If you are a regular member of a gym or fitness club as they refer to it today, I always find January to be the most interesting month of the year to be a member.
At the beginning of every year the place is so crowded that you usually have to wait in line to use the equipment. Then, within a few weeks the crush subsides and the facility is back to normal.
I kind of look at business from the same point view. Just like at the gym, this time of year my mailbox is usually full of emails, blogs and pings from contacts wanting to reconnect to see how we can “align our strategies in a mutually beneficial relationship”. Sound familiar?
I’m always amazed by the emails I receive from people who do not know what factoring is and what our industry does to help businesses with cash flow.
A few days ago I received a call from a mortgage broker asking what the rates were on our 15 and 30 year mortgage loans.
Really?
Is it that difficult to do an internet search on our company or just go directly to www.oxygenfunding.com and check us out? I cannot tell you how many emails I delete on a given day and that nothing is more annoying than having to “safely unsubscribe” from a newsletter or blog that I never wanted to receive in the first place.
The point here is that if you are trying to reach out to new customers or create new alliances, do your homework.
Sure, you can take the shotgun approach and just blast your message out to every contact you know and see what sticks. We have found that with a little extra effort your results will significantly improve if you research your market and personally contact prospects and partners that fit your company’s business model.
Technology has given us the world at our fingertips. With little or no cost you can research information on your industry, marketing techniques, competitors, and countless others. It is very easy to get overwhelmed once you get started so chart a broad course of action and narrow it down to your niche audience. Most importantly, stay focused and don’t get discouraged if you do not achieve immediate results for your efforts.
As they say, Rome wasn’t built in a day and those few extra holiday pounds will usually take more than a month to lose. Now if I can only find an open treadmill.
Don D’Ambrosio is the president of Oxygen Funding, Inc., an invoice factoring company located in Lake Forest, California. For more information, he can be reached at don.dambrosio@oxygenfunding.com or you can visit his company’s website at www.oxygenfunding.com
Right on. Great article.
Don – Your point is indeed well taken. Apparently though, too few people don’t bother to read or search – even if it’s right in front of them! M.G.