Duct Tape Marketing

Duct Tape Marketing introduces small businesses to the nuts and bolts of marketing in the 21st century by taking them all the way from character profiles and strategy through specific marketing tactics to building a great referral system.

The summary talks about objectives, missions, goals and a marketing strategy. Out of all of these, the mission seems to be the one you mustn’t screw up.

I’ve mentioned Walmart’s mission before, to bring people retail products at the lowest price with the greatest service. That’s a mission I can support.

Your mission should always be somewhat idealistic and focus on the greater good. A mission example from a window cleaning company was along the lines of “We treat the homes we enter as if they were our own.”

My mission over at my blog is to bring people step-by-step instructions to build better habits, so they can start improving their lives 1% at a time.

For Four Minute Books it’s to help you learn more in less time (4 minutes, to be exact).

The reason I pulled out the mission here is that it’s what keeps you going when you want to quit. It’s not your drive to become the market leader or your goal to double your revenue that will push you when you need it the most.

When you hit a roadblock, and you don’t have a mission, you will quit. So make sure you have one before your first, inevitable, big crash.

This part I really like. The book puts your customers into different groups, or rather stages of the customer’s journey.

There are suspects, who are a good fit, but don’t know you yet and prospects who you’ve been in touch with and that want to know more about you.

Clients are first-time buyers and repeat clients keep coming back. Lastly, there are champions. These are not only repeat customers, but they love you and your products so much, that they keep telling all of their friends about you.

Champions remind me a lot of Kevin Kelly’s 1000 true fans, as it seems that when you hit a certain number of those, your business really starts to prosper and grow.

That’s why your best new customers are your old customers. Once you have a few clients, focus on giving them the best possible experience and service, so that they’ll eventually become champions and do your marketing for you.

This summary didn’t quite hit home for me. Maybe it’s because I’m a little sick of marketing altogether right now, after banging my head against the wall for the past year. Personal feelings aside, I do think it’s too crammed. The blink about being online tells you to hire…