The Four Steps of Marketing
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There are four basic steps for the marketing of your service or product:
Each of these is important for your success. Don't just jump to the getting the commitment if you want success. Let's take a brief look at each of these steps. Getting Your Customer's AttentionWe live in an information-dense world. Your web site is in the search engine with (in the case of Google) over 8 billion pages. Your classified advertisement in the newspaper is buried with others. Almost any approach you take to distribute your message is going to be competing with others. How do your competitors get the attention of their customers? To be successful, you also need to first learn how your customer makes decisions; i.e., walk in their shoes. More and more people, for example, are using the Internet search engines to make their purchasing decisions - not the printed yellow pages. Even if they use a brick-and-mortar store, they often will do their web shopping on the Internet as well - either for information, to find out who can help them, or for the actual buying. Do you have a web site in those search engines? Can you design that web site so they come back again and again? What are the basic needs of your customer? Why do they come to the Internet? How can you take advantage of that to get their attention? There are several ways web designers use to get your attention. Flashing text is generally considered poor taste. Animation is good if the animation is part of your message. Eyes move to the animation, drawing the user’s attention. If you use animation, be sure it carries your message or the animation is a distraction. The words you use are important. Here are a few hot words you can use in headlines and body text to increase sales. Get their attention with selective action words. In contrast to what some people say, people in the sales business will tell you that hype does work. Some people are turned off by hype, but it works in general. Involve the reader emotionally. Example words to use could be Amazing, Money, Benefit, How to, Discover, Explode - you get the idea. Avoid words that could turn the reader off such as Cheap, Contract, Liability, and First You will also find that various specialties have their own hot words – and words to avoid. If you are selling a car, for example, the make, model, and color all can be hot words. Building a RelationshipToday you generally no longer can close a sale on simply getting your customer's attention. Today, you have to build trust through a relationship with your client. This is particularly true if your target audience is a GenX or Millennial generation. This takes time. Why should they buy from you? What is your credibility? You generally do not have enough trust with your client initially to know what the keyword phrase - the hot button - is. The key strategy here, then, is listening. He or she will tell you the hot button if you listen. Through your relationship, you are listening for clues about their need as it relates to your product or service. Sometimes the need may not relate to your product or service, but you still can help them. Go ahead and help them – build that relationship. This means if your website is your marketing vehicle, you need to be able to keep your customer returning and interacting with your site. Newsletters, contests, blogs, and more can help you build this interaction and relationship. You want their email address for your database of clients, and you need to give them something to get this. Also, during this process, you are qualifying your clients. I have a friend that is a professional photographer. He sends me free screen-resolution samples of his work occasionally, which constantly acts as a reminder of his mission and credibility. Who do you think I'll turn to first when I need professional photography for a site I am designing? PositioningPositioning implies placing yourself of value to your client relative to your competitors. In what way are you unique relative to your competitors? Support? Are you certified? Lower price? Closer geographically? Do you provide extra benefits? Are you communicating those benefits effectively? Several people sell WebPostion Gold for example. We sell it with a free copy of our e-Book. What extra benefit can you provide? Often you should lead with those benefits. Lead from stories. What testimonies can you provide? Several people sell e-books on the Web. One of these sellers leads with a long, long page of testimonies on their e-Book with pictures of the customers. With some of the testimonies, they haven't even read the book they are promoting. Now that's a good trick! No trust there for me. Your strategy is to increase the value of your product or service relative to your competition. Clarify that value. Increase your credibility. Close the SaleDo you know this is the step that most people leave out? For whatever reason - probably fear - people often fail to ask for the commitment. This is also the phrase that you deal with objections. Anticipate your objections ahead of time and be prepared to answer them. Is price the problem (benefits worth the price)? Your geographic location? Don't need it now?For a web site, add an FAQ page that deals with the objections and your answers. For an online web site, you close using a button with an active command. Try to avoid the "Buy" word. You want to drive the commitment from the user’s need. For example “Get the solution book for repairing that Mustang” is better than “Buy the book on repairing your Mustang.” More Tips
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