PHASE 2:  POSITIONING

Step 3.  Establishing Your Credibility-  People won’t buy from you until they feel confident that they know and trust you.  Use your articles, books, interviews, and testimonials from clients to establish your credibility and make prospects feel confident in buying from your firm.

Does your marketing help establish the trust necessary to convince prospects to buy from you?  How can you leverage the trust of existing clients to attract new prospects? 

Collect testimonials.  Pick up the phone and call your customers to ask what they thought of your product or service, what they liked about it and how it was helpful.  Feature these testimonials in your marketing materials.  Use articles to establish yourself or your firm as experts.  Invest your time in writing articles to establish yourself as an expert.  Give something away.  Use an ebook, article, workshop or free demonstration to build trust.

Step 4.  Clarifying Your Value-  Whether you are selling a $15 book, a $10,000 business consultation, or a $75,000 car, prospects won’t make a commitment unless they understand in their own terms the value you are providing.  Use your marketing materials, your web site, and your conversations to help prospects define the value of your goods or services.

To help prospects understand that value, don’t tell them… ask them.  Most people learn new ideas by putting them in their own words.  Use questions to get prospects to identify the ways they’ll benefit from your products.  Ask them what they want, what they are looking for, and how they expect to benefit.  Get your prospects to define their aspirations and objectives for purchase. 

The questions actively engage your prospects.  By describing the benefits they are looking for, they begin to imagine how much better off they’d be with your products and services.  Questions like:  Are you presenting your pricing information too soon?  What are prospects’ reasons for buying?  What questions can you ask to get prospects to describe the value of your products and services? 

After prospects have defined the value of the service or product they’re interested in and can see themselves using it, then you can tell them the price.  A price of ten dollars or ten thousand can scare prospects away if you give it to them too soon.  Increase your sales by pitching to your prospects’ reasons for buying.  Use your questions to help prospects define the benefits of your products and services in their own words.  They will have far fewer objections to price and you’ll make many more sales. 

Check out Marketing for Success by Charlie Cook and his In Mind Communications, LLC.

PHASE 1:  GETTING ATTENTION

Step 1.  Generating Awareness– Introduce yourself to prospects and tell them what you do and how you can help them.  Make sure your marketing message addresses your target markets’ interests, and then use it to write ads that pay for themselves, whether you are using google/adwords, ezine ads, newspaper ads, or radio spots. 

Start with client problems… clients’ biggest concerns are their needs and wants, not your processes or credentials.  Too often service providers fall in love with their services and product5s.  That can be a good thing when it is evident in the passion they demonstrate in helping clients.  It can be a bad thing when they focus on detailing their processes, methodologies, and credentials instead of focusing their marketing on their client concerns. 

What are your clients’ primary concerns?  What client needs do your services meet?  What are the solutions you provide?  What is the end result clients receive from your services?  Which of these results differentiate your firm from your competitors?

Develop a brilliant marketing message that describes the unique value you provide for clients and prompts prospects to contact you.  Use your brilliant message as the foundation of all your marketing efforts including meetings, phone calls, letters, newsletters, web sites, etc.  Develop marketing materials from your clients’ perspective.  Clients buy results.  Market the results, not the product or service methodology.  Review and revamp all your marketing materials so they focus on clients’ primary concerns and on the results you provide. 

Step 2.  Motivating Prospects to Action–  Use everything from your ads to your business card to your web site to stimulate a contact or a conversation.  Give prospects a reason to take the next step and respond by emailing, calling you, or visiting your store. 

One of the biggest hurdles for service professionals is convincing people of the value of their services.  Whether you provide haircuts, run a restaurant, or give legal or financial advice,  prospects won’t know how good they look, how tasty the food is, or the benefits of your advice until they’ve experienced it. 

The best way to convince people of the usefulness of your services is to demonstrate the value you provide by letting them “test drive” the benefits of your services or products.  For example, Amazon.com allows users to read the first few pages of the books they sell, and music lovers can download samples of tracks on CDs. 

What is the fundamental need or objective that drives prospects’ decisions to use or not use your services?  How can you help prospects experience the benefit of your products and services? 

Find a way to let people “test drive” your services or products.  Whether you are offering a sample newsletter, design tips, or training strategies, before people become customers they need to understand the quality of work you provide.  The best way to do this is to demonstrate your expertise or the benefits of your products. 

Become a trusted advisor.  Regularly provide clients with tips for “free.”  For example, if you’re an accountant, you could provide them with tax planning tips.  Share ideas they can put to use immediately and that will clarify the need for your products and services.

Next week:  Phase 2, POSITIONING, and Phase 3, SELLING.  Check out Marketing for Success by Charlie Cook and his In Mind Communications, LLC. 

I’ve discovered an awesome resource for all things marketing related.  Check out Marketing for Success by Charlie Cook and his In Mind Communications, LLC.  Below are some of his ideas on the marketing process and execution to close more sales, grow business, and be more successful. 

Make the Marketing Cycle work for you because the phases are as predictable as the waxing and waning of the moon.  Work with the Marketing Cycle to generate a steady stream of prospects and to convert prospects to clients.

No matter how much you might like to have a full moon on any given night, you can’t skip the quarter moon and half moon to ge there.  Similarly, your marketing needs to move people through three phases and a series of steps to take them from prospect to client status. 

The first phase of marketing is Getting Attention.  People need to know that you exist and what it is that you do or offer before they can buy.  The second phase is Positioning.  Before a prospect will part with their hard-earned dollars, they need to get to know and trust you and understand the value of what you provide.  The final phase of the marketing cycle is Selling, obtaining first time and repeat sales.

You can’t affect the moon, but you can control the marketing and sales cycle.  You can influence your prospects and generate a steady stream of clients and customers.  Think of your marketing as a short flight of stairs into your business.  First, you help prospects become aware that your firm exists, then you motivate them to contact you, next you establish your credibility, etc.  Step by step, you move them closer to a sale.

Over the next several days, I’ll be outlining Charlie Cook’s 7 steps to get more clients and grow your business while moving prospects through the 3 Phases of Marketing.