13 marketing power strategies for Black business to deploy in 2013

Aunkhn Aakhu
Aunkhn Aakhu

13 marketing power strategies for Black business to deploy in 2013

By Aunkh Aakhu

     Although 13 is often seen as a negative number given the year 2012 and its impact on Black business it is probably better to go ahead and look at the glass has half full. So we will consider the year 2013 and the number thirteen as transformative.

 If 2012 has taught Black business owners anything it’s that

    a. You are going have to go this one alone …… if you are talking about the journey to success and

    b. It’s going to take more effort than ever to get there.

That’s said, we are laying 13 marketing strategies for our businesses in 2013 to deploy and thrive.

      1. Know the context.

    It is said the 80 percent of business startups fail in the first year and 95 percent by the tenth year….unless you are Black then for you the numbers are much worse.  That’s not counting the impact of the recession. The lesson here is to get ready to persevere, get ready to do more, get ready to work smarter, be open, be patient, and change quickly. Phew! That’s a tall order, but that’s the core mindset it’s going to take to become successful this year.

      2. Clarify your focus.

    This is no time to generalize your marketing. Get clear on who your customers are, ask yourself, who’s are most likely to buy my products right now, who can benefit most from having this and who has a pressing need, want or problem I can address. Get laser focused on these people and stop trying to sell to everybody. There are already too many distractions. Get focused and you’ll get fruitful, it’s time to reap your harvest.

      3. Know marketing as a holistic concept.

    Too many of our businesses do not know the difference between marketing and advertising and as such are not optimizing their marketing efforts. Marketing for the record according to Jay Conrad Levinson, father of guerilla marketing is everything, you do to promote your business from the moment you conceive of it to the point at which customers buy your product or service and begin to patronize your business on a regular basis. The key words there are everything and regular. This means you should look closely at how everything you are doing is fixated on building the kind of customer relationship that leads to long term repeat business. If you do not have a specific strategy for this, you are probably just playing the survive today game as opposed to thrive indefinitely game.

      4. Use what you have.

    People in recession tend to obsess on scarcity and lack and what you focus on often times; you inadvertently tend to attract more of. What if you focused, instead, on what you do have. You might discover that there are ways to solve problems that you previously assumed could not be solved. Be more resourceful even if you are under resourced.

      5. Devote time to your ongoing self-development.

    Does that seem like a strange marketing strategy? Well just do not underestimate the value of improving your entrepreneurial qualities and ultimately your people skills in helping to accelerate your overall success. Truth is much of success revolves around relationship skills and the more evolved you are the more you’ll seem to understand and practice it.

      6. Spend the majority of your time doing what you do best.

    This is a very complex notion for most solo-preneurs which many Black businesses are. If you are doing everything yourself, there is a tendency to give everything the same value. That is a recipe for disaster. Stay in the area you can create the most value for your company and learn how to outsource the rest. Solo-preneurs that resist this advice are rarely able to compete in the business landscape.

      7. Know the results you want to create.

    What is your goal for 2013? Do you have a detailed plan of what it takes to get there? Do you know how many sales it will take? How many per month? Etc.

You should have a plan the establish your goal but reverse engineer your success so you have laid out every step of how to get from where you are to where you want to  be.

  8.  Select your niche wisely.

A student once told me “niche better have my money!” Funny , but true. You want to exercise wisdom when selecting a niche. Make sure you work with people who you can appreciate and they can appreciate you. Then you will wake each day excited and energized by the thought of interacting with your customers.

9.  Make it easy as possible for folks to spend money with you.

    In the age of smart phones that can take orders with check or credit cards there is little excuse for making it easy for people to give you money. Be sure to offer layaways payment plans etc. Just make sure they can access you if they really want what you are offering.

10. There are three numbers you should always be aware of.

    At just about any time in your business you should know numbers like the cash flow, the net profit and the ROI on marketing campaigns. This is like the temperature of your business, if they are doing well you have a great business.

11.  Give them what they want at a price they can afford.  Nuff said!

12. Remember; better marketing= more profits.

            Take time to improve your marketing. Are you making the basics mistakes, not using a campaign structure and not tracking results? If so that has to change this year. Your business is too important to playing with it like a toy.

13. Treat your best customers best.

            That should be called the business golden rule. Too many business owners are so often in search of the new customer that they neglect the person who they have already built up trust with and whom very often would be willing to purchase again and again and again. Can you afford to lose out on that? I didn’t think so!

            If you can apply all 13 of these strategies to your business this year we will experience 2013 as a truly transformative year in which you break free from the survival mind state and move into a thriving, prosperous state of being.

 Aunkh Aakhu, C.E.O. Better Marketing Mastery

bettermarketingmastery.com – When it comes to maximizing profits you win with better marketing!

 

About Carma Henry 24481 Articles
Carma Lynn Henry Westside Gazette Newspaper 545 N.W. 7th Terrace, Fort Lauderdale, Florida 33311 Office: (954) 525-1489 Fax: (954) 525-1861

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