Believe it or not, everything you think you know about marketing is wrong. That’s right, flat out wrong.
Fortunately, it’s not really your fault. You see, what we today think of as marketing is something that’s been in the works for the past 1/2 century or so. It hasn’t always been this way, but because of the slow hijacking of the idea of what marketing really is, what we now think of as marketing is really nothing more than an attempt to build up name recognition.
Turn on the TV, flip through any magazine, open up most any telephone directory in any city, or drive along any major highway and you’ll see a never ending parade of attempts to simply brand a company. Or in other words, these companies are paying big bucks with the hope that when the time comes for you to buy a product or service they happen to offer that you’ll remember having seen their ad somewhere and decide to spend money with them.
As a small business, investing your hard earned dollars on the simple HOPE that someone remembers you at some time in the future is in my opinion, suicide!
So, if branding is such a bad idea, then how should you market your business?
Well, if we go back to the early days of selling and even up until the mid-1920’s and examine the type of marketing that was being used we’d see that it was all very much about telling a story and building a relationship.
Instead of simply trying to get someone to remember them, companies would paint a picture of life with their product or service in it. They’d go into as much detail as possible about why their product was better than the competition.
Unfortunately, over time as it became more costly to advertise companies started focusing more on branding instead of telling a story, painting a picture, and explaining exactly why someone should purchase their product or service.
In my next post I’ll share with you some videos that show clear cut evidence of how the focus of marketing has changed over the years. It’s a pretty eye-opening piece of evidence and I think you’ll find it interesting.
There are a lot of things that you as a business owner that provides products or services to a limited geographic or local area you can do to try and grab people’s attention and get them to pick up the phone or visit your storefront.
There is of course all of the traditional media like TV, radio, newspaper, and direct mail that are available to you. There are the many online tools and resources like SEO, PPC, email marketing, banner ads, social media, and various other methods as well.
But no matter how you decide to market your business, if you’re missing this one critical ingredient your marketing efforts will fall flat and you won’t generate the type of response you need in order to continue growing your business.
What’s this one ‘critical’ ingredient?
It’s a killer offer. You see, when you invest your money marketing your business, if you don’t have something to motivate your prospects to actually get off their rear and either pick up the phone, log onto your website, or stop by your shop, all you’re really doing is spending money on branding, and at the end of the day it’s not a very effective way to grow your business today.
Yes, having a solid, well-recognized brand is an important element to growing a successful local business. However, paying money to do anything other than generate customer RIGHT now is a deadly mistake that should be avoided at all costs.
So, what makes for a killer offer and why is it so important?
A killer offer is essentially the bait that gets your target market to identify themselves as interested and/or qualified in the product or service you offer. It’s the carrot you dangle in front of the horse so they’ll come to you.
What should you offer?
Unfortunately, that ones a little tougher to figure out because there’s really no one answer that applies to every business. The killer offer for a dentist will be very different from the home theater installer will be very different from the lawn care contractor.
The key to figuring out what to offer starts with knowing your target market and understanding what it is they’re really trying to achieve. What is it that keeps them up at night? What is it they really, REALLY want?
Once you have an answer to that question, put together a product or service that solves their problem and you have yourself a powerful offer that will generate interested, qualified prospects.
Now, chances are it’ll take a few times to really figure out what to offer your target market. Again, there’s no silver bullet that works for everyone or for every business so you’ll need to spend some time working on your solution.
However, once you come up with an offer that is powerfully motivating for YOUR prospects and customers, you’ll solve 75% of your marketing problems and your business will start to grow like crazy.
Already have what you think is a great offer?
Share it with us in the comments section. Tell us who your prospect is and what you’ve found to be extremely effective in getting them to take action.
I’ve been saying this for a very long time (okay, a long time on the Internet is only a few years, but who’s counting) and it’s looking like more and more people are finally starting to come around to the idea that marketing has got to be about MUCH MORE than the tools or tactics we use to reach prospects and customers.
John Jantsch at Duct Tape Marketing posted an interesting commentary on his blog that discussed this very point and I completely agree with his assessment.
In fact, I’d argue that the specific tools or media platforms themselves really don’t matter much at all. Not that they’re not important, because they are, but more because it should be about how we use the tools and platforms to interact with our target market.
For example, how different ‘tools’ are there that allow you to manage your social media profiles in one single location? Right off hand I can think of 5 or 6 and I know that number’s VERY LOW.
So what is marketing really about if not for the tools?
I’d propose that as John states, it’s all about the strategy that employs these specific tools, platforms, and other means of reaching a target market and how well they help you achieve your individual objectives.
You see, without a competent plan for actually using the tools and tactics to achieve a measurable increase in some MEANINGFUL aspect of your business (more leads, higher quality leads, more customer conversions, more word-of-mouth referrals, etc.), you could easily spend all day messing around with tools but not making any significant progress.
So, as a business owner it’s up to you to determine IF a particular tool or tactic can help you grow your business. If you determine that indeed it can, it’s then up to you to figure out how best to employee that tool as efficiently and effectively as possible in order to achiever your objectives.
What are your thoughts about the role of the countless tools, tactics, and media platforms available to you as a business owner? How do you social media impacting your business and your ability to reach your target market?
Go ahead and post your comment below. I’d love to hear what you think!
So much of the marketing and advertising we see on a daily basis is downright ‘put you to sleep’ boring. Well, the guys over at 37 Signals, creators of some fantastic small business project management, CRM, and other productivity tools, recently created a unique ad to help propel their new book to the top of the best sellers list.
You see, Karl Rove, the Chief of Staff to former President G.W. Bush, released his new book about the same time and because he has a rather long list of friends in powerful media positions, he’s been on a rather rampant tour lately promoting his book.
As a result and without much surprise, his book is ranked higher than the guys at 37 Signals. In spite of a much smaller list of friends in high media positions and not to be outdone, they set out to do everything within their power to help propel their book to the top of the list.
And when it comes to dealing with politicians, what could be more appropriate than a good ol’ attack ad?
Yep, you read that right, an attack ad pitting Rove’s book, Courage and Consequence: My Life as a Conservative in the Fight, against the work of 37 Signals, REWORK.
If you ask me, I’d say it’s a pretty ingenious way to get the word out about their book. Will it be successful in pushing the 37 Signals guys to the top of the list? Who knows, but I think it’s an incredibly creative way to use something that most people despise in a fun and entertaining way.
Take a look and tell me what you think:
We just wrapped up the 7 critical elements to successfully marketing your products or services, and I hope you’ve taken the time to read about each of these 7 marketing elements.
If you haven’t already read them, you’ll find them here:
- Marketing Should Be Your #1 Responsibility
- Branding Is NOT Marketing
- Direct Response Marketing Is King
- Join The Conversation
- Educate Your Prospects and Customers
- Develop Real Relationships
- Marketing Consistency is CRITICAL
Okay, now that you’ve caught yourself up with what we’re talking about, there’s another critical distinction we need to make in order to truly understand marketing and see how it can help you grow your business. And that distinction is the difference between marketing strategies and marketing tactics.
Marketing strategies are the over-arching plan of attack. It’s the why you do what you do when it comes to marketing your products or services. It’s the roadmap that gets you from Point A to Point Z.
Tactics on the other hand are simply tools, methods, or mediums you use to carry out your marketing strategy. They’re the actual vehicles that get you from Point A to Point Z.
(definitions courtesy of Dictionary.com)
Unfortunately, when most people think of marketing they think of tactics, and not the strategy. As a result, they end up investing money on marketing methods or tactics that aren’t well suited for their particular business, they end up frustrated because they things they’re doing don’t seem to be working, and they end up with this false belief that marketing doesn’t work.
When you try to do anything without a clear sense of purpose or objective, you can bet it’s going to fail. The same can be said for marketing your small business.
In the next week or so I’ll be sharing some specific ideas and action steps you could take to help you implement a powerful, profit producing marketing strategy that will create new customers and clients for you, so stay tuned!
