Graham McGregor: Getting ideas from other people

Photo / Thinkstock

Here is a simple way to get useful marketing ideas for your business.

Invite at least one person a month to share positive ideas with your team in a live presentation.

There are many different ways you could do this.

1: If you have a sales team for your business, you might like to have one of your top sales people share a couple of useful strategies that they have found are working well.

Top sales people are often doing things a tiny bit different from average sales people.

They might have some great questions they ask in a sales presentation. Or perhaps they have an interesting way to explain the benefits of the products and services they sell.

And if you can have this top sales person explain to your whole team what they are doing, it can often inspire other sales people to try the same thing themselves.

2: If you sell through resellers you might like to arrange a short conference call or webinar once a month where several of your resellers share some marketing ideas that are working well for their business. If you record this call or webinar you then have a useful resource that you can share with all your resellers on a regular basis.

3: You could invite a successful business person to speak to your team.

This business person could be from your own industry or from a totally different industry.

Just ask if they would mind sharing with your team a couple of useful strategies on sales or marketing that have worked well for their own business.

(Sometimes you may need to pay these people to present to your people. And occasionally a person may speak at no charge in exchange for the opportunity to introduce their business to your team.)

Let's say you have a successful accounting practice and would like to grow your business. You might like to invite a successful lawyer, architect, dentist, cosmetic surgeon or other professional services person to share some helpful marketing ideas with your accounting team.

Ask them...

How do they encourage potential clients to contact them to get information on their professional services? How do they get repeat and referral business? How do they position their business as being the right one to choose? And so on.

The great news about marketing ideas is that what works well in one industry can often be easily adapted and used in another industry.

4: You could hire a professional presenter to speak to your team. A professional presenter is often hired to speak at conferences, however they are useful for many other types of meetings as well.

As an example, I am hired by some organisations to present marketing ideas at a conference.

For other businesses I present a marketing seminar that they can then invite existing clients to or get large numbers of potential new clients to attend.

(So the presentation becomes a way for an organisation to both 'add value' to current clients and generate potential new clients for their business at the same time.)

A big advantage of hiring a professional presenter is that they can quickly help to get your whole team focussed on a common goal or a certain way of doing things in your business.

If you are considering hiring a professional presenter (or getting anyone to speak to your team) here are a few things to consider.

What is this person an expert on? Check out the feedback from other groups that they have spoken to. Make sure that the message they have to share is the right 'fit' for your business.

Find out what follow up resources or on-going assistance they may be able to give to your people after they have spoken.

Great marketing ideas are everywhere and sometimes a simple way to get them is to invite the right person to speak to your team.

Action Exercise:
Who could you get to share useful ideas with your team in a live presentation in the next month?

Graham McGregor is a marketing consultant and the creator of the 396 page 'Unfair Business Advantage Report.' www.theunfairbusinessadvantage.com (This is free and has now been read by business owners from 27 countries.) You can email him at the link above.