How marketing your business is just like writing a resume
If you’ve ever applied for a job…. You’ve marketed yourself in your every day life… outside of your business.
When I was recruiting for my latest role in Chromatical, I had over 200 applicants apply. I waded through a LOT of people marketing themselves to me.
What I noticed? A lot of people didn’t know how to market themselves.
👉🏻They didn’t look into the type of business who they were talking to
👉🏻They didn’t research my brand to know what might appeal to me
👉🏻They didn’t highlight their unique reasons as to why I might be interested in them or why they may be best suited for the role
👉🏻They didn’t find a way to stand out from the other 200 resumes I received
👉🏻They didn’t use their words and tone of voice to try and connect with me
👉🏻They didn’t spend the time and effort to think about what would appeal to me
👉🏻They didn’t think “Hmm, this business is probably going to get hundreds of resumes, how can I make sure that in this saturated market, I don’t blend in”
But…
Those people who knew how to market themselves?
I paid attention to them.
Even though most of them weren’t marketers.
They were not graphic designers.
They were not copywriters.
They were not experts at creating social media posts, writing emails, creating ads, or developing websites… they were regular people… who did something so simple.
They thought, “What does the person who will be reading my application need to hear/see/feel/think in order to go ‘Yep, this person looks great, I’ll invite them in for an interview’.
And then they did that.
In business, that’s as simple as marketing ever has to be.
You don’t need to be the perfect writer
You don’t need fancy expensive tools and programs
You don’t need to be a marketer or have a degree
You don’t need to be perfect at anything really
You just need to know how to connect with those who would most likely want what you have to offer and share why you’d be perfect for them!
If you understand your audience, and make content/products/services/website/etc. for them specifically, that showcases how what you offer is perfect for them… MAGIC.
If you don’t understand your audience in depth, and struggle to connect with them, you’ll likely be like the bulk of the resumes I received and it’ll be much harder to get people to pay attention, make sales and grow your business.
If you do understand what I mentioned above? Your resume (social media account) may get opened, followed, and you may even get a call back (sale/booking!)
After reading through 20 generic resumes, do you reckon I was even properly reading them anymore? Nope. But do you reckon after I was 20 resumes deep and someone stuck a flower power border around the edge knowing that flowers are a big part of my branding I paid attention??
YEAH I DID!!!!!
Sometimes it was even as simple as writing “Hiiii Trish” at the top of their cover letter instead of “To whom it may concern” (showing they understood me as the customer, and spoke the same language I speak, in order to connect). Whereas the resumes (content) that didn’t match what I needed, I glossed right over.
They either blended in with the sea of other resumes, or didn’t understand me as as their audience and their resume was more targeted to a different audience. Many I didn’t even read past the first line.
That’s exactly what it’s like when people are scrolling through social media feeds. Blendy post, blendy post, blendy post, oooooooh this looks different, stops, pays attention.
Now, there may have been absolutely WONDERFUL qualified employees hidden amongst those 200 resumes. But I didn’t have the time to read them all. Nor does every potential customer/client of yours have the time to read through every single page on every single persons website who sells similar things to you, nor read every post of yours in the hope there’s something good in there, when there are other businesses nailing the brief, immediately connecting, standing out and ticking all of their boxes.
That’s the impact of marketing.
Those who got to the next stage of interviews simply just knew how to market themselves.
The people who got to the next stage thought about what their objective was (to get noticed by me aka: marketing) and to convert me, the employer, into asking them for an interview (converting aka: making a sale). They then filled in the gaps with how to achieve that.
In the end, marketing is as simple as that and you don’t have to ‘be a marketer’ to be able to market yourself.
Truly anyone can market themselves. You just have to think about the basics. What does the person (your potential customers) who will be reading your application (your product/offer) need to hear/see/feel/think in order to go ‘Yep, I LOVE this brand” and then click book/buy!?
If you know that, and stop trying to be like the other 200 resumes (or businesses) out there all doing the same thing making you go unnoticed, and start trying to simply talk to the people who want what you have to offer, in the way that they need to hear from you…
MARKETING MAGIC HAPPENS!
The core of marketing is the following…
It’s about putting the right product in front of the right people at the right time and showing it off in the right way.
Just like putting the right applicant in front of the right employer for the right job and showing themselves off in the right way.
If you find yourself getting overwhelmed, overcomplicating things, feeling stale, feeling stuck, feeling like you’re overworking your marketing (like kneading dough so much that it ends up dense (or in marketing land, generic/stale/clinical etc)) it might be time to go back to the basics. Simplify it.
Think about your audience, think about what you offer, and match the two up just like a resume.
If you know you struggle with this, The Marketing Plan Experience that I offer will basically help you figure out, in depth, exactly who your audience is, what they need to hear in order to understand that you’re perfect for them, and how to convey that message to them in the right places at the right times.
It digs into a LOT more than that too, but if you know that this is one of your issues, not being noticed or recognized or feeling like you’re in that over saturated sea of resumes and not standing out, you’ll probably get SO much value from investing in The Experience.