Today, I’d like to teach you about the three most important startup marketing tools you need to acquire and retain new customers.

In person:

It’s essential to meet with customers/clients in person whenever possible. This demonstrates that you respect them and are willing to invest time in working with your clients to provide personal attention to each of them.

Follow up Letter:

Always take a moment to send a follow-up letter summarizing your discussion, any new agreements or partnerships established, and express gratitude for their time. Similarly, it’s important to send thank-you letters or small gifts to partners with whom you find success.

Phone Call:

Use a phone call to follow up with them, discussing the matters covered in your meeting, and offer any assistance to help their business run smoothly and more successfully.

None of these will work if you don’t have a quality product or service to back you up!

Here are the key steps for assembling your start-up marketing toolkit:

1. Research potential customers, buyers, and competitors, along with their preferred methods of distribution.
2. Talk to potential customers. Take a hard look at your product from their perspective and determine what it needs to be successful.
3. Follow up with the 3-step process outlined above.
4. Develop systems for contact follow-through, quality control standards, and customer service.
5. Develop a post-sale follow-up system to keep lines of communication open with customers and build on your current relationship, which increases the likelihood of future purchases.

“Marketing and innovation produce results; all the rest are costs” – Peter Drucker, Management Consultant

Here’s another one I love from an icon:

“If there is any one secret of success, it lies in the ability to get the other person’s point of view and see things from that person’s angle as well as from your own.” – Henry Ford, Founder of Ford Motor Company

This lesson has provided you with the tools to assemble a start-up marketing plan that can be utilized repeatedly to foster the growth of your customer base and business in a manageable way. The tools offered in our FREE test drive provide these very same benefits.