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We put up barriers.
Not intentionally but nevertheless, they are there. If there were zero barriers, we would have a 100% conversion rate. Every sales call would result in a sale.
If you are closing at this percentage, don’t read this article. Instead, start a marketing and sales consulting business. I’ll be your first customer.
If you want to improve your close rate and build stronger relationships with your market… read on.
Here is how to overcome 13 overlooked barriers between you and your market:
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The concept isn’t new, the tactics are.
Business has been done this way for decades. What is different is the tools we are using to execute this strategy and the power we now have as tiny business owners to make this strategy work.
Here is the 3 step routine:
- Create valuable content
- Build an audience around that content
- Make offers to the audience
Television, radio and print advertising all work this way. It’s not new.
It all starts with the content. If the content is no good, there will be no audience. No audience, no offer. No offer, no money.
Think about what happens to television shows with poor content. They are unable to gather an audience and therefore, there are no advertisers willing to make offers around that content. For further information, see any television program Julia Louis-Dreyfuss has done since Seinfeld.
It’s important that all three aspects of the routine be in place and be executed consistently. Without content, there is no audience. Without an audience, there is no one to which to make offers.
Step 1 – It begins with content
Ask yourself this question:
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In 2004, I met with a small business loan officer to discuss an SBA loan.
I was all but laughed at.
I understand. They needed a solid three years of Profit & Loss statements. They wanted to know my cash position. They wanted a business plan.
My answer … I have no P & L’s (it was my first year), no cash position (I was broke) and a business plan I typed up on Microsoft Word using a Quickbooks template.
No dice, they said.
It was then that I realized I was talking to the wrong people. I didn’t need the Small Business Administration (SBA), I needed the Tiny Business Administration (TBA.)
Upon further investigation, I learned a few things about what the federal government thinks is a small business.
Find your industry below…
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Let me get this straight.
You know…
- Google will send you more love if you blog
- you will get “retweeted” and “liked” on social media channels if you blog
- your prospects and customers will be convinced of your expertise if you blog
- you will likely get covered by mainstream media if you blog
But you don’t blog.
You have nothing to blog about
So you’re in one of those non-sexy industries, eh? An industry where it makes no sense to blog?
What do you sell? Office Supplies? Real Estate? Karate Lessons?
No matter what you are selling, you can get all the benefits of blogging. You just need to put on your thinking cap.
Let’s get busy…
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Generating sales isn’t easy.
If it were, there wouldn’t be gridlock traffic at 8 am and 5 pm every weekday.
You’ve heard that business blogging is a powerful way to generate sales.
It is.
Business blogging will generate sales. But first, you will likely endure a struggle similar to a 162 game baseball season.
Seeing a pattern
I was laid off from my job in February of 2009.
By the time baseball’s Spring Training schedule was firing up in April, I had started a blog. After a grinding three months of blogging in obscurity, I received my first comment (that wasn’t motivated by pity.) In October, as the World Series of Baseball was taking center stage, my blog was generating sales for my business.
Over the past two years, I have been studying the path that sales generating blogs have taken. It’s a challenging path. A path not unlike that of a grueling and lengthy baseball season.
The actions recommended below are by no means the only path to creating a sales generating blog. But it is the path I have taken to sell both products and services through my blog, and the path of others I have observed.
Are you ready? Let’s play ball!
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A sale is a response.
It is a response to a call to action. It is a response to marketing.
So, if you want to learn to increase sales, you must learn to increase response.
When you stand in line at the grocery store you have access to 100′s of lessons in response. As you stand, unsuspecting, in the checkout line you are targeted by the best direct response marketers in the world.
Usually to your left, you will find a dozen or so magazine covers printed with headlines that are proven to create response. They draw consumers in like magnets and they get consumers to respond.
Where to apply these lessons
The lessons you can learn from these headlines can be applied in literally thousands of marketing and sales activities.
Here are just a few:
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Have you ever wondered how some tiny business owners seem to make all the right marketing moves?
It isn’t because they are smarter than you. It isn’t because they work harder than you either.
It is because of the way that make marketing decisions.
Narcissists make bad marketers
This isn’t about you. It isn’t about your spouse or your close friends.
It’s about your customers.
Each and every marketing decision should be weighed against your customers, not you or your immediate acquaintances.
The worst statement you can make is…
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Remember the childhood game Chutes and Ladders?
You spin the dial. You land on a ladder. Bingo — you are transported to a space that puts you way ahead in the game. You spin again. You land on a chute, and back you go.
Building sales is this way. You spin the dial. You hit a ladder and you zoom ahead in the mind of your prospect. You spin again, you land on a chute — and there goes your sale.
Sales is a function of trust. We won’t buy if we don’t first trust the person or the brand.
But fortunately, the actions you need to take to build sales-generating trust are not as arbitrary as spinning a dial.
Think about your closest friend.
Do you remember meeting your friend for the first time? Do you remember when you had very little trust in them? After all, you just met.
What happened? Why do you trust them now?
Simple Sales Success Formula
Actually, two things happened:
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Don’t get me wrong. I love Seth.
But I think he would be the first to tell you that he makes up his own rules. Seth is the sort of person that takes absolutely nothing for granted. He challenges everything and not because he wants to appear controversial.
Sure, there is marketing brilliance in Seth’s controversial stands on topics like book publishing, Twitter and quitting stuff. They get him attention. But these are not just marketing tricks. Seth always presents a logical argument for challenging the status quo.
Here are some logical arguments from yours truly about some of Seth’s online marketing decisions:
Seth’s Main Domain Name
Seth Godin has numerous web properties but I think most would agree that his blog is the most highly trafficked.
His main domain name is http://sethgodin.typepad.com — notice the typepad in the domain name. This means Seth doesn’t own it. TypePad owns it.
It’s called a subdomain and it happens a lot. You’ve seen it before… http://example.wordpress.com -or- http://www.example.blogspot.com. In these examples, these domains actually belong to WordPress and Google (Google owns Blogger) respectively.
Don’t follow Seth here. Here are five reasons:
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Location, location, location.
Every new website is born in the dark back alleys of the Internet. No exposure and no foot traffic.
The site is a puppy. It’s a spring chicken with no authority or trust. No traffic. No buzz.
The sad thing is that your site can remain online for years without ever moving out of that dark back alley.
Meanwhile, the sites that are “doing it right” are on the main drag. They have put the processes in place to go from darkness to to the bright lights.
Step 1 – Get Your House In Order
Firstly, let’s understand the two qualities of these “main drag” websites.
All of these “main drag” websites contain:
- entertaining, informative, educational or inspirational content.
- the ability for target communities (not target markets) to interact with and share this content.
To get your house in order, create a content strategy and stick to it for a couple of months. Build up a significant resource on your site before moving on to step 2.
Notice that you don’t need to have the community in place, but you do need to have the ability for a community to exist.
Ask yourself these questions about your “back alley” website:
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