Have you wasted countless dollars and precious time on marketing endeavors that just didn't produce?  You're not alone.  Plus it's not your fault because the people selling you their ad space don't have anything to lose when you follow their errant advice. Traditional marketing doesn't work, but direct response marketing for the independent service business/professional does.

Lies, lies, lies.  You're told you just need to get your name out there, run your ad for at least a year, get exposure in the media with the largest head count, etc.  Those lies are all founded in traditional marketing.  Traditional marketing doesn't pay for itself, therefore, you must divorce yourself from any form of traditional marketing that you may be spending your precious dollars on right this minute.

Aim small, miss small, fail forward fast.  That's my philosophy for direct marketing and it's a philosophy that works.  If you follow this simple philosophy your marketing will pay for itself because your marketing will produce highly qualified prospects entering your sales funnel...becoming your clients.  And it will do so consistently and predictably.  

What do I mean by aim small, miss small, fail forward fast?  Let's start with "small".  Have you purchased a mailing list and sent out 1,000 maybe 5,000 pieces only to have a zero response rate, at best a 1% response rate? There are so many things wrong with that approach including:

• unless you used a list broker who really knows what they're doing and you paid a lot of money for that list those names are probably absolutely worthless.
• unless you have a piece that you already know generates an acceptable response rate you should never be mailing anything on a large scale like that.
• how could you possibly follow-up with 1,000-5,000 people within 72 hours?  And if you can't you should never send them.
• did you have a highly motivating call to action in the piece that gets the people on your purchased/rented list on your list so you don't have to pay to send them anything again?
• do you have a multi-step marketing campaign in place before you send the first mailing?

Small also means making sure that whatever you do when it comes to marketing yourself is very narrowly focused. Your message should resonate with a specific ideal prospect.  No matter where you communicate that message: face-to-face, letter, media, etc. the message should not only be narrow but it should be communicated in the right places where the right people will receive it.    

What do I mean by "miss small"?  It's really tied to aiming small.  You see it makes a whole lot more sense and you'll get a much better response if you test a few marketing messages on a small scale tracking the response.  Then you can continue to make small improvements against your control message until you get the highest response rate you can get.  

What do I mean by "fail forward fast"?  The biggest hurdle in your marketing communications is just doing something.  Whether it's developing a core marketing message that gets people to ask you to tell them more about what you do at a networking event, a letter you mail to highly targeted prospects, or perhaps an ad -- start with the attitude that good is good enough.  The reason I say that is because you're better off doing something than never doing anything because you can't get it perfect. Your marketing will never be perfect because the world around you will continue to change.  The best you can do is market yourself good enough to get highly qualified leads entering your sales funnel as prospects and leaving as clients.  

And that's the whole point of marketing yourself.  There is so much more to say when it comes to marketing yourself and getting highly qualified prospects reaching out to you. That's why I've written a special FREE report...