It’s March Madness, the US hunt to determine the national champion of college basketball, — how do you pick your NCAA basketball tournament brackets?

Some fans talk to their friends…

Some scan the Internet or listen to radio DJ’s picks for recommendations…

Some have hopes for their favorite team that they’ve always supported to be the next Cinderella story…

I’ve even heard people pick brackets based on uniforms…

Fans have big hopes and dreams of NCAA glory.

The recent stories and office pools got me to thinking about how business owners sometimes pick their “winning” marketing strategies much the way fans pick their March Madness bracket…

Some business owners ask their friends for opinions on their ads and promotions.

Others search publications and the Internet to see what others are doing and swipe ideas from competitors.

And some stick with what has worked for them in the past. The problem is that friends often know nothing about what makes an effective ad or are too sensitive to your feelings  to give you their honest opinion.

Swiping ideas only works if you know for sure the idea is working first.

And some are too attached to worn out marketing strategies and want to do what they’ve always done—not realizing there is something that will work even better.

Are you basing your marketing on what you’re comfortable and familiar with or are you using what is proven to work?

It’s easy to get attached to a certain look, positioning or way of marketing.

However, clinging to old ways or jumping on the latest trends are based more on emotion and Cinderella hopes than on the evidence that shows what really works.

Here are five tips for helping you pick winning marketing strategies:

1)    Have an open mind about your marketing. Like a fan that gets attached to their favorite team, being too attached to certain elements of your marketing can cripple your chances of finding big wins and can even cause you to turn a blind eye to something proven to work better.

Similarly dumping an old marketing media proven to work for you in favor of a new trend is hanging your business success on dreams of marketing glory.

The truth is, as marketers, to get the best results, you need to always be open to ways to improve your current marketing and pick your strategy based on evidence.

2) Get an objective opinion. Find someone who knows and understands marketing who is outside your business to look at what you are doing. It’s important to pick someone who can really be objective.  Stay away from family members and people who are too close to you or your business. (This is where a mastermind group comes in handy.)

Often times, someone with fresh eyes will uncover something you’ve overlooked, identify a problem you can’t see or give you an entirely new perspective that will resonate well with your clients.

3) Look for ways to improve the things that are already working. If you have a marketing strategy that is working for you, continue using it while you try new strategies simultaneously.

Sometimes you’ll find the combined strategies give you even better results.

For instance, social media has proven to improve brand, public relations and builds your relationship with your audience. Pay Per Click (PPC) converts traffic better than social media, doesn’t require the same demands as social media and drives traffic 24/7.  But combine the two together and watch what happens. According to the Search Marketing Benchmark Survey by leading research firm, Marketing Sherpa, companies combining social media with Pay Per Click(PPC) are improving their PPC results by almost 2 to 1.

4) Get the facts, before you jump in. Businesses too often go by what they see a competitor doing instead of what is proven to work.  For example, let’s say you see a competitor running ads in an industry publication, so you decide you should run ads there too. The problem is you don’t know if those ads are working for the competitor or not.

Instead, use recommendations from trusted sources. Watch to see if promotions are repeated and appear on multiple channels (for example in print and online). Once you have done your homework, do a small test to see if the idea transfers to your business.

5) Test, Test, Test. Dan Kennedy gives this advice over and over and he’s right. Don’t wait until your marketing isn’t working.  Continually test and be ready with the next promotion before you need it.

When it comes to picking marketing strategy that will win you more customers, clients or patients, remember not to leave your emotions behind and not get too attached to any one method or idea.

Just like the smartest move is for you to put your money on NCAA teams who have proven they can win instead of the teams you’d like to see win, pick your marketing strategies based on their proven track records to succeed in your market place. When you do, you’ll improve your chances of advancing your results and pushing your profits to the top of the chart.

What do you do to ensure your marketing is more likely to come up a winner?  Post your comments below.

Note: If you are looking for a proven winner that has been Dan Kennedy’s number one media choice for the 30+ years Dan has been in business, check out Unlocking the Secrets of Direct Mail Profits .  Take a quantum leap in understanding what it takes to make direct mail super-profitable along with how to generate income at will and discover how to quickly boost your net worth.
Learn more here.

Far too many business owners do not realize that, as your business grows, careful strategic planning to sell your business is just as important as a business plan to launch and grow your business.

In addition to an independent lifestyle and personal fulfillment, a successful exit is the primary motivator for business ownership and entrepreneurship.

(Not to mention that a successful exit tends to improve one’s lifestyle and personal fulfillment…)

Because acquisition is the most common exit for an entrepreneur / business owner, here are nine tips to better prepare you to sell your business.

1. Don’t Wait Too Long To Sell

Many business owners wait until the last minute to try and sell their business. They wait until the business is stagnating, or they are exhausted with running the business. In fact, the best time to sell is when business is booming.

2. Take Your Time – Don’t Be in Too Much of a Hurry

If you are in too much of a hurry to sell, you will probably leave a lot of money on the table. Buyers – especially sophisticated larger corporations – will likely sense your urgency and will take advantage of it in the negotiation period.

3. Start the Process Early

It’s a good idea to begin preparing 2-4 years BEFORE the sale. It’s much more expensive and time-consuming to rush and prepare all of the necessary financial and other information in a few months than it is to consistently record and compile records over a period of years. This record-keeping is also important for your business’s growth, since it provides more perspective on your company’s performance.

4. Get Your House in Order

Make sure that you have been keeping accurate financial records and that your assets are ready for sale.  This includes both tangible assets such as equipment and inventory, as well as intangible assets such as contracts, leases, patents, trademarks, etc.  Make sure that everything is assignable to the buyer and be prepared for extensive due diligence.

5. Try to See It From the Buyer’s Point of View

A buyer’s motivations are often different than the typical business owner’s. While the entrepreneurial business owner may get excited about innovation and creative strategies, the buyer cares much more about the potential for stable revenue streams and growth potential.  Take time to understand your potential buyer’s point of view, interests, and motivations.

6. Make Yourself Less Central to the Business’s Success

The buyer wants to buy a business – not you or your job.  From the buyer’s perspective, it’s better if the current owner is not important to the success of the business.  Therefore, in planning for the sale of your business, you should begin training your management team to take over critical business functions.  If all of the key decisions revolve around you (the owner), then the value of the company will be limited without the owner – and therefore, the business is less attractive to a buyer.

7. Meanwhile, Keep Focused on Running (and Growing) Your Business

When starting the sales process, you must keep a laser-sharp focus on your business’s operations.  It’s important that you do not get too wrapped up in either the sales process or in the romance of any particular sale offer.  As difficult as this is, it’s best to act as if any deal can fall through, even if you are in the final negotiation period, because any deal can come unraveled at the last moment.  Keep your focus on growing your business until the check has cleared and is in the bank.

In addition, you should do your best to keep the sales process confidential so that you do not endanger relationships with any key clients, employees, or partners whose departure could threaten a transaction or the operations of your business.

8. Get Professional Assistance

If you are a business owner seeking to sell your business, you can benefit from outside advice and assistance.  As the old saying goes, “The attorney who represents himself has a fool for a client.”  The same applies for a business owner selling without an advisor.  Your advisor will provide you with guidance regarding valuation, due diligence, and the marketing of your business opportunity.  Without a competent advisor, you decrease your chances of selling your business at its maximum price.

9. Even if a Deal Comes, Be Prepared to Say No

If you have invested a lot of time and energy into the search, negotiation, and due diligence phases, you may be reluctant to reject any deal that comes across the table. However, just because you have a deal in front of you, you do not have to take it.  If the price is not attractive or if the deal is not right for another reason – and it cannot be mended – you may be wise to walk away and consider the next opportunity.

Sometimes, during the process of preparing their business for sale, business owners will find themselves at the helm of a much more profitable, attractive business.  If you have a profitable business, keep in mind that you have other options at your disposable.  In addition to selling your business, you can continue to grow organically, raise growth capital, and/or explore strategic partnerships.

It’s important to continually evaluate your options throughout all phases of business growth to ensure that you are making the best decisions for the long term.

A while back, Donald Trump became the 2,327th person to get a star on the Hollywood Walk Of Fame.

Almost before the glue dried, but then his TV show was rather abruptly cancelled. Somebody at NBC called and said: “You’re Fired.”

That’s life.

Tom Monaghan once said he went from the World’s Wonder Boy to the Village Idiot almost overnight. Personally, I’ve never actually been fired, but there are plenty of times when I should be, but if I fire me, there’ll be nobody to do the work. I know what ignominy is. I’ve been in bankruptcy court, I’ve been thrown out of a trade association, I’ve been served divorce papers.

At some point, usually more than once, everybody who’s doing much of anything gets their teeth kicked in. Goes from being the most popular king to the outcast nobody admits knowing. Has a series of really, really, really bad days. Fortunes turn.

Michael Eisener led a renaissance at Disney and was then driven from the kingdom. He’s far from the first or last CEO to have that experience.

There’s little of interest in any of these many fall-from-grace stories, although the public and the press take so much delight in the embarrassing crashes off pedestals you can almost hear a collective snarling and chewing of bones.

Most of the fall from grace stories are maudlin and representative of remarkable stupidity and smallness and arrogance or greed or absence of control, and poking around in all that only leads to a need to shower.

What’s interesting and instructive is those who are unabashed, who are quickly resilient, who achieve redemption, who have a greater and grander next act. From those people, there are philosophical, attitudinal and methodical, operational object lessons. A comeback story is infinitely more instructive than a success story.

Over the long haul, this ‘resiliency’ may be the single most important of all personal characteristics.

How well you can take a punch.

How quickly you can recover.

How you can weather storms of criticism or humiliation. How adept you are at reinvention.

If you want to cultivate a characteristic, this is the one. And one way to do so is with the little stuff. The day to day.

A lot of people are easily de-railed. Easily put into a funk lasting hours or even days.

Easily compromise or sacrifice their agenda. The breeze from a missed punch is sufficient to send them to the canvas. They wonder why they don’t get a lot more accomplished. It’s their glass jaw.

I was recently going over Sydney Biddle Barrows material, particularly her “training class” for the ‘escorts’, I was reminded that I have always viewed selling as performing, a sales presentation as a performance – and that I tend to forget, most salespeople do not share my view, or Sydney’s.

This viewpoint translates in many practical ways, including scripting; rehearsal and practice; attention to detail; pride in the performance itself….as opposed to saying any damned thing that comes to mind in any random order, winging it, using any old pen or pad, no props, and so on. Ernie Kessler, who has since died , a superb speaker/platform salesperson (who is in the Platform Selling Boot Camp program with Ron LeGrand and I) had his presentation choreographed….so he took his sip of water at the same minute, against the same phrase every time. I’ve always sold that way.

That’s important if you happen to sell, face to face, by phone, from the stage, and very, very, very few folks have the self-discipline to perform professionally like this, even when it is pointed out to them as the difference between a peak performer and an also-ran. But it is also a metaphor for whatever you do. One of the great speakers I’ve had opportunity to work with and learn from, Bill Gove, had a talk: “Are You A Pro?” Most people simply aren’t.

Woody Allen famously remarked that 50% of success was “showing up.” Too many people stop there, and get 50% of what they could – if they showed up as a real Pro. Alert. Prepared. Practiced. Primed in every way to deliver an extraordinary performance and get extraordinary results.

Nido Qubein and Tom Hopkins who both spoke at previous SuperConferences are speakers we all recognize as consummate professionals. But why shouldn’t you be a consummate professional doing whatever you do? And imagine a whole business staffed by consummate professionals.

The person taking phone calls, a consummate pro, with practiced scripts, polished skills. The salespeople, the service people. The guy putting the packages in the trunk of the car. Each person viewing their job as “Performance Art”. Such businesses are rare – and usually ENORMOUSLY profitable, as they are fueled by zealous word of mouth advertising, spend little or nothing on paid advertising and keep all that money as profit.

In fact, professionalizing yourself and everyone in your business might be the best way to boost net profits.

It Really Isn’t Hard To Have The World Clamoring For You
(and: how to make next year your best money year ever)

It has reached the point where I am annoying A LOT of people by turning them away and being unavailable to speak or consult or write, weeks to months tardy in responding to correspondence from those not already clients, yet still having so much to do I’m having trouble keeping my commitments (something I hate with a passion) and crave relief from pressure, so I am again re-engineering my entire approach to work between now and January.

Looking backward, I see it is not difficult to get into this position, of having the world clamoring for a piece of your attention, lined up outside your door waving money at you. Anyone can do it. The key components are simple.

I talked at length at my Sales Seminar in about one of them: Authority. A linked component is Competence. Consistent, reliable competence. It is SO rare these days that anyone who reveals himself, within an organization or to a clientele or market, as being solidly competent quickly attracts far, far, far more work or customers and clients or opportunity than can be handled.

It is, in fact, how we all kill The Competent Employee: you have five but one is The Competent One. All work and responsibility gravitates to her until she is so overwhelmed she becomes incompetent. If you place yourself in the middle of some group of people capable of giving you money for Service, Know-How and Expertise – of any kind – and prove yourself Competent, they will quickly come to rely on you (at exclusion of all others). Once you’ve done this, to make this year your best money year ever is child’s play; just keep raising your fees or prices, charge for access or the right to buy from you, “stretch the top of the pyramid”, so you get more and more money for the same hours.

I suppose that sounds horribly simplistic, as did your last success marketing strategy e-mail. Oh, you can complicate it and bring in all sorts of sophisticated and intriguing nuances, from NLP to hypnosis to preferred language for handling customers or clients, to our kinds of marketing strategies, and on and on and on. However all that and a dollar isn’t worth but a dollar if not matched with truly “delivering the goods” – competence. And sadly, most don’t. most are far more adept at promising than at keeping.

No, being the best is never, in and of itself, good enough to attract money in today’s cluttered, competitive, confusing markets. Emerson would starve sitting next to his superior mousetrap. But being the best, being extraordinary, getting it right and promoting like crazy, now you’ve got something. In business, “getting it right” extends to the answering of the phone, the frequency of cleaning the public restrooms, whether the thank you notes go out on time, and a million other ‘little things’.

A lot of businesses have most of it right but are then undermined by one incompetent or rude or lazy employee, one stupid policy, one neglected step. I moved a lot of business from one vendor to an overall less competent vendor only to end dealing with the first’s Battleaxe Bertha on the phone.