Why Success Isn´t Falling Into Your Lap
Marketing your business, no matter what stage you´re at, is an essential part of business. If you think you can just put out an awesome product and people will magically appear to buy it, you´re kidding yourself. The whole “build it and they will come” strategy is something that only works in movies and in a very few, very rare real life cases.
When I was young, I desperately wanted to become an actress. I´d read about people like Brad Renfrow who were just eating lunch in their school cafeteria when someone “discovered” them and I would wonder why that stuff didn´t happen to me. If you have ever looked at some amazing success story where someone was quietly making kimonos or something for their children and suddenly people were begging to buy her products, you know what I´m talking about.
The problem is that while we tend to hear about these people more often, for every single person who had a sudden leap to fame, there are hundreds of thousands who worked their butts off and marketed like mad to get to where they are.
It´s time to stop waiting for something to happen so you can make it big.
The only way you´re going to succeed, short of a miracle, is putting in your time, and then some, and marketing the snot out of your business. Obviously, having a good product and providing excellent customer service is good too, but your business just isn´t going to go anywhere without some serious dedication.
Are you willing to do that? It sounds like an obvious question, but let me tell you a story. I have three sisters and all of them have some talent that they could totally use to earn money. One sister in particular is very, very good at art and making jewelry. She can also write, but she doesn´t particularly like it, so that´s out. But her jewelry is amazing. She does her own glasswork in her tiny apartment. I personally think she could go places with this if she really wanted to.
Now, this sister of mine lost her job three months ago and has been going insane looking for work, any work. Meanwhile, she has a bunch of jewelry sitting at home, but she can´t start her business because “no one wants to buy it”. I love my sister, but this makes me mad.
You see, over a year ago, when I first saw some of her pieces, I asked her to get some good photos and told her that I would happily set up a website for her so she could market online. She agreed that it was a great idea. Then she went on her merry way and didn´t send photos. I asked again a few weeks later. She didn´t have a camera. I asked if any of her friends did, or why didn´t she pop over to our dad´s and get him to do some professional pictures (he has a video and photo studio)? She agreed, great idea, but again, never took action.
Now, she´s out of work, desperate, and still has nothing to show for her AMAZING skill. She wants to build a business, but she isn´t willing to actually push the marketing and do what it takes to get her jewelry out in front of people that would buy it.
Unfortunately, her story isn´t that unusual. I get emails constantly from people who want to become freelance writers, start their own craft business, etc. But then they never take action, never actually market anything. They sit there, thinking that my emails must have magical powers and now that I´ve given them some ideas on what to do, people will run to buy from them.
WRONG! It doesn´t work that way.
Why am I ranting and raving about this? Because I´m so sick of people complaining about not having money and not being able to launch their business when they haven´t even tried, really. It´s time to make a decision. Either piss or get off the pot, as they say. If you are serious about running your own business, it´s going to take work. Maybe you can´t dedicate 8 hours a day to it, but that doesn´t matter. Spend 15 minutes a day, but do SOMETHING to work on it. Don´t just sit there and whine about how no one wants to buy your handmade instruments or your embroidered napkins. Use that time to get out there and find the people who want your product and tell them about it. It´s not easy, no one ever said it would be. But you have to do something if you want it to work.
Ok, rant over. If you are serious and you want to know more about how to market your business and start getting people to pay attention to you, then I suggest you subscribe to this blog and if you´re REALLY REALLY serious, go sign up for my ezine in the left hand sidebar there. I don´t send out many emails, but I do send out quality information, so you won´t be inundated.
you go girl!!!!!!!!!!!!!
stop the talk and get to work, people!!!!!!!!!!!
This is so true. Business (especially online business) is simply too competitive to sit back and wait for things to happen. Your competition is out there marketing every day – and if you’re not, guess who gets the business?
Thanks for this post; I write fiction and have my own lifestyle blog, and everything you say here is true. I just read an article about starting up one’s blog–it claimed that 70% of one’s success is marketing. This makes it tough, though! Marketing online can be schizophrenic and fractured…oh well…but thanks again for this kick in the pants.
Marketing is definitely very important when you look at how much competition there is out there. It doesn`t have to be difficult, though. I would suggest setting up a marketing plan and working on it . . . if you are consistent, you will see results.