Page 150 - Duct Tape Marketing

Get Your Entire Team Involved in Marketing

a stunning way. Treat this meeting as one of your most important
sales calls for your new marketing business. Think balloons, T-shirts,
cake, and logo apparel. Paint the new picture, outline the new future,
present the new expectations, and commit to the next steps in this edu-
cation process. Most of all, commit the resources to launch powerfully.

A Marketing Board of Directors

Another very powerful marketing education tool is a marketing board
of directors. Many times small business owners feel they don’t have
access to strategic thinking resources, that much of the work within
their marketing world is tactical in nature. The focus is spent on writ-
ing the ad, ordering the list, or working with the designer.

A marketing board of directors, made up of members who can offer
a strategic perspective to your marketing business, can be a great way
to get outside advice to help drive your marketing decisions. Create a
board mixed with clients, vendors, partners, and a community member
or two, and ask them to commit to a quarterly meeting with the intent
of reviewing and commenting on your marketing plans and progress.

The benefits to this approach make it well worth the small
amount of work it may require to recruit your board. Clients of mine
have found that a marketing board offers several benefits:

 It gives them someone to hold them accountable—most
notably, the quarterly report of results drives them to focus on
achieving goals.

 It provides creativity beyond what the owner or staff could
muster while working in the business.

 It creates a loyal group of external champions—board
members often feel compelled to champion a business they
become this deeply connected with.

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