Larry owned a landscaping company in southern Florida. Having all that warm weather was great for the landscaping business, because those yards needed mowing all year long. Of course, that also meant that he had a lot of competition. By using educational marketing, he had gained a solid core of clients and steady referrals. But, he wanted to take his business to the next level and have enough business to hire a second crew.
In thinking about how to teach more people, he reviewed the skill set list he had created when setting up his business. Larry noticed that he had listed that he had been a writer for his high school paper and that gave him an idea. There were a couple of free community papers that were published in his area. The one he liked best came in the mail once a month.
So he decided to go talk to the editor and offer to write, free of charge, a monthly column on landscaping in southern Florida. All he asked in return is the name of his company and phone number listed at the bottom. Since community papers don't have much of a budget, the editor liked the free part and that it would be one less article he would have to come up with to fill the paper. They agreed to give it a try.
After a few months of articles, Larry started getting phone calls asking about landscaping problems. He gladly answered any questions they had and never tried to sell them anything. Word spread that Larry was the expert to talk to if you had a question and you didn't have to worry about a sales pitch.
Eventually, many of those people called back and decided to hire Larry's company and his business grew at a faster pace than he had ever imagined. He noticed another big change in his life. Because he now had so many people looking up to him as an expert in his field, he had to start studying again himself to be able to answer all the questions. This, in return, made him an even better landscaper.