Helping professionals have a conundrum when it comes to marketing.  We need to see clients to get paid, but we need to find time to market to bring in those clients.

Sure, when we get started in practice and have only a few clients, we have the time to market and lo and behold, clients show up, we get busy and the marketing slows down.  Things might hum along for awhile, until our clients start to feel better, find something else to do, move out of town. Business slows down, we panic, start to market again, get busier.  This cycle can go on for years.  Quite frankly, it’s an exhausting way to make a living (I especially dislike the panic-y parts when business slows down….not fun.)

The long-term success depends on your ability to consistently find time to market your practice.  In fact, marketing must be the first task you schedule into your work day because without the marketing, clients can’t find you and without clients you don’t pay your bills.

Often, small business folks avoid marketing because they don’t really know what they should be doing.  Marketing can mean lots of things and it is different depending what business you are building, so it can be hard to define.  When someone says, “I’m too busy to market,” what she is usually saying is, “I have no idea what to do so, therefore, I find other things to fill the time.”  I get that, but we can’t let fear get in our way, can we?

How to find time

If you already have a practice, I’m sure you find time to invoice your clients, collect money, manage your bookkeeping, return phone calls, do the filing, yes? (Please say ‘yes’.)  OK, so in addition to all of those administrative tasks, you must add “do my marketing.”

At a minimum you should dedicate 1 hour each day to marketing tasks, yes, 5 hours a week. If you are just starting out, every hour you wish you had a client in your office you need to be marketing. For example, Chloe wants to see 20 clients a week. She currently has 5 weekly clients.  Therefore, Chloe should be marketing 15 hours a week.  As her billable hours increase, the marketing time will gradually decrease, but never below 5 hours a week.  Why? Because even if you establish great referral relationships, a smashing website and do an occasional workshop, if you are not consistently in front of people (even those who know you well) they forget about you and your services. It’s just human nature.

How to schedule the time

Write it down.  Too obvious?  No. If you  just say to yourself, “OK, 5 hours a week. I can do that,” and neglect to write it down in your scheduler, you’ll forget, fill the time with another task, or procrastinate that hour away. I am speaking from experience. I know these things.

I suggest one of two ways to schedule your marketing time.

1. Schedule 1 hour a day (or more if you are just starting out).

2. Schedule time in larger chunks that add up to 5 hours a week. For example 2 hours on Wednesdays and 3 hours on Fridays.

I often like the longer amounts of time because I can then really get into a project and not have to wrap it up just as I am getting into a groove.

What to do during your marketing time

If you are just starting on the small business marketing journey use lots of this time to learn about marketing.  Read blogs, articles, books, talk to others in the field who seem to have a good marketing system.

You will then use your time to develop and put up  a professional looking website or blog. Yes, you will. (I know this is not as simple as I make it sound. I’ll talk about getting together a blog soon, I promise. If you are in a rush I can refer you to some blog designers I know and love. Just leave a comment here or send an email).

Once you have a sense of what marketing is and isn’t and what feels comfortable to you AND your website/blog is live you can begin to actively market your practice.  Marketing activities  include:  blogging, writing articles for a local paper, giving like workshops, meeting with referral sources, attending networking events, starting a marketing group with colleagues, engaging on Twitter and other social media platforms.  A good marketing plan includes elements of many of these tasks.

Marketing is not esoteric, complicated or difficult.  It requires you to tell people about who you are, what you do and how it helps solve specific problems.  You do need to reach out, talk to people you don’t know well (or at all), and toot your horn a bit. Not a lot, just a bit.  You can do that 1 hour a day, right?
[photo credit:ckaiserca, on Flickr]

Was this post useful, informative, intruguing?  To get more ideas on how to build a thriving business that helps others feel free to download my audio: “8 Ways to Get More Clients, Make More Money and Enjoy Your Life.”