Newsletter Archive – March 2008

How to Get and Maintain A Live Database

Published March, 2008

TABLE OF CONTENTS:

1.   Featured Article: How to Get and Maintain a Live Database
2.   Born to Read Book Club with convenient Amazon.ca links: BLOGWILD! A Guide for Small Business Blogging by Andy Wibbels and First You Have to Row A Little Boat by Richard Bode
3.   Think about this Question. Do you have and maintain a database (or list of contacts) somewhere?
4.   Read My Blog called Marketing to Small Business–I NOW WRITE 3 TIMES A WEEK! - at http://www.trudyvanbuskirk.typepad.com

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TRUDY’S NOTE

Hi There

Do you have a record of every contact you make and how you met them? Do you keep in touch with these people?
Do you have your clients in a database along with their purchase history? And I don’t mean just in your accounting software.
Business is a game of relationships and numbers. You have to attract enough potential clients through your marketing efforts who then buy your product or service at a profit.
Then you have to do it again. And again.
Everyone can do this. Read on to find out how.
(See my blog at http://www.trudyvanbuskirk.typepad.com with my thoughts on this and other things that relate to marketing for small business.)

Thanks for reading.

My Best Wishes,
Trudy
Organized Marketing Mentor and Teacher
mailto:trudy@smallbizbuilder.com http://www.smallbizbuilder.com

Please print or forward this ezine to your friends and colleagues – I have lots to tell you and would like you to give this info as a gift to yourself and others. Enjoy.
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1. Featured Article. HOW TO PICK YOUR CLIENTS.
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A database is the tool to keep track of more than just the names on a business card. It will let you leverage your contacts.
Enter the cards of people you meet within 1 day of meeting them. You won’t forget them, their business or what you promised. That’s a form of discipline. It’s also a way to be organized. Be proud of that!
Here’s how to do this in stages …
* Use either a Rolodex, or a notebook named “prospects” and another called “clients”, or your email address book, or a list in a spreadsheet like Excel, a or PDA (like Palm Pilot or Blackberry), or contact management software like ACT TM, or build your own in FilemakerPro TM. All work. You can progress through as you know more about them – or start with software right away if you’re comfortable. (I use Filemaker Pro because I’m familiar with computers and it.)
* Prospects: record where you met them and when, what their business is, and any pertinent information that you learned about them at the time including any promises that you made to send them information or contacts.
* Clients: track what they buy, how much, how often, how they found you initially (marketing source, word of mouth, referral, online, etc), and any referrals they send you.
* Develop systems for communicating regularly with both groups (clients and prospects) ….
** Follow up by phone and/ or email after you meet new people. Send what you said you would.
** Add them to a regular email newsletter that you send out (NOTE: this is another important tool to consider and you MUST have their permission to do it.)
** Email notices of specials related to your products or services to both groups.
** Mail a postcard a couple of times a year so that you can check mailing addresses and give them something tangible to remember you by – they can also pass this along to others they know (referrals!).
* Communicate regularly with everyone you’ve met or do business with.
* Review your database and all that you have learned about these people in it in order to design interesting and useful offers. Check to see where your clients are coming from so you know which of your marketing methods is most effective. Then repeat what works best and drop what doesn’t. This is how to ensure you’re doing no cost and low cost marketing.
* Design a referral program that gives your best clients a way to help you grow your business.
A database is a goldmine when you maintain it and use it creatively to build relationships – and your business!
Keep learning, … and until next time.
© 2008 Trudy Van Buskirk

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2. BORN TO READ BOOK CLUB

Here are the two books for this issue. The first one is business and the second is spiritual. As always I own them both and have read them.

BLOGWILD! A Guide for Small Business Blogging by Andy Wibbels.
People have been talking about blogs – reading them, writing in one, or having one for your business. There are many companies to choose from. Some blogs are free and some cost. I started mine in 2006 and because there weren’t many places yet to learn about them, I did it myself and chose this book to help me. Blogwild! B Andy Wibbels takes you by the hand and step by step (chapter by chapter) you develop a blog.
Wibbels makes it easy to read and follow and not technical at all and adds an index that is very helpful. I still go to it. This book is about how to set up and use a b log in Typepad, only one place to go for one.
Full of websites, you can be up and running with your own blog by tomorrow with this book. It helped me and it can help you, too.
Get this book and read and use it..

http://tinyurl.com/29xc2m

FIRST YOU HAVE TO ROW A LITTLE BOAT by Richard Bode
I love sailing. I even got to co-own a 39 foot boat and keep it at Pier 39 in San Francisco when I lived there. Wonderful!
I’ve often used sailing as an analogy for business in my talks. That’s why I was drawn first to this book. The dust jacket says “To sail a boat is to negotiate a life …”. I was hooked. I had to have this book.
Bode takes what happens on the boat and compares it to life. You don’t have to be a sailor to understand.
Buy this book and read it and think about what he says. http://tinyurl.com/yoqaxz
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3. THINK ABOUT THIS QUESTION: Do you have and maintain a database (or list of contacts) somewhere?
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4. Read my blog at http://www.trudyvanbuskirk.typepad.com to learn more about marketing tips. I am writing three times a week here about whatever comes up.

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DO YOU LIKE THIS NEWSLETTER? Please pass it along to your friends, associates, and clients who you think would appreciate it. It comes to you once a month from marketing mentor and consultant Trudy Van Buskirk.

ABOUT TRUDY VAN BUSKIRK

Trudy Van Buskirk, is the founder of Smallbizbuilder. As a small business consultant, trainer, author, and resource, Trudy ensures that her clients get the results they want using her practical and disciplined system which motivates them to plan AND to take action. She has built three businesses from the ground up in Canada and the U.S.; consulted with small businesses and professionals; developed and delivered training courses for entrepreneurs; given keynote addresses and authored four books for TVOntario’s Bits ‘n Bytes television series on computers in 1982 and Winning Women in 1992.

CONTACT ME: Email: mailto:trudy@smallbizbuilder.com
Voice: 416-778-9976 (Eastern time)
Web: http://www.smallbizbuilder.com

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Reprinted from Inspired Marketing by Trudy Van Buskirk of Smallbizbuilder, a fr*e*e ezine published to educate and communicate Tips, Tools, and Resources to build your business or your professional practice.

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