More Work At Home Business Marketing Techniques
Continuing on with more home based business marketing techniques that are useful.
Website
If you’re a service business, your website acts as a sort of virtual brochure. It will be rare that someone contacts you strictly after seeing your website with no other contact. Websites are vital, but they work best in conjunction with other forms of marketing. Although updating your website might be considered part of your marketing work, don’t fixate on your website to the exclusion of meeting real people and connecting.
Cold Calling
I’ve never tried this, and quite frankly, never want to. Before the “do not call” list went into effect, my responses to telemarketers ranged from professional but abrupt to downright nasty (for which I’ve done penance). Because most of us feel the same way, why would you want to market your business in such an annoying way? Can you imagine someone barging into your home any time they feel like it? This is what cold callers are doing - barging in, and unilaterally attempting to change the recipient’s calendar and priorities. Because it’s also time-consuming, draining, and rarely the image you want anyway, you will probably want to avoid it in most instances.
How do you get the attention of that ideal client who is a business? If you can’t find a personal connection, send a marketing package (cover letter and brochure minimum - press clippings if you have them) to the key decision maker. Make a follow-up call one week later, asking if he received the package, and does he have any questions. But even here, be prepared for a low return - many decision makers have gatekeepers, and/or routinely discard unsolicited mail. Avoid any “pseudo-cold-calling” strategies. In other words, don’t call strangers and say that you’re conducting a survey, providing information only, or any other strategy used to weasel out of saying that you’re cold calling.
With the Do Not Call registry in place, calling consumers (for example, private individuals) can be a costly mistake. Businesses are not covered by this registry, however, and some exceptions for calling consumers include calls from charities and calls from political organizations. If you’d still like to make cold calls, particularly to private households, be sure to check out the Federal Trade Commission’s Do Not Call website, ftc.gov/donotcall/. Contact a lawyer if you are uncertain whether the specific calling you are doing is prohibited.
Tags: home business, home business marketing, work at home, work at home business