5 marketing must-dos each week

It’s a fact: business owners are time-poor.

But your marketing machine is vital to the success of your business, so keeping the momentum going is vital.

Luckily, much like keeping fit it’s best done in short bursts rather than big bursts. When time is short, you can keep things rolling along by doing the following five things:

1. Maintain your database

A database is one of the most valuable marketing tools for business. Keeping your customer and prospect details up to date is vital so you can stay in touch.

Each week, add any new names or make changes to customer details as they come through. There is nothing more annoying for a customer than to have information sent to an old email address when they have gone out of their way to advise you of the new one.

2. Follow up sales leads

Whether this is making a call or sending an email or text, make the time to complete this task, as it is highly likely to result in a sale.

If you haven’t got a lot of time, prioritise these. For example, if the sales enquiry was from an existing customer, you have double the chance of it turning into a sale.

3. Reply to any sales enquiries

Make time to go through your emails or social media and respond to any sales enquiries that come through. The person who gets back to the customer in a timely fashion will often get the work.

If you’re short on time, respond to enquiries in a batch rather than as they come through — maybe during the middle or end of the day. It’s amazing how often an important email can be missed. (Also consider creating templates and setting up automatic replies.)

4. Evaluate customer feedback

To keep customers coming back it’s important to do a good job. How do we check if we are?

Customer evaluation can be automated through programs such as Survey Monkey and email marketing programs. The important part is to check in, as there’s no point gathering survey results if you don’t look at them. If customers are not satisfied, then fixing their issues will be your number one priority. (Also read 3 ways to listen better to your customers.)

5. Communicate to potential clients

Keeping your existing customers is super important, but for business growth, attracting new clients is vital.

Each week, do something that promotes your business to potential new customers. It might be placing an ongoing advertisement, posting some good content on social media, attending a networking event, meeting a prospective client, or making one to two cold sales calls.

If done each week, these tasks can keep your marketing moving in the right direction.

When spending time on marketing, the golden rule is allocating it to activities that will make a difference to your business.

Prioritising is key, as it cuts out the fat and allows you to use your time efficiently.