Many business owners and professionals that we work with would agree with that statement, which is not ideal when you have products or services to sell!

You know you have to do marketing in order keep the income flowing, but it frequently falls down the list of priorities. Occasionally you will carry out a big burst of marketing activity (sometimes in response to a sudden loss of fees). This is usually not well planned, costs you lots of time and money to implement and yields very poor results, thereby reaffirming that ‘marketing is not for me’.

How to promote your business when you hate marketing

Before we get into the tips and tricks for helping you overcome your marketing fears, let’s make one assumption – you don’t have a marketing person/department in your business to do your marketing, i.e. the marketing buck stops with you. So, what steps can you personally make to implement marketing activities to help grow your business?

Focus on what you enjoy doing

Rather than trying to carry out a series of different marketing activities because: a) your competitors are doing them; or b) you read somewhere that they will bring you outstanding results, focus on the things that you actually like doing. This varies from person to person, but the general rule is if you enjoy doing something you’ll be more likely to do it, and you’re more likely to do it well, which will mean you’re more likely to get results. So what do you enjoy doing, which could also help you to grow your income?

• Attending networking events – meeting new people, taking an interest in what they do, referring business to them etc.
• Writing articles or blogs – could you become a local/national voice on a particular topic, getting yourself known across social media channels, trade publications and professional groups?
• Presenting seminars – taking your expertise to the masses – getting a reputation as someone who knows what they’re talking about.
• Cold calling – yes there are people out there who get a buzz from telemarketing! Do you like the thrill of calling someone for the first time, developing a rapport with them with a view to arranging to meet or perhaps getting them to sign up/buy something whilst on the phone?

Outsource what you don’t enjoy

Frequently we are seeing more businesses, even smaller firms, outsourcing some of their marketing activities to relevant professionals so that the job gets done. Whether that’s getting someone to keep your social media pages or website up to date, write brochures or mailing letters, make follow-up calls or appointments for you to meet prospective clients. The bottom line is, play to your strengths and what you’re not good at, try outsourcing to someone who can do it well for you.

Think of marketing as communicating – not sales

A lot of people are turned off by the word ‘marketing’ as they think it will make them come across as being aggressive sales people (It won’t by the way!). If you perceive meeting people, sending letters or emails etc., as a method of communication, rather than being a sales pitch, you will feel more confident in interacting with your clients and target groups.

Choose your best time of day

Do your marketing activities at a time when you know you’ll get things done. Is that first thing in the morning, so it gets it out of the way leaving you to focus on the other things which you enjoy? Or is it attending evening networking events (because you’re a night owl and not a morning lark), or sitting down with a nice glass of something you fancy to write an article, newspaper column or blog in the evenings? Whatever works best for you – follow that format. There are no rules for when you should or shouldn’t do marketing, so go with what works for you.

Less is more

A constant steady trickle of marketing yields far greater and longer term results than a boom or bust approach. Plus, it will help you manage your cash flow and resources to help you get things done. If you give yourself a lot of marketing activities to carry out in a short space of time, you’re unlikely to do them all, and you’ll probably resent doing them because it will take up your time and stop you from doing other activities. A little and often is far more palatable.

Who’s making you accountable?

Get a mentor – whether they are internal or external to your business, but give yourself activities and deadlines and share these with your ‘mentor’. It is their job to make you accountable and to see how much progress is being made. They should challenge and encourage you to implement your marketing activities and to make the process as painless as possible for you.

Hopefully, the tips and ideas given in this article will help you move away from ‘I hate marketing’ to ‘Marketing’s not as bad as I thought’. Who knows, you may even start to like it!