I’m so excited about my new Ask Me Anything podcast episodes! I’m dropping these every Monday over the summer and I’d love for this community to submit your questions here! This week we chat about system automations, marketing time allocation, and client appreciation strategy.
System Automations
I received so many questions about where to start with system automations which makes sense for busy small business owners. As you may know I am a huge proponent of automating as much of your business as possible because time = money. For example, I use Zapier a ton in Forever Friday Consulting and it saves me hours a week. No joke!
My first recommendation is, you need to understand how your client is interacting with you right now, and then in an ideal world, how they would interact with you. Map out your client journey from start to finish. Then notice where something takes manual effort or where you are involved.
This will quickly point out to you where you can find an automation for this step. There are so many great resources within systems that we already use such as campaigns, follow-up, workflows, etc.
Step two would be to get to know your systems or start shopping for a better option. Within your current systems there are probably a lot of really cool features that you may not know about. Technology companies are quickly expanding their product offerings and roadmaps. You can always reach out to the customer service rep and ask if the feature you are looking for is something they are working on.
(If you haven’t checked out my blog about my favorite tools, read it here).
Marketing Time Allocation
Question two came from Kim from Heart of Wisdom Yoga who is a Friday Society member and she asked about percentage of time you should be spending on marketing. I had to think about this a lot because it was such a great question! Marketing can include so many things, and at the beginning, can feel overwhelming.
My overall goal is to be excited about everything I am doing within my business so that it doesn’t feel like marketing and/or sales. The overall goal is that you enjoy communicating with your clients. Once you have an established communication strategy you should be spending about 50% of your time on marketing. The other 50% is broken into, 25% of time focused on client acquisition and 25% client retention.
I break down the percentages with more detail in the podcast so make sure to listen!
Starting a Client Appreciation Strategy
I love when my clients are thinking about the future and working towards big goals. If a milestone program is something you are currently doing, or want to start, this is a great first step to a client appreciation strategy!
If you have never had a client appreciation strategy, or milestone strategy, before then I’d start by blanketing every client. Then make a conscious effort to keep tabs on milestones going forward.
This should definitely be a part of your strategy because it encourages client retention. We dive deep into this in The Friday Society Membership so make sure you listen to this module!
Also, your client appreciation strategy doesn’t have to be super expensive. It could be as simple as a client party, theme nights, a small gift, or 10% off merchandise. There are so many ways to go about this so listen to the podcast for all of the suggestions I offer!
The Friday Society Membership
In TFSM we have an entire module based on Client Appreciation where we dive into the do’s, and don’ts, of setting up your strategy. To learn more about the membership click here! For just $58 a month (with zero minimum commitment) you receive expert marketing advice to amply your business strategy and increase your bottom line.
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