What do you think you need more than anything else to attract more of your ideal clients?

Many people will say “better information to show me how to do what works.”

Others will say, “more motivation and drive to implement what I already know.”

Another common answer is“more time to include marketing activities in my schedule”.

And many people will say, “I need better goals and more clarity on what I want to achieve.”

In writing this ezine/blog for the last 20 years, I have talked about the importance of all of them.

But I am finally understanding a much more important factor: good habits.

Over the past year, I have been a strong supporter of the writings of James Clear. Write a blog about success and habits. And he just published his first book, Atomic Habits, which is fantastic.

Although James is not a marketing expert, I am convinced that he is right when he says that the ultimate determinant of success is developing positive habits.

This idea is simple but true: Freelancers who establish regular marketing habits have a much better chance of success than those who don’t.

And the crazy thing is that the four elements (information, motivation, time and goals) that I mentioned earlier don’t really make a big difference.

Information. These days, we have access to more information about marketing than ever before in history. And much of it is free and instantly available via a Google or YouTube search.

The problem is that most of us haven’t established the regular habit of studying what we need to know to become better salespeople. Information is useless unless we are experts at implementing it.

And even if we pay good money for courses and programs, much of it is wasted. I recently learned online that 97% of people who buy an online course never complete it.

Motivation. If we measure motivation by intention, we are all motivated. Don’t we all want and need to grow our businesses? But we keep getting distracted and not fulfilling our intentions. Once again, the problem is bad habits.

Hour. If only we had more. But the unsuccessful salespeople have just as much as the most successful ones. The key is that they spend more time implementing regular marketing habits.

Objectives. There is nothing wrong with goals except that they are just a starting point for success. And they can leave us stuck in the future, instead of doing what needs to be done today: the routine marketing habits we engage in every day or week.

“A habit or system beats a goal every time.” -Clear James

The investigation is done and the conclusion is clear.

Establishing positive and consistent marketing habits has a greater impact on marketing success than anything else.

We may have great information, high motivation, plenty of time, and clear goals, but unless marketing activities are done on a regular and regular basis, the chances of success are slim to none.

The question you should ask yourself is, “How do I start establishing better marketing habits?”

James’s Atomic Habits goes to great lengths to share a multitude of ways to become an expert habit practitioner. So I suggest you get the book from him. It could be the most valuable ‘marketing’ book you’ve ever read.

But let me also give you my perspective on what it takes to establish new marketing habits.

The C-SPAT model

This is a model I came up with for one of my marketing programs.

Coaching or Context. A coach declares the game, how it is played and how to win. And this creates the context in which you play. It helps if he has an outside source who can hold him accountable for playing by the rules necessary to be successful.

This principle is why when you’re working with a coach or in a program and you suddenly find it’s easier to take action and form positive habits. The context of the game helps shape your behaviors.

Keep in mind that all professionals, such as doctors, lawyers, and accountants, go through rigorous training in the form of career school and internships. And in this context professional habits and protocols are established.

As freelancers, we would all prefer to do things on our own, charting our own direction. That’s good, except it doesn’t always work very well, right?

Study. A big part of the game is studying and learning the body of knowledge needed to perform effectively. Once again, the information required to be an effective marketer is readily available, but you need help separating the wheat from the chaff and studying what is more useful.

Calendar. All successful marketing needs a plan. The alternative is to implement haphazard marketing activities with little structure and direction. So it’s not about how much you know, but how you put what you know into practice.

Action. Success doesn’t come from being busy or doing a lot of things, but from doing the right things at the right time. This is where establishing regular marketing habits comes into play.

For some, it might be writing an article once or twice a week. For others, it may mean hosting more meetings with networking contacts. Or it could be booking regular speaking engagements.

The secret to making this work is to leverage the first three steps of the model—training, studying, and planning—into marketing actions you take as consistently as possible.

Tracing. What gets measured gets done. And when we fail to measure, clothes don’t tend to stick. When we measure and track habits, the chances of them being done consistently increase dramatically.

It may take some time to establish positive habits. You know that happened when you don’t even have to think about it anymore; just sit down and write that article every Monday or make five calls to prospects each week.

And when you’re in action like this, you create a feedback loop, learning what works best and what doesn’t. This allows you to fine-tune and adjust over time until your marketing habits are more established.

So stop putting so much focus on finding the “perfect” marketing strategy, getting motivated, finding more time, and setting goals.

Instead, use the C – SPAT approach to establish positive marketing habits.

Regards, Robert