure would take more than half of my day and most of my evening. But it is done and it looks great! I will post pictures later…. Now I have a great and most importantly versatile marketing piece that can be handed out at a moments notice (and while I am still waiting for my new business cards.)

3. Find out how to submit press releases and schedule dates to send

Well this task was a lot less complicated then I thought it would be which was nice for a change. With the exception of the Farmington Independent I was able to find information about how to email my press release to the local newspapers. I am looking at the Farmington Independent, the Sun Newspapers, and This Week newspaper to submit my press release. The Sun Newspapers and This Week newspaper had information under the “Contact Us” section of their websites. I couldn’t find anything for the Farmington Independent so I emailed the editor to ask about the process. This task seemed daunting to me so I am pretty excited that it was so easy. And yes I scheduled it too…Tuesday the 18th I will be writing the press release and Thursday the 20th I will be submitting the press release…more to come!

4. Miscellaneous Tasks

I wrote two sales letters to different people that are looking to hire marketing assistants. I included above mentioned brochure in the envelope.

I submitted my business information to the marketplace directory with the Farmington Independent. While I was looking for information on press releases I found this and thought what the heck might as well do it while I am here.

5. Wrote the blog post and one before it

One of my goals with my blog is to help educate people on my company but also about marketing too. I have struggled with what to write and trying to come up with topics and then I thought why not be honest, let people know what I am doing to market my business? Maybe by me trying these ideas it will bring success to others. I sure hope it does!

Okay one final note about the finally above, I was definitely frustrated today trying to get this all done and work on marketing projects for people. It is hard to wear all the hats isn’t it?! But I must say I do feel pretty good after writing down all that I have accomplished to promote my business today. So there’s another tip…cross off each project you complete. I like to use a highlighter (green at the moment) because it is bright and I can see very well what I have gotten done for the day.

More tomorrow…TGIF but still a work day!

Talk the Talk, Walk the Walk

So I am a business owner, a business owner who promotes marketing your business on a consistent basis, but I am a business owner that is just as guilty as everyone else. I too find it hard to keep up with my marketing when I am doing everyone elses! Well that stops today, as I said above if I am going to talk the talk, I must walk the walk. I have instituted a 30 Day Marketing Challenge for Automated Marketing. I am a one woman show here and I am challenging myself to market my business every single (business) day for 30 days. I have created a 30 Day Marketing Challenge plan that began today March 13th and ends April 23rd.  My goal is to tell as many people as I can about my business. I have been in business for almost a year catering specifically to Loan Officers and then slowly Realtors started to need my services and then Insurance Agents then people outside the Twin Cities….so I am expanding. And with expansion comes promotion!

I had a thought today…marketing is letting people know you are here, sales is what happens when the marketing works. So I am going after the first piece– the marketing and yes here it is: I challenge you to do the same thing. Pull out a 30 day calendar and write down 1-3 marketing activities you can do every day. Let’s see what happens to our businesses after 30 days shall we? Daily I will be reporting about my activities as a way to hold myself accountable. If I try a marketing tactic you’re interested in let me know and I will pass my tips onto you. So without further ado here comes day one in the marketing trenches…

Reconnect with Postcards

Has it been a few months maybe even a year since you have reached out to your database?

By sending out a simple postcard you can reestablish contact with your database and let them know you plan to stay in better contact with them.

Mailing postcards is also a cost effective way to update your database by utilizing the “Return Service Requested” through the post office.

What’s this about a marketing plan?

What’s the old saying “fail to plan, plan to fail?” I have always hated that saying because it is so negative…and because it is so true! I think we are all guilty of not having a plan or even worse having a plan and paying attention to it only when we are slow and looking for new business. If you don’t have a marketing plan how do you know what to do to bring in new business? If you do have a marketing plan and only follow it sporadically is it working to bring in new business?

It’s hard to implement a marketing plan; as I business owner who runs a company that helps people implement their marketing plans I know this all too well. When your business is rocking you get caught up in the details of making sales and the marketing is the last thing to get done. Then when it is slow and it is time to do the marketing it can be a daunting and overwhelming task. Yet marketing is something that has to be done consistently to bring in new business. It’s a never ending (sometimes vicious) circle.

If this sounds all too familiar to you I have a solution. Well I have a few solutions actually. First would be to create a marketing plan. One of my favorite websites, Entrepreneur.com has great articles about creating marketing plans. Two articles I like on this website are Here’s the Plan and Plan Your Marketing Now. Both articles give easy but smart ideas on how to create a marketing plan.

The second solution is to look at your calendar. Every day plan at least one simple activity to jump start your marketing plan and work towards your goals. If your goal is to stay in touch with your past clients on a more regular basis then work on the first step of that plan. Actually schedule your marketing tasks as if they are meetings with clients. Block off however long you think it will take you to complete that task. By working this way before you know it you will be sending out marketing materials to your past clients and your business will be growing!

Now if looking at solutions one and two puts you into a total panic do not fear. I have one more solution. Call me! In all seriousness I created Automated Marketing because I know there are many people like you who don’t have the time, don’t know how to or plain don’t want to do their own marketing. I will work with you to develop a plan that works for you, your business and probably most important your budget.

Whatever your solution is my advice is just to take the first step. In 6 to 12 months you’ll be amazed at the growth of your business and my guess? Proud of what you have worked to accomplish. That is a reward all its own!

#1 Question from Loan Officers

The number one question I get asked by Loan Officers is “What are other Loan Officers doing to get business?” “What are they doing with you that is working?”

Automatically my answer is this: Consistent Marketing Efforts

My clients that are busy originating loans are working with me to do marketing on a consistent basis every month. We have developed a plan together and they have stuck with it; even at the end of last year when times were tough. Even more so they have acknowledged that they don’t have time to do the marketing or they don’t want to and they have handed it completely over to me. Those that have done this have set themselves up for success with the mini refi boom we are experiencing and also for the spring market that is right around the corner.

Tired of the up and down income roller coaster? I can help you consistently market your business so you are ready for the spring and summer markets that are right around the corner. I am here to help!