Podcasts
FGDO Podcast 103 - 3 Easy Steps to a Profitable Design Business
by Michael Huggins, RGDEpisode 103
This episode: 3 Easy Steps to Growing Your Design Business
Hello and Welcome to the
FOR GRAPHIC DESIGNERS ONLY.com Live PodCast
My name is Michael Huggins…
and this is the podcast for information, tips and resources for the creative entrepreneur
This week…
3 Easy Steps to Growing Your Design Business
Whether you run an established design business or you’re just thinking of starting one – marketing is crucial to your business success.
And if you think creating a brochure and website will end all your marketing woes – think again. Your marketing has to have a little more planning and thought put to it if you are going to create a viable and secure business.
Although the ultimate goal of your marketing is to get more clients into your business (so that you can service them for many, many years). You also have to use your marketing for other purposes – like creating strong relationships with your existing clients.
Or encouraging them to use your services more often.
Or to encourage them to purchase higher priced services and products.
To do this you’ll have to create a series of marketing tools that help you do some very specific things in your business. Things like:
• Find new prospects
• Qualify your prospects
• Convert your leads into clients
• Promote new services to your clients
• Reinforce your position in the marketplace
• Get testimonials
• Get referral business
and that only names just a few…
How do you create a program that does all this? And how do you stay on top of each activity? It can get a little overwhelming to manage. Especially when you are busy enough just doing the daily work of servicing your current clients (never mind trying to get new ones)!
The answer is in creating a marketing plan that breaks down your marketing into simple, easy-to-handle stages or components. So that you can automate it as much as possible. Freeing up much needed time and resources for you.
In the early days of my own business I was overwhelmed with the many tasks required to build my company. I knew marketing was critical to my success, but trying to keep on top of the many aspects of my marketing was wearing me down. So I began to think about my marketing in its most basic functions so I could create a program that once finished could practically work on its own.
And what I discovered was that I only needed 3 essential marketing stages to make a successful program. By simplifying my marketing to 3 easy stages it became both easy to manage and a source of dependable revenue.
The 3 marketing stages you need in your design business are:
1. “Getting”
2. “Converting”
3. “Keeping”
They are the only 3 components you need to have for profitable and successful marketing program. In fact you can think of each stage as a kind of like a mini marketing program unto itself!
Lets look at each in a little more detail…
1. “ Getting”
This stage is all about using your marketing to help you FIND and QUALIFY true prospects. I say “true” prospects because contrary to popular belief – not everyone is a prospect for your business.
Its very important for you to understand that a prospect is FOUND not MADE. You can’t MAKE a prospect you can only DISCOVER them.
This means that no matter how much you sell your services to a person – if they aren’t a real prospect – they won’t buy. Conversely, there are people out there who are looking for your design services right now – your job is to find them and connect with THEM. And forget about the others.
Your “Getting” stage is all about discovering prospects and generating leads for your business. For any marketing plan to work well you’ve got to have a solid “Getting” component to it. And the purpose of this stage is to motivate your prospect to take action with you.
In the “Getting” stage you focus on creating tools that help you identify your prospect and pre-qualify them for you in advance. So you maximize your time by spending your energies only on your best prospects.
When you create persuasive marketing tools, they will generate leads for your design business every time you use them. What are the best marketing tools to use to identify prospects for your business? Here are just a few that work well (and are low in cost to create!)…
The best “Getting” stage marketing tools are:
• Sales letters
• Special FREE reports
• Lead-generating websites
• Lead-generating Ads
• Lead-generating Email marketing
In order to have a successful “Getting” component you should be using at least 3 or 4 of the tools I just listed. Then integrate them so they work together.
For example: If you use sales letters to generate new leads for your business, provide your prospect with a reason to also connect to your website. Or motivate them to get into your email marketing program. This gives you a greater advantage of reaching them effectively and making a meaningful connection with them.
2. “Converting”
Once you’ve identified a TRUE prospect and you’ve connected with them through your “Getting” component, then your next job is to convert your prospect into a paying client. That’s the objective of the “Converting” stage – to take a prospect and turn them into a client.
This doesn’t just happen by chance.
And in most cases it won’t happen over night either.
Rarely will prospects become a client after your first contact with them. So you need to use your “Converting” component to establish a relationship with them. Relationship building must always be your goal. Ultimately you want it to result in a strong ‘client relationship’ but in order to get there you have to start the relationship at the beginning.
To build your relationship with your prospect and convert them into a client, understand that your prospect will need 3 things from you along the way:
1. They will need to KNOW what you do.
2. They will need to LIKE your design and business approach.
3. They will need to TRUST YOU to help them.
There are lots of ways to accomplish this. But the best way I’ve found is through creating marketing tools that help educate your prospect. To address these 3 areas of need. You can also look at it like this – you want to give your prospect more information about: WHO you are. WHAT you do. And WHY they should trust you.
You’ll need to create some very different marketing tools than you have in the “Getting” stage of your program. Some of the best tools I use in my own business to accomplish this are:
• Success Stories
• Industry Specific Portfolios
• Newsletters
• E-zines
• And even Proposals (yep, your proposal is a marketing tool too!)
And if you have downloaded the audio program on “Creating Winning Proposals” from the ForGrapohicDesignersOnly.com website – you’ll be very familiar with this truth.
All of these tools are designed to help you build a relationship with your prospect. To help your prospect get to know you and your business in greater detail. So they are more comfortable and confident in you and your abilities. All of which makes their transition from prospect to client easier – not to mention quicker.
3. “Keeping”
This final stage to your marketing program is just as critical as the other two segments. But unfortunately many designers don’t treat it that way. In fact many designers don’t market to their clients at all after they get them on board.
Even when you’ve converted your prospect to a client your marketing efforts to them should never stop – it just has to change focus and have a new objective.
If you don’t spend time on designing a marketing program that focuses on keeping your clients, then you are wasting your time and money on the two other stages. And you’ll being resigning yourself to a frantic mode of always looking for new clients in order to keep your business afloat.
Happy, satisfied clients can make your marketing much easier and a lot less stressful. Because your happy clients continue to come back again and again with very little effort on your part. Not to mention that marketing to your existing clients is usually a lot cheaper than your other marketing components.
Your “Keeping” stage is designed to strengthen your position with your client. And it should be designed to so that you can justify higher fees, persuade them to use you more often, as well as encourage them to refer you to others.
What kind of materials do you use for your “Keeping” component? Here are just a few you could use:
• Case Studies (featuring current or past projects)
• Reference Sheets and Guides (outlining best practices on design strategies)
• Insider Secrets
• Industry Reports
• Current Business Success Stories (featuring one of your star clients)
• Incentive Programs
The whole goal of your “Keeping” component is to continually add value, constantly position your firm and create incentives for their patronage. Not only will you benefit from their continued loyalty you’ll make it very difficult to lose clients to your competitors. And that in itself is worth the effort.
Breaking down your marketing into these 3 easy stages will ensure you create a marketing program that covers all the bases. From finding your a prospect and converting them – all the way through to having them as a loyal client for many, many years to come.
But it won’t happen haphazardly. You need to carefully plan out each stage and then get busy at creating the tools that will attract, convert and keep your most valuable asset in your business – your client.
If you’re interested in learning more about creating persuasive tools to help you get more clients into your business – you can find more information and marketing tools on the ForGraphicDesignersOnly.com website, under the resource section of the site.
Well that’s it for another week.
Thanks for joining me on the ForGraphicDesignersOnly.com live podcast
Where you as a creative business owner… – learn how to attract more clients, – Earn higher fees – and get more of the work you want
Have a great week.
Dedicated to Graphic Designer SuccessMichael Huggins
This article has a podcast! Click here to listen!
Like this article? Share it!
[BACK TO TOP]