I hung up the phone at the end of a 30-minute call from a prospective client shaking my head. They wanted help with their marketing but really had no idea how their business generated income. I'm sure the call was as frustrating for the prospect as it was for me after all, no one likes to keep saying "I don't know" especially when they know that they SHOULD be able to answer the questions I had asked.

A big part of a business owner's frustration comes from 2 main areas:

First, the reporting information they receive is generated by an accounting software like Quickbooks or Xero and while perfectly adequate for calculating your taxes, is virtually useless for evaluating the effectiveness of your marketing. And that leads to the second problem which is...

The business owner does not have a grasp on what the specific data is that they need to look at regularly (at a minimum weekly) to know what is and is not working in their marketing.

Fortunately, the problem is easily solved. Speak with your marketing person and review the funnel for each of your products or services. Next, make a list of each of the milestone events that must happen as a prospect moves down the funnel on the way to becoming a paying buyer. Last, collect the numbers – at least weekly - of prospects that passed through each milestone for the previous week.

Not doing this will leave you in the dark, unaware of problems that may have started during the previous week. It's not uncommon for websites to go down, email spam filters to get aggressive with your outbound follow-up emails or for a staff member to suddenly go lame because their spouse walked out the previous week. All of these things plus many more can have a VERy detrimental effect on your business and it is incumbent upon you to make sure that any negative events are corrected before they become problematic.

On a positive note, business owners that do monitor their sales funnels regularly can proactively make adjustments, redeploy resources, or bring in new assets to deal with any little (or big) "blips" that will occur from time to time.

If you need help with this, eLaunchers is here to help. All you need to do - right now - is book your complimentary assessment appointment with Parthiv Shah.