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Ranked #3,246 in Business & Work, #117,986 overall

Mind mapping speeds the 10 essential small business marketing tasks

By: Roger C. Parker
Design to Sell

Before Jay Conrad Levinson's Guerrilla Marketing book series appeared, (see Guerrilla Marketing Group), marketing referred to the activities of large corporations with deep pockets and the advertising agencies that served them.

Guerrilla Marketing was the first best-selling book to legitimize small business marketing by providing the inspiration and resources small businesses need to take control of their own marketing. Guerrilla Marketing has become the world's Number 1 marketing book series.

Guerrilla Marketing has always stressed efficiency. Mind mapping, a term created by Tony Buzan over 20 years ago, helps you market better by allowing you to switch between a "big picture" view of your marketing or focus on the details of individual projects.

Contents at a Glance

How can you profit from a map?
Essential Marketing Task #1: Positioning
Essential Marketing Task #2: Personas
Essential Marketing Task #3: Creative Br...
Essential Marketing Task #4: Newsletter...
Essential Marketing Task #5: Blog posts

And why are they so popular among marketing professionals?

Originally, maps were created with colored crayons on large sheets of paper.

Now, you can create maps using software programs like MindManager, which is available for a variety of computing platforms from Mindjet, wwww.mindjet.com.

MindManager makes it easy for you to plan and organize projects by quickly entering ideas into topics, which you can then drag into the appropriate location.

You can expand maps and topics to show all of the details, or you can collapse the topics so you view the overall landscape of your project. Or, you can expand individual topics, to see how they how the parts of the topic fit together and the topic contributes to the whole.

Maps avoid the problem associated with lists, outlines, and spreadsheets, which is that information located at the top quickly scrolls out of sight.

Following are the 10 essential tasks of small business marketing, and how MindManager saves time and contributes to better results.

Essential Marketing Task #1: Positioning

You must view your business in the context of your competition

Over 25 years ago, Al Ries and Jack Trout wrote a highly-influential book called Position: The Battle for Your Mind.

It was the first book to popularize the importance of identifying a market niche you could dominate in your market's mind.

The classic positioning example if Avis's "We Try Harder!" campaign. Avis defined what made them different by relating them to Hertz, their larger competitor.

The starting point for business success is to create a visual representation of your business and your competition, so you can focus on what makes you different--and better--than the competition.

Essential Marketing Task #2: Personas

Who are your website visitors and what do they want?

Personas are a technique used to create more effective websites. Persons help focus content, design, and navigation on the visitor's needs.

Use personas to represent various categories of customers and prospects. Each persona is a cluster of traits, a combination of attitudes, needs, and motivations that represent a segment of your market.

The personas are given names, i.e., Jill, Jack, or West Coast Bill, New York Tom. In most cases, the majority of a firm's business can be represented by between five and ten personas.

Using MindManager helps you visually display your market at a glance, then--after looking at the big picture--you can explore each persona's characteritics in more detail.

MindManager's Boundry feature allows you to group personas with similar characteristics together.

Essential Marketing Task #3: Creative Briefs

What are the goals and objectives of each project?

A Creative Brief is a document shared by everyone involved in a project. Creative Briefs summarize the the goals of a project, and the strategies used to accomplish them.

Specifying all of a project's details in a single document eliminates ambiguity and clarifies the work that follows. Creative Briefs further eliminate uncertainty by delegating tasks and responsibilities, as well as specify the dates when work begins and is due.

MindManager maps are excellent for creative briefs, since they can be updated as work progresses. Markers and icons can showing progress on individual tasks as well as completed tasks.

Creative Briefs can also contain links to computer files, making it easier to locate and share files.

Essential Marketing Task #4: Newsletter editorial calendar

What are the topics for your upcoming issues?

A newsletter editorial calendar is one of the most powerful tools for creating a consistent and on-time newsletter marketing program.

Experience has shown that, before creating the first issue of your monthly One-Page Newsletter, you should identify the topics of your first 12 issues.

Identifing the titles of upcoming topics puts your mind to work. While sleeping and driving, your mind will be unbsconsciously gathering ideas for use in the future issues. As a result, when you sit down to prepare each issue, you'll be amazed at how much work has already been done!

An added benefit, you can link your monthly newsletters to your editorial calendar, so you can quickly add ideas to each issue's file, as they come to you.

Essential Marketing Task #5: Blog posts

Organize blog posts by identifying repeating themes and topics

Blogs are one of the biggest gifts that technology has given to small business owners. Blogs remove design and programming as obstacles to frequently updating your web presence.

But, blogs have not eliminated the need for content. Business owners still have to know what topics they're going to address each time they update their blog.

MindManager maps make it easy to choose topics for blog posts by visually reminding you of the major content categories you have created for your blog, and showing you when each category has been last updated.

Serendipity should certainly play a role in your blog posts, but, it's equally important that you frequently return to your key categories and continuously update them with new posts.

Essential Marketing Task #6: Writing

Save time creating articles, e-books, newsletters, tip sheets, and website content

Use mapping programs like MindManager to provide a structure that greatly simplifies your ability to write effective marketing messages.

The biggest barrier to writing is a blank screen. Once you have a repeatable framework for your messages, you'll find them easier to produce.

The more time you spend mapping your project, the less time you'll spend writing! Your writing will be better, easier, and take less time.

Once you have completed the map, all you have to do is finish your project by supplying the words and sentences needed to complete each the various components of your project.

GOAL: What is the goal of your project? Do you want to recommend a sequence of steps, identify available resources, dexcribe mistakes to avoid, or list the benefits of following a course of action?
INTRODUCTION: describe the importance and relevance of the information that follows.
MAIN POINTS: list the main points you want to discuss. Don't stop to write them now, just create a map topic for each of the points you want to cover--and in what order.
CONCLUDE with a summary of the information you've covered and a CALL TO ACTION describing the recommended next next step.

Essential Marketing Task #7: Speaking in person and online

Making the most of presentations, speeches, teleseminars, and webinars

MindManager maps can greatly improve the quality of your spoken communications, from routine telephone calls to speeches, teleseminars, and webinars.

At the most basic level, at the beginning of each day, or the start of each week, you can make a map displaying each of your client and prospect phone calls.

Attached to each topic are the goals of each phone call and the topics you want to cover--and in the desired order.

In a similar way, you can quickly assemble, presentations, teleseminars, and webinars, Each can follow the same content formula. The same map structure can be used over and over again for events of different length.

INTRODUCTION; begin by describing the characteristics of the topic you're going to address, and--most important--its relevance to the audience.
3 TO 7 MAIN POINTS; list the main points you want to cover, and how each point affects your audience.
SUMMARIZE the highlights of the topic, and re-emphaize its relevance to your audience.
CALL TO ACTION. End with a call to action that describes the next step you want your audience to take and how they can take it.

Essential Marketing Task #8: Website evaluations

Rate your website--by itself, and in comparison to the competition

Take the time to map the effectiveness of your website, and those of your competitors, using standardized criteria.

You'll gain a "real world," as opposed to a subjective, view of your website's effectiveness. Evaluate websites in terms of:

BENEFIT; does the site make it easy for visitors to understand how they can benefit from the products and services described?
ENGAGEMENT; how quickly and effectively does it arouse and maintain the visitor's interest?
NAVIGATION; is it easy for visitors to locate desired information?
PERMISSION-BASED MARKETING; does the site offer an meaningful incentive for visitors to join your e-mail mailing list?
COMPETANCE; does the website provide visitors with proof of the firm's ability to satisfy their needs.
CALL TO ACTION; does the site offer a clear "next step" for visitors who want to know more?

Essential Marketing Task #9: Marketing plans

Create a plan of attack for each quarter of the year

MindManager maps make it easy to see your marketing plan as a whole, while being able to instantly access the details involved with each project.

The starting point is to avoid the common mistake of trying to display a year's worth of marketing on a single map. A much better alternative is to display your yearly marketing four maps, each displaying three months at a time.

This provides enough of a context to be meaningful, without cluttering the map with too much information which would reduce the size of the type too much.

Use a separate topic for each project. Include details like the project's goals, intended market, projected results, start dates and deadlines. Use these maps to identify who will contribute what element, and when.

Use your quarterly planning to track the results of each month's marketing. Use total sales, profit margin, new customers, or new prospects, as your measure of success.

Remember to add links between each project and its Creative Briefs.

Essential Marketing Task #10: New business proposals

Spend less time creating proposals, more time closing sales and satisfying buyers!

Many business owners dislike the hours they put into preparing proposals that often fail to get the business.

Your prospects also dislike the time they put into proposals that don't really address their concerns.

Proposals fail when they are too long, too detailed, and fail to address the right topics.

As an alternative, consider creating a MindManager proposal map that you can use over and over again as a structure that will help you quickly convert your notes and analysis of the project into a proposal you can get into the hands of your prospect as quickly as possible.

AREAS OF CONCERN: create a numbered list of the 3 to 5 most important concerns your client mentioned, or your research revealed.
OBJECTIVES: create another numbered list, in the same sequence as the Areas of concern, listing the objectives of your recommended course of action.
BENEFITS: Use another numbered list describing the specific benefits your prospect will enjoy after the objectives have been achieved.
RECOMMENDATIONS: Describe the steps you will take to accomplsh the client's objectives.
TIMELIN: create a timeline--based on immediate acceptance of the proposal--showing when the benefits will be achieved.
ADDENDUM: use this for "to be read only if necessary" information documenting your ability to provide the products or services necessary. (This section of your proposal rarely changes and is intended to be used over and over again.)

Conclusion: Getting started

Explore Guerrilla Marketing with Mindjet's MindManager for free!

The above just skims of the surface of the benefits of using Mindjet's MindManager as a marketing tool.

Guerrilla Marketing success is based on focus, effectiveness, and efficiency. MindManager makes it easy to fine-tune the your goals and objectives for your marketing as a whole, as well as each individual project.

Using MindManager, you can drag and drop information until every project element is in the correct location, displaying hierarchy and sequence of information and steps.

Visit Mindjet at www.mindjet.com and download a free 21 day MindManager trial.

Links to help you get started mapping your marketing success

Put these valuable resources to work!

Includes blogs, Lenses, and websites to visit, downloadable newsletters and special reports, plus recommended books.

Submit your suggestions, too!

Guerrilla Marketing with mind maps

Mind mapping speeds the 10 essential small business marketing tasks

Contents at a Glance

Contents at a Glance

How can you profit from a map?

And why are they so popular among marketing professionals?

Essential Marketing Task #1: Positioning

You must view your business in the context of your competition

Essential Marketing Task #2: Personas

Who are your website visitors and what do they want?

Essential Marketing Task #3: Creative Briefs

What are the goals and objectives of each project?

Essential Marketing Task #4: Newsletter editorial calendar

What are the topics for your upcoming issues?

Essential Marketing Task #5: Blog posts

Organize blog posts by identifying repeating themes and topics

Essential Marketing Task #6: Writing

Save time creating articles, e-books, newsletters, tip sheets, and website content

Essential Marketing Task #7: Speaking in person and online

Making the most of presentations, speeches, teleseminars, and webinars

Essential Marketing Task #8: Website evaluations

Rate your website--by itself, and in comparison to the competition

Essential Marketing Task #9: Marketing plans

Create a plan of attack for each quarter of the year

Essential Marketing Task #10: New business proposals

Spend less time creating proposals, more time closing sales and satisfying buyers!

Conclusion: Getting started

Explore Guerrilla Marketing with Mindjet's MindManager for free!

Links to help you get started mapping your marketing success

Put these valuable resources to work!

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