1. Business Link Yorkshire Mike Shannon Business Adviser

2. Top tips to improve your marketing

3. Top tips to improve your marketing Throw your old marketing guide in the bin If you want to avoid wasting stacks of money and missing countless sales opportunities, throw your old marketing guides in the recycling bin! You need to know what works today; where even the smallest business can advertise itself to millions online for less than the cost of a one-off trade journal advert – and – where you can email thousands of potential clients in a few hours for just pennies.

4. Top tips to improve your marketing Be different In any sector or industry it's natural for businesses to copy other ventures - the same products, price-cutting offers, sales messages and other promotions. Its easy to be a copycat, but this doesn't make any sense if you want your business to outsmart and outsell your rivals. Simple methods of differentiation include: Be quicker to respond to customer requests. Focus on quality, rather than lowest prices. Provide faster delivery. Offer more accessories, add-ons and related products than others do.

5. Top tips to improve your marketing Start taking your website seriously Most small businesses are unaware that they could receive stacks of high quality enquiries, leads, phone calls and sales from interested prospective clients; if only they had a professionally designed website that has been properly search engine optimised. When a website is well optimised, it’s like moving a little shop from an unused dirt road in the middle of nowhere and relocating it in the middle of the High Street.

6. Top tips to improve your marketing Match your fees to your promises! You cannot promise the marketplace a high quality service and yet charge a bargain-basement price! If you do, you will send people a mixed-message and it will lose you business every time. Everyone knows that quality never comes cheap – that if something looks too good to be true, it probably is too good to be true! Make your services as valuable to the marketplace as possible and then charge accordingly.

7. Top tips to improve your marketing Do some competitor research It’s impossible to effectively sell or market your services unless you have researched your competitors. You need to know what offers, guarantees, prices or fees you are selling against, in order to make your offering the most attractive to potential clients. Find out what you’re up against and then beat it by adding massive value!

8. Top tips to improve your marketing Don’t mistake movement for progress The owners of under performing businesses almost always work just as hard, and sometimes even harder, than the owners of successful ones! In other words, they work hard and put in an insane number of hours, doing the wrong things! A well written advertisement, placed in the wrong section of the wrong publication will still fail – no matter how hard you work at it! If you find yourself working hard on your marketing and not getting the sales results you want, STOP! Make sure you are doing the right things, then ensure you are doing them correctly.

9. Top tips to improve your marketing Do more of what works If you can, identify the marketing activities that are producing the best results for you at the moment, or have done the business for you in the past, and then work out how you can do this again. What was it that worked to get you that new contract, big customer or surge in website visitors? How can you replicate that and make it work again or succeed elsewhere?

10. Top tips to improve your marketing Start using email marketing It’s a fact; email marketing is extremely cost effective and perhaps the single most powerful marketing tool available to small businesses. This is because it provides predictable results and costs little or nothing to use!

11. Top tips to improve your marketing Be Precise Being precise with your marketing means making sure you are focusing on the value and benefits of your product or service from your customers' point of view. This will also involve making the buying process and customer experience as easy, uncomplicated and free from hassle as possible. Communicate the benefits of your offer and how you are different from your competitors, and have a clear call to action that helps your customers order from you. Don't waffle, don't confuse and avoid saying things from your own rather than your customers' point of view.“

12. Top tips to improve your marketing Finally Don’t just find these marketing tips interesting – use them! The best marketing ideas in the world will not work unless you use them. Business Link Yorkshire Ring our customer information centre on 08456 048 048 Go to our website www.businesslinkyorkshire.co.ukwww.businesslinkyorkshire.co.uk Contact us on info@businesslinkyorkshire.co.ukinfo@businesslinkyorkshire.co.uk