by Ruth Balkin, Balkin Information Services
I'll admit it, I'm hooked on Sudoku. At the urging of my assistant (thanks a lot, Natalie), I started out doing the puzzles in the newspaper, then bought a few books. However, my favorite is JigSawDoku, available free online at
http://www.jigsawdoku.com/. Each number has a specific color and you can change the difficulty level. Today I discovered that marketing is a lot like playing Sudoku:
- The more you practice, the better you get.
- If one thing doesn't work, try something else. You need to use various methods even in the same game.
- It's okay to "cheat" - in other words, ask for help. Or in the case of the game, try a number to see if it works.
- When all else fails, go back to the beginning.
- If you get stuck, put it on "pause" and take a break. Go do something else.
- Set a limit on how much you will "play." Don't get distracted and spend all your time playing the game; you have other things to do in your business besides marketing.
- Check your progress as you go along. You can do this by clicking on "Hint." For marketing, how many follow-up calls did you make or how many e-mails did you send?
- Get organized, and the pieces will fall into place...How are you doing?
- Check your stats periodically. 14 calls made; 4 proposals to do!
- And finally, remember to have fun doing it!
By Ruth G Balkin, Balkin Information Services,
rbalkin@balkininfo.com 585-482-1506
With thanks to Rachel Lee and Gideon Greenspan, creators of JigSawDoku,