Marketing – Page 2 – Velocity Media

5 January 2016

Six tips for more persuasive marketing

With customers bombarded with so many brands and advertisements each day, it is your job to make your marketing messages more persuasive and relevant to break through the noise.

But where do you start? Here are six tips to help you make your marketing messages more persuasive.

1. Know what your customers are buying

When your customers choose to buy from you, they are buying more than a product or service. They are buying the solution to their problem, the answer to their question, the feeling they’ve been missing or the convenience they’ve been wanting.

When you uncover what your customers really want, you capture not only the attention of your customer but their heart as well.

2. Speak with authority

Every purchase requires your customer to trust you. The higher the purchase price, the more trust your customer needs to have in you.

To build trust, you need to speak with authority. Present yourself as the expert, share your knowledge, draw on your experiences, and tell stories about the value you have provided. Own your skills and expertise. Be confident in your abilities and bold in your belief that you can deliver. Confidence makes you more persuasive.

3. Leverage social proof

People follow people. People also want to be part of something – a movement, cause, group or community. Social proof helps you to build this.

When you share the experiences others have had with your products and services, you ease the concerns and minimise the risks for your customers. But more importantly, you create commonality among your customers, and that can be built into a sense of community.

4. Treat customers as ‘the one’

Do the unexpected. Go above and beyond. Be committed to doing the most you can do in your business. The more you can make your customers feel like they are the only one you are concerned about and the only one you are speaking to, the more powerful your message becomes.

5. Keep it simple

Our customers crave convenience, yet many of us have a tendency to overcomplicate our sales process. We give too many choices and price points, include too many steps and clicks and request too many details.

Keep it simple. Don’t ask for every contact detail up front, make your website easy to navigate, ensure the next step is clear, and your calls to action are compelling and easy to follow.

6. Create urgency

We are a competitive bunch. If we think we are going to miss out on something, we act faster. So once you have established your value, create urgency through special edition products or services, time limited opportunities or bonuses open to limited people.

How can you be more persuasive in your marketing?

Amanda

1 December 2015

Four questions you MUST ask to get to know your customers

Whether you are designing a product, developing a marketing strategy or writing a blog post having a thorough understanding of your target marketing is vital.

But how do you get clear on who it is you are talking to and targeting? Here are four questions you MUST ask to get to know your customers – and why you need to ask them.

1. Who are my customers?

What types of people are your customers? Are they a business or consumer? Male or female? Older or younger?

Do they have money, or are they buying on credit? Are they impulsive or considered? Are they well educated or uneducated? Are they fun or reserved? Daring or cautious? Kids or no kids? Happy or unhappy? Are they making ends meet or living the high life? Are they worried about what others think of them?

What is important to them? What do they value most? Who do they trust? What media do they consume? What social media do they use?

By asking who your customers are, you will discover how to speak to them and where to find them.

2. What do my customers really want?

What does your customer want from you, do you know?

While your customers may justify their purchases logically based on the features or inclusions you provide, they don’t tend to buy because of them. Your customers buy based on what your product or service will do for them, save them, make them feel, or make others think or feel about them.

So again, I ask you, what do your customers really want from you?

Is it to save time or money? Is it to have a certain status or level of respect? Is it to be first and lead the way? Is it to make them feel more worthy, attractive or confident? Is it to alleviate guilt, stress or grief? Is it to live longer? Is it to be more successful, prosperous or influential? Is it to be a trendsetter or forward thinker?

By identifying what your customers really want, you will uncover how to market to them and what you need to say.

3. How motivated are my customers?

How great are your customers’ needs, wants, frustrations or challenges? How motivated are your customers to buy from you? Do they need and want your product or service or just like the idea of it? Is your product or service an essential or luxury to them? Do your customers know and acknowledge they need your product or service?

By asking how motivated your customers are you can determine if your product, service or market is viable. You will also be able to identify the level of education you will need to provide and what you will need to do to motivate them.

4. What is holding my customers back from buying?

What are the reasons your customers won’t buy from you? What are some of the reservations they have?

Is it price or timing? Is it a lack of awareness or understanding? Is it a lack credibility or runs on the board? Is it that you are too new or too established? Is there too much risk involved? Do they need it but don’t want it? Is there not enough proof of your claims? Is there someone influencing their decision?

By finding out what is holding your customers back you can identify ways to build trust, and calm concerns, fears and objections through your marketing. You will also be able to uncover what influencers you need to market to and win over to get the sale.

Do you know your target market as well as you should?

Amanda

24 November 2015

Are your motives costing you business?

Networking can be an interesting experience. While you meet a lot of different personalities and businesses, two types of people tend to stand out in the crowd, those who are interested in building relationships and those focused on the sale.

While we need sales to survive in business, there is a real danger in making sales your only focus. Could your motives be costing you customers?

The sales-focused, money driven person

We all know this character, and there’s a high chance we’ve all been this character at some point in our careers. They are the ones who nearly give you a paper cut as they shove their business card under your nose or the businesses that make you feel like a dollar sign rather than a living, breathing, paying customer.

While you may still buy from these characters, chances are you are buying because it is easier, cheaper, or there is no other viable option at the moment, not because you are loyal to them.

The same applies to your customers. When you focus on ‘getting the sale’ your customers’ money has a habit of becoming more important than the problems they need solving, and let’s face it anyone willing to pay becomes your customer not just those you know you can help. While this might help you with short-term cash flow, it can harm you long-term and leave you vulnerable to disruption.

If your customers are only with you because you are the cheapest or the most viable at the moment you need to prepare for a mass exit when something better comes along – and it will.

The service-focused, value-driven person

Smart business owners know that the best way of generating more sales is to stop selling and start serving.

I’ll never forget the day I decided to stop having sales meetings and start having problem-solving sessions. I was no longer at a meeting to ‘get the sale’ I was there to ‘give value’ through an idea, suggestion, shortcut, solution, contact or similar, and ensure my potential customer walked away with something far more tangible than my business card.

Making this shift not only felt more authentic, but it also made building relationships easier, meetings more productive, and it generated a lot more sales and referrals.

Why? Because people want to be helped not sold to.

So the next time you are networking or at a sales meeting, remember that customers want to be more than a sale to you. And if you don’t want to act as a lead source for your competitors, make sure you never make them feel that way.

Amanda

3 November 2015

To niche or not to niche?

It’s an age-old question that many business owners struggle to answer. But the truth is if you want your marketing to be as effective as possible you need your target market to be an inch wide and a mile deep.

When you try to be everything to everyone you risk appearing irrelevant to those customers who you want and need the most.

Still not sure? Here are four opportunities you open up when you pick a niche.

1. Become the go-to expert

When you zone in on a niche, you naturally become a go-to expert. You are assumed to have more knowledge on the industry, area or market than anyone else who is generalising.

As a result, people who start to target a niche can end up with more leads and a bigger following than when they worked more broadly. It becomes easier to find you, and you are perceived to be more relevant and valuable to your potential customers.

Let’s imagine for a moment you need a business coach. You search around and narrow it down to two coaches with the same qualifications and experience level, but one specialises purely in your industry. Who would you choose?

2. Generate more sales

Perhaps one of the biggest fears around choosing a niche is the chance it could reduce sales. But when done well it has the opposite effect.

When you target a broad audience, your message needs to be broad to appeal to as many people as possible. While this can still generate results, you will get far better results when your market is specific.

When you target fewer people with more in common, you can tell more relevant stories, address specific problems and appeal to the right emotions to make your customer feel as though you are talking directly to them.

This approach increases your chances of speaking the right words to the right people at the right time, creating more sales and more raving fans.

3. Get more bang for your marketing buck

There is no faster way to blow your marketing budget than to target anyone and everyone. The more specific your audience, the more strategic your campaign.

Opportunities, strategies, tactics and influencers can all be better qualified when you know who you need to reach.

4. Gain more loyal customers

When you serve a niche, your customer can believe working with you will be easier. There’s less groundwork and explaining to do because you already know their problems, issues, frustrations and needs, and have had experience solving them.

There is also a perception that you will look out for their best interests, and be able to give them ideas and guidance about best practices and produce more tailored products or services to get their desired results.

Because of this (and providing you do a great job) your customers are more likely to be more loyal to you in the long term.

Do you work within a niche or do you generalise?

Amanda

21 October 2015

How to stay relevant in the mind of your customers

Few things can kill your business faster than becoming irrelevant to your customers. The hard fact of business is that change is inevitable, while you can be on trend and meeting needs and wants one day, there is no guarantee that it will be the same the next.

With greater competition, new technology and changing customer demands how do you ensure you stay relevant in the mind of your customers?

1. Stay connected

When we start out in business, we are more open to input. In fact, we actively seek it to make sure we are on track and that our customers are happy. We value customer feedback, listen to concerns and promptly make changes to rectify problems. While some businesses continue this process, many others don’t.

It’s almost like there is a certain point in business where we know better. We have the experience and industry knowledge now, we know what is happening and what our customers want – so we no longer ask them.

We detach and become so focused on growth and development that we lose that customer connection we so desperately need to stay relevant and meet growing needs. Our time becomes precious. We limit the calls and meetings we have and opt for an email – bulk email – to stay in touch and “save time”.

We start to tell more than we ask, push more than we pull. But to weather the storm of changing needs and wants we need to connect with our customers. We need to understand their purchase decisions, why they make them and how we can make the experience better, and this comes from talking to them, not just looking at the numbers.

2. Understand how your customers use your products and services

When we developed our products and services we knew the problem they solved and how we thought they should be used. But that is only one perspective. Your customers may have a completely different idea or purpose for your products or services.

They may even use them to solve problems you hadn’t thought of, or didn’t know they solved. By understanding how your customers use and want to use your products and services you can start to identify limitations and opportunities to make them even more relevant going forward.

3. Know why your customers do business with you

Do you know why your customers chose to do business with you over your competitors? What was special or different about you? What did you provide that no one else did or did as well? What got them over the line?

Once you know the bigger reason of why they chose and valued your business you can ensure this is prioritised, communicated and maintained even when you need to change, adapt and expand to suit needs and wants.

4. Sell the experience, not the product or service

The moment you start selling a product or service by its features and benefits you compete with everyone in your industry. But when you sell the experience, tell the story, share the vision or back the cause your customers are buying something else entirely. Your customers no longer compare you in the same way – you are in a different league.

This shift creates loyalty not just at a product or service level; it creates loyalty at a company-wide level so when your customers do change, or when you introduce new products and services and try to upsell, cross-sell or resell customers, holding onto them and converting them is far easier.

How do you stay relevant in the mind of your customers?

Amanda

6 October 2015

How to convince customers to believe in you

It doesn’t matter if you are pitching an idea, promoting a product or delivering a service, to make a sale your customer needs to believe in you. But with only minutes to win them over, where do you start?

1. Communicate your why

If you are like many of us in business, there are hundreds if not thousands of people who do what you do. But not all of them do it for the same reasons you do.

To inspire, attract and recruit the customers you want, you need a cause or passion that is much bigger than the products or services you provide. Give your customers something to aspire to and believe in. As leadership expert Simon Sinek says, “People don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it.”

2. Show your passion

Have you had the privilege of being around someone who is truly passionate about what they do? It is infectious. You can’t help but get excited and passionate right along with them.

When you get passionate about your business, you engage and excite your customers in the same way. By showing you believe in your products and services, you give your potential customers permission to believe in them too.

3. Speak ‘to’ them not ‘at’ them

Ultimately your customer wants to be heard and understood; that is why it is so important to talk to them and not at them. Your potential customers are people with real issues, frustrations, and needs, and they have come to you to get help.

For this reason, switch your focus from selling to solving. Instead of talking about generic features and benefits, ask questions. Get to know them, their business and the reason they need your product or service.

Their answers will give you the clues you need to develop a personalised pitch, which in turn will give them the belief you are the right person or company for the job.

4. Tell stories

To increase your customers’ belief in you, you need to establish your credibility. While you can talk about your background, qualifications and experience directly, telling stories is far more effective.

To show you understand a potential customer’s needs, share stories of how others with similar goals or frustrations used your product or service and the results or outcomes they achieved.

If you find yourself pitching a new concept or idea without any existing customer stories, then try using metaphors to increase their interest and understanding.

5. Be relatable

Be mindful of body language, the tone of voice and the words your customers use as this will indicate how they like to communicate and do business. If they have a relaxed approach, be relaxed. If they want to get straight to the point, then get down to business. Meet them at their level.

But don’t stop there. To be more relatable, you also need to find points in common. Do you share interests, passions or opinions? Have you experienced or solved similar frustrations? Do you have shared contacts? Are you in a similar phase of life or business? We all want to do business with ‘like-minded’ people.

Amanda

21 September 2015

Four marketing lessons your customers can teach you

Your customers are one of your most valuable assets in business. They not only provide the necessary income through sales to help your business survive, but they also provide valuable insight into your products and services, and the best way to market them.

If you want to find out how to be more strategic in your marketing, spend your budget more wisely and attract more of the customers you want to work with, the answer lies in your existing customers. Here are four marketing lessons your customers can teach you.

1. They can tell you what customers to target

One of the best lessons your customers can teach you is who you do and don’t want to work with. Make a list of your most challenging customers. What made them challenging? Why did you not like working with them? Do they have any characteristics in common that may help you qualify potential customers better?

Now make a list of your top customers. What did you love most about working with them? What made them a great customer? Do you see any commonalities or patterns that will help you find and identify your top customers easily?

2. They can tell you where to find more customers

Once you have identified your top customers, look at where you found them or how they found you. Are there any commonalities or patterns here?

Did a particular advertisement, message, referral source, marketing activity, incentive, product or service, attract your top customers to you? Is there a particular social media platform, publication, website or influencer they were influenced by?

If you can, also compare how your most challenging customers found you. This will allow you to qualify your sales and marketing efforts and ensure you attract more of your top customers into your business.

3. They can tell you what customers will love most about you

Often in our marketing we will pick out the features, benefits and solutions that we think will appeal most to our customers.

While we can often be right, a customer can give you a more practical example or application that you or a potential customer may not have thought of. They can also find additional benefits or prioritise benefits differently to how you would have imagined.

4. They can get new customers to trust you

Your current customers play a major part in your marketing and sales process; they minimise the risk of your new customers purchase decision. While you can address the frustrations of potential customers, offer solutions and provide an incentive, your existing customers provide the ‘proof’ that what you say or do works.

Without their stories, testimonials, case studies or referrals your sales are hinged on how much trust and rapport you or your sales people can build, or how competitive your pricing is.

What marketing lessons have your customers taught you?

Amanda

8 September 2015

Why you need to ask questions in your sales and marketing

Questions are powerful in sales and marketing. When you use them right they uncover needs, challenge thought processes, demonstrate your uniqueness and increase conversions.

If you aren’t convinced already, here are four reasons why you need to ask your potential customers more questions in your sales and marketing.

1. Questions engage

Questions draw readers into your words and make them involved. When a question is asked (a closed question in this case) we naturally answer it, we can’t help but agree, disagree or form an opinion.

When this happens, your potential customers are more likely to read on. Your potential customer will want to see if you share the same opinion, have an interesting point, or can provide the solution to the issue, problem or ‘what if’ scenario raised in the question.

2. Questions challenge beliefs

A well-posed question can help you challenge your potential customers beliefs, disrupt their thought process and help them uncover needs they don’t know they have so your message or point of view can pierce through.

These piercing questions are particularly important when people have “heard it all before…” or when you are launching a new product, service or concept and need to educate people on why they need your business.

3. Questions break down perceptions

A lot of times potential customers bring perceptions to your business and industry. They make assumptions about what you do and how you do it based on their level of understanding and experience with competitors.

While this can work in your favour (the education is done for you), it can also work against you and fuel their objections if they have had negative past experiences.

When you pose a question based on your point of difference or a failing in your industry (think “Tired of [insert point]?” “Sick of [insert point]?” or “Isn’t it time you [insert point]?”), it can change your potential customers perceptions of you, demonstrate your understanding of them and separate you from competitors.

4. Questions can make sales

Leading questions, where you ask your potential customer a series of questions you know they will say yes to, have been proven to increase sales conversions.

When you can get potential customers in the habit of saying “yes” when you ask them to act or buy they are more prone to say “yes” again.

What questions could you ask to engage and convert your customers?

Amanda

10 August 2015

Why you need customers to want you

One of our greatest strengths as entrepreneurs can also be one of our greatest marketing stumbling blocks – our vision.

Our ability to disrupt industries and think up products and services that fill needs our target market doesn’t even know they have yet can make for some incredible businesses and profits.

But for the very big picture disrupters and entrepreneurs with new and unique ideas, it can also lead to a lot of education to convince customers to buy from you.

While you may have the next brilliant idea that people need, if your customer doesn’t want your product it won’t matter how good it is. Still not convinced? Here are three reasons why you need your customer to want you.

1. Want translates to need

I’m sure you’ve experienced it, where you have wanted something so badly you have convinced yourself you need it? It’s the main reason I have so many shoes and notebooks.

While a customer may need your product or service, and even see the purpose or benefit in doing business with you, it doesn’t mean they will want to. Want brings motivation. It is why great ideas that have met customer needs have still fallen flat – customers don’t want them or know why they should want them and fail to act.

2. Want creates urgency

Think about the last time you wanted something. If it was a larger purchase, it might have consumed your thoughts for a while, and if it was a smaller purchase, chances are you bought it immediately.

When the want is strong enough, it doesn’t ease until it’s met. While a need can build interest, a want creates the urgency to act.

3. Want persuades

When a customer wants your product or service they will often push past objections, justify concerns and persuade other decision makers to come on board. Want increases desire, creates excitement and builds anticipation.

Building a customer’s want for your product or service will make them the best sales person, and if happy with your product or service, they’ll become the best advocate for your business.

Do your customers need and want you? How can you create more want for your products and services?

Amanda

28 July 2015

Four truths to accept when positioning yourself as an expert

Having the confidence to establish yourself as an expert doesn’t always come easy, particularly for the more humble among us. But to build your profile, and make the difference that most entrepreneurs want to in business, you need to.

To give you a little more confidence that what you have to say is of value, here are four truths to accept when positioning yourself as an expert.

#1 – It’s a matter of opinion

Becoming an expert isn’t just about what you do or how you do it – it’s about what you know, and what you think. Put forward your opinions, derive conclusions based on your experiences and share your passion.

Your opinion and experiences will help you bring a different perspective to the information you share.

#2 – What you know is NOT common sense

This is one of the biggest hurdles you need to overcome in your own mind. We each have skills, strengths and specialties. While something may be easy, or seem like common sense to you, it doesn’t mean it will be the same for others.

Chances are you have studied, researched, serviced customers, learnt lessons, overcome challenges, had wins, sought council and grown in experience to know what you know now. For this reason, most people will never have the distinct skills, knowledge and perspective you do.

#3 – You don’t need to know everything

You don’t need to know as much as others in your industry – you only need to know how to package it better. There will always be someone who knows more than you, but that doesn’t mean what you have to say is of any less value!

You might be able to package up your knowledge in a way that is more relatable, easier to understand, or more profitable to a customer. Your explanation might just be what they need to take action, get the breakthrough they need or achieve the result they want.

#4 – Everything has NOT been said

There is a lot of information out there – and a lot of experts, but that doesn’t mean everything that needs to be said, has been said yet. Times, needs and challenges change and consumers will always want the latest tips, hacks and facts.

Amanda

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