Guerrilla Marketing

by Charles Rubin

With dozens of online marketing weapons and hundreds of places where you can attack in cyberspace, it's easy to lose focus. Yet an effective marketing attack involves following a consistent strategy. To keep your attack on track as the days and weeks go by, make a Do List. Here are some activities you'll want to consider putting on that list for your daily, weekly, monthly, and quarterly marching orders.

Daily tasks can include:

• Checking the positions of classified ads you've posted (and re-posting them if they're too far down the message list);
• Adding new e-mail addresses to your mailing list from messages you receive ;
• Following up leads to new information resources;
• Checking your e-mail and responding the same day;
• Monitoring discussion groups in which you participate, and posting messages in them;
• Visiting your Web site or storefront to make sure it's working properly; and
• Sending a message to your own mailbot to make sure it's working properly.

Weekly tasks can include:

• Reviewing responses from different ads to see which are pulling the best;
• Adding information to your storefront;
• Reviewing your storefront's server activity log to monitor store traffic;
• Checking out "What's New" items on online services; and
• Following up with more detailed exploration of resources that you discovered from daily leads.

Monthly tasks can include:

• Reading monthly magazines and online newsletters;
• Publishing new information of your own in appropriate forum libraries and on your Web site;
• Scouting and pursuing new publicity opportunities in print publications; and
• Seeking new links and directory listings.

Quarterly tasks can include:

• Conducting seasonal promotions for your online business;
• Publishing a newsletter;
• Adding a new department to your storefront; and
• Updating your online customer list via e-mail.

By scheduling appropriate activities out into the future, planning to enhance your attack over time, and following the marching orders that arise from that planning and scheduling, you'll create an online presence that becomes richer and more visible from month to month.