One of the most brilliant and beautiful minds in conscious marketing today is Suzanne Falter-Barns. A lot of people ‘talk’ about spiritual marketing – but it’s often from a ‘how do you USE ‘the secret’ to draw in more clients’ and Suzanne’s approach feels so much cleaner, clearer grounding and uplifting to me.
I commend her upcoming Spiritual Marketing Quest to you. I might just be going myself.
I’ve had a really interesting mind shift today as we begin to invite people to join us at our next Spiritual Marketing Quest in April. What Spirit has shown me is that our natural inclination is to go ‘get people’ … and boy, that is the essence of Old Paradigm marketing. Control, force, manipulate. These days, it just doesn’t work.
The opportunity in promoting any event is to invite people in … just like you would invite dear friends over for dinner. That’s how you want to think of it — like you’re pouring the Chardonnay and cooking up a little something for these folks you just LOVE to have over!
Because in truth, these ARE dear friends you’re speaking to.
They love what you have to say, they follow your words, they are engaged in your work … they even want to know details of your personal life on Facebook (for instance, I recently got 55 comments and ‘likes’ when I changed my FB status from Single to In a Relationship.) And I didn’t personally know most of those who commented!
So who’s to say you’re not speaking to friends with your work … even if you don’t actually know these people? They are still involved in who you are — and so the way to approach them when creating, say, an event is simply to graciously invite them in.
Share from your heart what you love about the upcoming event, what excites you about doing the work, why you are doing it in the first place. You want to engage them in the conversation about it — as opposed to just thrusting the event at them and needing them to get in.
Think about it … when inviting good friends to dinner you wouldn’t call them up and say ‘OK, dinner’s at 8 and I’ll need you to be there.’ Instead, you engage in conversation because you want to hear how they’re doing, and share what’s new with you. And then you ask them. Or you send them a beautiful invitation that is gracious and welcoming. You tune into them … you read them. You feel them. And then you share your heart.
For example, about the Spiritual Marketing Quest I would say this is the work we were born to do. When we get these conscious entrepreneurs in the room, something magical happens — a love vortex is created that expands and fills every heart in the room, so people are changed by it. It’s an experience in the Divine that is directly applicable to business…. It’s our offering of love that leads people gently and powerfully into their own greatness by helping them set themselves apart on the Web and attract more people.
As opposed to just saying, “Come join us at the Quest. It’s good for your business. You’ll learn new strategies for defining your market, and standing apart on the Net. You’ll love it!”
That’s marketing with love, and it makes all the difference in how your business rolls these days because people no longer are willing to be told what to do by advertisers. Interruption Marketing — as in those TV spots you’ve gotten good at avoiding with the Mute button — is dying, as is television as the primary way to reach people. Now we need the warm, fuzzy, relationship building Internet because we, as consumers, have changed!
This is great news as we enter more deeply into The Great Turning in 2011. May you enjoy all the benefits of marketing with love … it’s powerful stuff. (And yes, that’s just what we’ll be teaching at the next Quest.)
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