Don’t Speak Jargon to Your Buyers- Use Plain English

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If you want to get your point across and make a friend, use plain English. Industry jargon may be fine for working around your coworkers, industry friends and associates, but it should not be used in sales presentations. Jargon is one of the greatest frustrations for a buyer. The inability to grasp what is being said when speaking to a sales person will kill a sale every time. Your job as sales pro is to close the deal, but your success rate depends on building rapport and a relationship with your prospect. If they cannot “get it” you are wasting your time. Your presentation should be easily explained in layman’s terms so that even a high school student can understand clearly. The same holds true for your written communications.

One of my closest friends, a District Attorney, used to tell me that when he would compose his closing argument to the jury he would try to write it at the eighth grade level. That way he felt that he wouldn’t be speaking above or below anyone on the jury and that his argument would be perfectly understood.

In the inbound marketing world, we refer to this concept as communicating by “persona”.
By speaking to an audience, or writing for that matter, communicate in a language they can understand and relate. Your message will be received without delay or suspicion if they can clearly correlate the information. This is nothing new; the concept has been around for as long as story telling. It is a skill however, that must be practiced and mastered to be effective.

The great author Oscar Wilde is known to have stated,

"Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth."

Persona is Latin word for the word Mask, when in ancient Greek dramas the actor would change a mask for whomever he played. Although the actor was the same person, the change of mask, and the change of voice and inflections got their point across without difficulty. When someone speaks about a particular topic and is well versed but fails to reach the audience, said person is referred to as an unreliable narrator. Trust does not ensue nor does belief. This can be on the stage of performance or the stage of the sales presentation. Your message must resonate and not repel. The term a writer’s voice (metaphor) is a clear example of speaking to the audience for maximum effect and acceptance of the message. It may be turn of phrase, tone, tempo or language. Jargon is part of the language that should be avoided when your audience is the general public.

A great example of persona is when a friend calls on the phone, and within a word or two, you know exactly who is on the other end of the line. The sound of their voice, tone and language are clear and defined, making them instantly accepted and acknowledged.

When speaking to an audience either in person or in writing, you should do so from a perspective other than your own. That said, this is not to deceive but to relate. Enter the mind of your audience, and create a being that mirrors the tone, tempo and language of them so that your message will be instantly received. From a selling standpoint, your prospect has certain expectations and a particular perspective, so speak to them rather than merely regurgitating facts and figures and canned jargon.

If your marketing is at the point where developing the message through the use of persona and you can’t seem to make headway, contact Zen Marketing Inc. for some assistance. We’ll get you started on the road to successful communications that appeal to your prospects, or we can handle the entirety of your persona writing needs.

Deceptive Sales 101 (A great plug for Inbound marketing)

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Or why pretending to be someone’s Grandmother isn’t going to help you get that order.

My latest favorite term is Sales Prevention Officer… borrowed from Jonathan Farrington on the Eyes on Sales blog. Professional, effective sales processes are a combination of art and science. A great sales person is trained in acting, engineering, politics, relationship building and strategic planning.

The best salespeople understand personal improvement is a never ending process. They study constantly and follow a process or systematic approach. They invest for the long term. But some people feel the need to cheat the system. They seek a faster and less arduous path to making fast money rather than a long term process.

That is why I admire some of the “schemes” the Sales Prevention Officers invent. The lengths that some people will go- believing that there is a way to shortcut success- are incredible. And the latest one my wife received was a total deception that fizzled for one simple reason. But more about that in a minute.

If people make their buy decisions based on the “know, like and trust” factor (and this is an immutable law of sales) then how can anyone expect to circumvent one of these three tenants with false or misleading messages or tactics? Human behavior is largely predictable and a good understanding of how people’s preference of behavior affects their decision making process can be an invaluable tool in sales.

So if being deceptive, if trying to be clever to get an appointment or if using tricks to get in touch with a decision maker are a violation of trust why do people believe they are a faster track for quick success? Perhaps they think the general public are sheep?

Here is my wife’s story

A letter arrived in the mail last week. It looked odd to her so she gave it to me. It was a plain white No.10 envelope with no return address, using an ordinary stamp and addressed using a Courier font (like anyone still uses a typewriter today!)

Now the clever part… inside was a carefully folded newspaper article featuring a “story” relevant only to married woman. The newsprint was light and dry (ink on real newsprint takes days to fully dry which is why it easily rubs off on your fingers when you read your daily) and the left edge had a pretty realistic “tear” to it- but a little too consistent and straight a pattern to have been real. But all told, it was a terrific fabrication, a close facsimile of a real torn newspaper article at first glance.

Someone should get points for style and originality.

But when was the last time you read a three column by full height article in any newspaper? That is a lot of space! And the copy just screamed sales pitch, with separators speaking about one pain point after another. And of course it closed with the guaranteed solution, along with something else that was included for free. Buried in some very fine print at the end was an admission that the piece was actually an advertisement.

But what tied it all together was the yellow sticky-note at the top, immediately greeting you when you opened the envelope. In big blue handwriting it said “Sally, Thought you’d be interested, - K”.

It’s shown here in the image.

Nice! Make it appear to be from someone you know and maybe they’ll act on the offer, although the recipient has no clue who actually sent it to them. Ah! The root of the deception is complete.

But it fizzled with my wife, an incredibly intelligent and risk-averse individual who saw through the deception beginning with the envelope! Her behavioral preference immediately made her suspicious of the article, and was profoundly insulted that someone might pretend to be an acquaintance.

Nope. No way. No how. She was never going to act on this offer, even if it had been a good one (*it was not).

There is a better way

We have amazing information and data gathering resources available to us today.

• Consider  the inbound marketing tools we now have at our fingertips, systems that  allow us to easily build credibility in our product or services  and support it with automated lead generation (we use and recommend Hubspot)
• Look at all of the social media tools we have to research the decision makers in our target audience (Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, along with aggregators like Nimble)
• Access to portals for content creation (E-Lance, Zerys)
• Grab hold of proven and relevant sales training processes (Sandler, TripleWin Sales)

With today’s sophisticated marketing environment no one who is serious about his/her craft should have to resort to deception or overpromising in order to be successful over the long term. And with  training and strategic management the odds are heavily weighted in our favor… and we must succeed because of all those who shortcut the process and make a bad name for everyone else!

Hosting an Event? Use a Hashtag for Marketing It.

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If your business regularly uses events such as workshops or public speaking engagements, whether for promotional purposes, or actual revenue generation, then you'll know how difficult it can be to generate a buzz around your event. But without genuine excitement in your target audience, how can you be sure that enough people will attend to make your event worthwhile?

The good news is that social media offers new avenues for engaging with your potential audience. For rapid-fire engagement with today’s time-poor consumers, nothing beats Twitter. But updates on Twitter are limited to a maximum of 140 characters, meaning your message could flash past in an instant. And how can you track whether people are talking about your event, and make it easy for them to join in the conversation?

Enter the hashtag. This is a single word or phrase, that starts with the hash or pound sign, like this: #myhashtag. Simply by including this hashtag in a tweet, the tweeter can make sure that the tweet forms part of the conversation around the hashtag. This conversation can be found by searching for the hashtag, or in most Twitter clients, including the Twitter webpage, just by clicking on the hashtag itself.

To set up a hashtag that people can use to talk about your event, pick a short word or phrase that describes it. The hashtag needs to be short, so that it’s easy to type, and doesn’t use up too many of the 140 allowed characters. Check that the hashtag is not already in use by searching for it on a search engine. If you want to use a phrase as opposed to a word, leave out the spaces between the words, and make sure the phrase still makes sense without spaces: sometimes taking out the spaces can lead to a quite different meaning!

Let people know about your hashtag by including it in every tweet that you make about the event. Begin this process with some event teasers a week or two before the actual event. You can also encourage people to use the hashtag by referring to it in other media, such as web pages, email communications, and even print ads and flyers. Although experienced Twitter users will recognise a hashtag right away, including brief explanations or instructions may be appropriate.

And once your event is underway, you can use the hashtag in audience participation via Twitter, which will make it easy for you to track and collate audience responses and feedback. Or you can be extra clever and make a list of triggers or hot topics from your content, and cut/paste them into your Twitter, Facebook or Google+ feeds at the appropriate time... or arrange for someone, somewhere to do this for you. It's usually easy to add a time stamp to the items on the list so someone back in the office can perform this.

Finally, when your event has concluded, don’t forget to tweet your thanks to all the attendees, using your hashtag, to build interest in your next event.

Pay Per Click is Probably Not the Answer to Better Lead Generation

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For many a small business, especially those that rely on generating as many leads as possible online, pay per click is an easy answer, but it may not be the answer to your marketing dilemma. Your lead generation is what drives your business, and your marketing budget must yield as large an ROI as possible, which PPC can sometimes deliver quickly. Sure, people will tell you all of the great things about pay per click, (otherwise known as PPC) but PPC has some downsides that need to be understood as well.

When depending on your website to attract new clients and prospects to your business, there are a host of tools to consider. Pay Per Click is just one of them, yet many businesses have come to rely on PPC only to see diminishing returns in this form of advertising. You probably have heard about all the great things about PPC, but frankly, not all of it pertains to every business model; some models definitely work better with PPC than others.

Before we get into the negatives about pay per click, let’s discuss the advantages of PPC, because there are many. The problem is with the deployment of a PPC campaign to solve your marketing dilemmas is that there are often more negatives than positives. If you are new to this discussion, you’ll be wise to consider all sides in the use of this tactic.

Some Pay Per Click Advantages

• Targeted Traffic – PPC advertising is a tool that can target specific niche markets due to the design and placement of the ads. People clicking on your ads should have a pre-conceived interest in your product or service.
• Quick Results – PPC ads bring quick results, so if you are in need of a quick ramp up in leads, this is a great tool. Because it takes only a few hours to set up, your site can be receiving new traffic in no time. And if you are utilizing A/B testing to validate a marketing message or design PPC can help accelerate the results, make a choice faster and help minimize risks before rolling it out.
• Easy to Implement and Use – Once the ad is designed and contact is made with the search engine (be it Google, Bing, Yahoo or any other), you are off to the races.
• Controllable Costs – Because you will bid on the cost of your ads, you know in advance how much a particular campaign will cost. Your costs are only incurred when someone actually clicks on your ad. If no clicks, no expense.
• Ad Rankings – If your ad is popular and the click through rate is high, your ad can be on the first page of Google Search. Mind you, your site may still be on page 10, but your ad visibility can be on the first page.

At this point PPC must sound like a magic carpet ride to success. And for some businesses it might be. But very little is written about the downside of PPC, mainly because this tactic is so easy to get involved and doesn’t require a highly technical skill set. It is easy for someone to become very enchanted if good results are achieved quickly or one a first time campaign, leading to over-rely on this method of lead generation. In a sense they get lazy and don’t implement other useful tactics.

Here are some of the easily overlooked disadvantages of Pay Per Click, and why it may not be the answer to your marketing and lead generation strategies.

Some Pay Per Click Disadvantages

• Typically “Deal” Oriented – Some of the most successful PPC ads revolve around discount offers. If someone is looking for a “deal” on say, hotel reservations, then an ad on the first page of Google Search for hotel deals will display PPC ads offering such a service. If yours is one of them, great. However, if you are merely offering an opportunity to drive traffic, your PPC ad will not generate as much traffic as you might have hoped.
• Abuse & Fraudulent Clicks – This is a topic that receives far too little attention when speaking about Pay Per Click. A PPC ad costs you nothing until someone clicks on it, but you get charged against your budget even if no one leaves their email address. There are a lot of nefarious characters behaving badly on the Internet, and the PPC arena is a fiercely competitive landscape. Have you accidently clicked on an ad and regretted it? What if someone was actually seeking out your ads and clicking on them merely for the sake of exhausting your PPC budget? Do you think that can happen? Would you believe that there are companies willing to pay spies to burn through competitor’s PPC ads just for the sake of maliciously hurting them? It shouldn’t be assumed that online business is more honest than any other- abuse and fraud are competitive tools many businesses utilize. 
• Price Escalation – Like everything in business, there is a process that must be followed to attain top ranked keyword PPC ad costs. The top keywords are used to price ad placement and therefore cost is based on this and other factors. If your ad is bid at a price and performs well, the next purchase you make will more than likely require a higher rate than before. 
• Diminishing Law of Returns – When the PPC ad is fresh, your click through rate will be much higher than after it has been visible for a length of time. Naturally, the return on such an ad will diminish, especially when you consider the price inflation you will experience when you re-negotiate another campaign contract. Adding additional keywords to the campaign will drive up the individual click cost, but may not generate any increase in leads. Costs rise, return falls; one of the greatest laws of business.
• Competitive Bidding Wars - The search engines are in the business of making large profits, and it has to come from somewhere. The bidding process drives the price per click, and the two highest bidders will share the spotlight, whereas the lower bids will pick up the lesser performing placements. PPC ads can cost as little as a few cents to $50 per click. The old adage “It costs money to make money” remains as true in Pay Per Click as anywhere else. But keep an eye on the trends, as your budget will only go so far.
• Ads Go Stale Quickly – If you plan on using PPC as the primary driver of leads to your site, you will need to spend a great deal of time refreshing your ads. Once viewed by the public, they quite literally become invisible in short time. To be in the pursuit of targeted leads, you must have fresh appeal to draw the attention away from the fierce competition PPC creates.
• Requires Micro-Management – Based on everything mentioned here, you probably have already deduced that PPC marketing requires a great deal of management time. If you have the resources to utilize PPC as your primary marketing lead generation vehicle, you had better have sufficient financial resources to manage the great many tasks in oversight of the program. Constant ad refreshment, placement contracts, pricing wars, and a plethora of other management duties involved with driving the leads through nothing but Pay Per Click.
• Only a Short-Term Strategy – When marketing online, PPC is a great tool to gain visibility, grow some leads quickly, and is a means that controls your budget expenditure by each campaign. You will know what it will cost at the onset, regardless of how long (or quickly) it takes to exhaust your pre-paid arrangement. Pay Per Click advertising is piece of a strategic marketing plan that any company should utilize, but it should not be looked at as the panacea. PPC while a part of the plan, is not a long-term strategy. PPC costs can be turned on and off as leads are needed, but to generate a constant flow of leads, there are other alternatives that are less costly in both time and money.

Conclusion

Pay Per Click is another method of advertising and when used tactically can be a good addition to a marketing plan, but it is just that- a subset of the overall plan. It is a terrific way to accelerate test results but when expanded beyond short term, tactal use can require significant time and financial assets.

At Zen Marketing, we will provide a no-cost assessment of your current web marketing and advertising strategies, and highlight where you may want to adjust or tweak it. Visit our website to discover new ways to drive and manage lead generation using the web.

Facebook Marketing Tips for Small Businesses

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Even if you don't use it you already know Facebook is one of the most powerful social network platforms. You have probably come to realize that it’s not just for teenagers and socialites, but also for the small private business as well. Why? Because Facebook gives every business owner  an effective and affordable marketing tool. But we will agree to one thing: Facebook marketing can be intimidating.

When it comes to marketing your small business, social media should be part of your game plan. If you do not yet have a Facebook page for your business, stop what you are doing and call a marketing agency! Okay, it's so simple you really can do it yourself and in under half an hour but the point is DO IT!

Once you have your Facebook page up and ready to go, you will need to know how to use it to increase brand recognition, customer response and user activity. Here are a few simple first steps:

The first thing you will need to do is to gain followers, or friends, for your page. You can do this by promoting your Facebook page via email marketing or in your physical location. Create a special offer (perhaps a percentage off the customer's next purchase) if they sign up to be your friend on Facebook and remind them of that while they are at your location doing business. Restaurants can use tent cards on the tables. Retail stores can have signs at the registers. Place the special offer on all of your print advertising.

Once you have your first few followers, you can begin your first Facebook marketing campaign.

Posting the occasional discount or reminder to come into your store is not enough and will quickly put your audience to sleep. You will need to engage clients and share posts that are worthy of re-sharing. For example, if your business is a car wash, you might want to post a cartoon about how much pollen is in the air and then remind folks that it's time to wash their car.

And use photos! It has been proven that readers react significantly greater to image-driven posts, a major difference between Facebook and Twitter. Photo's in posts draw more attention. And phot's can elicit a humorous response!

A tip about pictures: crop them. Facebook shows tiny versions of pictures so you need to focus on the most important area.

Getting your readers engaged in answering questions on your Facebook page is another way to have them become more involved in sharing your business with others. For instance, you could ask a question such as, "What is your favorite car wash memory from childhood?" Readers love to share nostalgic answers to questions such as these and every time they post an answer, it not only shows up on your Facebook page, but it also shows up on theirs. Then, their friends can see the question and response as well and you have just introduced your brand to an entirely new set of potential clients.

Use the Facebook search feature for the keywords that relate to your business. The search for car washes in central NJ delivered someone looking for an affordable auto detailer and someone just back from Florida looking to get the bucks off the front of her car.

Think your car wash can help? Tell them you can! And now you are a solution provider instead of just an advertiser! :-)

Here are a few things to keep in mind regarding posts:

• You can write about any current event that is related to your industry or brand.
• If you find any fun or interesting video (hosted on Vimeo or YouTube) that is related to your brand or procuct/service, share it on your page.
• Encourage your audience to post pictures, stories, or questions that relate to your industry.
• From whatever the fans post, repost the content that you find the most interesting and credit that audience member.

When it comes to marketing your small business on Facebook, remember to be engaging and fun. If you only post boring business posts, your readers will not share them, nor will they be impressed. Keep it light and social and success will follow.

After all, it is called social media for a reason!

The Cold Calling Conundrum

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While the world has “gone digital,” cold calling is out of date to say the least. However, there are cold calling statistics that make me wonder; well sort of; it’s a bit of a conundrum actually.

In the past I posted articles relating to the cold calling marketing strategy. One article alluded to the fact that cold calling has definitely had its day; another stated that the marketing shift caused by technology has left even the best cold calling sales people wanting, and another still that bashed the “training systems” still being marketed on the net.

In my training workshops, I speak to professionals and discuss cold calling and their reluctance, if not abhorrence of the concept, you can read more here.

There are competing sides to the story, so to speak.

I have found that most traditional sales managers cling to cold calling, despite its decline, for the frank reason that it’s all they have ever known. When they were the sales person, they were forced to cold call, and eventually got good enough to be promoted to sales manager. I spoke about so-called training systems that are still to be found online in an article last year, which can be found in the blog archives.

Today’s consumer has all of the disruptive marketing shields; caller id, voicemail, Tivo or the DVR, Serius Radio, ad free digital news media. I wrote about this before. Every person I know hates telemarketing pitchmen. You as an executive shield yourself from unsolicited calls too. Knowing all that, why do business owners still choose to use cold calling despite all of the negatives associated with it?

The truly candid rationale I come up with is “I don’t have to learn any new strategies or tactics to get what I am after.” It’s true, inbound marketing takes time and a bit of education. Sure you will need to know how to effectively create email marketing campaigns, online lead generation and nurturing and a host of other methodologies. It is also true that cold calling is the most challenging of marketing tactics, and very few are actually good at it; that is why the stats are what they are; a whole lot of efforts for 1-3% return at best.

In the Zen Blog Archive, there are a host of articles regarding inbound marketing, and the proven fact that it costs less than traditional marketing by as much as 60%. The fact that inbound marketing is growing at such a drastic rate is because it works. But you decide.

Here are the pros and cons I was able to come up with to attempt to offer both sides of what I see is an issue facing a lot of businesses, especially this close to tax season.

PRO
On one side of the debate as to its worthiness, cold calling is a revered, yet out-dated sales generation methodology. The Direct Marketing Association study in June, 2010, noted an average of their constituents yielded a 6.1 customer to cold call ratio. With the nation’s average shrinking annually from the 1-3% average return, this is surprising. Remember though, these are a minimum of two year old statistics.

CON
The other side on this cold calling issue, which comes to us from Kenan Flagler Business School at the University of North Carolina:

Cold Calling Is Dead- "Over 80% of decision makers absolutely will not buy from a cold call."

PRO
May 2011 – B2B Marketing Zone – More than 70% of all US employees are not engaged, so it is important to keep inbound sales people active through innovative games, contests and ongoing training. This article earned 7 Tweets

CON
On the same page of the B2B blog report, a Hubspot article stating, “So, why do we take our expensive salespeople and insist they must be good at "cold-calling" when the buyer doesn't want anything to do with this?”
Jan 2011 – This article earned 299 Tweets

PRO
The afore mentioned Houston Chronicle article, written by Miranda Brookins of Demand Media gives a complete explanation of cold calling, how it is done, and boasts the statistics from sources in favor of it.

CON
That same article was sponsored by an online public relations firm. Additionally, when looking up exactly what Demand Media does, the very first words on their site are “At Demand Media, we live up to our name by first listening to what our more than one hundred million monthly visitors want and then delivering the content and rich online experiences they crave.” You discern the true meaning of all this.

QUESTIONS

• Now if it is true that more than 80% of company executives want nothing to do with a cold call, why would they invest valuable resources using a method they despise? 
• When was the last time you accepted an unsolicited phone call from a stranger?
• If the national average success rate for cold calling is between 1.3 and 3%, the Direct Marketing Association claims their members (who happen to be the best trained cold callers in the world) reach 6.1%, what can you expect in terms of results?
• What amount of resources are you willing to invest for your expected return?

In the past I have done a pretty good job of bashing cold calling, but the aforementioned facts and suppositions speak otherwise to a degree. It is up to the individual executive to determine the marketing path they will pursue. Cold calling may have one time been the preferred choice of marketing tactics, but is it in this digital world today?

Inbound Marketing is Cold Callings Best Friend

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What inbound marketing does really, really well is eliminate the cold call. After all, when you have scores of interested people taking the time to visit your landing page or blog and then leaving you their contact information the odds are pretty good your call will be taken.

This behavioral bridge is amplified when they have taken advantage of a download (white paper, case study or some other relevant piece of information) and have something really tangible... and it has your brand on it!

What we are actually describing is an effort to create a warmer environment and avoid a cold one. To accomplish this a good sales professional will usually "prime the pump" with an introductory letter (print or e-mail) to make his/her reason for contact known, introduce his/her product or service, present his/her company's value proposition, and set up the real objective... getting an appointment.

Landing pages can play a large role in this, and a good letter is designed to trigger a visit to a dedicated landing page. The landing page can provide a lot more information (testimonials, images, product reviews) than a single letter can (or should!). And the right marketing platform (we use and recommend Hubspot©) makes creating and deploying landing pages quick and painless.

However, this article is intended to remind us of some best practices from the past. I would like you to consider one important but often overlooked aspect with the introductory letter tactic...

The quality of the paper that you use, the design of the letterhead that you use, the ink on the page... all of these come into play and can separate the wheat from the chaff! Want some proof?

We were retained to redesign an existing corporate identity package for a prospective client, and to prove the best efficacy we ran a test. 400 introductory letters were crafted and distributed to a totally cold list, a B-to-B list which we purchased. All of the companies played in the professional services arena and all were privately held companies. All of the letters were identically messaged, with the call to action being a visit to one of four landing pages for a complimentary report download (which, thanks to our Hubspot© platform, we can easily build effective landing pages and track them back to the respective letter).

Here is how we constructed the mailing:

• 25% were printed using a solid toner Xerox Phaser printer with 32-lb HP Premium Choice paper (great hand-feel and very bright). We used a full color letterhead design (which we designed and were striving to get client adoption of) - variation A
• 25% were printed using an HP Officejet Pro Inkjet with 24-lb Hammermill paper (still better than almost anything else), using the same full color letterhead design - variation B
• 25% were printed using a monochrome Dell laser, with a store brand 24-lb laser paper on the identical but preprinted full color letterhead - variation C
• 25% were printed using a monochrome Dell laser, with a store brand 24-lb laser paper on the client's existing one-color letterhead - variation D

Here are the results:

Variation's A and B more than doubled the response rates of C, and had far better response rates than D. Variation A was slightly better than B but the difference in the paper quality is mostly in weight and unless compared side by side the difference isn't really appreciated. But I do enjoy watching people run their hands over a report I've brought to a meeting having used the combinations found in variation A.

So when you are using a introductory letter campaign to support a call-based sales tactic consider the design, the printing, and the paper because it does have an effect on the behavior you wish to drive in the recipient.

By the way, 69 recipients downloaded the report, 18% overall (net of the bounces, but that is a matter for another post all together, isn't it?).

Rising Annual Revenues? Disaster May Be Near...

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The aphorism "a rising tide lifts all boats" is associated with the idea that improvements in the general economy will benefit all participants in that economy. Many businesses see changes in their top line revenue in this same fashion.

Everyone on the planet is aware of the economic storm wreaking havoc on the bond market, shrinking retail demand, the rise in gold prices and the somewhat-stagnant unemployment rate. It has been reported that the U.S. is experiencing a “softening” in the rebound from the “great recession”. European economists cannot seem to accurately assess the future of some of the member EU countries. Yet these same soothsayers press upon others involved to “stay the course” rather than depart the Union.

If your firm is experiencing annual growth in revenues through “organic market activity”, you may just be heading for trouble. In fact, unless you are strategically creating increasing revenues rather than benefiting from the overall market demand, then you are near disaster if and/or when the market demand weakens and dries up. For those lulled into believing you have been “just plain fortunate”, you are in a serious situation that won’t change in any circumstantial fashion. You, my friend, are in a “quagmire.”

Experience tells me that there are telltale signals to be mindful of to qualify for the quagmire distinction:

• Key decision makers don’t understand marketing in the “new age”.
• Lack of specific, growth oriented goals throughout the organization.
• Lack of analytics, metrics and regular measurement against goals and previous efforts pertaining to ROI of sales and marketing efforts.
• Absence of a sophisticated, strategic marketing plan; one with definable objectives and multi-faceted, cross-channel actions,
• Lack of marketing-focused logic in the mindset of all; executives and staff alike. It is everyone’s job toward growth initiatives.
• Missing forms of pay-for-performance programs for non-sales staff.

Quagmire firms are those that have no strategic plan, no marketing plan, and exist thinking that the gods of commerce have favored them. Their year over year growth is remarkable, I would agree, but it is no measure of how the business is doing. In fact, once the markets dry up further, disaster plans will be too late to intervene in the free fall of revenues and profits. Unless there is an active, sustainable strategic marketing plan to drive revenues (as opposed to let the free market dictate), businesses relying on the status quo are merely fooling themselves. Once the rose-colored glasses come off, the severance agreements and bankruptcy settlements will not support any type of comfortable future.

There are things that can be done to avoid becoming a “failed business” statistic. Rather than relying on luck and good fortune, begin to think proactively and strategically. Develop a professional marketing plan that works in today’s environment. While centered in the digital space, inbound marketing can become the linchpin of an overall marketing plan, regardless of industry. A professional inbound marketing agency can review not only your marketing activities, but analyze your competitors’ actions, and help with goals and what it will take to get you there.

There is no time like the present, to coin a phrase. There are notable inbound marketing agencies with the wherewithal to assess and address your needs, hopefully in time for the next market adjustment.

Unfortunately for some, the time may have passed for salvation. I met with a PA-based printing company, looking to us to help create a succession plan. After completing my assessment of the business I sat in my car and nearly cried, realizing that this seventy year old owner had worked hard for many years and believed his business would one day represent his retirement plan. But in actuality his business was nearly worthless and his ideas for succession were simply not going to be a reality. It broke my heart.

As for your firm, it may not be too late to react and turn the situation to your advantage.

Strategic Marketing Crucial During Stagnant Economies for CPA's

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Regardless of this time of year, the current economic storm we find ourselves in does not seem to be relinquishing its grip on the market. It is tax time, and everyone in the financial services field is busy taking care of clients. Let us not forget the importance of the client; we need them now more than ever.

Even though the last two quarters of 2012 began to push busineswees a bit more towards recovery, we know now that this was a little spark not a substantial blaze. Our economy has been trying to maintain a growth curve, with a few areas of the country actually sliding back toward the abyss the U.S. economy barely avoided. As a person that handles their tax returns, it isn’t just about that; you must provide leadership and integrity as well.

When looking at the CFNAI (Chicago Federal National Activity Index), things don’t appear to be all that rosy.

The CFNAI is a weighted average of 85 existing monthly indicators of national economic activity. It is constructed to have an average value of zero and a standard deviation of one. Since economic activity tends toward trend growth rate over time, a positive index reading corresponds to growth above trend and a negative index reading corresponds to growth below trend.

What does this mean when it comes to growing your business? Quite a lot actually. This is a great time to market; tax season is at full speed, but this likely won’t last. The realization that the market is rather soft presents everyone with a need to strengthen and reinforce relationships with current and past customers. Connect with your most influential customers, those that you haven’t seen in a while and those new prospects as well. Offer them some specialized services that you don’t presently advertise, and push hard toward cementing a deeper relationship through their use. Make the services highly innovative, strategic and oriented toward the customer with value in mind. Doing so will not only strengthen your current customer base, but should be setting up for a referral program. Ask for referrals once you have improved loyalty and retention; you’d be surprised at the outcome.

The most effectiove referral methods of marketing are rooted in loyalty, perceived value and integrity. If you win all three from your clients, you can win the battle for sustainability. Insuring that your marketing includes your existing customer base as well as former and new clientele, and providing excellent services while "touting" (a marketing term, by the way)  your appreciation of them, you can begin to grow organically by working with the best clients instead of always on the hunt for new clients. The new clients that join your firm will be excited with the new relationship at first, so keep the excitement going. Through innovative and value added services that are new and unique (setting you apart from your competitors), your new customers will happily provide referrals once they trust, rely on and admire your company.

Most professionally designed websites for financial services firms offer some capabilities that other industries don’t. In a previous posting we spoke of the client portals as a noteworthy service offering, include appointment setting functions and reminder systems for clients to access themselves. Another value added feature might be an auto-updated news feed from the markets, as well as other financial information. By communicating with your clientele the importance of timely information, security of data transfer and how a diminished economy affects asset planning, succession planning and the like.

As a CPA firm or other financial services organization, it isn’t always about money. Certainly cash flow management and asset protection is important, but in an uncertain economy with which we currently face, the trust factor is paramount. By enhancing your trust factor with your clients and providing new, innovative services that make your relationship more valuable, you can sustain your firm and the protection of your client’s relationship with you. Displaying a strong sense of leadership will help cement your relationship, but more so it will provide the necessary hope and someone to lean on to handle the stresses of the marketplace. If you are a firm that assists in the management of stock portfolios, your clients are under a tremendous amount of stress that ebbs and flows several times a day. Providing that solid leadership is the buoy they are looking for.

Getting out into the local community and offering tax planning sessions is another great way to generate new leads, and can allow you to be seen as an expert in your field. Plus it is a natural extension for blogging. It is an automatic assumption that when a speaker is presenting their expertise, they are the local expert in their field. Unless you blow it, your audience will respect your opinions and automatically buy-in to of what you speak. With appropriate information and a lead follow up system in place, you might find some new clients you didn’t know existed.

Leadership, specialized and innovative services and a strong dose of hope delivered to your client and prospect bases will sustain you through this difficult time.

If you are unsure of how to begin a strategy into the uncharted part of the market, a call to Zen Marketing Inc. can provide the necessary analysis, review and tactical discussions to get you on your way.

Reverse Cold-Calling, or How to Lose a Customer in 10 Seconds or Less

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We know it as Cold Calling 2.0 (in our office we refer to it as interruptive sales) but there is a tactic in telemarketing and phone sales that is guaranteed NOT win the hearts and minds of your potential customers. Don’t know to what I am referring? Reverse – cold calling is the act of trickery in getting someone to phone you. Here’s an example:

“Hello, is Mr. Jones in?” “Will you please leave him a very urgent message about a significant purchase we would like to make?”

Obviously, when Mr. Jones returns to his office and is told by his secretary that a very important call may mean a big sale. Of course Mr. Jones will call you back immediately. In this tumultuous economy, every chance at a sale is a big deal.

“Mr. Jones, thank you for calling me back. I really don’t need to purchase anything from you; I just wanted you to hear me out, blah, blah, blah.”

Can you hear the irritation in Mr. Jones’ voice? The angry breathing? The sudden slam of the receiver hitting the base of the phone? Without a doubt, that is the last time you will ever hear his voice again, unless you face him in court.

There are a lot of ways to trick someone into calling you back, or, even better, to ask for a fraudulent name you know won’t work, and when the response is that there is no person by that name; you ask for the person that does. This manipulation is the types of “cons” that have been used by swindlers and “magic beans” sales people have used for centuries, only now it can be performed on the telephone or the internet.

There are business owners trying reverse cold calling every day in this country, and the chances of this working are even less than actual cold calling itself. Cold calling 2.0, or what ever you wish to call it is not only unethical, it borders on fraudulently conducting a business enterprise, which by the way is illegal. Wikipedia doesn’t even have a definition for either of these “new and improved” methods of telemarketing.

It has been my experience that this type of deception is typically used when sales people are pressured for a certain number of call backs or appointments set; results only responses. These people are “smilin’ and dialin’” as quickly as they possibly can, so any technique can be rationalized and a perfectly acceptable business practice in their minds.

I sincerely hope my readers do not participate in these sorts of shenanigans, and I’ll leave it at that. There are other ways of growing your customer base without the need to stoop as low as trickery and manipulation.

The Art of Persuasion……Building a Relationship

The best sales people, or the folks responsible for sales are best served using the age old art of persuasion: Win Friends and Influence People. Despite the methodology of marketing; traditional or digital, the highest success will come to those that practice ethical, customer centric relationship building tactics.

The economic storm we continue to live within shows little signs of recovery, and therefore every penny a company invests in growing their enterprise must produce ROI in one form or other. Telephone sales no longer works, unless the prospect is calling you from some other form of marketing has captured your attention. It should never be the result of some form of trickery or deception.

Your marketing efforts to generate leads may comprise of a variety of “offline” methods, which is fine if they’re ethical. They can be augmented with online “inbound marketing’ strategies, which are performed via the internet and email. It may be in the form of a blog, or series of articles, eBooks, White Papers or other digital products. These content pieces should be designed to impart sincere, relationship building information that will help people. That is the way marketing is performed today. The slash and burn methods of the past are no longer effective.

Here at Zen Marketing we utilize relationship building as our foundation for all things marketing. As an inbound marketing agency, it is our job to not only develop comprehensive marketing plans, but in many cases, implement them as well. Some of our clients use us for everything, while others perform much of it themselves, and we fill in the gaps with which they are not comfortable with, or lack the resources to fulfill the task at hand.

I have mentioned this in the past, but it bears repeating. At Zen Marketing, we offer a no obligation marketing analysis of your present marketing methodologies, and offer you a solution based strategy to help you make an informed decision on how to proceed. While inbound marketing may rival traditional marketing methods in termns of investment, it offers measurability and processes that might replace everything you are presently doing. Traditional and inbound marketing integrate cohesively to increase your leads, improving your chances for sustainability and growth.

Give us a call to find out more.