This post is written by Ilise Benun, marketing coach for creative professionals, and the mind behind Marketing Mentor - the go-to resource for creative pros who want better projects with bigger budgets.
Once you’ve connected with your prospects (especially those who’ve responded), you need to cultivate those connections. They need to get to know you better and remember you when they’re ready for your help.
Remember: Timing is everything when it comes to marketing. If you neglect to cultivate your connections, they’re essentially wasted.
Here are a few of the marketing tools that do a great job at cultivating and developing those burgeoning relationships:
Email newsletter
Send a regular message to your growing opt-in list of prospects (monthly if possible, quarterly at a minimum).
As you connect with prospects, you should also be building your list of people who’ve granted you permission to stay in touch. Quality trumps quantity here: The list doesn’t have to be huge.
Stay in touch by disseminating relevant information and examples of your work, further demonstrating your understanding of their needs. This is content marketing at its most basic and it keeps you top of mind so that when they have a need, you are easy to remember and easy to find.
The trick, however, is to be consistent. If you stop, you are quickly forgotten. So plan ahead and get help developing this content if you can’t do it yourself.
Video: 6 Excellent Examples of Email Newsletters of Designers
Video: 6 Excellent Examples of Email Newsletters of Copywriters & Content Strategists
Video: 6 Excellent Examples of Email Newsletters of Agencies
Social media
Don’t try to be on all the platforms. Instead, focus on those most frequented by your prospects. In business, it’s usually LinkedIn, Twitter or sometimes, Facebook.
Whichever networks you focus on, make sure your profiles are up to date and consistent with each other and with your web site. Use them as one more way to demonstrate and reinforce your positioning in the markets you serve.
Build your own following by following and connecting with others. Most will reciprocate.
As for the substance of your social media efforts, start by passing along useful material by others—a daily retweet is plenty to start with. This creates good will as a by-product.
Build from there by re-purposing (i.e. posting) the content from your email newsletter for those who missed it and/or aren’t on your list.
Personal messages/outreach
Go through your list of prospects on a monthly basis and reach out with a simple “Hello, are you ready yet?” message.
Even if they don’t respond, you’ll know that you are staying in touch and they will appreciate it. Plus, it shows you’re organized and interested.
Don’t fill that mental vacuum with negativity that sounds like, “They don’t want to hear from me, I’m bothering them.”
And when they do respond, I'll bet they will thank you for staying in touch. They may even apologize for not responding!
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