Attracting Customers (and keeping them)

What is the best way to influence your ideas on others?

Is it through cold calling prospects all day? Dropping off brochures in neighborhoods? Or paying a premium to run an ad in newspaper, top radio station, or national TV network?

I think there's a much easier way with better return on your buck and time.

Instead of interrupting people's day (or worse: when they're eating), why not create fabulous content for them to find you?

If you idea is so noteworthy people will be compelled to tell their friends about you. Their friends in return will tell others, and many of those the people who hear your story may contact you for more information.

This is what new marketing is really all about - creating product that are personalized, anticipated, and relevant to your target audience; while making it easy for them to spread your message.

Bringing us back to influence, you should ask yourself how your time is best spent. Is it with media buyers or learning how to blog? Is it with canvassing your local neighborhood or spending more time with your existing clientèle? How bout adding more customers/prospects to your CRM software or finding out what really motivates your customers to stay with you?

Remember you only have 24 hours in a day and it can be very expensive to buy time (i.e. outsource). So making a plan on (what and who) you want to spend time with is so much more important than just spending time working "in" your business.

Finding key channels of influence can bring you more attention, more qualified customers, and more productivity to a sleepless, time starved, society.