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Lazy marketing rant

Posted byIan Brodie on July 3rd, 2011.

I hate lazy marketing.

How many times in the last couple of weeks have you heard about new products, services or even books that are apparently “game changers”?

Or “innovative”? Or “leading edge”?

How many websites have you been to where they promise to teach you “how to quickly and easily…” do something or other? (of course, it's never quick or easy). Or tell you you'll soon be “crushing it” or they'll get you to the “next level” whatever the latest in-phrase is.

Now, the first time you hear these phrases they have impact. Maybe even the third or fourth time too.

But over time, you start to ignore them, or just not believe them. If everything is “game-changing” then nothing is.

How about this gem: “Learn how to harness the power of referrals to get a flood of new clients for your business”.

Sadly, that's one of mine. Written years ago when I released my first ebook on how to get more referrals.

Now I'm still very proud of the content of the ebook – it stands up well today and is a great guide for professionals who want to get more referrals.

But “harness the power” and “a flood of new clients”? What was I thinking?

Lazy marketing comes from two sources.

Sometimes, the marketer really is lazy. They can't be bothered writing decent copy or coming up with a decent idea for how to promote their services. So they copy what everyone else is using.

Unfortunately, that means what they write becomes invisible. If everything looks and sounds the same, it disappears into the background. Especially true if we're talking about something like Google Adwords where 8 ads are shown next to each other. Next time you do a search for something read the ads and see just how similar they often look.

More often though, it happens because the marketer hasn't really understood their target client. They haven't gone beyond the surface to understand what motivates them and why they might want what you have to offer.

As a result, they're forced to use generic descriptions and hype to say how good it is – rather than being able to state precisely the benefit their client actually wants.

In my case, I got as far as knowing that professionals are interested in referrals because they want more clients. But I didn't go deeper than that so I had to use hype like “power” and “flood of clients”.

What I should have done was ask why they wanted more referrals and more clients.

Perhaps their business was struggling and they were in financial difficulties? Or perhaps they were looking to bring in more clients to get promoted to partner? Or maybe the real motivation was because they felt uncomfortable with cold calling and networking and wanted a method they could use that didn't make them cringe?

There's usually no “one right answer”. When you dig a little deeper you often find that different people want your services for different reasons. And that's OK – it means you should market to those different people in different ways.

Perhaps, for example, I could have done a Google Adwords ad asking “Hate Cold Calling? Get More Clients Through Referrals Instead” or similar.

It wouldn't have hooked everyone. But for those in that situation it's a lot more compelling than the myriad of unbelievable ads offering a “flood of new clients”.

Have you been lazy with your marketing?

Take a look at your website, your brochures, your online and offline advertising.

Is it filled with generic phrases, hype and platitudes?

If so, your first step is to think more deeply about your clients and what they really want. Keep asking yourself (or even better, them) the question “why?” until you get to the underlying reason – often a feeling or an emotion.

Focusing on that will get you much more attention than the generic copycat marketing we so often see.

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What’s the most common marketing problem?

Posted byIan Brodie on June 12th, 2011.

I sometimes get asked, “what's the most common marketing problem you see?”.

Out of all the potential issues, not having enough leads is by far the one I see the most frequently amongst professionals – especially sole practitioners. And it's also the most debilitating one.

When I'm having initial discussions with potential clients, almost half of them say something along the lines of “if I can just get in front of the right clients, I can almost always sell”.

Now sometimes they're wrong. They're overestimating their selling skills.

But very often they're right.

You see, selling for consultants, coaches and other professionals is not that far removed from our “day jobs”. It involves talking to clients about their issues, diagnosing what the cause might be, understanding the impact, and proposing solutions.

That's not a lot different from what we do when clients have already hired us.

Some professionals have big psychological hangs up about selling. It's beneath them, It doesn't fit with their self image. But often, when push comes to shove, they're not that bad at it.

And if you've worked for a professional firm for any length of time, you'll inevitably have been involved in a number of initial client meetings. You'll have built up experience in it, even if you don't like it.

Lead generation is a different kettle of fish though.

It involves activities like presentations and “pitches”. Asking for referrals. Writing sales letters or doing email marketing. Stuff that's very different from our day jobs.

And if we've come from a large professional firm background the chances are that those activites were done by someone else. The marketing team or the firm's star rainmakers.

Now suddenly we have to do those things. And many of us struggle.

I know I did initially. Even though I'd learnt how to be pretty darn good at selling when working for big consulting firms, when I went solo, lead generation was new to me. I had to go through a painful learning curve very fast.

The first area most people struggle with is knowing which marketing approaches will work to generate high-quality leads in their specific situation.

But even after they've got this sussed, many professionals then fall into a huge trap.

They just don't fill their pipelines with enough leads.

Because they don't (yet) enjoy lead generation activities, they do what they feel is just enough to get them the business they need. Then they stop and focus on delivery.

But, of course, they overestimate their chances of landing each client in their pipeline. So when they don't all come off, they're left feeding off scraps.

My advice is to always “overfill” your pipeline. Generate at least twice as many leads as you think you need.

Because having an overfull pipeline generates some wonderful side-effects:

-> You can cherry-pick. With a surfeit of opportunities you can choose the best ones to work on. The best clients, the most interesting work, or the most lucrative.

-> You can establish the right peer-level relationships with clients from the start. When you're not desperate for business, when you can take it or leave it, then you immediately elevate your status and can work with senior clients as a peer right from the get-go.

Conversely, if you really need to win a deal you can very easily drift into a subservient relationship that damages your ability to advise and guide your client.

-> You can be highly ethical. You can turn down work you're not perfectly suited for if you don't need to win it to pay the bills.

-> You can negotiate from strength. You don't have to make unfair concessions just because you really need the work.

-> You can relax. You'll be surprised how much better this makes you at selling.

Of course, building an overfull pipeline isn't easy (that's why clients pay me the “big bucks” ;) ).

But it absolutely is possible if you use the right approaches and keep going beyond the point where you think you have “just enough”.

Because, believe me, “just enough” is not enough.

More Clients Memorandum

So, are you going to do this?

Posted byIan Brodie on June 12th, 2011.

One of the things Kathy and I always wanted was a big garden.

When we found our dream home in 1994 that was one of the things we fell in love with.

Sure, it was a little overrun. But it was huge. And it had potential. Three big borders and a woodland area shaded under horse chestnut trees.

And the most exciting bit for me was the prospect of getting my own little vegetable patch at the bottom of the garden.

It was something I'd always dreamed of. I come from a family of gardeners. Back in the mining villages of the North East you pretty much had football and your allotment.

That was life outside of work.

Unfortunately, the spot we'd earmarked had been used as a dumping ground for years by the previous owner. A quick bit of digging around and I discovered an overgrown knee-high wall and a buried climbing frame in there – just for starters.

It looked like a ton of work to sort out, so the vegetable patch plan got shelved for a bit.

And then a bit more.

And then a bit more still.

Pretty soon, I'd settled into thinking it might never get done. The thought of clearing that area was just so overwhelming.

And maybe it was OK like that. Maybe I could grow a few vegetables in the flower borders. or in pots. That would be alright, wouldn't it?

Not what I'd dreamed of, but OK really.

But Kathy hadn't forgotten my dream.

And after a couple of years of me putting things off she asked me the simple question: “are we going to do this or not?”

I knew by the look in her eyes that “no” wasn't an acceptable answer.

So late that summer I got out a spade and began to dig.

I'm not going to tell you it was easy when we got started – it wasn't. It was back-breaking work clearing that plot. Every spare hour every weekend for a month.

I still remember Kathy working away while heavily pregnant with our eldest. I remember us both being shattered every evening.

But I also remember the 20 plus years we've now had that vegetable patch.

The first crops – lettuce, carrots, peas, sweetcorn.

Growing giant onions, and giant parsnips in drainpipes for fun.

Putting up a greenhouse, and getting bumper harvests of tomatoes and peppers.

And most of all just being down there. Working on the garden and having somewhere away from work I could go to relax and think.

None of it possible without that first step of getting a spade and putting it into the ground.

Now you know where this is going, of course.

Sometimes in the last 20 or so years I've had the same feelings of being overwhelmed in my work and business.

Workload so high it seemed like I'd never get anything done.

So much to do to make an impact with so many potential clients. Not knowing where to start really. And nothing happening fast.

I'm betting you've felt like that too, at times.

So easy to put things off and think maybe it's OK.

Maybe things will sort themselves out. Maybe it doesn't really matter if the business doesn't grow this year or I don't bring in all those clients I was dreaming of.

But eventually, you have to ask yourself “am I going to do this or not?”

Because once you decide you are, all it takes is for you to put that first spade in the ground.

Sure, it'll be back-breaking work for a while. Dreams don't come easy.

But when they do come. When it does happen, they're so much better than you'd ever imagined.

So what about you? Are you going to do this or not?

More Clients Memorandum

Why selling benefits can (sometimes) lose you sales

Posted byIan Brodie on June 6th, 2011.

“Focus on the benefits, not the features”

I'm sure you've heard this a million times.

It's standard marketing dogma. Focus on benefits. The problems you solve. The results people get from working with you.

Normally that's absolutely the right thing to do.

But sometimes it's absolutely wrong.

You see, focusing on benefits implies that's why people buy. And that's not always the case.

Imagine yourself in this scenario:

You're the CIO of a multinational. You've been set a target to reduce expenditure by 10% across the board.

You're looking at outsourcing. One firm is quoting you savings of 15%, the other 20%?

Which one do you go with. The 20% is a no-brainer, right?

Not necessarily.

15% and 20% are both significantly better than your budget. Both will keep the board happy.

In theory, you might go for the 20% to get the maximum benefit. But there's another huge factor that's going to be weighing on your mind. One that more often than not will determine your decision.

RISK.

You see, you might get an extra pat on the back for getting those extra savings – if they come off.

But if something goes wrong. If the outsourcer fails to deliver, if your systems start failing or your users start complaining all the time. Then you're in big trouble.

So as a buyer, you're rarely out to simply maximise benefits. You're looking to hit your target benefits at minimum risk.

And you'll see this buying behaviour repeated time and time again. Especially in large corporations and the public sector where maximising benefits will get you a small bonus or a pat on the back, but buying something which fails will get you the sack.

So as a seller (especially to large corporations or the public sector) you've got to focus not just on the benefits you'll bring – but on making sure they see you as the lowest risk option.

If you're like me, and you're a small or solo business, you're automatically at a disadvantage in these circumstances. By default, large businesses will see you as a risk.

So that means that very often, the focus of your “pitch” needs to be on minimising the perceived risk of working with you (and maximising the perceived risk of working with someone else).

Next time you're bidding for a big piece of work with a major customer, spend some time putting yourself in your potential client's shoes and brainstorming what risks they might see in the project and in working with you.

Maybe it's financial stability. Maybe it's continuity if you get hit by illness. Maybe it's that you don't understand their business. Maybe it's whether you can work in a unionised environment.

Whatever the risks you spot, make sure you address those risks.

Because just banging on about the wonderful benefits of working with you is going to get you nowhere if your client is frightened it may all fall apart and they won't see any of them in practice.