Yesterday, I got back from the first 2-day 'Small Business Marketing Workshop' run by the very smart Jonathan Jay in his new business venture Success Track
The purpose of the 2-day workshop was for Jonathan to share his own experience in what does and doesn't work in terms of marketing a business. Jonathan also offered a 'marketing clinic', where attendees could (perhaps crushingly honestly in some cases!) receive a critique of their current marketing materials and approach (note to anyone who attended here — you will of course get the irony of Jonathan describing this in his own words as "a clinic"!).
Not only did every business owner leave (I have no doubt) with ideas, and a plan for their marketing that will literally catapult their business forward, but I know that it's all good stuff THAT ACTUALLY WORKS!
I've 'worked' in Marketing for a long time now (let's just say it's more than 10 years, so I don't feel too old!), and more and more I've learnt about what does and doesn't work, and I have to say Jonathon is spot on. Not that I always realised this, however, as most credit for me 'getting my head around' direct response marketing and a personality-led, benefits driven 'tell more' approach was Paul Gorman. Paul is a source of pure inspiration for me, and one of the smartest people I have ever had the pleasure of meeting and being coached by.
Paul is technically 'retired' now, but he has graciously put ALL his marketing ideas, articles and materials on his Leave Them in the Dust website, which you really should visit right now if you've not done so before. I am sure I will be referencing it more than once!
So what is it about Paul's and Jonathan's approach that means I want them to fill up my head with knowledge? Well, for one they have the answers based on experience and actual results, not theory (might sound obvious, but it's not always the case). Time and time again I've sat in one of Paul's seminars, for example, and witnessed first-hand people who have transformed their businesses after he switched the lightbulb on in their head.
Now, just to make sure this isn't the longest first blog post in history :) I'll talk about some of Paul's, and Jonathan's, and other people's, ideas and approaches in separate posts. Which reminds me, I should also mention that the event this weekend also had a guest speaker — Ed Rivis — who is someone else who I love to learn from too. Ed's area of expertise is web marketing, and I am a kindred spirit with Ed when it come to getting geeky about web stats and landing pages and split testing, etc!
I'm not ever going to pretend I know it all (afterall, I will be the first to admit I'm not sitting on a £million company right now), but I sure do know some people who know a lot, I've worked with some very successful business people, and I do have a bit of a clue having run my own business for a few years :)
I'm planning to share what I know, what I've learned, and what I think are great business ideas on this blog, and hopefully make it a useful resource for other small business owners.
Want to talk more about this?
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