I f you were to stop every marketing initiative you have going on right now – would it make a difference in your business?  If you canceled your newspaper ads, radio ads, brochures, website, social media sites, etc. – would your sales suffer?  For most businesses, the answer is yes.  We spend a lot of money to market and advertise our businesses.  Many of us have had the same marketing plan for years.  We do what we are comfortable doing.  Sadly, what we are comfortable with is spending money in the same places our competitors spend their money.

But when times get tough, we also start to look for that ‘silver bullet.’  That one marketing program that will bring an insane number of clients to your door step, create a plethora of new sales instantly, or encourage your existing client base to spend more with you overnight.  Before long, you find that you are taking a shotgun approach to marketing – rather than a focused program designed to produce specific results.  Time and money lost…

What does it cost you to acquire a new customer?  Have you ever determined how much you spend to attract and retain a customer?  Most businesses have not calculated that price.  But they know the pain of not having enough income coming in to pay for all of their expenses.

You are probably spending too much money on marketing and advertising without realizing it.  Take out a piece of paper and write down everything you are doing to market your business and put a price on it.  A good way to do this is to take a look at the line items on your budget or better yet – your actual expenses.

Let’s draw a line in the sand.  Just for a moment.  Just for now.  Cancel everything you are doing.  Stop it!  Draw a line in the sand.  How much money would you save?  Put a number on it.  You will need that number for the next step.

Now let’s look at what you should be doing….

So, you have ‘X’ number of dollars to spend on marketing.  If there were only three things you could do in the next 9o days to marketing your business, what would they be?  This is where you need to spend that money.  Would you rather have mediocre results in a lot of areas, or outstanding results in two or three areas?  In my opinion, dominating a medium is much better than simply existing in that medium.  Once you are the dominate player, then add to your marketing mix.

This blog post is all about focus of your time and your money.  It can be uncomfortable to try new things – even more uncomfortable to stop doing things you have done for years.  What are your thoughts?