Taking the initiative: practical advice for nurse leaders and entrepreneurs

Q I am going freelance as a private health visitor but have no idea how much to invest in marketing my services. How much should I spend on producing brochures and a website?

A: Your marketing priorities depend very much on where your business is at the moment. If you have so far sold your service to less than 10 people, or perhaps even none at all yet, focus on word-of-mouth sales. This involves making the people in your life aware of what you are doing. Let's assume you have 100 family members and friends. and that each of them has 100 family and friends. That is a pool of 100 x 100 people, equating to 10,000 people who know about your service and may want to use your service. Social networking sites such as Faceboor,Twitter and LinkedIn can also help spread the word. Don't think of this as ‘selling' to your family and friends, all you are doing is letting them know what you are doing. Most people like to help people and if they find someone who needs the service you provide, they may well recommend you. If after making everyone you know aware of your service, you have not had sufficient interest, consider how you are describing your service and whether there is any genuine need for it. This should then be your focus of attention until you reach your first 10 sales. It is very easy for nurses to focus on the service they would like to provide rather than doing any research as to whether there is a genuine local need for the service. Only when you have made 10 sales should you consider investing in brochures and websites (even a very simple one-page site can cost a few hundred pounds to have developed). I know many successful independent nurses that have been working for years without either.