The Time Poor Business Owner - Just 'Doing the Do'!

It occurred to me recently that in many conversations I’ve had with small business owners, the words ‘time poor’ often spill out of their mouths when the topic of ‘social media’ in raised.  Their eyes usually glaze over at the same time, but that’s a whole different story often centred around them just racking up another 80-hour week in the business.  
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So, why do the words ‘time poor’ and ‘social media’ often appear in the same sentence?  

Small businesses are largely reliant on their owners for everything!  Sales, purchasing, administration, HR, recruitment, strategy, customer engagement and of course marketing.  The latter two often going hand in hand.

Small business owners often get stuck in just “doing the do”.  It’s a quaint little phrase a business associate of mine often articulates (thanks Steve) that has nothing to do with bodily functions, (parents of young children will get that lame little joke) but is all about the owner getting stuck in the groove of ‘doing’ the businesses core role.  You know the story, the fruit vendor selling the fruit, the mechanic with their head down fixing the cars, the lawyer focusing just on their court cases, and so it goes on………..

The owner also worries (often obsesses) about having a consistent pipeline of leads or sales to help smooth out the peaks and troughs experienced by all businesses.  

However, what was once considered by owners as an optional peripheral issue in their business, customer engagement, social media and digital marketing are now core functions.  At the heart of them and also the main problem for small business owners is ‘content’.  

Being time poor, small business owners struggle with delivering consistent and professional content to engage new customers as well as their existing customer base.  So, you may have a business page on Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram or other social media platforms, but if you aren’t pumping quality targeted content through them regularly, you may as well not bother.  In fact, you may be doing your business some harm by having a myriad of sites that sit there idle for days on end without any content pumping though, or any marketing campaigns reaching out to your customers.  

You may also write a few blogs or newsletters or mail out brochures to generate business.  But, if the content is poor, or the presentation bland, or more importantly if the message you are sending out doesn’t correlate with the businesses marketing strategy and key message, then your efforts at customer engagement will probably fail.  

So, what’s the answer you ask?

Well, if you do nothing else, remember these next 11 words, and then call me!
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“Consistent content - gives consistent engagement - and a consistent pipeline of leads.”

Anthony Ferro
 
Present Professionally serves customers across the Toowoomba Region and South East Queensland.  You can follow Anthony at https://au.linkedin.com/in/anthonyferro1  or view details at www.presentprofessionally.com.au and LIKE us on Facebook @ https://www.facebook.com/PresentProfessionallyAustralia/
 
Written and Published by  www.presentprofessionally.com.au