Change creates opportunity. This being true, there is apparently a lot of opportunity out there. The trick is in knowing when opportunity is knocking. The solution lies in developing personal relationships in such a way that people will think of you when an appropriate opportunity presents itself.

Those of you who attended the Patricia Fripp/Alan Weiss "Odd Couple" meeting in San Francisco have learned where to invest marketing time via Alan's "Gravity" diagram. You also learned about the value of building relationships. The problem is, as a small, often one-person business, how do you free up enough time to do a good job? Here's the solution: Automate!

Any marketing campaign can succumb to three major pitfalls:

• Lack of time,
• Lack of money and
• Lack of focus.

When starting a campaign, what happens is initial enthusiasm, followed by a sense of becoming overwhelmed by the sheer volume of the task. The usual result is that you lose focus by chasing what appear to be the most promising 10 percent and failing to follow up the other 90 percent. As you accumulate clients, the need to chase new prospects often results in failure to stay in touch with people who have already paid you for your ability! Automation can go a long way toward solving these problems.

A good Sales Force Automation tool can reduce the magnitude of the task to something very manageable. "Being in touch" doesn't necessarily mean your calling every few weeks to chat! You can pre-design a series of steps consisting of e-mails, faxes, letters and follow-up calls, then attach this "track" to the contact records of your clients and prospects. The best way to save money is to use e-mail wherever possible, followed by faxing. Use letters as a last resort as these are the most costly and labor-intensive.

Tracks can be created:

• To remind you of all the steps needed to process everything related to cementing a booking; contract sent, received back; fees paid; travel arranged, final payment, expenses received, etc.;
• To send periodic newsletters, ideas, reminders of product you sell and other topics/services you provide.

In fact, a track can be created to accomplish any task you wish!

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