Do you remember the old truism about success, “Showing up is half the battle?”
Consider for a minute how this applies to your promotional visibility.
I don’t have to tell you that promoting a professional-level service is a complex challenge very often consisting of communicating fine capabilities distinctions between competitors. These are precisely the distinctions that require repetition to give your market the opportunity to absorb and understand the value you offer.
This repetition is even more important if you are a market leader. Leaders are visible. You either walk the talk or risk losing your competitive advantage.
But, regardless of your market position, if you don’t regularly appear before your ideal buyers in your key market segments, you are conceding the battlefield to your competitors that do.
…Which is fine with them. They are counting on you to continue to lay low.
When is the last time you communicated your value proposition to your ideal buyers within your key market segments?
Not indirectly through blog posts, news releases, or white papers; through a promotional message that clearly communicated how you can solve a hot button issue.
I know that content marketing through social media is the current top marketing dog. It is a wonderful tool. You may have noticed that I am using this approach now.
This does not invalidate paid promotion. The next time you sit down to discuss strategies for increasing market recognition of your value proposition, take some time to get out of your social media comfort zone and look at how online or traditional media promotion can round out your promotional program.
In fact, used correctly the two strategies will reinforce each other.
Direct promotion is not dead. It is not even sick. It can be a vital tool for increasing your sales leads.
