A Blogger, a Baker and a Relationship Maker

By on February 7, 2007 in Marketing with 12 Comments

Working with business owners looking to boost their bottom line, a lot of our conversation centers around their marketing plans and practices.

Last month, I had a new restaurant owner ask my thoughts on who he should network with. I suggested he find a cab driver, a hotel front desk clerk and a bartender. Each one of these professionals are already in the habit of sharing their opinions. Become best business friends with those folks.

That said, if you’re blogging and want to build business, create a few relationships (offline and online) with people that touch your target AND are in the habit of sharing their opinions.

If my target is retailers, I’m looking to hook up with a manufacturer, a distributor and a like-minded vendor.

If I’m a pet-sitter, find me a veterinarian, a pet store and the HR dept of the largest employer in the county.

If I sell sporting goods, team me up with athletic directors, coaches and distributors of apparel.

Think a bit outside of your target customers – on the fringe. If they blog – that’s a big plus!

Follow on Twitter or Facebook or on Google+

Find Your Social Media ROI

I hear it from a lot of business owners: “Where is the ROI with all this Social Media?“ If this is a question you ask yourself, maybe we should work together a bit more. We can work together solo, or via a professional learning community. Find and increase your ROI. There is a “there” there.

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  • http://www.marketinghipster.com Cord Silverstein

    I could not agree more Mike. It seems so simple the way you put it, but sometimes the things right in front of our face are hardest to see. Keep up the great work.

  • http://healthywebdesign.com Dawud Miracle

    Small, service-oriented business is all about relationships. Any good sales person will tell you, that people don’t by with their minds as much as they buy from their emotions. And relationships touch emotions.

  • http://www.passionmeetspurpose.com/blog Kammie K.

    Mike,
    Thanks for this post. Great reminder to stretch and think more expansive with our network.
    Stay passionate,
    Kam

  • http://www.maryschmidt.com Mary Schmidt

    One of the biggest challenges I see is that people don’t even have a marketing plan – of any kind – and then expect to do a blog or web site or event or a single press release and – presto! instant business!
    It doesn’t have to be fancy or long – but you should have a plan – one page, with three goals, dates and action points, and some form of ROI measurement is a great start (what I call a marketing road map).

  • Cynthia Bridal

    If you are a new online pet shop, How do you get you name out on the world wide. http://www.savannahsmilespetique.com

  • Cynthia Bridal

    Get the pet supply http://www.savannahsmilespetique.com has been difficult getting the name out on the world wide web. We have tried almost everything. What are other tool to promote a website.

  • http://www.douglaskarr.com/ Doug Karr

    It’s amazing how much we learn simply by asking, isn’t it?

  • http://ok-lah.blogspot.com Adam ok

    Good advice. Agree wholeheartedly with you.

  • http://www.converstations.com Mike Sansone

    > Hi Cord, thanks for your feedback – and simple is the key. In fact, as I look at this post and the wonderful comments here – this took about eight minutes to write. Sometimes simple is best:-) Ditto Doug! Simple works.
    >Hiya Dawud – Right on target with relationships and emotions. Small businesses will find more opportunities to build on those than some of the big boxes, right?
    > Hi Kammie:-) Right, sometimes our most contagious customer evnaglelists might not even be our customer base – but they touch them daily.
    >Say hey, Mary – right. And your site provides some (watch the adjectives here, Mike ) excellent, simple, yet very important planning tools.
    >Thanks Cythnia:-) Glad you hit it with the second swing

  • http://credibilitybranding.typepad.com Jennifer McLean

    Mike, great simple elegant advice. This marketing stuff is pretty simple when it gets right down to it, thanks for reminding us of that. I focus on helping companies to identify and leverage influencers (influencing the influencers)… this is a perfect example. I am posting this on my blog too: http://credibilitybranding.typepad.com

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