Archive for July, 2009

My dirty little secret

Friday, July 24th, 2009

There is a dirty little secret that I am perpetuating.  I hear its aftermath consistently and each time that I do, it puts a little smile on my face.  Perhaps I should not take so much joy in other people’s ignorance, but when such a deception means that I am good at my job, I cannot help but feel good about my actions.

 

But, before I tell you my secret, I want to explain something to you. 

 

A long time ago I learned that life is not about what you know, but who you know.  Any smart business person works diligently to meet the right people, gain the right favors and be well known and respected within their business community.  And such a quest makes perfect sense.  Humans are emotional creatures and they want to work with someone they feel they can trust. You gain such trust by having the right people sing your praise when you are nowhere near.

 

So what is my secret?  I consistently and repeatedly have people that I meet sing my clients’ praise.  Not such a big secret you say?  Well, take into consideration that the people I meet with have never met my clients.  They have never worked on a project with them, they know little about their personal life and they have never uttered one word in their direction.  Furthermore, they have no idea that they are my clients.

 

Hopefully you are starting to ask how you can gain such favor with people you have never met.  And the simple fact of the matter is that you can and you do not even have to be a client of mine to do it!

 

My clients gained so many peoples’ trust because they network constantly.  Not a day goes by that they are not driving a conversation that establishes them as their market’s authority, a helpful friend and needed resource.  Though this sounds exhausting, they never leave their office and expend only a few hours per week.

 

Like all things in life, if it sounds too good to be true, it must not be true.  And perhaps I am over simplifying things. But with the right knowledge and dedication of a few hours a week, you too can reach such a powerful position.

 

My clients have harnessed the power of social networking and, just like face-to-face networking, they use it to drive new business.  They use it to strike-up conversations, they use it to get introduced to the right people, they use it to be well respected in their field.  Everything that they would do in face-to-face networking, they do in social networking.

 

But their success does not come from the simple fact that they applied driven conversation to social networking.  Their real success has come because of the exponential factor of social networks.  Instead of engaging ten new people in a week who are then connected to a few hundred people, they are meeting tens of thousands of people in week who are then connected to hundreds of thousands other people.  And therein lies the exponential power of social networking. Because the truth of it is that social networking is just like regular networking, only better…what a dirty little secret!

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Advertising goes archaic

Tuesday, July 21st, 2009

Words are nothing more than agreed upon symbols and sounds meant to convey feelings.  They are a simple, antiquated invention that has somehow lasted through time.  But now, with all of our technology and endless innovation, words have become our crutch.  A word, phrase or sentence has become the most powerful tool we own. 

Technology brought us pictures which are said to speak a thousand words.  Innovation then brought us moving pictures that streamed constant action into our lives.  But even with all of these improvements, we still fall back on words.

When we think about it though, words are really what define us as humans.  Our ability to communicate, discuss and educate is really what separates us from the rest of the animal kingdom.  So it should be no surprise that words carry such weight.  They have been a powerful tool for some time.

Word of mouth.  Everyone knows it is the most powerful way to reach new customers.  For years advertisers worked on recommendation and referral programs meant to harness its power.  And then another innovation put the power right into our laps.

Social networks burst onto the scene and into our lives within a matter of a few short years.  With their rise in popularity, the power of words has increased.  Now, instead of telling our neighbors and friends about a product we love, we can reach hundreds of millions within seconds.

This is a powerful tool.  As I logged into my social networks this morning, I calculated over ten thousand people that I can reach in a moment’s notice, just as soon as a company gives me reason to spread its message for them.  Those ten thousand people then connect me to tens of millions of people that will get the message, should a company give us a reason to spread its message.

Perhaps you are catching a trend.  Companies must give the consumer a reason to spread their message.  Call this buzz, guerrilla, groundswell or viral. I call it word of mouth.  As social networks continue to become an integral part of our lives, word of mouth becomes an integral tool to reach new consumers.  This is archaic advertising and this is the future.

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The art of desire

Wednesday, July 1st, 2009

“I can’t make you love me.” And with that a two-year relationship ended.  My girlfriend said she just didn’t feel the same way anymore and so I threw in the towel.  Words would not change feelings.  However, the truth is that I could have changed the way she felt but not then, not at the end.  Over the previous two years, in the daily grind, I could have changed her desire.

 

It’s always the small things that add up.  I let the dishes pile up.  I left my clothes lying around the house.  I constantly worked late.  Each slip pushed her a little further away until it was too late: she was gone.

 

And so it is with advertising.  It is not when you lose a customer that you really lose them.  It is all the small concessions along the way that let them slip away.  If you don’t pay your customers enough attention you will lose sight of both their priorities and changing needs.  You must listen.  If not, the advertisement might not be relevant.  The lack of conversation may make you seem distant.  The poor shopping experience may make purchasing difficult.  These are the difference between a sale or no sale.

 

In advertising, as in relationships, you must constantly supply information that creates desire.  Things like time, communication and trust are what make a relationship work and advertising is the creation of a relationship.  When we form strong relationships, we create desire. Nurturing those relationships maintains that desire.

 

I will never get that girlfriend back, just as you may never get back the consumers you pushed away.  But now I know that in order to create and maintain desire, I must constantly supply information that builds a relationship.  And so must you supply the information to build relationships with your consumers, for when you build relationships, you master the art of desire.

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