Do It! Marketing Blog: Marketing for Smart People™

You may have already heard about the upcoming Expertise to Empire Bootcamp Webinar Series produced my good friend and National Speakers Association colleague Shari Alexander.

This 6-Session Weekly Bootcamp includes information, materials, and coaching on:   

• How to create your personal Brand that puts your competition to shame
• Strategically navigating the world of Social Media so that it doesn't eat up your life and your productivity while still generating leads 
• The business of Public Speaking; learn what the top speakers are doing in today's market to get gigs and build their list
• The ins and outs of the fast-changing Publishing world. Discover which method of book publishing is right for you. Then put the steps in place to successfully execute the book you've been dreaming of
• Insider secrets of a successful Product Launch. Get more product sales in a shorter period of time with these tested and proven techniques
• Find out what the masters are doing for their Market Research.  Get the edge in your business plan right from the start by implementing these easy and quick techniques

As with most well-marketed, well-delivered programs, naturally you get some nice bonuses in addition to the Early Bird pricing that is now in effect.  

As a marketing concept, it's hard to find a more basic one than this: 

Get. Off. Your. Ass.

Yes, you!

Yes, right now!!

Here's a quick test to see whether or not you might benefit from APPLYING this revolutionary marketing concept: 

• Are you tired of endlessly chasing prospects and "tire kickers"?
• Do you get frustrated because your clients just don't seem to listen to you?
• Have you ever worked all day and felt like you got nothing done?
• Let's be real...have you considered packing it in and just getting a J.O.B.?

If this sounds familiar, then I have a solution for you.

Want to know what it is?

Are you sure??

You may not like the answer...

Ok..here it is.

You have to Get Off Your A$$ and Make it Happen!

(See, I warned you.)

Here's the good news. My friend Sean Carroll has a program that will show you exactly WHAT to do and HOW to do it, once you make the decision to Get Off Your A$$ 

By taking advantage of this FREE video training series, you will:

As a small business marketing speaker and small business marketing coach, I know you're probably wearing lots of different hats in your small business, and it's tough to keep all the areas of your business running smoothly all the time.

Think spinning plates or juggling balls. What's worse is that when time is tight, your least favorite tasks (often marketing and sales) get neglected, and your business suffers.

To keep your business running smoothly, don't rely on your memory or your never-ending to-do list.

You'll thrive or starve by three calendars: an Editorial calendar, a Marketing calendar, and a Sales calendar.

If you set up these calendars and then rely on them, your business will hum along, growing and thriving as you regularly accomplish all you need to.

Let's take a look at each of these three calendars to find out how they work their magic.

Editorial Calendar

As you know, content is king when it comes to today's inbound marketing environment. To get noticed and to be recognized as an authority in your industry, you've got to produce timely, quality content, and you've got to do it regularly. Set aside a time on your calendar for each of the following tasks:

Email Newsletter. An email newsletter lets you communicate with customers you've already tapped into. These customers will be your repeat business if you stay fresh on their minds. Quality email newsletters include articles and news that your customers can't get anywhere else like invitations to exclusive events, industry updates, valuable resources, and timely articles that offer real value.

Blog. An updated blog tells your customers that you're an authority in your industry, that you're with-it, and that you are responsive to their needs. One of the greatest benefits of a blog is that you can build a genuine two-way relationship with readers. They can comment and ask questions, and you can show your knowledge and responsiveness as you reply.

Offline Publications. Your internet presence is priceless, but don't discount offline publications. Articles in national trade publications, association magazines, industry journals and major newspapers may reach an entirely different audience than your blog and social media. 

Guest Posts. Writing guest posts for outside blogs is a great way to reach more people and send more traffic back to your own website.

Article Marketing. Once you've written an article or paid a writer to write one for you, use it to your best advantage. Syndicate it so that it appears on many different websites, increasing your web presence and generating more traffic to your business website.

Marketing Calendar

Like your editorial calendar, your marketing calendar will ensure that important tasks are done on a regular basis, including your least favorite tasks. Make sure you have the following items on your marketing calendar:

Email. Nothing kills interest like unresponsiveness. If you don't respond quickly to emails, potential clients and customers will turn to someone who does respond quickly. Checking and responding to email should be on your marketing calendar every day.

Promotions and offers. Regular promotions and special offers keep you top-of-mind. Put your promotions on your marketing calendar, and use your editorial calendar to inform readers and customers about upcoming promotions.

Outreach. Put your business out in the community regularly by setting up booths at targeted trade shows or sponsoring events aimed squarely at your target market. Outreach may show up on your calendar much less frequently than other marketing tasks, and that's fine. But if it's on your calendar, you're much more likely to make the preparations necessary to participate in such events.

Web. Web marketing, whether it's paying for Google ads or finding appropriate blogs to comment on, takes some time, and it's very easy to push this task aside. Assign an hour or so each week to web marketing. Track your web marketing success over several months to see if you need to spend more time on it.

Sales Calendar

Developing and using a sales calendar will help you to stay on top of more personal tasks. Coordinate your sales efforts with your other calendars.

Calls. Set aside some time each day to make and return phone calls. If you work in an office, warn your co-workers that you'll be unavailable during this time.

In-person meetings. Even though phone and video conference work well for catching up, there's nothing like an in-person meeting for solving problems and getting on the same page. Put these meetings on your calendar as frequently as you think you need them.

Follow-ups and Decisions. Schedule a time for following up on leads and for collecting decisions from prospects you've had initial conversations with. By scheduling this time, prospects will meet your deadlines more often, and your sales funnel will operate more reliably.

It may seem intimidating to set these calendars up, but once you do, you'll find that you feel less stressed and more able to meet the demands of your day when you abide by them. With slots for each important task, you may even feel that you have more time for your favorite tasks - like running your business and serving your clients.

p.s. If you'd like some personalized help - and your very own customized marketing and sales toolkit PLUS an easy-to-implement small business marketing game plan with 1-on-1 guidance for 90 days, get all the details here.

As a marketing speaker and marketing coach, I read roughly 100 marketing, sales and business development books per year. My company is 10 years old, so that makes about 1,000 books so far, give or take a few dozen. 

And in almost every one - you'll hear something similar to these bits of advice about sales follow-up:

• "The fortune is in the follow-up"
• "If you don't follow up 5-7 times, you'll lose the sale"
• "Nobody ever EVER buys on the first, second, or third appointment"
• "Most sales are made after the 8th contact, but most salespeople stop after the 3rd contact"

I have good news: This advice is horse doo-doo. (And it's probably making you needlessly tired, frustrated and depressed.) 

I also have bad news: This advice is STINKY horse doo-doo that is costing you face time with REAL decision-makers.

Here are 7 reasons you're wasting your time with follow-up: 

1. If you're exclusively focused on prospects who are actively SEEKING to solve the problem you're positioned to solve, you'll get their attention on the first or second attempt. If you don't - then you need more targeted and relevant prospects.

2. We're marketing in an era where everyone - including (and especially) your prospects - are lazy, busy, and befuddled. Life moves too fast for follow-up. You're either an immediate priority or you're invisible.

3. Leave non-prospects the hell alone. Continuing to "check in" for no good reason when you're in the invisible column gets real annoying real fast. You may even damage your chances at future sales when you're a current pest.

4. Decision makers make decisions. If you're stuck in follow-up hell, you weren't dealing with a real decision maker in the first place. Following up with someone with no check-writing authority is like trying to teach a Labrador Retriever to drive. It may be fun for a short time, but then someone is going to get bitten.

5. "Short attention span theater" rules the day. If you follow up with today's "hot prospect" next month, chances are excellent that your prospect will say, "Who are you again? We talked about what? When? I'm sorry - I'm just running to a meeting... Bye!"

6. Alpha dogs BUY - Sheep dogs BARK. Chances are that no matter what your product or service, if you're selling to a decision maker, that person has an "alpha dog" personality. They are a Driver (D on the DISC profile) and they make fast decisions with a very low threshold of patience for dickering, bureaucracy or delay. If you want to make a fast sale, the REAL buyer is your best ally to make that happen. Or not. But "following up" to drag out the process will simply turn them off. 

7. If you relentlessly focus on the right prospects at the right time for the right reasons, you'll spend a whole lot less time "convincing" and "persuading" fence-sitters and a whole lot more time focusing like a laser beam on the buyers who are ready, willing, and eager to do business with you. No followup needed. 

Two quick examples for you: 

Dave - The No-Followup Sales Champ

When I was working for a large enterprise software firm, I sat across from one of our top inside salespeople on the days that he and I were both in the office. Those days were a rare treat because I could overhear Dave's sales calls in between my own work and meetings. Talk about free sales training - Dave was masterful. 

Dave would call hand-selected leads who were, more often than not, Fortune 1000 Chief Information Officers (CIOs). His opening question after a 7-second introduction of his name and company went something like this: 

"I don't know if you're currently evaluating options for enterprise software but if you are, I can offer you some insights and recommendations in less than 15 minutes to help you make a better decision, whether that's with us or not. Is ERP software on your agenda for this year?"

Yes. No. Boom. He opened conversations with about 70% of these prospects. The other 30% politely disqualified themselves and he never called them again. If you're not looking to invest in this category of software BEFORE Dave called you, nothing he said by way of "follow up" would make you dig into the corporate budget and come up with an extra 1-2 million dollars, which was our average sale.

Dave made a note in his CRM database to call them next year. Sometimes he would get the same CIO. And sometimes he would connect with the new CIO because the previous guy botched the ERP installation they bought from someone else. In any case, each annual call was a qualification call - a yes/no filter and NOT a "follow up."

Colleen - The Superachiever Coach with the No-Follow-Up Sales Letter

My pal Colleen Bracken and I started our speaking and coaching businesses within a few months of each other back in 2001. In her early days, Colleen specialized in what she called "Superachiever" coaching - working with CEOs, government leaders, and other top dogs in the corporate and non-profit world. 

We worked together on crafting a "no-follow-up" sales letter. Why? Because Colleen had ZERO interest in chasing prospects and she wanted to make this clear in her sales process because she also knew that the alpha dogs she was selling to felt the same way. (See points 1-7 above!)

Here is a portion of the letter we put together: 

=====

If you know someone [perhaps someone sitting in your chair?] who is ready to embark on the short, fast, exhilarating ride to the next level of success, STRAP IN and call me at XXX-XXX-XXXX or email colleen@superachiever.net. We’ll set up your no-risk no-obligation 15-minute SuperAchiever coaching call. You’ll be amazed at what we can do in a quarter of an hour.

Finally, I need to answer your unasked question: Why should you work with me? After all, we’ve both been doing just fine without each other so far, right?

1. I’ve handpicked you as someone I specifically want to work with.  

2. I’m a REAL professional coach. I’ve received my PCC certification which means that I’ve studied 250 hrs, coached for 1000 hrs and have been designated by the International Coach Federation (the world governing body of the coaching profession). Only 275 other coaches (out of 35,000 coaches worldwide) in the world have met this standard.  

3. Clients I’ve worked with have had this to say about our professional relationship:  

[Three of Colleen's most powerful 2-3 line testimonials from other Alpha Dogs the recipient would respect.]

Invest 15 minutes with me – no-risk, no obligation -- then decide for yourself. What’s the worst that could happen? You spend 15 minutes getting my best ideas, questions, and tools around what you’re working on right now, and we part ways.  

Or... throw this letter straight into the recycling. Only you know if you’re ready for this personal, powerful, unique stuff and the breakthrough successes that come with it.  

-- Colleen

[Signature block]

p.s. You're working at 100mph and so am I. For this reason, I won't bother to follow up with you. In my experience, SuperAchievers make fast decisions. So I figure I’ll be hearing from you in the next 3-5 days. Or not at all.

p.p.s. It's your move. 

=====

Between this approach in her letters, emails, and personal networking, Colleen built her extremely successful leadership coaching, training and speaking business. 

The moral of the story? Screw follow-up. You hate doing it. They hate receiving it. 

Instead, do everything in your power to market, sell, and profit from people who are eager to open the door for you when you knock!

p.s. If you'd like some personalized help - and your very own customized marketing and sales toolkit PLUS an easy-to-implement small business marketing game plan with 1-on-1 guidance for 90 days, get all the details here.

As a marketing speaker and marketing coach, I not only GIVE lots of presentations, I SEE lots of presentations - both at the conferences and meetings I attend and for my clients as we collaborate on improving their OWN speaking and marketing effectiveness. 

Here are the 7 deadly sins of presentation design - and then you'll get 10 keys to presentations that rock (courtesy of our friends at SlidesThatRock): 

7 Deadly Sins of Presentation Design

1. Too much text

2. Too much jargon

3. Appeal only to head, not heart

4. No new point of view, perspective, or opinion

5. Preach and teach, rather than "how and wow"

6. Quoting dead white guys - it's not a book report!

7. No call to action or "easy, effortless, enjoyable" (EEE) payoff

And now - here's some visual eye candy to help you do it better, smarter, and faster...

10 Keys to Presentations that Rock

What do you think? Please use the COMMENTS area below to share your presentation advice, insights and recommendations.

Buyer persona marketing is not about knowing your customers or what they like to buy. 

It's much more than that. It's about getting inside their heads to deeply understand their emotional drives.  

Many of my small business owner and solopreneur clients claim to know their customer, yet they haven't really tapped into the potential of buyer persona marketing.

Once you finish this article, you'll own the 5 keys to unlock your very own pair of X-Ray goggles to connect with your best prospects so you can sell more, more easily and more often. 

As far as small business marketing goes, you'll be stuck in the minor leagues until you realize that in order to know your customer, you must first create an archetypical buyer, based upon all the information you can glean from your past clients, prospects, and previous conversations you've had with folks who bought - and perhaps more importantly, folks who didn't buy. 

What you need to figure out is the entire person, the whole picture.  Once you begin to understand the psychological motivations and emotional triggers that make your customers buy a certain product or service, you can much more effectively market to them in a way that will put you miles ahead of your competition.

Understanding your buyers is a bit like taking apart a mechanical apparatus to see what makes it tick. 

First, you need to know what problems your buyers are experiencing on a daily basis, or how they prioritize their time and the solutions to these problems.  Your product needs to offer an emotional relief from one or more of these problems.  In short, the buyer needs to NEED your product from an emotional standpoint, and they will then justify the purchase rationally after the fact.  Humans are capable of rationalizing just about any behavior if it triggers an emotional reward.  Bank on that with your product and let your marketing follow.

Secondly, work to identify the rewards your customers gain from purchasing your product.  This ties back into the emotional reward, but try to understand exactly what the buyer gains from your product, on a very basic level.  This will help you market to that reward and toward filling your prospect's emotional gap. 

Just as you consider the rewards, also look at what the perceived barriers to success or reaching that reward are, from the customer's standpoint.  This is the part of the process where you need to understand the thought process that each customer uses to either justify their emotional reactions or to justify not buying your product. 

When you begin to build a model to break down these barriers, your product or service literally sells itself with little to no resistance from your customer.  

Third, it is crucial to understand the buying process that your typical customer goes through.  This is to say that you need to better understand each step of their emotional and rational justification for having your product in their lives.  Do they compare other products to yours in an effort to sort out which one will offer the best reward?  If so, you need to understand the other products they are comparing yours to.  It is important to align your product and marketing solutions to their process for vetting information along with the emotional connection to the problem your product is solving for them on a day to day basis.

This leads to your fourth key - your competitive analysis. Which boils down to a simple answer to a simple question: Exactly how does your product compare against others from the standpoint of the criteria that your customers develop to help them make a decision? 

These are questions that can be answered if you truly LISTEN to your customers and understand what they are telling you. 

The fifth key is personal conversations. The fastest, easiest and most enjoyable way to figure all of this out is to ENGAGE your customer base in face-to-face real time dialogue. Yes, I'm talking about personal conversations, either on the phone or in person. Think about sitting down - at least monthly - with your clients and prospects over breakfasts, lunches, coffees. Can't make it in person? Use the phone or Skype and take them to a "virtual lunch" or "virtual coffee." Shouldn't take more than 30 minutes and you'll both benefit hugely.

Why? Because you'll learn firsthand the direct path to their own interests and emotional triggers - and you'll hear it in their OWN WORDS. Use THAT language in your marketing, and it's much more likely to resonate with others just like them!

When you begin to "sync" with your buyers at the deepest and most personal level -- and how they make buying decisions -- you're on your way to effective, attractive marketing that will draw clients and customers to you like a magnet.

What do you think? Please use the COMMENTS area below to share your experiences with buyer persona marketing...

Here is special treat for you: A 68-minute content-packed interview with speaker's bureau owner and speaker success coach Shawn Ellis of Succeed Speaking and The Speakers Group.

Simply right-click the link below and select "Save File As..." "Save Target As..." or "Download Linked File..." and save the digital audio file to your Desktop:

Download Interview Now

Shawn and I share some rock-solid ideas to help you grow your speaking business, approach speakers bureaus in the right way at the right time and for the right reasons, separate your speaking business from the rest of the pack, and leverage your long-term value to clients way beyond your speech. 

Shawn helps speakers have more fun, reach more people and make more money.

NOTE: Don't forget to grab your Succeed Speaking Subscribers Toolbox of resources, videos and tips that Shawn and I mention during our interview. Grab your copy now at...

http://www.succeedspeaking.com/ 

Listen in, grab your free resources and then please leave a comment below so you can...

I get questions. Some are smart and some are... not so smart.

This one is not QUITE worth the Marketing Jackass Award - but it's close. 

And now without further ado, here it is - THE Dumbest Marketing Question of the Week (yes, it's only Wednesday but I have a high level of confidence that it won't get any worse THIS week)...

=====
From: Joe Blow <joe@JoeBlowCompanyShallRemainNameless.com>
To: david@doitmarketing.com  
Sent: Wednesday, March 21, 2012 4:54 PM
Subject: David, may I borrow your mind?  

David,  

We all appreciate and can feel the power of social media. My question is, if I do not care about impression national wide / long time brand build, what's the best way to move products? Just simply sale it.  

-- Joe
=====

First, this gent wants to "borrow my mind." That's a compliment I suppose. Some days, I'm not sure even I can use it to best advantage. Tell you what, Joe -- it's yours. Be my guest...

If I don't care about impressions nationwide - Hello? This guy sells a product. A great product. A product sold on the web. GLOBALLY. Yet the premise of his question is that he doesn't care about impressions nationwide. This is problem #1.

I don't care about long time brand build - WHAT?? So you want the slam-bam thank-you ma'am instant sort of branding, name recognition, word-of-mouth referrals, and raving fan base, right? Coming right up... How about a zero-calorie Big Mac to go with that? And some non-addictive cigarettes? This type of wishful fantasy thinking is problem #2.

What's the best way to move products? Just simply sale it? The best way to "move products" and sell more is to make impressions nationwide, become known as the "trusted brand" in your market, focus on a niche to generate a raving fan base over time, and let your customers spread the word about how ridiculously AWESOME your product is. Missing this fact ("as obvious as a ham sandwich" as Alan Weiss likes to say) is problem #3.

The second best way (and it's a FAR DISTANT second) is to invest in a LOT of direct marketing and buy a LOT of advertising. 

I'm not being a smartass - really - because if you have the direct marketing and advertising budget of Bose, Gevalia, or Tempur-Pedic - be my guest. Spend hundreds of millions of dollars. But here's the rub: THAT will take YEARS too! And a whole hell of a lot more dollars.

You can do it my way. For 95% less money. Starting right now.  

Your call, Joe. 

What do you think? Please share your responses in the COMMENTS area below...

Here is special treat for you: A 45-minute content-packed interview with marketing coach and professional services marketing expert Stacey Hylen of Business Optimizer Coach.

Simply right-click the link below and select "Save File As..." "Save Target As..." or "Download Linked File..." and save the digital audio file to your Desktop:

Download Interview Now

Stacey and I share some rock-solid ideas to help you profit from "Low-Hanging Fruit Strategies to Rapidly Increase Your Sales" 

Stacey helps 6- and 7-figure entrepreneurs and professionals get more business, more profits, and more time off. 

NOTE: Don't forget to grab your Listening Guide and Resources that Stacey mentions during our interview. Grab your copy now at...

http://businessoptimizercoach.com/dnewman/ 

Listen in, grab your free resources and then please leave a comment below so you can...