How to Get More Clients. Step 1 - Reflect and Build Awareness
Expert blog series | 4 minute read
In this series of blog articles, I'll be providing ideas on how you can attract clients to your business. Each article will give you insights and tips into what works and how to achieve outstanding results. This article will cover where marketing begins - with reflecting on your purpose, why you started your business, what you want to achieve, who your ideal clients are that you want to attract. It will also give you ideas on how to build awareness in the marketplace, so people can find you. Next I will be providing tips on how to move clients from being aware of you to:
becoming interested in who you are and what you offer. The ideas and tactics to peak curiosity,
having a strong desire to reach out and connect with you, and then
turning interest into action. Motivate prospects to take action and reach out to you for support or to make an enquiry.
Know your position in the market
Firstly, take some time to do a SWOT analysis on your business, as you'll be able to define what your Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats are. You can then look at how you will use the Strengths in your marketing as a key messages, know where you need to address any weaknesses or threats and leverage opportunities for your business. This helps you to know your position in the market, bring to light anything you may have taken for granted, or forgotten about. You could possibly invite others to assist you, with their ideas and inspiration.
Next, do some self-reflection in order to gain clarity about how you want your business to be represented. Decide what type of client you are best suited to to serve and why. Documenting these ideas will help create the key messages you want to use in your marketing. This will be the beginnings of content you use to help build awareness and greater connection with your audience. You'll be more likely when using these messages regularly to become a Known, Liked and Trusted provider.
"Who is my ideal client?"
Describe this as a person with their profile, who would get the most value from what you are offering. What are their pain points and challenges that you can most help with? What would they like to see, what are their life circumstances and what is their primary disability type likely to be? What is their age and were do they live? What are their primary goals in life right now? Once you have been able to describe this person, you can then tailor your marketing messages to show how you can solve their problems and why you are a good fit for them.
Who are the competitors?
Next, I recommend doing a Competitor/Collaborator Analysis, which involves researching other service providers (of a similar size, scale and that offer similar services) to see how they are representing themselves, what key messages and images they are using. After all, its a competitive marketplace, and your referrers and prospective clients will be looking at other options for products and services, so you need to know who else is offering similar services in the community, what they offer and how they represent themselves. This will help you to decide what your unique selling proposition (or competitive edge) is.
Decide how you want your business represented
In order to market your business and attract clients, you need to consider how you will describe your service. This can be challenging, as you won't always be there to describe what you do, so you business needs to have a description and be shaped into something that can be understood on a flyer or website. Ask yourself the following questions and document your ideas. You can further refine your answers over time as to what feels right to you (and most likely for your audience) in response to each of the following:
What my business stands for? What do I want achieve and be known for?
How do I want my business to be represented?
My business logo - an image that represents your business
My key messages - that describe my core beliefs or philosophy about how I approach my service delivery, or what I'm aiming to achieve or how I work.
My business vision, mission and values. Your business vision is a compelling description of the amazing outcomes you imagine happening (if absolutely everything works out) as a result of your business. This is a motivating description of your business performing at its best.
My business values - the top 5-7 key values that I have prioritised as most important in how I operate.
My business mission - the activities my business will do or steps I will take in achieving my vision.
My 'why' - why I set up my business or service in the first place. Outline the difference or impact I aim to make in people's lives. This is the warm and fuzzy stuff that helps to build a positive relationship with your prospective clients and referrers in the first place.
Once you have addressed the questions above, you can then use your answers and ideas in your marketing. Using the AIDA marketing acronym (Awareness, Interest, Desire and Action), you can take the first necessary step - to build Awareness. This step will help you to get your name out there. Once you have found ways to achieve this, you can then take the next steps of creating Interest, then Desire and Action from your referrers or prospective clients. The aim is that you build up on each of the four elements to market your business successfully.
Build Awareness
People can't buy your services if they don't know about you. The first step in attracting clients is to create awareness of your product or service. Review and action the following steps as below. Note that marketing is an ongoing, daily activity that requires planning, so you know ahead of time what you are going to do, when and how. Try setting up a plan (maybe 90 days) or strategy that will work for you. Reach out for assistance if you need to, to ensure you keep the momentum going.
Get found online
Take steps to ensure that you can be easily found on a Google search for your product or service type and location. The way to do this is to increase your presence online through a range of available platforms. Do your best to ensure that there Google search results that come up listing you and your business. This will reinforce your credibility and provide information about how to get in touch regarding you and your business. Here's some ways to help you achieve this. You may want to tackle one or more of these each day and build up over time. Have patience, remember the old saying that 'Rome wasn't built in a day'.
'Google My Business' Account - this is a free service providing a listing to help your business to be found online quickly and easily. To set this up, simply search for Google My Business and create your own profile.
LinkedIn Profile & Company Page - build up your professional profile and ensure you have an accompanying company page. This will highlight what you and your business offer, along with your work history, qualifications and any articles you have shared. This helps give potential referrers and clients an opportunity to research you to understand more about you and what you offer. Your LinkedIn profile can also motivate the referrer or client to get in touch when they see your profile picture and an outline of how you could help them or their clients.
Facebook and Instagram Pages & Ads - there's many ways to leverage these platforms. Here's a few examples of activities you could undertaken Note there's a lot of training available that will help ensure you are more effective with your social media marketing. Some ideas include:
schedule regular content that keeps your audience engaged and interested in what you are doing.
highlight your client's outcomes
business activities - such as attending Expos
your wins
educational content,
representing your values and personality.
connect with others or groups to help build up your audience.
hold Facebook or Instagram Lives where you are capturing more attention and awareness of your service.
Do interviews with people
give explanations or answer questions you are frequently asked.
targeted paid advertisements to promote your business and reach more people faster.
Website and Blog Articles- if you aren’t sure what to write, look at what topics others are writing about. You may wish to include Client Case Studies. This helps build up your google rankings for SEO.
Videos - the aim is add value to your audience and show your range of expertise that's of interest to your audience. This is proving to be a very popular medium - as people like to learn and have things explained to them, rather than reading a long article! You can post the videos on all your social media and you could set up your own YouTube Channel.
Client Reviews with Five Star client ratings on Google, Facebook, Trip Advisor (or any other platforms relevant to your industry). You can give others reviews and see if they return the favour and give you one. Also, get into the habit of asking happy clients to give you a review. You can make it easier for them by providing the link to give a review. This coujld be through Facebook Reviews, LinkedIn Recommendations or other.
List your Business with online Disability Directories under your industry or service offering. There are many directories you can list on. Here are a few example: MyCareSpace. Some are free and others are paid.
Signs and Logos
Have some mobile or fixed signs at your location, promoting your business, vehicles, uniforms, hats, promotional give aways such as pens, caps and drink bottles. You can also use your logo on all your documentation.
Business Cards, Flyers, Banners and Posters
Have these created so you can hand them out, display or mail them. You could make them downloadable on your website. The more people that have your information, then more people will be aware of you and your products or services.
Public Relations with Media exposure
Writing for other websites (in an area that compliments what you do), journals and be interviewed on the Radio, Podcasts and TV. Find ways to build awareness through a bigger business by sharing your expertise is a great way to become known. The program or website will have followers, who are your potential clients already who can gain value from you, that will be of interest, helps to broadcast your business further, to more people faster!
Many more options
There are many other ways to build awareness of your business, you are only limited by your imagination! I hope you found these ideas helpful. Please comment as to what you are doing that's working and what you want to share with others that could help them on their business journey. I look forward to bringing you the next articles, jam packed full of ideas you can action in your business to attract those wonderful new clients!
Next steps, reach out if you'd like to discuss business and how to kick-start your marketing strategy and gain new clients. Contact info@nurturingndis.com.au
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Jacquie Tewes, CEO, Nurturing Your NDIS Business Jacquie Tewes is assisting new and current disability sector services with the NDIS, Registration, Business Development and business set up and management. She has worked across several community services organisations, as a Program Manager, and provides coaching and training. She is committed to ensuring business owners are empowered and equipped to navigate the NDIS. She has won a range of awards for outstanding achievements with exceptional performance with the BEC, Initial Healthcare and DHL. She has a management degree from University of Canberra, is an accredited trainer, coach with Diplomas in HR, Small Business and Business Administration. You can contact Jacquie via email or by visiting the Nurturing NDIS website. |
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