A cafe up our road closed its doors this month. A family run business by the sweetest of people. They would make home made sandwiches in front of you and they remembered your face. I don’t think it was enough. 3 trendy / friendly / savvy cafes opened up within a year and a 50 metre vicinity of them. I loved this cafe and while I did recommend them to friends, I never blogged about them. There was nothing extraordinary to blog about. Make your brand worth talking about. Through the good times and the bad.
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This is the handy resource to have on file when you’re planning business development and marketing.
The 12 month calendar which reminds you to make shit happen. Not sure about what you could do to grow your business? Did you just land yourself a new marketing job and you don’t really know where to start? Would you like to try your hand at social media as well as traditional methods of marketing? Here is where its at.
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Why are you going to take my word for it?
Cause I’m not shy to tell you what worked for us and what didn’t. Then you need to take my thoughts and apply them to your business. We all have those week long lulls when the phone never seems to ring. This is how you fill that lull.
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This isn’t in reference to cold calling. I wouldn’t tell you to do that. This is purely calling people you know and “touching base”. Calling is something I’ve found really, very hard to do. It’s actually the hardest thing on this list for me (aside from networking, which didn’t make it to the list, but is in this marketing calendar). Somehow, I could never just pick up the phone and says “whats up?”. Or even worse, “whats up, do you have any work for me?”. So now, if I think of them or something that reminds me of them, I call them. It’s so much more natural and they love it. 
Having a dream client to aspire to or to approach, means you’ve got goals. You can choose how you want to approach them, whether you know someone who works within their company, you want to pop into their store and say hi, create some artwork tied to their brand and pop it in the post, it’s all your call. But having them in your line of vision which is almost tangible, is what makes it become real. 
Connect over food. Coffee. Dinner. It’s not about work. It’s about connecting. I love my lunch meetings. And I love the people I work with. Having lunch with them just gives me the excuse to get to know them better and see what they’re searching for and how I can help. 
There will always be a soft spot in my heart for special occasions. Once I sent out printers a box of samosas for Christmas. I let my clients know I was out for Diwali. We delivered cupcakes all over town with Kish+Co branding on them. Occasions are the perfect excuse to touch base. You don’t even need a reason. 
If you don’t believe in the whole karma / give thing, then this probably isn’t for you. Every time we’ve done pro-bono work, we get excellent folio work from it, samples to show other potential clients and a great relationship with friends and newbies to Kish+Co. And this goes from brochures, event planning and the simple lost dog poster. 
How much many letters do you get weekly? How many emails do you get weekly? How many people sent you a Christmas e-card this year? How many sent you one with a postage stamp on it? If marketing is about differentiation, then this is a simple ticket. 
Do good work and share it. Ask people to share your goodness — give them two vouchers, a box of cupcakes to share, a six pack of beer. When they share it, they’re going to be talking about your brand. 
I’m sure you already know it, but if you don’t – then invest in search engine optimisation, and invest in it now. (Email me for details and pricing). It needs to an ongoing investment, but it will definitely bring enquiries. It’s the new yellow pages. 
A lot of people don’t get social media. That is A-Okay. But that doesn’t mean you should ignore it. Just get the cool kids to make it happen for you. Or learn it and make it happen. Much like Search Engine Optimisation, Social Media is key. In fact, it now affects your rankings within searches. But what is it? Just imagine if we all went out of our bodies and into our computers. We’d be shaking hands and having conversations through the internet right? Well – that is what your brand is doing. Get social. Be nice. Two basic things my Papa taught me well. 
Blogging seems to get a lot of smirks. But f that. We get visits to our website purely for the food blogging I do (it started off as a way to get me out of bed and now I can’t stop). And you know all those cafe logos we’ve done… Where do you think we got those clients from? If you’re not into food, talk about something you’re smart about. You’ve got knowledge to share. Give readers a reason to come back. Because they’ll get loyal and they’ll share. 
Before you run ahead and dive into everything, pause. Think about what you want in 2013. Then make it happen. Here is a general marketing plan you can download to your iCal. Let me know if you want a customised one and we can work through it together. ++++++++++++
