When it comes to marketing, it's time to stop pushing so hard. After all, you don't like being pushed, do you?

In the ultra competitive world of the 21st century, the secret to business success lies in customer attraction. The people you are trying to market to are inundated with thousands of marketing messages each day. To keep sane, they put up filters. So it's harder than ever to get marketing messages through - hence falling response rates. Growing businesses should consider a new approach.

If you educate your customers and add value throughout the buying cycle you will win. Increasingly, you will see promotional campaigns which are primarily educational in nature. They will offer useful, interesting and informative help and advice. This approach is especially relevant for businesses on limited budgets.

In order to attract customers to your enterprise, both internet marketing and traditional forms of promotion should be used (there are over 250 methods to choose from). There is no need to use a 'hard sell' approach, which will turn people away. All you have to do is to point people in the direction of the useful material that we have been talking about. For example, a banner ad could say that a free buyer's guide to (your product/service)is available if they 'click here'.

This approach will attract more potential customers. Some of them will be in the market to buy today. Many, however, will just be browsing. Therefore, the next stage is to tempt them to sign-up to some form of regular communication, such as an e-newsletter or blog. In order to do this, provide an incentive – in terms of packaged information which is relevant to the target market you are communicating with.

For example, within my website, I offer a free marketing toolkit for new subscribers to my e-newsletter. The toolkit contains a marketing plan template and other items which I would normally only give to paying clients. Hence the toolkit has a high perceived value. This strategy has created an opt-in list of some 2,500 business owners.

The final step is to send useful and helpful material on a monthly basis. Yes, this is quite a commitment! However, regular communication works.

Written by marketing consultant, speaker and author Nigel Temple who is the author of the book 'How to Get Clients to Come to You'.

www.nigeltemple.com