Create Multiple Routes to Market

There are two kinds of business model: The diving board theory of business and the parthenon theory of business. Almost every business….. operate(s) using the diving board model. It has one primary method which is generating 90 or 100% of the revenue. The parthenon method, on the other hand, has different pillars each of which is a revenue generating activity. If you can move your business from the diving board model to the parthenon model, you will no longer be dependent on that one primary activity. Ironically, that one activity will actually improve as all the other activities will reach out and impact that activity. If each pillar adds a mere 10% to your business, the overall effect will be geometric.

Jay Abraham

When I heard about the parthenon method I began to wonder how to create multiple pillars or multiple routes to market. Here is the process that I created:

Step 1: Brainstorm Ideas

A good starting point is to aim for half of your routes to market to be online and half to be offline. Begin by simply brainstorming possibilities. You may end up with a list that looks something like this:

Online routes to market

* social networking site
* web site
* micro blogging site
* email
* online networking site
* blog

You may begin to find out which social media is used by people in the market you are aiming for and do some additional research to identify your market precisely. A good idea is to use a keyword research tool on the internet which will tell you what search terms potential buyers are keying into Google. One of your routes to market may be a web site that contains the key word that you are aiming for.

Offline routes to market

* magazine advertisements
* radio
* networking
* shop
* joint venture
* direct mail

Step 2: Research which Route to develop first

Consider: Where do people in your market get their information at present? Do they read particular magazines, go to specific web sites, read particular forums or blogs, do they go to exhibitions, is there an exhibition for your stuff, do they go networking, do they watch particular tv programmes, how old are they, where do they live, what clubs do they belong to? Then choose two or three routes to market to start with and…

Step 3: Develop your message

Put yourself into the position of your client or potential client and see the world through their eyes. What do they identify with? What is their worldview? How can you associate with their experience, beliefs and values? You may need to vary your message for each medium.

Step 4: Take one route at a time

Get each route to market working before you move on to the next one. How will you know that a route to market is working? Well you may create criteria for each route to market so that you will know when it is working and track where your business is coming from.

Step 5: Keep on going until you have 10 routes to market

You may find that you need to chop some and add others as one thing that used to work stops working or does not yield the results that you anticipated. Keep on going until you are getting the response that you want. Enjoy.

Create an Attention Grabbing USP

“There is no substitute for uniqueness. By going against the grain, doing the opposite of people around you, you will automatically stand out. Standing out is always better than blending in. Most people and businesses are earth tones in a world of drab colors, camouflaged, purposefully unnoticed. That’s not good when your goal is to attract customers.” Gravitational Marketing Jimmy Vee, Travis Miller and Joel Bauer.

When I read this I realised that there were no excuses… I had to create a Unique Selling Point (Or You SP) for our business. Here is the step by step process that I came up with as I did this. Hope this helps you to discover or create your uniqueness:

Step 1:Recognise that you are Unique

Write your signature on a piece of paper and study it closely. Then take a felt tip pen (I just tested this with orange and dark blue and the darker colour definitely works better) apply colour to your left index finger in the area between the tip of your finger and the top joint of your finger then roll your finger on the page like you are taking your fingerprint. Your signature and fingerprints are uniquely you and no-one else on the planet has these unique attributes. Similarly there are many things that only you can do which are often outside of your awareness as they have become unconscious competence. The process of finding your You SP is to notice what is unique about you and start to use it in your marketing.

Step 2: Review What Other People Say About You

Here’s the thing, for many people the things that you are good at, your unconscious competence is difficult to describe in words, so you may not know that it is something that only you can do and imagine that everyone else can do it. So, a good way around this is to ask other people. Create a mind map and write in the middle:

What are you known for?

Collect the answers and write them as branches on your mind map that you can then start to distill into your essence, your “authentic” uniqueness.

Get inspiration: Imagine that you are a top chef, what would be your signature dish?

Step 3: Review How Other People Describe their USP

Here are some USP’s that I collected when I was doing some research into internet marketing, where each person has answered “what are you known for?” in their own unique way:

The Marketing Rebel rant
The Officlal Blog of John Carlton
Insights, Tactics, Advice and Mutterings from the most respected and ripped off marketing expert on the web…..

Internet Marketing Speed
Internet Marketing Speed Founder James Schramko is an Australian Internet Marketer who quit his highly paid job and left the ‘rat race’ after learning and applying powerful internet marketing strategies.

Strategic Profits
He is well-known within Internet marketing communities as the ”business coaching guru to the gurus” for his success in working with many of the top names in Internet marketing.

Step 4: Create 3 different USP’s for You and Test Them

Become curious, how do you know that you have created your usp and what does it look like, sound like, feel like and if it’s your signature dish what does it smell and taste like? You can test your USP by posting it as a comment to this blog post and get feedback from me and from others.

Step 5: Create an Anchor

“There are a lot of books and training seminars that attempt to teach you how to “trick” people into making a sale, or to buy what it is you do. Some of these things even have some value.

But many of these methods shy away from the one SINGLE most important reason we “buy” ANYTHING. Numerous studies have now proven that we generally BUY based on FEELINGS - NOT “Intellect”.

If in some way, our FEELINGS can be related to a product or service, THEN we tend to buy that product or service.” Kenton Knepper Rants into Raves

So once you have defined your USP you can have fun using NLP techniques to anchor it to You.

Enjoy.

Create and Implement a 90 Day Plan

“Unless commitment is made, there are only promises and hopes; but no plans.”
Peter F. Drucker

In November 2006 I went to Edinburgh for a shamanic states and basic brain exploration workshop with Richard Bandler, one of the co-creators of NLP. Yes I know you may be thinking, what has this got to do with running a small business? Well, please just indulge me for a few moments and I will get to that. One of the big “themes” of the workshop was getting things done. Once I had processed what I heard I began to look for the keys to getting things done, and after loads of research I got inspired to create a step by step process to get more done in your business, so without further ado, here it is:

Step 1: Create a 90 Day Plan

I went to a presentation in Gatwick by Simon Woodroffe, the founder of YO! Sushi (To quote from his web site YO! Sushi is based on the concept of a Japanese kaiten sushi bar offering a quality, fast and fun dining experience for all ages). He was also one of the Dragons in the Dragons Den (a popular BBC TV programme on business). What he said in the presentation really made sense. “Think of all the steps that you need to take in order to get your business started or take it to the next level and break them down into action steps that you can take over the next 90 days.”

Step 2: Get started!

Here’s a simple way to get going:

1. Think about what you want to accomplish
2. Write it down as a well-formed goal
3. Share your plan with someone else
4. Share your plan with a larger group
5. Get someone else to hold you to account (Often a mentor)

Take the time to go through these steps and set a date, mark it in your diary and begin!

Step 3: Review Your Progress Regularly

As you start your a new project you will tend to have a high level of enthusiasm (If you don’t….. check, are you doing the right project;0)). Many people have a habit of putting in that extra effort to meet a deadline, so, create some artificial deadlines. Create a deadline to review what you have accomplished, every five days, then continue to take action for the next five days. At the end of the 90 days either you will have achieved what you set out to do or you can create a new plan for the next 90 days. Works for me!

Step 4: Do it Every Day
Just like any other complex skill the more you practice the better you get. So take action towards accomplishing your plan every day! As you complete each task, mark it off on your calender. We use Google calender which has a useful feature in that it sends an email to reminds you what you plan to do each day or hour depending on how you set it up.

Step 5: Ship and Celebrate
As you complete each action take a few moments to enjoy the feeling of getting things done. When you complete the final action then you will be ready to ship! Now it’s time to celebrate.

Enjoy

Discover and Create Your Message You Want to Share with the World

The Medium is the Message. “The electric light is pure information. It is a medium without a message, as it were, unless it is used to spell out some verbal ad or name. This fact, characteristic of all media, means that the “content” of any medium is always another medium. The content of writing is speech, just as the written word is the content of print…. If it is asked, “What is the content of speech?,” it is necessary to say, “It is an actual process of thought, which is in itself non-verbal.” An abstract painting represents direct manifestation of creative thought processes” Understanding Media Marshall Mcluhan

Mmmmm….. the first time that I read this quote, I didn’t have a clue what it meant!

Yesterday, as I sat on the train on my way back from Brighton I picked up my iPhone and clicked on the guardian online icon. I was of course shocked to see the headline “Israeli attack on Gaza flotilla sparks international outrage”. As I read the article I noticed tweets sent in from individual observers and organisations expressing different points of view and as I watched the you tube video shot on one of the vessels from the flotilla I realised the speed with which messages now spread around the globe. I was watching the news from the Middle East unfolding on my iPhone sitting on a train in the middle of Sussex.
I also realised that those people sending the tweets or posting videos on you tube could be small businesses or coaches trainers and consultants like you and I. We too can deliver an instant “real time” message to our target audience, and as it becomes so much easier and quicker to share your message with the world it’s really important to have something to say! So I thought it may be useful to break down Mcluhan’s ideas into this simple 5 step process that I’m going to share with you now, to organise your thought processes and create a message from your own specific point of view:

Step 1: Unblock your internal censor

“Yet he dismisses without notice his thought, because it is his. In every work of genius we recognise our own rejected thoughts; they come back to us with a certain alienated majesty.” Ralph Waldo Emerson.

Ask the question ” What is my message to the world?”
Use the pomodoro technique and set a timer for 25 minutes then write (or type) without pausing for 25 minutes. Ignore the temptation to edit or correct spelling, grammar, punctuation etc….. just keep on going until the timer indicates that you have completed your 25 minutes. This is simply a way to tap into your creative mind and to get into the flow. What happens when you say the words out loud as you type them down?

Step 2: Make a Mind Map of the Key Themes or ideas

Make the central idea in your mind map “My message to the world” and write down the ideas that you have on what your message may be and start to get them down on paper.

Step 3: Experiment with Different Media

Start to Record Your Spoken and Visual Sense Impressions. You can record what you have to say on a dictaphone or on an iPhone which has a special recording device. Notice which senses you use the most to present your message. Next you can get a flip video camera and experiment with video.

Step 4: Review what you have recorded

“Teach yourself to become unafraid of speaking your “inmost” ideas and feelings, and you will be able to tap into people “universally”. Rants into Raves Kenton Knepper.

Imagine that you are in the pub with your best and closest friend having a deep conversation about what is stirring deep within your heart. Edit the recording and ensure that you remain true to yourself.

Step 5: Create a Story or Metaphor

Realise that there is a metaphor that you can use to make your message more accessible to the general public who may have an interest in how you resolve and reconcile the creative and the commercial.

Enjoy.

Mark Yourself Out as a Maven in your field

The word maven comes from the Yiddish, and means one who understands, based on an accumulation of knowledge. In recent years, economists have spent a great deal of time studying Mavens, for the obvious reason that if marketplaces depend on information, the people with the most information must be the most important. The Tipping Point Malcolm Gladwell

“Maven” is used by Malcolm Gladwell in the Tipping Point to identify someone who is an intense gatherer of information and impressions, and so is often the first to pick up on new or nascent trends… and most importantly… someone who wants to tell other people about it too, to be a helper in the marketplace.

Seems like a good starting point for any coach, trainer or consultant, as I have noticed that in many markets the market leader (who is often also recognised as the “maven” in that field) is able to command premium prices, generate more leads and get more referrals simply by virtue of his or her “maven” status.

So I began the quest to become a maven and share the information that I know and devised this step by step process for finding your maven along the way:

Step 1: Make an Inventory of Your Strengths

What are you really good at?
On which topics do you have lots of information?
What is your passion?
On what topic do people come to you for advice and guidance?
What combination of skills and interests is unique to you?
Who shares your passion and interests and wants your skills?

Step 2: Remember the 1/3; 1/3; 1/3 Rule

As you “step up to the plate” or “put your head above the parapet”, as a maven you may well find that you get things thrown at you, (metaphorically speaking) and you will polarise opinions. A bit like marmite, you either love it or…

One rule of thumb that you can use is the 1/3; 1/3; 1/3 rule which is that one third of the people will love what you have to say and become your “raving fans” one third of the people will hate what you have to say and one third will be ambivalent. So if some people don’t like what you have to say that’s a signal that you are starting to stand out from the crowd. Concentrate on your raving fans!

Step 3: Structure Your Information

Break your information down into steps or stages so that you can provide what you know to your audience in manageable chunks.

Step 4: Create authority as a maven in your chosen field.

Now comes the time to establish your perceived authority as a a maven in your chosen field, market or more likely micro-market/niche. You may choose to present or publish your information to your chosen market through a variety of different media, including books, presentations, video, audio, multimedia, blog, ezine articles. Initially you may seem to be in “broadcast mode” and it may seem a bit lonely. So, next, get interactive and…..

Step 5: Start a conversation with your audience in your chosen field

Now you can begin a conversation with the people in your chosen field to find out what they want to know and tailor your messages accordingly!

Enjoy.

Warm Regards

Graham

NLP with Whole Being

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Whole Being specialises in the application of NLP in personal development and business, combining over 13 years experience in commercial, account management and general management with 13 years of training and coaching people using NLP. We use NLP methods to deliver the training which means that the skills of NLP are easily and quickly converted into tangible benefits and bottom line results for your business. We have trained over 125 NLP Practitioners, NLP Business Practitioners and NLP Master Practitioners to date.