There are those marketers who believe in the really old school techniques for selling. From starting with big names like Dale Carnegie (author of “How To Win Friends & Influence People”) and going over the books and training that have been pillars of marketing and understanding how to build a healthy trust necessary for a selling relationship. There’s a reason many of these books and lessons have been a cornerstone of marketing lessons for many years.
Then there is the ever-changing world of digital marketing and new online techniques. Grabbing short attention fans, getting e-mail sign ups, and turning visitors who are just window shopping into returning loyal customers. These new strategies take into consideration the online world and the skills you need to reach out to a mass audience and find those strategies that are going to work in an increasingly digital world.
The most successful businesses today know how to mix these two together successfully.
The reason marketing campaigns fail often comes down to one of two reasons:
1) You’re delusional and no one cares about the benefits or features of your product/service. Harsh, but sometimes true – this is why testing is so important. Do people engage with ideas? Do they talk about a certain issue over and over? Do the related keywords show actual traffic?
2) People don’t understand or don’t get the value of your service/product. They don’t understand the benefits to them or why you should be chosen over a competitor.
Talk in terms of the other person’s interests
“What’s in it for them?” Too many people confuse features with selling points. Features might be your definition of why your service and product is shiny, useful, worth fawning over, but they’re not selling points. Selling points should always directly answer the question “What do I get out of this?” or “Why do I need this right now?”
Mix The Two
Take the knowledge to blend the two. Get loyal customers by remembering that your job is to give value away. Whether through E-mail series, video series, infographics, PDFs, press releases, and more can all do this. Focus on a few main questions:
– Do people care about your benefit?
– Are you listening to them on what they want?
– Are you educating them on what you offer?
A smart way is to learn the new right method for creating a press release. Don’t do it traditionally, but optimize it for SEO online and write to feature a benefit instead of bragging. For example, instead of doing the traditional “company won an award” (no one cares: feature) change it to focus on “company won an award for fixing problems X, Y, Z for people like you” and suddenly it becomes a benefit and social proof.
