If you read my article about reasons not to make cold calls in your home-based business, and you have made the decision to stop cold calling, then you now have extra time during your day to market your business.

One way to market your business effectively is to hand out flyers to your prospects. This is not cold calling. This is giving free information about your product or service to people who may want or need what you have in the future. You are not asking for anyone's time when handing out your flyer. You should only be asking to get the person's business card or an email address (so you can follow up with them later via email), nothing else. Just get your flyer in their hand and go...they will appreciate you for not trying to insert yourself into their schedule that day.

A flyer does so much more than just a business card. A business card has enough room for your contact information and not much else. A flyer will contain all of your contact information, but more than that, it will work to do your selling for you long after you're gone.

Here are guidelines for creating a good flyer:

• Use a big, bold, attention-getting headline.
• Don't have too much text...leave plenty of empty space on the page.
• Use bullet points.
• Discuss the benefits of your product or service, not features.
  
• Provide multiple ways for your prospect to contact you: phone, fax, email, and personal website.
• Give them an incentive to contact you: offer something for free, a discount, a time limitation, a chance to win something, or anything else that can motivate someone to call you now rather than later.
  

Once you have created your marketing flyer, it's time to start handing them out to prospects. Depending on who your target market is, you may be going to businesses,  homes, or both. One thing is certain, you can get your message to many more people each day by using this inexpensive marketing method, rather than cold calling. Try getting out 25 - 50 flyers every day for just two months and (if you've done a good job creating the flyer) your prospects will start to call you.