Zig When They Zag

What happens when your annual business plan goes out of the window?

In this episode, Jessica Scanlon and Kevin Ring discuss how business leaders should reevaluate their business and marketing plans during times of crisis. 

Before a crisis occurs, make sure you are keeping an updated dashboard of your business goals and key metrics. Jessica mentions that a few of the key indicators for Hot Dog Marketing are website visits and how many proposals the sales team is writing and sending out. Check in with this dashboard periodically to see how things are shifting and how to prepare for future shifts.

Kevin discusses how the health of small businesses is often tied to their cashflow. Unexpected changes in cash flow can have severe consequences. Business owners can retain confidence by tapping into unused lines of credit or government assistance programs (like the Paycheck Protection Program).

The third topic discussed was that sales cycles will be longer this year. Businesses and consumers will take longer to make decisions due to uncertainty. This doesn't mean your marketing efforts should halt, but your messaging should pivot to address customers' new concerns.

Key questions for adjusting to "new normals":

• What do you need to optimize to stay productive in this time?
• What does your marketing pipeline look like?
• How are you able to align marketing with the sales cycle in the new economy?

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Link to Pivot Workshop Download

https://sales.hotdogmarketing.net/pivot-workshop-download
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Hot Dog Marketing is a digital marketing agency in Round Rock, TX serving small and medium-sized businesses. We excel in delivering marketing strategy, digital marketing, website design and development, and outstanding customer service.

To work with us, visit www.hotdogmarketing.net

Who is your ideal customer? (Hint: it's not everyone)

In this episode, Kevin Ring and Jessica Scanlon dispel some of the marketing myths we hear often. Unfortunately, there are many occasions where business owners fall into the trap of one or more of these marketing myths. Often, the effects are expensive and can also be creating much more work. 

The marketing myths businesses often believe:

1. My customer is everyone since my product is for everyone.
2. I know the value we bring our customers and what they're looking for.
3. We don't do marketing.
4. Our business comes from government procurement so we don't need marketing, just a low price.

Jessica and Kevin talk about what happens when companies believe these myths and how to identify misbeliefs and turn them around.

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Hot Dog Marketing is a digital marketing agency in Round Rock, TX serving small and medium-sized businesses. We excel in delivering marketing strategy, digital marketing, website design and development, and outstanding customer service.

To work with us, visit www.hotdogmarketing.net

The term "brand equity" is thrown around a lot, but what does it really mean?

In this episode, Jessica Scanlon and Kevin Ring focus on brand equity. They discuss not only what it is but how you can obtain brand equity for your small or medium-sized business. Having brand equity means that your brand is the one that comes to mind when people think about your industry/product/service. 

Earning brand equity can come before the sale (like in advertising or clever marketing) or after the sale (through remarkable product delivery-not just fulfillment).

Your brand equity should be woven into your company's messaging, marketing, and business strategy. Be conscious of it in each step of your sales pipeline and service delivery. Having positive brand equity can put you first in mind before competitors since they know your business is trusted and reliable.
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Hot Dog Marketing is a digital marketing agency in Round Rock, TX serving small and medium-sized businesses. We excel in delivering marketing strategy, digital marketing, website design and development, and outstanding customer service.

To work with us, visit www.hotdogmarketing.net

In business, you solve a problem for your customer. Pivoting means that you anticipate your customers' new concerns and adjust to solve their problems in a new way.

Customer effort score: the harder it is for customers to interact with you, the quicker they'll abandon the purchase.

Kevin discusses the framework we use at Hot Dog Marketing to help clients craft their strategic marketing plans. 

• Who is your customer?
• Who is your buyer?
• Who is your user?
• How do they use your service?
• What value does your service create for them?

Kevin discusses the "value chain": the process of developing, producing, selling, and delivering your product. Knowing the entire value chain of your product, including who the buyers and users are, can help you identify how COVID-19 has impacted your customers.

Key questions:

Where are the new needs that are arising?

How is your customer's plight impacted by the complexity of the pandemic?

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Link to Pivot Workshop Download

https://sales.hotdogmarketing.net/pivot-workshop-download

________________

Hot Dog Marketing is a digital marketing agency in Round Rock, TX serving small and medium-sized businesses. We excel in delivering marketing strategy, digital marketing, website design and development, and outstanding customer service.

To work with us, visit www.hotdogmarketing.net

Having a customer-centric value proposition is critical to making a real impact with your audience.

In this episode, Jessica Scanlon and Kevin Ring discuss focusing your messaging on the customer's values, instead of your own. Kevin compares this to dating, you don't want to spend the entire time talking about yourself. Marketing is similar. Instead, as a small business owner, communicate the value you can provide to your customers. 

Many small businesses believe they simply need to communicate how much experience they have and how good they are at what they do in front of more people. However, this self-focused messaging is ineffective.

When your marketing is aligned with the value you provide, your customers come to you primed to purchase and sales teams don't have to work as hard.

Identify the value you provide to your customers:

1. What is the one thing you do that makes you stand out from your competitors?
2. What is the perceived value that your customers experience?

Your customers won't see your product or service as a path to a better future without you painting the picture for them.
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Hot Dog Marketing is a digital marketing agency in Round Rock, TX serving small and medium-sized businesses. We excel in delivering marketing strategy, digital marketing, website design and development, and outstanding customer service.

To work with us, visit www.hotdogmarketing.net

Episode 1: originally recorded April 10, 2020. The first in a two-part mini-series about leadership in crisis finds Jessica Scanlon, Founder and CEO of Hot Dog Marketing, and Kevin Ring, our Director of Strategy, discussing what it means to be a leader in these uncertain times. What does being a leader mean now? What should leaders focus on? How should they adapt? What is really important to businesses now? All this and some pretty funny banter!