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The paradox that stops your clients buying

Posted byIan Brodie on May 8th, 2016.

What does it take for someone to be ready to buy?

Usually, they need some kind of big problem or opportunity you can help them solve. Something big enough to justify the pain, cost and time of making the change.

But what if they're not aware of that big problem?

Frankly, that's most often the case. After all, if they were fully aware of their big problem or challenge they'd be working on it already.

So it's your job to educate them and show them the huge opportunity they're missing, right? Show them the big mistakes they're making that you can fix?

Hmmmm.

Has anyone ever shown you a big mistake you've been making?

How did you react?

Unless you're some kind of angel, then chances are that your immediate reaction to being told you were wrong or making a big mistake was probably indignation. 

Maybe followed by a determination to prove your accuser wrong. Or at least to argue your case.

It's human nature really, we hate to be wrong. Or at least, we hate to be shown to be wrong.

Psychologists call it the “backfire effect”. When your beliefs are challenged with evidence, especially deeply held beliefs, then rather than reform your beliefs you tend to reject the evidence and harden your beliefs.

So we're left with a paradox.

We need to challenge our clients and get them to see they have problems in order for them to buy. But the most likely outcome of that challenge is that they push back against us. 

How do we break that paradox?

One way is to get our potential clients to discover their problems for themselves. Give them a diagnostic they can do that will enable them to see where they're going wrong. 

Or tell them a story about how you or one of your clients discovered the problem yourselves and they'll learn by analogy. 

Or “let them off the hook”. Give them a valid reason for why they're making the mistake that doesn't make them feel stupid or challenged. Maybe these new opportunities have arisen through new technology. Or a new way of organising things. Or maybe they were too busy focusing on other areas to notice this.

However you do it, you need to avoid triggering the kind of push-back that will prevent your client from seeing the truth and from buying from you.

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Try this, it works.

Posted byIan Brodie on May 1st, 2016.

One thing I'm horrendously guilty of is overthinking thinks.

Maybe you are too.

So when I want to do a marketing campaign to promote a new program or relaunch an existing one I usually end up overcooking it in the first draft.

I'll think about all the free content I'll send first. Then how I'll tag everyone interested in that. Then a follow-up sequence. Then more value. Then maybe a webinar. Then after some more twists and turns, maybe I'll actually ask people for the order.

What my superdupercomplex campaign forgets though is that in any audience, some people genuinely are ready to buy right now.

A small percentage of course. But if you only need a small percentage for, say, a pilot, then don't make them jump through hoops.

Just tell them what you've got to offer and ask if they're interested and want more details.

An email reply will do. No need to set up complex funnels with application forms to fill in. That all dehumanises the process anyway. Just ask your gang if they're interested. Email them more details if they are. Jump on a call if needed. then ask them if they want to buy.  

I tried it recently. It worked. 

Now, of course, next time it won't be so straight-line. Most of the folks who are ready have said yes already so I'll need to do more nurturing for everyone else.

But the first time you promote something, keep it simple. 

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Are you brave enough to fail in public

Posted byIan Brodie on April 24th, 2016.

Something I very much admire in some of the people I follow online is a willingness to fail in public.

What I mean by that is that there are a small number of people (though growing) who are on a path to becoming seen as experts not by figuring things out in private and then unleashing their newfound genius on the world. But by letting us see behind the curtain as they try, fail, try again, fail again, then eventually succeed.

One case in point is Aaron Orrendorff. He's a writer I connected with after he wrote an article on the top 10 experts on email marketing that I was named in.

Aaron sells his services to organisations as an expert writer of content. That could be blog posts, articles, landing pages, adverts.

So you'd think that he'd do his very best to only let the world see all his successes, his testimonials and the big name companies he's worked for.

Well he does that. But he also lets you see his work in progress. He has a project going on right now he calls “#letsgetrejected” where he's on a quest to write for big prestigious magazines like Forbes, Entrepreneur, Inc etc.

His end game, I believe, is to sell his services teaching others how to do the same. But instead of doing his learning in private and then emerging as a fully formed expert, he's letting us see his progress as he goes along.

On his Facebook page he's documenting the places he's trying to write for, the ones he gets accepted for, and the ones he gets rejected by.

He's not playing the “know it all” game at all. He's asking for help and ideas when he gets rejected. 

And all the time he's building a following of people cheering him on. 

It doesn't matter to them (I should say “us” really, as I'm one of them) that he's not getting a 100% acceptance rate. We feel like we're part of his journey. And it feels more realistic too. It feels like we can learn more from him and all the hard work and learning he's done than someone who seems to have been a natural. 

I've not yet been brave enough to make all the thing I do public. But when I do (like when I challenged myself to get 10,000 new email subscribers in a year but had to change tack mid-way through) it's worked out incredibly well for me. People seem to love following the journey and it raises rather than lowers your credibility to see you grow and develop.

I guess there's a reason People magazine has about 5 times the circulation of Business Week. We're interested in people and their stories.

Could you be more public about your successes and failures? Could you do a public project where you document what you're doing and let people see behind the scenes?

It's a great way to build a following and learn as you go along.

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Don’t be a bully

Posted byIan Brodie on April 17th, 2016.

As you'd probably expect from someone who's written a pretty decent-selling book on Email Marketing, I subscribe to a lot of emails. Particularly emails from people who have a reputation for being good at it.

There's a pattern I've seen over the last few years from some of these “email experts” that I find pretty distasteful and I want to call it out to help you avoid falling into the trap yourself.

One of the things I like is “edgy” emails. People who aren't afraid to express a strong opinion. To point out things they think are wrong or disagree with. To highlight hypocrisy and call out fakers. 

The thing with expressing a strong opinion is that some people will disagree. That's only natural: if no one disagreed then it would be a pretty bland opinion.

But some people with edgy opinions appear to be pretty thin-skinned.

Worse, they seem to be so insecure that they find it necessary to belittle people who disagree with them.

I see it time and time again. Guru X will send out an email with a deliberately provocative opinion in it. Then they'll get some complaints from people and their next email will be spent telling you why you shouldn't care about people disagreeing with you while simultaneously demonstrating they absolutely do care about people disagreeing with them because they spend most of the email belittling the people who disagreed.

Here's the thing: it's great to have strong opinions and to call out people in power for things you disagree with.

But to belittle email subscribers who write in to you who have no means of redress and no power themselves. That's just bullying.

You upset them. Live with it. Don't go all sulky and try to justify yourself and get some validation from your crowd by having a go at them.

Email bullies think their nastiness and rabble-rousing builds a strong following which leads to more sales.

And, of course, all bullies have their gangs of cronies who hang on their every word and cheer their nastiness.

But I don't want those sort of people as clients. I bet you don't either. 

So please. If you're subscribed to someone's emails and you see them repeatedly belittle the dissenting voices in their crowd and then tell you that you should do the same – don't listen to them.

Be the kind of person who stands up for the little guy, not the kind of person who bullies them.

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Enjoy the silence

Posted byIan Brodie on April 10th, 2016.

A bit of a break from marketing tips this week – and instead something about how to have more good ideas.

It's a simple tip really. It's to increase the amount of time you have in silence.

What I mean by that is that next time you're driving somewhere, don't switch on the car radio. Next time you go for a walk or run, don't plug in to your favourite music or podcast.

Instead, give your brain a dose of silence.

Even better, set your brain a task to work on in that silence. Something like “I'm going to come up with 10 ideas for new blog posts” or “I'm going to outline my next webinar”.

I started listening to podcasts when I went out on walks a while back. I thought it would help me be more productive by learning while I was doing other things.

But the truth is that few of need more inputs. We need to do more thinking.

We've found so many ways to avoid the hard work of thinking these days.

It's too easy to flip our screens to email or Facebook instead of powering through a few moments of writer's block. 

It's too easy to listen to a talk show or blast music into our ears on a long drive to avoid having to listen to our own thoughts.

But in our sorts of business, those thoughts are our lifeblood. They're where the solutions to problems come from. Where ideas for content come from. Where new products come from.

I've gone back to walking in silence and now driving in silence too.

The temptation to flip on the radio is irresistible sometimes. But when I do persevere I always come out with something useful for my business.

Try it :)