The Irresistible Offer | marketingforhippies.com

The Four Keys to Getting New Clients

By: Tad | Published: July 19, 2010 · Leave a Comment

Each of these components can help you attract more brand new clients and each level can help you get the most out of your existing relationships.

The first component is the niche. The niche is your target market. It’s who you’re going after. This is the center of any marketing. When I talked to Dominic he and I were both commiserating that whenever we would get confused in terms of helping clients or clients would get fuzzy about a next step, not being sure what to do, it always came back to this. About looking at the niche of who are you going after.

The second component is the irresistible offer. What are you offering to this niche? A lot of people make the mistake in marketing of thinking, “Oh, I’m going to design this product and service,” and then it’s like, “How do I market it?” is a separate step.

I think if we’re going to be successful in business we need to step back and think of the marketing in the design process itself. Meaning, how can we make the product so irresistible inherently, that it’s easy to sell, versus just a generic sort of bland, boring product and service and then figuring out how we can sort of sell the sizzle and not the steak. That’s the second component is the offer.

The third component is the hubs. This was one of the things that really made so much sense to me when I was talking with Dominic. A lot of people at my trainings would say, “Well where do I advertise? Where do I market? How do I find people?”

I never really knew how to answer that. I always give kind of vague answers but now the answer’s really clear for me. Where you find them depends entirely on who you’re looking for. One group of people is going to hang out in one place. Another group’s going to hang out in another place.

It’s not just about where to find them. It’s also about a way to build trust with them. That’s a lot more powerful than other things you may have tried. So that’s the third component, the hubs.

The first is the niche. Second, what are we offering them? Third the hubs, where do we find them?

And fourth, word of mouth strategies. Again you’re already getting passive word of mouth but are there things you can do to accelerate it and get more word of mouth? Yes.

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| Categories: identifying your hubs, marketing strategy, The Irresistible Offer, word of mouth - Tags: attraction, hubs, irresistible offers, marketing, niche

Being a Generosity Based Business

By: Tad | Published: July 9, 2010 · 1 Comment

This is my friend Jimbo.

He’s a street performer.

Street performing can teach you a lot about magic.

You seem them every summer. Juggling, riding unicycles, balancing on things, setting things on fire or doing magic.

And people often say, ‘What amazing tricks!’

But they miss the point.

The real trick is not that they can make a goldfish bowl appear from under their hat while totally surrounded (like Jimbo can) but that he gets hundreds of people to stop and watch his show for 45 minutes and then gets them to pay him money at the end.

Think about it. If I took you to a street performer’s festival and put you in one of the circle pitches – could YOU actually get people to stop? And if you did – for how long? And would they pay you at the end?

I do close up magic and tried street shows for a while. Which convinced me that it was a lot harder than those buskers made it look.

Of course – the first (and hardest) job of any street performer is to gather a crowd.

Here’s how this relates to your business.

The best street performers in the world don’t get their crowds by saying, ‘Everyone! Come and look at me. I promise you a great show! No really! Stop for a little bit. Okay. Great. Just wait here ’til more people come and . . . what? No. Can’t tell you yet what kind of a show it is . . . Just trust me and wait for 15 minutes while I build a crowd. Oh. And please be quiet while you wait.’

But a lot of businesses do this. They say, ‘Work with us! Hire us! We promise we’ll be good.’

It’s basically asking them to trust you – sight unseen. And there’s nothing wrong with this. Nothing unethical. It’s just not very effective.

What’s more powerful? A cafe SAYING they’ve got the best coffee in town or GIVING you a free cup to try yourself? Someone SAYING that their weekend workshop is amazing or GIVING you a free intro workshop to let you try it out? Someone SAYING that they give amazing massages or GIVING you a free 15 minute sample session? Someone SAYING they’re an amazing therapist and listing their credentials or them actually GIVING you their undivided attention so you can FEEL what it would be like to work with them.

It’s vital that you give people a taste of what you do so they can sample you for themselves. It helps people feel safer about approaching you and hiring you.

These days, I’m talking a lot about being a ‘generosity based’ business. A business that gives advice, insight and wisdom liberally. Some people look at how much content I put in my blogs and online videos and free reports and say, ‘but Tad. You’re giving too much away.’ They could be right. But I don’t think they are. I think the more you give to people in context and information – the more they trust you and the more open they are to hiring you. They feel safer and clearer about who you are and what you’re about.

Start with giving value, not asking for attention.

Don’t start your show with promises. Just start your show.

| Categories: marketing philosophy, marketing strategy, The Irresistible Offer - Tags: building trust, generosity based business, irresistible offers, marketing, pink spoons, pressure free, safety

The 10 Biggest Offer Blunders

By: Tad | Published: July 8, 2010 · Leave a Comment

1. Unclear or Non-Existent Target Market: I’d say that I see this in about 90% of the cases of resistible, moribund offers. When I ask “who is this for?” I get answer that translates as “everyone. this product/service can help everyone.” But targeting everyone doesn’t work. You can’t do it. When you narrow your focus to just the communities you most love and are best able to helps you will be shocked at how the floodgates of creativity open up. You will find yourself in a place to create offers that pull many times the response of our current ‘do-nothing’ offers.

2. No clear problem being solved. This is directly related to #1. Your inability to articulate – with crystal clarity and profound empathy – the experience, problems and needs of the person your marketing too stops everything dead in its tracks. The first filter that your product and service has to make it through is the filter of relevance. People look at everything product or service and silently ask themselves, “can this help someone like me?” And if they don’t get an immediate answer of yes – the game is over – no matter how great your product is. Hard but true. They must see themselves in the product. It must be immediately apparent – with no need for guess work – that this can help them with a problem they are currently experiencing.

3. No clear results being promised. This is the flip side or mirror image of #2. You can’t just give empathy for the problem they experience – you need to paint a picture of what life would be like without the problem. You need to tell them exactly what sorts of results, benefits or changes this product will bring. You need to articulate the experience they’ll have once they own it. Most businesses don’t do this – instead, they drone on ad nauseum about how great they are.

4. Wrong Package: If you’re really clear about the three above (and I can tell you that you probably aren’t even if you think you are) and there’s no response still – then it could be a few things – almost certainly you haven’t identified the right mix of products and services. If you have a core product and service – that product or service can be made far more relevant by choosing a target market and far more valuable by adding other products and services to it. It can be made more valuable by thinking through the whole experience people will have with you from booking the appointment to the appointment itself to them leaving. From them buying the product to using it. With a few simple tweaks and additions your offer can likely be twice as attractive. What to add? What to tweak? This depends 100% on who your target market is and what problems they’re dealing with.

5. Wrong articulation: To correct that – people just aren’t that excited about what they understand of what you’re offering. You’re using a lot of confusing jargon. You’re speaking in platitudes.

6. Too much too soon: You’re trying to sell them on the whole farm on their first visit. You aren’t taking the time to build a relationship. It’s as if they come into your ice cream shop and ask to try a taste of the pistachio gelato and you try to sell them a quadruple scoop waffle cone. You haven’t thought through you marketing strategy from meeting to buying.

7. Selling your methodology before promising a result: When people ask what you do – what do you tell them? What is it that you highlight in your ads or on your website? For most people it’s their company name and logo. This is the first thing that people see. Hard truth moment: no one cares. But the next place a lot of people go to is straight to how they do what they do. The classic example is someone at a cocktail party saying, “Oh, I do a unique combination of trager, shiatsu, the reconnection, quantum healing and rebirthing.” Eyes glaze over. Awkward silence ensues. No business occurs. What just happened? They jumped to far ahead. People don’t actually care how you do what you do until they know what you do and who you do it for. I don’t tell people, “I do workshops and one on one consulting.” That’s how I do my work – but it’s not what I do. What do I do? I work with green, community minded and holistic entrepreneurs who are struggling with their cashflow and not attracting enough clients and what I help them do is to craft strategies that allow them to attract more of the kinds of clients they’re looking for.

8. No empathy for or understanding of ‘industry frustrations’: In every industry there are certain things that piss people off. Cell phones? The way they lock you into unbreakable contracts. Plumbers? The show up late, don’t fix it right the first time and charge you more than the initial quote. Web designers? You always have to go to them to make updates on our site, which they charge you for, and you have to wait til they get around to it. Make sense? The point is that it’s not just one company that does these things. It’s the whole industry. And here’s the golden question – do you know what these are for your industry?

9. Not understanding why people are really buying what you’re selling and not speaking directly to those needs and desires: This one is shockingly difficult to wrap one’s mind around. We spend years becoming experts in articulating the features and benefits of our products and services – but we’re still novices at articulating the experiences, problems and needs of our target market. Remember, they aren’t buying your product per se. In their minds, they’re buying relief from pain. They’re buying a solution to a problem. But what is that problem or pain? Can you articulate it better than they can?

10. No case being made: credibility. It’s not enough to make wonderful, huge claims about what you can do. You must be seen as a credible source of the solution they need. They must trust that you can produce the results you say you can. You must, in short, make your case before the jury of your target market. You must show them the steps you would take them through, give them evidence (e.g. testimonials, case studies, certifications, articles written etc). Without credibility – they will not buy. Period.

Before you add any bells and whistles you must have your core information figured out. You must know what it is that you’re offering to whom – and why exactly they would find it irresistible.

| Categories: marketing strategy, The Irresistible Offer - Tags: irresistible offers

Why Your Offer Matters So Much

By: Tad | Published: July 8, 2010 · Leave a Comment

Why don’t other people love your business as much as you do?

Why don’t you get the kind of response you’d like to your emails, ads or mailings?

Why do you get only mild interest or blank looks from people when they ask you what you do?

I want to make two bold claims. Here’s the first:

As it stands right now, your offer is – almost certainly – resistible. It’s easy to say ‘no’ to. When you tell people in your target market what you do, when you place ads or try to market your services – you’re met with either confusion, blank faces, mild (read: polite) interest, ‘That’s nice,” followed by a change of topic or . . . absolutely no response at all.

Here’s the second:

Radically (not moderately) improving the irresistibility of your offers is the simplest and most powerful action you can take to grow your business – pretty much at any pace you want. Literally like a faucet you can turn on or off at will.

That sounds like hype.

And of course there’s more to it.

Having an offer won’t do everything.

You still need to know where to find your target market.

And you still need to have a plan on how exactly you plan to introduce your offer to them.

It’s important to make sure you have the business systems in place to make sure you can consistently deliver on what you promise.

You still need to think about the mechanisms, incentives and excuses to make it easy (and desirable) for people to talk about what you do.

All true – but consider this:

What good is it to know where to find your target market if you have nothing to offer them. Or – more to the point – nothing they are excited to buy?

How can you possibly create a strategy around introducing your offer – when the offer isn’t that good?

What’s the point of creating some really whizbang word of mouth strategy if all it’s going to do is let people know that what you’re offering is actually pretty mediocre?

But let’s go back to the first . . .

People just aren’t that excited about what you have to offer. Let me tell you exactly why your offer hasn’t been pulling even a fraction of the response you secretly know it could.

You don’t want confused faces when you tell people what you do.

You don’t want polite interest.

No, you want them to say, “Hell yeah!” or “Wow! How do I get one?”

Your offer must – at the very least – get their attention and engage them to want to know more. It must at least strike the chord of relevance.

Your offer must be crystal clear. It must give easily understandable answers to the following questions:

1. What are you offering me? (in plain english)

2. What’s the return on investment (ROI)? If I give you my hard earned money – what do I get back? Why is this worth it to me?

I’d be willing to be that you aren’t answering these questions as well as you might think you are.

In fact, let me tell you the logical reasons why people aren’t as excited about your offer as you wish they were. There’s 10 likely culprits to the disinterest you’re getting from the marketplace. I think they’ll make a lot of sense to you.

Big picture: It’s because there are certain core elements of your offer that aren’t ‘right’. You can look for all the bells and whistles and fancy new marketing tactics but – at the end of the day – if you’re missing these things your offer is much more likely to fail.

In fact, if you are suffering from too many of the following the problem may not be that you have a ‘bad’ offer – but that you have NO offer.

| Categories: marketing strategy, The Irresistible Offer - Tags: irresistible offers

Without this your offer is probably lame

By: Tad | Published: July 8, 2010 · Leave a Comment

The Customer Values Question:

What things are most important to your prospects when buying what you sell?

IMPORTANT POINT #1: This isn’t what is most important to people in buying from YOU. It’s what is most important to them when buying the generic product or service you sell. This is about their experience of buying as a customer – not yours as a seller. You must put yourself in their shoes. You must learn, above all, to see the world through their eyes.

IMPORTANT POINT #2: We’re asking what is most important to your ideal client – whether or not it’s something you provide yet. If what’s most important to your customer is 24 service but you only have 8 hour a day service, still write it down.

IMPORTANT POINT #3: Remember, there are two parts to any business interaction – there’s what they’re getting and how they’re getting it. There’s the product and then there’s the process of getting it. And they are both equally important. There are things that are going to be important to them about the product they’re buying but there’s also going to be things that are important about the salesperson.

IMPORTANT POINT #4: This question includes not only the value they want to get but the values they hope or expect your business will embody. These values are what makes them feel good about themselves for doing business with you.
Example #1: What things are most important to your prospects when buying a new car?

I want the car to:

be fuel efficient
be a nice colour
have a good warranty
not have too many miles on the odometer?
not have too much wear and tear

About the salesman:

is the sales-person slimy and manipulative or trustworthy?
can i trust that they have my own best interests in mind?
no hidden fees?

Example #2: What things are most important to your prospects when buying a new fence?

I want the fence to: look good, not turn brown quickly, not sag or lean, last at least ten years and be of high quality.
About the fence contractor: I don’t want any hidden costs, I want the fence to be completed in a reasonable time frame, I don’t want the workers to be scary drug users, I want a reasonable price.

Example #3: What things are most important to your prospects when hiring a life coach?

I want to know that my coach . . .

will be on time for calls
is able give me templates, quizzes and other materials to help me
has made significant, positive shifts in their own life dues to life coaching
is aligned with my life values
asks questions vs. doling out advice
is committed to their own growth
is certified by a recognized coaching organization
is not going to pressure me to do things I don’t want to do

Example #4: What things are most important to your prospects when hiring a web designer?

I want to know that my web designer . . .

will be able to respond quickly to any changes i need to make to my site.
will ask me a tonne of questions upfront to make sure that they really understand what exactly it is I’m wanting and needing
can explain to me, up front, their process for designing a website.
has designed other sites that I like
will deliver their work on time and on budget

Example #5: “British Airways wanted to keep customers happy, so it asked regular customers on the transatlantic run what they most wanted. The answer was an overwhelming “Leave us alone and let us sleep!” Passengers wanted their own comfy universe, and they got it. British Airways first-class passengers currently dine on a five-course meal with fine linen and candlelight in the waiting lounge before they board the aircraft, and then it’s to sleep right after take-off. The seat reclines almost to horizontal – as close to a bed as you can get. The airline lends you a two-piece running suit that is like a nice pair of pajamas and provides you with a comforter and face mask. If you don’t want to sleep, you have a choice of movies at your own seat and an in-flight banquet.” – Marketing Without Advertising

**Then Identify What They Don’t Want:**

Says Seth Godin:

“When you identify what is broken among you competitors, you’ve found a free prize. Your growth will come instead from the dissatisfied and the unsatisfied.

The dissatisfied know that they want a solution, but aren’t happy with the solution you’ve got. The minute they find it, they’ll buy it. Yahoo!’s best customers weren’t Google’s first users. Nope. The happy Yahoo! customers weren’t busy looking for a replacement. Google focused on dissatisfied Web surfers.

The unsatisfied are the folks who don’t even realize that they’ve got a problem that needs solving. The question you ought to ask first is, “will people dissatisfied with what they’re using now embrace this, and even better, will they tell the large number of unsatisfied people to go buy it right away?”

Yahoo! changed its focus from engaging the dissatisfied and the unsatisfied to trying to maintain it’s hold on the satisfied.

Go find some people who hate what you’ve got and who hate what your competitors have but still have a problem they want solved. Those are the folks that want the free prize.”

Dental Office Example of Industry Frustrations:
Says Paddi Lund:

“Just fill out these forms and hand them back when you’re done…” say the medical receptionists handing you a clipboard with the pen on a string.

I don’t know about you, but I hate when I hear these words, and I get them a lot. I don’t like them for several reasons.

I look at forms and go bug-eyed – literally I find most of them difficult to comprehend and a pain to fill out. Apparently I’m not alone in this regard!

Questions on medical forms are often complicated or difficult to understand – ie they’re often poorly written and confusing … and seemingly irrelevant!

There’s rarely enough space for the questions that matter, as if I can figure out which ones do matter.

I just “KNOW” that no one will look at these forms ever again. I “know” that because no one ever seems to mention that information again, and I’m often repeating the same answers verbally later.

It seems that even though I’m on time for my appointment, I only get my place in line after I complete the forms – anyone who comes in while I’m writing gets in before me.

Now, because I’m writing so fast, I’m certain my already scratchy hand- writing is doubly illegible! Nobody ever asks for clarification. Nobody seems to care.

(Can you tell I’ve been to the doctor a lot with my kids recently!)

I think completing forms is one of the most obviously frustrating customer service problems that exist in the world today. Big statement, but more so because it’s so obviously unpleasant and yet no one seems to want to do anything about it!

Well Paddi did, and how he fixed the problem is so simple and seamless that it’s admirable and worthy of specific mention.

~~~~~~~~~~~ Back to your Walk Through of Paddi’s practice ~~~~~~~~~~~

You rang the doorbell and were personally greeted by Merilyn, your Care Nurse. Merilyn showed you to your Personal Lounge, and she has just poured you a cup of Special Blend Tea from the lovely Royal Doulton china and silver tea service.

As you chat over your cup of tea, Merilyn is affable and genuinely interested as she asks about you and shares a little about herself (mutual disclosure is another of Paddi’s principles of building trust). You already have a few things in common because of your friend who invited you to the practice.

In the first few minutes Merilyn explains, “As it’s your first visit with us today, as we get to know each other I’ll be asking a few questions about your medical history that might be important for us to know.”

At this stage, Merilyn draws your attention to the laptop computer on the coffee table in front of her that you noticed as you sat down.

“I’ll just take a moment every now and then to type the important information directly into your file. Please don’t think me impolite, but we think it’s better than giving you forms that we’d have to type in later anyway. Is that ok with you?”

“Hmmmmm,” you ponder. You might have to think about that one for a moment!

And that’s Paddi’s answer to the problem of forms. They don’t have them. His Care Nurses have wirelessly networked laptops they carry around with them so they can update client’s records in real time, even in the dental surgery.

It’s perhaps a little detail, but it makes such an impact on anyone who dislikes forms as much as I do. The pain that once was filling out forms has been transformed into a pleasant conversation with a very likable Merilyn over a lovely cup of tea and a fresh baked dental bun.

And it’s a much more efficient use of everyone’s time:

Merilyn doesn’t have to find time later to decipher your handwriting – let alone another admin nurse who doesn’t know you at all.

The data is recorded accurately the first time, no additional questions later or mistakes from mistyped information.

As your Care Nurse, Merilyn is with you your entire visit – in the Personal Lounge and in the dental surgery –you’ll never have to repeat information to Paddi that you’ve already told Merilyn.

Hence, you only have to share the information once, enjoyably and accurately, in less time than it would take to write the same history.

And the privacy of the Personal Lounge is so much more appropriate for these somewhat personal conversations than the conventional all-in-one waiting room. As Paddi likes to say, “Treat in public, communicate in private.” (More on this in an upcoming issue.)

www.PaddiLund.com

People really seem to open up when they’re comfortable and in control, in their personal lounge talking with their Care Nurse. It’s an important part of building faith and trust in Paddi’s expertise.

And because it’s enjoyable, customers are quite happy to spend the time chatting – anyway, they were told in advance that they should set aside 90 minutes for their first appointment, so no one is watching the clock wondering how long all this will take.

For more on the importance of addressing key customer fears and frustrations, see Paddi’s Advanced Manual, “Training Customers to Treasure Your Business” at http://www.solutionspress.com.au/page.asp?nid=dwzltpp&name=TrainingCustomers

~~~~~~~~~~~ What this means to you? ~~~~~~~~~~~

If you’re in professional practice where new patients fill in forms, you might consider how Paddi’s solution to this key customer frustration might work with your service systems. Paddi has found it a far more simple and effective way of doing things, and the extra 20 minutes or so that Merilyn spends chatting is time and money well invested in the future business relationship.

But even if you’re not in a medical related business, you might consider these points:

What key frustrations do your customers experience when doing business with you? (ie what are your businesses “Forms & Clipboards”?)
How can you change your service systems to turn those frustrations into enjoyable parts of the service experience? (If for no other reason than your obvious care in addressing an otherwise common problem in a creative way.)
How can you integrate your new process into your systems, procedures and checklists so that the problems never arise for your customers again?

Why not make a list of what you think are the most common key service frustrations in your industry and send it to me by e-mail. I’d be interested in comparing notes.

Coming up in the next issue, we’ll visit the one room in Paddi’s practice that has the most impact on how customers perceive his business.

A Few More Examples:

If you can address the common industry frustrations – you’re going to be ahead of the game.

DENTISTS: No one likes to go to the dentist because it’s such a painful experience.
Potential Irresistible Offer: ‘Sedation Dentistry, the safe, pain free way to healthy teeth.’

REALTORS: People are wary of letting real estate agents sell their homes because the don’t believe the agents will aggressively try to sell them fast enough.
Potential Irresistible Offer: ‘Our 20 point Power Marketing Plan gets your house sold in 30 days or less.’

PLUMBERS: They show up late (or give you an all day timeline, don’t fix it right the first time and charge more than the initial estimate)
Potential Irresistible Offer: ‘We will give you an exact time and guarantee to have some there at that time. If we’re more than an hour late – it’s on us. We guarantee to never charge more than the initial quote and, if we have to come back to fix a job we were already working on – it’s on us. You shouldn’t pay for our mistakes.’

Robert Boduch of the website: www.makeyoursalessoar.com has this to say:

“The best system I’ve seen for developing a strong USP, comes from Marketing guru, Jay Abraham. He suggests taking out 2 sheets of paper. On one sheet write, “You Know How…” and on the other write “Well, what we do is…”

HOMECLEANERS: “You know how most home cleaners only work to schedules that suit them. Well, what we do is send a crew whenever you want, anytime of day or night, 7 days a week, including holidays, 52 weeks a year. When you want your home cleaned, we’re there fast, guaranteed!”

CONTRACTORS: “You know how most contractors promise a hassle-free renovation, then… they’re always behind schedule, leave your house a mess… and they even have the nerve to charge you 15% more than their estimate! Well what we do is ensure your job will be completed on time and at the initial price quoted – 100% guaranteed! And, our crew understands that you’re living in your home throughout the renovation, so we promise to take extra time at the end of every day, just to clean up any mess. We help you create dreams… not nightmares.”

| Categories: marketing strategy, The Irresistible Offer, Uncategorized - Tags: irresistible offers