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How to Get Clients to Chase You, Instead of You Always Having to Sell Them on Your Value
The zero-budget marketing approach
My business partner and I both grew up in small towns. But when we started our consulting practice in 1992, we had big city dreams. We aspired to work with the best companies. However, the old guard that ran our city and industry let us know we’d have to wait our turn before we’d get a seat at the big table.
How long would that be? Maybe 10–20 years. No way were we waiting that long to do what we love. But outspending our well-established competitors was not an option. Nor could we compete with their little black book of connections or their extensive portfolio of glossy projects.
As a former marketing director of an established firm, I’m intimately familiar with the costs of building out a robust marketing program. The annual budget needed to fund the marketing department salaries, brochures, PR agencies, website designers, trade show booths, golf club memberships, and wining and dining can take a sizable bite out of revenues.
But this traditional marketing approach has an even bigger weakness: it’s a push strategy. And the best way for small firms and startups to outmaneuver the big, established companies is to develop a pull strategy.
Don’t be a pusher
Companies with extensive marketing capabilities spend a good amount of their time in the selling mode of trying to talk clients into buying something they didn’t ask for or seek out. While they won’t ever admit it, marketing leaders find themselves willing to say and do whatever it takes to get a new sale and close the deal. As a result, they put a lot of energy into chasing clients instead of getting clients to pursue them.
The problem with chasing clients is it’s always on their terms — which often aren’t fair or reasonable. But when clients pursue you, it has a much better chance of being on your terms, which isn’t about ego, but the right fit.
Create a pull approach to marketing
I’ve taught courses at Harvard, UNCC, and other leading academic institutions on marketing, branding, consumer behavior, and design innovation. I’ve also…
