In companies of every size,  sales are down and quotas are not being met. “The Meeting” has occurred, the one where sales and marketing heads have asked for ideas on how to increase sales. “Well, we could do more with our website”, is what emerges because everyone in the room knows just how much they themselves use Google to find the products and services they buy. This is where I come in, as they’ve contacted my company. I let them know that the bad news is this is step 1 of 6, but that the good news is the six steps are relatively cheap and easy to implement. Most importantly, for the same cash asked for by traditional advertising, these steps deliver HUGE return on investment and over many years.

1. Update and refurbish the website. Read Seth Godin’s book “The Big Red Fez” and read the previous blog post.
2. Get search engine optimization (SEO); it’s cheap and easy. You need to get found by Google – 90% of B2B transaction start with a search engine. Focus in on a geographic area, win that and then expand from there.
3. Start online marketing; it’s cheap and easy. Google AdWords, link building campaigns, banner ads and Facebook are great places to start.
4. Start email campaigning; it’s cheap and easy. Use Email Service Providers (ESPs) like VerticalResponse, Constant Contact, MailChimp. ESPs will help keep your messages out of spam filters and keep you from getting labeled as a spammer. Start with the list your company already has, supplement it with data from Jigsaw.
5. Auto-nurture leads generated by your website; it’s a cheap and an easy competitive advantage. Get Marketing Automation software like ActiveConversion so that when your website does generate a lead you can auto deliver more touches to each and everyone one of them.
6. Track desirable activities on your website; it is a cheap and easy competitive advantage. Again, use Marketing Automation software to know which companies or contacts are visiting your site, how they got to your site, which pages they are visiting, if they come back for a second visit, and if they are achieving goal pages or goal clicks.

Do these things because:

The entry price is low – these eMarketing solutions cost a relatively little and very quickly let SMBs punch well above their weight.

Low change risk – these activities don’t replace the relationship selling that SMBs know – it just lets them eliminate the cold calling that uses their time inefficiently.

Low surprise risk – budgets for these activities are fixed, and the ROI feedback is exceptional.

Low time risk – these solutions don’t require a new hire, don’t require information technology infrastructure, don’t require new expertise, and implement in days.

Many others using it – must be the right (safe) choice.

Competitive advantage – the six steps will either give you a competitive advantage over your competitor, or you’ll need them to level the playing field with your competitor