Whenever I come across a new marketing idea I ask two questions. Photo / 123RF
COMMENT: Welcome to my first marketing message of 2019.
Whenever I come across a new marketing idea I ask two questions before I recommend it to other people.
I ask myself, is the idea simple? Does the idea work well?
Example 1
A few weeks ago I interviewed the owner of a large business in South America.
The owner explained to me how he got stories about his business published in a number of major media outlets around the world.
These media stories produced a sales increase of 29.3 per cent over 3 years for his business.
What I really liked about what this business owner did is how simple it was.
The owner first identified a couple of things about his business that might be potentially be of interest to media outlets.
He then did a Google search to find journalists who were already writing stories on similar topics.
The next step was to use a couple of free internet resources to find the direct email address of the journalists who wrote these stories.
The final step was to send each journalist a short two paragraph email to see if they might be interested in writing a story about this business.
The owner of this South American business showed me the actual Google search terms he used and how he identified things about his business that might be of interest to the media.
He also sent me a copy of the email that he sent journalists to get a story published.
Plus he told me which internet resources he used to find the direct email address of each journalist he wanted to contact.
When I saw what these person had done I realised that most business owners could use the same approach to get media coverage for their own business.
His idea was simple and it worked well.
Example 2
I was chatting with Alex Robinson, General Manager at Team Building Hero.
Team Building Hero provide corporate team building activities for groups in New York City, Philadelphia, Boston and some other major US cities.
In the past, their referral system was part of their customer satisfaction follow up.
So they would ask their customers…
"How was your event? Great! Would you be willing to refer a friend or colleague we could talk to about doing an event?"
The results were dismal, and they had maybe a few referrals each quarter and these seldom turned into sales.
Then Alex and his team implemented a super simple Donut Referral Strategy.
Now the follow-up call is 100 per cent focussed on custom satisfaction.
They don't ask for a referral at all in this call.
Instead, about one week after the call they send the client a box of 12 donuts from a premium shop in New York City.
They include a card with the donuts that says, "We love spreading joy to great teams! Do you have a friend or colleague in HR or office management who is awesome? Let us know and we'd love to send them a box of donuts too!"
It turns out people are 10x happier to refer a box of free, fancy donuts.
What was the end result of this simple donut referral strategy?
Alex and his team get 15 to 20 quality referrals per month, and many of these referrals turn into serious conversations about working with his firm.
My main message today is keep looking for simple sales and marketing strategies that work well. Then use these strategies in your business.
These simple and easy to use strategies are all around you if you look for them.
"Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication." - Leonardo da Vinci
Anytime you look at a new marketing idea or strategy ask yourself if it is simple and does it work well.
- Graham McGregor is The Added Value Marketing Expert™. Register at his website www.addedvaluemarketing.com and Graham will give you a free copy of his brand new free guide 'Easy Sales with Added Value Marketing'. (This guide contains ten time tested strategies that any business can use right now to create easy sales and delighted clients and is with Graham's compliments.)
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