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These two factors are what grabs attention

Posted byIan Brodie on April 21st, 2019.

I talked last week about the importance (and difficulty) of being able to grab the attention of your potential clients given just how much information they're being exposed to each day.

I mentioned entertainment and usefulness as two key strategies for getting attention. Let's look behind them a bit more.

If you look at scans to see what stimuli actually light up the attention centres of the brain, it comes down to two different but related factors.

The first is novelty.

Millennia ago, our ancestors who noticed when a new funny looking cat creature with big sharp teeth appeared tended to survive. Those who didn't, well, they didn't last long.

You see it today in the way almost all of us are drawn to try new foods or the way we love a surprise ending in a TV show.

New stuff stands out, and we're drawn to it.

The other key factor is salience. Is this something that is similar or reminds of something that is already important to us?

We're great at spotting yummy red berries against the green of the jungle. Because we know those berries are good for us.

So how can you use this in your marketing?

Often a good way is to use a novel presentation of a valuable idea.

Remember those “whiteboard explainer videos” that were all the rage a few years ago? Where an idea was explained by a voice over while simultaneously being sketched out on a whiteboard.

The first few times you saw them you paid attention because they were interesting and new. And if the message in them was useful, they kept your attention to the end.

But fast forward a few years and you don't see them much any more. The novelty has worn off and we tend to ignore them as they scroll past on our social media feeds.

Same thing with live video. Or long, long Facebook Ads.

Give your great idea an unusual presentation and you can get the attention you need to get your message across.

At least for a while.

But is there a way to get attention that doesn't go out of fashion?

More on that next week…

More Clients Memorandum

Without this scare resource you can’t win clients

Posted byIan Brodie on April 14th, 2019.

It's perhaps a bit of a cliché to remind you of just how many marketing messages our clients are bombarded with every day.

In fact, I can't even remember the actual number. But it's thousands.

And more important than the number of marketing messages they see are the number of things they'd rather pay attention to than marketing: TV, radio, their friends on social media, their real friends, their family, sport, cooking – just tons of stuff.

Your marketing is waaaay down the priority list.

But if you want to win clients you have to compete with all that, because you need *attention*.

Unless you can grab your potential client's attention, they're not going to notice anything you try to get across to them.

No relationship building. No authority.  No nothing.

How do you grab someone's attention?

You could try being very loud and obnoxious.

It works, and it's a strategy some people use to good effect in their marketing with rants about how bad things are or how awful your life is and how you need their solution.

Not for me.

One strategy is to be entertaining.

We like entertainment. We pay attention to stuff that's interesting and different.

Remember when we used to say that the adverts were the best part of TV? Cadbury's Gorilla, The Smash Martians, You've been Tangoed.

Apologies for the UK specific references (you might want to look them up on youtube for a bit of fun if you don't know them).

Or you could try being useful. We pay attention to things that we can quickly see will be valuable to us.

You probably signed up to get my emails years ago because you saw me offer a free report or checklist of template that you thought would be useful to you.

Either that or the beard.

But probably the value I would guess.

Combine entertainment and value and you're on to a winner in the battle for attention.

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Stop chasing hot leads

Posted byIan Brodie on April 8th, 2019.

If there's one thing I think most people do wrong with their marketing it's spending way too much time chasing “hot leads” and not nearly enough trying to build and nurture relationships with people they already know. 

I'm sure you know the numbers. The vast majority of potential clients you come into contact with just aren't ready to buy initially.

Maybe it's 80%. More likely 90%+. Either way it's a lot.

It's not that they won't ever buy. It's just that the time's not right, it's not a priority for them right now, or you haven't built up enough credibility or trust yet.

What most of us do when we realise someone isn't ready to buy (and I'm as guilty as anyone here) is we lose interest, we label them as tyre kickers and we move on to try to find someone who *is* ready to buy.

The problem is that focusing all your energy on trying to find people who are ready to buy is like a guy who wants to get married trying to find brides on the eve of their wedding and asking them to marry him.

After all, they're ready to get married…

Just not to him.

And unless you're George Clooney, it's very, very unlikely they'll suddenly decide that you're the one for them after all.

Meanwhile, as you flip from hot lead to hot lead, those “tyre kickers” you ignored have been getting more and more ready to buy.

And when they're ready, who are they going to call? The person who's ignored them for the last 6 months? Or the one who's kept in touch, kept helping them, kept top of mind?

Unless you're George Clooney it pays to keep in touch and to nurture your leads.

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If you don’t turn anyone away, who will you attract?

Posted byIan Brodie on April 7th, 2019.

I had someone have an argument with my website chat bot today.

Weird.

They seemed to take umbrage at my sales page for Momentum Club where I say:

“if you're anything like me, you're probably not a natural salesperson.

You don't enjoy all that networking and schmoozing. And you'd much rather be working with clients than spending all your time posting on Facebook or accepting endless connection requests on LinkedIn hoping it will turn into something.”

Apparently, they saw this as projecting my profile onto others and alienating prospects.

And if I didn't like networking I was in the wrong game.

Here's the thing.

If you're not alienating some prospects, you're not strongly attracting the right ones for you.

It sounds like my chatbot-arguing friend was a professional salesperson who loved all the schmoozing and high-pressure tactics that the rest of us hate.

And people like that are just not my people.

Nothing wrong with them.

But if I try to water down my message to appeal to people who have different skills and aspirations to my people just because they might buy; then it weakens the appeal to the people I really want as clients.

Same is true for you I'm sure.

Rather than worrying about scaring off some people, worry about attracting the right ones.

Everything else will fall into place. 

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This email nearly didn’t happen

Posted byIan Brodie on March 31st, 2019.

I'm writing this email at 1.39am my time at my Mum's house after having a few issues getting here to say the least.

I moved away from the North East 30-odd years ago. And to be frank, my knowledge of local geography wasn't all that great even when I lived here.

So I only really know two ways to get to my Mum's. The A189 or the A1.

When I drove here late last night and found that both those roads were closed I was in a bit of a pickle.

Satnav was no help. It just kept trying to send me down closed roads.

And the diversion signs sent me from one closed road to another.

Eventually, I did that thing you do when you're playing adventure games: I tried every route possible and finally found one that got me close enough that the Satnav kicked back in.

Which was lucky as the car was warning me it was running on pretty close to empty.

And since no near-disaster should be allowed to happen without a business lesson being learned from it, here's mine…

The multiple diversions were probably easy to navigate for locals who knew which side roads eventually joined back up to the main ones. But to someone unfamiliar it was pretty much impossible and I had to rely on guesswork.

And very often, when we're trying to explain the benefits of what we do to potential clients the same sort of thing happens.

Because we're “locals” who are deeply involved in our work, it's obvious to us how each little feature results in a big business benefit.

So we often just talk about the features and the stuff we think is clever and assume it's obvious what great results they'll bring.

But to someone who isn't a local like us, it's as clear as my route last night. ie, not clear at all.

Don't assume your potential clients can easily jump from being told about the features of your services to what it means for their bottom line.

Spell it out for them. Do the “mental heavy lifting”.

You've been on this route a hundred times before – they haven't. So guide them.

More Clients Memorandum

Marketing *can* be much simpler than you think

Posted byIan Brodie on March 24th, 2019.

If you want to be able to win clients without spending 24 hours a day working on marketing then you absolutely need to keep things simple.

But how?

For me, a large part of the answer is about what we think marketing actually is.

If we have a complicated view of marketing, we'll do complicated marketing.

And these days complicated views of marketing are constantly being pushed at us. We're told we need to persuade, to engage, to retarget, interact and a whole bunch of other “must do” tactical stuff.

The technology is complicated. The recommendations on all the stuff you need to do to “influence” people is complicated.

But I don't think it's needed really.

At its essence, marketing is simply getting people to want what you have to offer.

A lot of that starts with making sure you're offering what people want. And that's often overlooked.

If you're not offering something people really want then you're forced to do a lot of complex marketing to get them to want it.

Start with something they already want and your job is much easier.

Next, you need to get their attention.

Advertising legend Bill Bernbach said “You cannot sell a man who isn't listening” and he's absolutely right.

You get their attention by doing something interesting, different, and potentially valuable to them. This is where having a strong and distinctive point of view works wonders. And where your free lead magnet comes in.

But to *keep* their attention you need to do a little more.

Your communications need to be not just valuable, but interesting and “entertaining”. Not necessarily laugh-a-minute, but out of the thousands of emails, videos, podcasts and social media posts they could be consuming, they need to stick with yours.

Finally, now you've earned and kept their attention, you need to be able to clearly communicate what value they'd get from what you have to offer.

And I think it's as simple as that.

The more experienced I get at marketing the more I realise how smart our clients actually are.

They see through gimmicks.

They may “fall” for clickbaity email headlines – but they lose trust when they realise what happened.

They might take action if you hammer them with deadlines and scarcity and bonuses that are magically going to disappear tomorrow. But they'll do it begrudgingly and it'll hurt you in the long term.

And they're not fooled by big businesses with mission statements about supporting communities who then avoid paying taxes in the countries they operate in. 

People don't like to be tricked and fed spin.

But show them something interesting, new, valuable or fun and they'll give you a bit of their attention.

If it turns out to be worthwhile they'll give you some more.

And they'll listen if you honestly explain why you think they should buy what you're offering.

Simples, as our meerkat friends would say. 

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Great service is *not* a differentiator

Posted byIan Brodie on March 17th, 2019.

If you ask professional service providers what sets them apart from others in their field the answer you'll get about 80% of the time runs something along the lines of…

“It's our service.”

Or “we're more client focused”. Or “we treat our customers better”.

The problem is, everyone says that.

Do you really think your service is that much better than everyone else's and that they're just lying about it?

I know you have testimonials and feedback from clients saying how great your service is.

So do your competitors.

And even if your level of service was streets ahead of your competitors, it's hard to prove it. Your clients never really know until they experience it.

Your primary differentiation needs to be more tangible.

Promise a higher level of results than anyone else. Or a service no one else delivers.

Offer additional benefits from your service no one else offers. Or get your clients the results they want but without the undesirable side effects they get when they get those results from anyone else.

Or use a proprietary method for getting results that's visibly different to how others do things (this is especially useful if your potential clients have tried other approaches before and they haven't worked out).

Sound difficult to figure out?

If they can do it for something as simple and commoditised as toothpaste, you can certainly do it.

Higher level of results: think Crest in the 1960s when it was the first toothpaste clinically proven to reduce decay.

Additional benefits: toothpaste that cleans your teeth and freshens your breath. Or whitens your teeth.

Without unwanted side-effects: non-abrasive brands.

Proprietary method: fluoride, baking soda, or these days hydroxylapatite. 

If they can give toothpaste differentiators you can surely to goodness come up with some for your own business that aren't just the generic “we give good service”.

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How I got to work from home instead of Paris

Posted byIan Brodie on March 10th, 2019.

Years ago, when I was still an employed consultant, I was running a big Pan-European project for a client based in Paris.

They were a great client. We did great work.

But the travel was wearing me out.

Each Monday I was on the 6.40am flight to Paris. And I got home late Friday evening. Every week for 18 months.

Eventually, I decided enough was enough. I scheduled a meeting with my senior client and told him I was going to find someone else to run the project.

He told me that wasn't possible. They wanted me to run the project.

“But you know, Ian” he said. “We don't need you here every day of the week. Half your team is in different countries anyway and you mainly work with them over the phone”.

He was right. And I just hadn't figured it out.

I'd assumed that they wanted their project lead to be there 5 days a week.

Turns out they didn't. They just wanted a successful project.

I assumed my only option was to quit the project.

It wasn't.

I just needed to talk to them and we worked out that 2-3 days a week on site was enough for me to spend the right amount of time with their key people to ensure the project succeeded.

The same thing happens time and time again to most of us when we work with clients or when we're talking to them about working together.

We keep quiet about our needs and what we want. We make assumptions about what they want. We don't tell them what would be best for us and so we don't give them a chance to work something out.

Whether it's your marketing or your delivery work: talk to your clients openly. Tell them what you'd like. You'll be surprised at how often it's easy for them to give it to you and how happy they are to do so.

And, of course, encourage them to do the same and be open with you about what they want too.

More Clients Memorandum

How you can replicate my first big success online

Posted byIan Brodie on March 10th, 2019.

The first time I did really well with my online marketing happened sort of by accident.

I'd been doing pretty well and had decided to launch a new online product as an entry point to Momentum Club, my online membership program.

I'd planned out the product and it ticked all the boxes I'd been told were needed: low cost, easy to buy, perfect lead-in to the membership program.

The only challenge was, I had a hard deadline.

We were off on a cruise round the Med in a few weeks and once we set sail I wouldn't have any way of recording videos or doing much at all online really.

So everything had to be up and running by the time we left.

Needless to say, with a week to go the new product wasn't ready.

Once I started making the videos I realised I needed to rethink what I was offering to make it really actionable for buyers. And that took a lot longer than I'd planned.

So with three days to go before the cruise, I took the decision to change tack.

Instead of launching a brand new product I took one of my existing and popular products and rejigged it a bit.

It didn't meet all the perfect product criteria. It was way more expensive than I'd been told I needed. And it was a much bigger and more comprehensive course that in theory ran the risk of dampening demand for the membership program because it had so much in it.

But it was ready.

So as we left for the port I pushed the button on the Facebook Ads campaign promoting the product and the upsell to Momentum Club.

A day or so later we pulled in to our first port and I was able to get reception on my mobile phone.

And in my inbox were the first 4 sales. Including one who'd upgraded to the membership program.

Phew!

The same thing happened as we pulled in to each port: get on the network, check sales, see some, yay!

That campaign was hugely profitable for me and built up a core of members for my program.

But frankly, if it hadn't have been for the hard deadline of heading off on a cruise I suspect I'd have taken months and months trying to create the perfect front-end product.

Instead, I built real momentum simply by reusing something I already had.

There's a good chance you can do the same.

Maybe not exactly the same. But the point is that you don't need everything perfect to get results.

You don't need the perfect product at the perfect price.

Just something valuable your clients will love.

And honestly, who really knows what the perfect price or perfect product is? When I eventually did make that perfect product it didn't sell anywhere near as well as my makeshift one.

Do something quick, learn from it, build momentum, do the next thing.

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Break free from the tyranny of tactics

Posted byIan Brodie on March 3rd, 2019.

If there's one thing marketing experts agree on, it's that there's only one way of marketing that works.

The problem is, they don't agree on what that one way is.

Speak to one and he'll tell you that if you're not doing Facebook ads you're an idiot.

Another tells you email marketing is the only reliable marketing tactic. The next one you speak to says email is dead.

And still another says that online is for losers and that you need to be doing direct mail or networking or presentations or blah blah blah.

I can't speak for everyone, but my experience has been this:

»» Almost every marketing tactic can work for someone

»» No tactic works if you don't get good at it

»» Flipping from tactic to tactic because yet another expert tells you it's the only way to go is a surefire route to failure

Some approaches definitely fit some situations better than others. And a little common sense should tell you what you need to know.

For example…

• Local breakfast networking groups are probably not going to be much use if you want to break into corporate clients.
• If you can identify your ideal client by industry or job title, Linkedin is probably going to be a good route for you.
• If the majority of your clients aren't ready to buy when you first connect with them then follow-up via email marketing will probably work for you.

Here's the important point: think for yourself.

Don't just jump onto a new marketing tactic because someone says it works for them. Think through whether it will work for you.

And remember that great execution of the second best marketing tactic will easily beat poor execution of the best one.

In fact, great execution of the seventh best marketing tactic will beat poor execution of the best one.