Printing & Design Blog

Most of us got into business because we loved doing something and thought it would be cool to make a living doing it.  Michael Gerber, who used to live right here in Santa Rosa, called this an entrepreneurial seizure.  It befell us because of a fatal assumption: if you understand the technical work of a business, you understand a business that does that technical work.

What does this have to do with making money you say? Well I’m just trying to quickly get to the point that the way to make money in any business is by attracting clients who will pay for what you do.  And to do that you have to market yourself.  Few of us got into business to be marketers.  We wanted to do work we loved.

So now that we are in business we discover that the work is to get customers, not do the thing we love.

The Good News

The good news today is that with the internet and search engines and websites, it is actually easier for your potential clients to find you and for you to meet up with your clients and not try and guess how to reach them.

They are out there searching for your type of work.  You don’t have to hunt them down and try to get their attention.  We all are bombarded with thousands of advertising messages each day.  Traditional marketing tried to get your message out there in a way that interrupted a person’s attention long enough to get them to consider contacting you.

With the internet today there are always people out there searching for what you are  offering.  You just need to connect with them and follow through on helping them get what they want.  This shift is an important one to recognize and take advantage of.

The Bad News

If you put the bulk of your marketing effort into trying to interrupt people’s attention, and neglect the people out there that are looking for your work, somebody else who is out there connecting with those who are looking on the web  is likely to capture their business.

If you are like me, you put up a website sometime ago because it seemed to be the thing to do.  You did it as inexpensively as you could.  Maybe some years later you realized that this web thing was only getting bigger and maybe you went out and spent more money  to put up a better site.

Now you might be hearing more about search engine optimization and social media marketing and  you wonder what way to turn.

The Solution

For certain the internet is not going away.  Maybe it won’t impact your business too much before you retire.  If you aren’t engaged with it though, it will decrease the value of your business.

What we can offer you at Ajalon is to sit down with you and sort out what the best course of action is.  We have been here in Sonoma County for over 50 years.  We have survived and have helped many other businesses with their marketing by staying closely in touch with what works and what is economical.

We have gone through internet marketing.  We personally have got our website to the top of Google rankings.  We did it ourselves.  We didn’t pay somebody to do it for us.  We can help you make the educated choices to take advantage of this great new resource and to avoid the pitfalls.  Call us for help in your marketing today.  707-528-0288.

Written by David Walrath

Ajalon Printing & Design