Today’s episode marks the 100th episode of The Business of Ergonomics Podcast! This milestone represents so much value, growth, and connection over the last 2 years. I very much enjoy giving my insights about the ergonomics industry. To celebrate, I’ll be sharing with you some of the mistakes I’ve made in my digital marketing process and the lessons I’ve learned. No matter what phase your consulting business is in, you can learn from them too.

Launching an ergonomic consulting business is hard work. It takes a lot more than planning out the details of the services you’re offering. As business owners, knowing how to communicate the value of what you offer in your marketing is essential to your business’s success. Digital marketing can help you connect with your ideal clients and generate sales. But at the same time, you can put your business’s growth at risk if you’re not doing it correctly. 

When I first started my own consulting business, I made some marketing mistakes and I’ve learned a lot along the way. Below are some of the oh-so-common but avoidable digital marketing mistakes I made that you should avoid. 

Here are 4 Digital Marketing Mistakes To Avoid:

1. Not establishing relationships before launching your business

One of the things that I wish I did early on was to develop relationships with companies and build networks. It took way more time than I could’ve ever thought to get my first client. I didn't have a good strategy in place, and I wasn't consistent. If I had enough demand for my services before I launched my business, I could’ve just informed them about my services and made an offer easily.  

Building a client base before starting a business may not be an option for many business owners, but it’s a possibility for many Ergonomic Consultants. This is especially true if you're an independent clinic owner or an independent consultant looking to add ergonomic services because you already have a client list. So the first thing that you can do is to just let your clients know via social media, emails, or phone calls that you’re adding ergonomic services and you’re open for business. It’s a great opportunity that shouldn’t be overlooked. 

The main takeaway is: plant the seeds with companies and establish networks long before it’s time to launch. Determine the people with whom it would be valuable to build connections and develop a strategy for communicating your services to them. 

2. Not capturing emails

One of the biggest mistakes that I made when I first started was not building an email list. Having an email list, combined with a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system, allows you to stay connected with your current and potential clients. Personally, I think email is the channel that brings in the best ROI. Email communication is a great way to let people know that you have new content, a promotion, or announcements. It also allows you to show your expertise and increase your audience’s understanding of your credibility. If you know how to utilize this channel properly, your email list is going to be your biggest asset.

The way that I learned this wasn’t the greatest way. Before, I thought that blogging was the way to build trust and encourage people to invest in my services. So I committed to blogging every single day, and I did it for a very long time. Even though I had quite a few readers on my website, I didn’t collect their emails. And it took me a long time to realize that I was missing an opportunity. Even if you publish the best content on social media or write the best blog posts, if there's no way for you to stay connected with your audience, then they’ll likely leave. That’s why you need to have an email management system so you can establish and maintain strong relationships with them. 

If your audience is willing to share their email address with you, that means that they’re interested in your content and what you do. Once you have them on your email list, send them emails consistently to build long-lasting relationships with your audience. You can nurture that relationship, eventually selling them your services.

3. Not planning out your sales funnel

Developing traction online is a slow process, even if you're doing everything correctly. Your prospects go through a sales funnel to get to the stage where they engage with your business or purchase your services. You need to guide them throughout this process—from first learning about your business to eventually becoming loyal clients. This involves setting up measures at every stage of the funnel to encourage prospects to move forward with you. 

I wish I had invested time in developing how I was going to transition my website visitors to being paid customers. Instead of doing that and working out the sales system, I wrote a blog every day for a very long time. If I had just scaled that back and added a little dabble of email management, sales page, and doing that more often, then my business would've generated more income and served many more people in my world. 

So the lesson is to plan out your sales funnel prior to developing your content. You need that back-end to support you in producing content. Also, you want your prospects to know you and your company better. If you don’t plan out your sales funnel, you’ll miss out on great opportunities to find and nurture future clients.

4. Wasting time building a perfect website

In today’s digital age, it’s important for a business to have an online presence, including having a website. Many marketing experts will say that it’s important to have a website to generate leads. But spending your time building a perfect website can distract you from the real work you need to be focusing on: getting clients. 

Just as your business will evolve over time, so will your website. So the whole infrastructure of how you represent your business may end up changing significantly once you gain a better understanding of who your target clients are. And over time, you’ll also discover how you can serve your clients even better and explore what other types of services to offer.

Of course, I want you to wireframe your website before you get started so you're not making expensive, time-consuming changes later on. The point is, you don’t need to spend too much time perfecting your website. You just need to provide your information so your website visitors will know who you are and what you do. The vital part is knowing exactly who you want to serve. Once you’ve defined that, you can focus on creating a specific message that will resonate with their pains, problems, and interests.

And that’s it! Are you making any of these common digital marketing mistakes yourself? Let me know in the comments below.

Big announcement:

I’ll be hosting a 3-part LIVE training starting next week, March 17th, 2022. In this training, you’ll learn the proven strategies on how to get started and get traction with positioning your Ergonomics Services. This is an opportunity for you to gain some highly valuable learning. So if you haven’t had a chance to sign up, just click here.