GRAPHICS PRO

August '22

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B U S I N E S S S T R A T E G I E S S T I T C H S O L U T I O N S 9 0 G R A P H I C S P R O A U G U S T 2 0 2 2 G R A P H I C S - P R O. C O M as I know nothing about horses. Sell to groups where you are involved — that means you have knowledge! Business Cards Dollar for dollar, this is the best money you can spend to share the key basics about your business with anyone, anytime and anywhere. Always include your full phone number, including the area and your postal zip code. On the back of the card add a coupon, add lines for notes, or even your favorite quote. Sexy Sells! e machines we use to put logos and designs on products are sexy – they are fun to watch in action. Showing a machine going is one of our greatest marketing assets. When people see the machine running, they often become enchanted enough to buy something that was done on it. Harness that power, as it is likely they will continue to buy from you well after the initial event. Shoot 20-30 seconds of video of an order being created. Include this video as an attachment the next time you email that customer or when you send them their invoice. It is highly likely that they will share that video with the people they work with, their family, and their friends. You can also post these short videos on your Facebook page and YouTube. Good marketing is essential for every company. It can make a company with a mediocre product successful, but poor marketing can send a good company out of business. Yet even business-to-business marketing is often seen as a soft creative field instead of the engine that drives company revenue. Here's the real secret that successful companies know and live by: Creating a clear marketing strategy is not what com- panies do after they get big – it is what small companies do to grow and get big- ger in the first place. Doing anything is better than doing nothing, no matter how small or infrequent. What is one marketing thing you can do today and do every day to move a sin- gle step forward? When you have a clear target, clear message, and a plan, use this to guide your small day to day decisions. Ask yourself, "How will doing X help me reach goal Y?" Your greatest limitation is you, and what you believe to be true and the decisions you make based on your beliefs. • "ey won't pay that …" • "ey don't need that …" • "ey won't like this …" • "It is not good enough …" ey are not saying these things, only you are – stop it! ey are not walking into your business naked – they need more than a shirt to wear with some colorful threads, ink, or vinyl on it. Learn to dis- cover their "what" or "why," and you will never have any real competition! No matter what approach you take to build your business and attract new cus- tomers, keep in mind that you should fine tune each effort on a small scale before investing in that effort on a larger scale. Also remember to let each effort have a fair shot at working before you abandon it. And most important of all, remember that unless the person has need for your deco- rated apparel at that exact moment that they are seeing your message, it doesn't matter anyway. So, keep your company visible and accessible so that when the cus- tomer does have a need, you are already in place in their mind. GP Jennifer Cox is one of the founders and serves as presi- dent of the National Network of Embroidery Professionals (NNEP), an organization that supports embroidery and apparel decoration professionals with programs and services designed to increase profitability and produc- tion. You can contact her at jennifer@nnep.com. 4 5 www.kernlasers.com Toll Free: 1-888-660-2755 Process: Metal, Wood, Glass, Fabric, Process: Metal, Wood, Glass, Fabric, Foam, Plastic, Acrylics and more! Foam, Plastic, Acrylics and more! Welcome to the PRODUCT HIGHLIGHTS section where each month we offer you resources to enrich and expand your business with great services and products from our advertisers.

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