Think about all the entry points to your business - Your website, in-person events, all your social media sites, etc. Do you know the steps individuals are taking to connect with you? Do they need to connect to specific sites to get unique information and is their experience on each different? Unless you are intentionally marketing in different ways (i.e., you are appealing to the visual learner on one site and the auditory learner on another) you should ask yourself if your voice is unified. And just to note, even if you are appealing to different types of learners...you still need a unified brand voice when you are doing it. For example, I may post two different visual representations of a single blog post on Pinterest. The pictures are different and the text written on each is different, but the colors, font, and style are all similar.
The first thing I recommend you do, is take some time and map out the flow that your customers are taking when they encounter your business. Think through all the different types of customers you have as well as all the methods by which they can access you or your business. Don't belittle any connection or path because they all count in this process. By doing this, you get a birds-eye view of your business, which helps you see problems in a much faster way. You can quickly pick up on processes that don't make sense or processes that are old. You may even decide you don't want a particular process based on where your business is now.
Once you have fully mapped out your current processes, you will need to identify areas for improvement. Determine how can you unify the routes you have so they are all similar no matter the platform. You want to identify routes that should be eliminated and those that should be added. If I click on the get to know me button on your Facebook page, does it have the same or similar wording, coloring, branding as the one on your website or on Instagram? These are just a few of the things I call leaks in your business. They are process flows or lack thereof that cause customers to have to stop the forward process of getting to you or your product.
Once you have identified the leaks, you will want to resolve the process route problems. Ultimately the goal is to ensure that no matter how people are trying to join your newsletter, their experience/route will be the same or similar. Each platform is a little different, but the actual route they take should be the same and should be the fastest route possible for what they are trying to do. If you identify routes with drop-offs (they don't have a path to you or your product), then you will need to rectify that or make a plan to rectify it. These of course are pretty serious leaks in your business and once identified, you always want to fill these as quickly as possible.
Now, leak filling is never a hit-and-quit type of action. Just like I teach in the Understanding the 5 Stages of Organizing mini-training, there is always a maintenance stage that needs to be completed. The amount of time between maintenance sessions depends on your developed systems and the number of changes you have had in your business since the last one. A person who adds a new service, opt-in or product on a regular basis would need much more frequent review periods than the person who rarely has changed. If you notice a software update or change in your provider(s) platform, this should also trigger a maintenance review. My standard recommendation is for a monthly review for those who add regularly and a quarterly review for those who change things less often. This will ensure everything is working and flowing as expected.
Building Agility into your Project Managment and Planning Process
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