Tag Archives: Branding

New World Networking

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New World NetworkingIt’s coming.

It started with Bit Coin.

Now there’s AirBnB, and Etsy and Task Rabbit.

Slowly but surely Block Chain Technology is edging out the Internet as we know it.

Here’s a great explanation of the technology:

https://blockgeeks.com/guides/what-is-blockchain-technology

This technology is the next step in the evolution of networking for business development.

Most people agree that people do business with folks they know, like and trust and that trust is based on reputation.

The more secure your reputation, the easier it is to get to trust.

This technology will make building a reputation and maintaining it easier but your brand will have to be carefully nurtured along the way.

Block Chain Technology is more secure than the server based internet. There is no central place a hacker can go to mess with your reputation. It is hosted by millions of computers, simultaneously.

Block Chain Technology is more up to date as it reconciles all transactions on all the stored blocks about every ten minutes. Your information is embedded and updated in the entire network not in a single place.

Block Chain Technology is more collaborative. The network operates on a user-to-user (or peer-to-peer) basis. An entire team can make changes in a document at the same time.

Block Chain Technology enables peer to peer payments.  You won’t have to go through an intermediary like Uber. OpenBazaar uses the technology to create a peer-to-peer eBay.

Block Chain Technology is transparent (nothing is hidden) and publicly accessible. Imagine if it were used for elections. Governance, even in the corporate world, could be managed in the block chain.

Block Chain Technology can protect your intellectual property. You could use smart contracts to protect copyright and automate the sale of your creative works online, eliminating the risk of file copying and redistribution.

Block Chain Technology will protect your reputation. Identity verification is critical to on-line transactions in the sharing economy. Applications currently in development will allow you to have a digital identity for you and your business deliverables that is secure well beyond what is currently available.

Are you ready for New World Networking?

Jerry Fletcher Keynote in ColombiaJerry Fletcher is a beBee ambassador, founder and Grand Poobah of www.BrandBrainTrust.com

His consulting practice, founded in 1990, is known for Trust-based Brand development, Positioning and business development on and off-line. He is also a sought-after International Speaker.

Consulting: www.JerryFletcher.com
Speaking: www.NetworkingNinja.com

Get all the Brand Success Stories. Sign up at http://www.brandbraintrust.com/home.html

 

Your Brand is Your Secret Funnel Story

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Story FunnelYou can’t sell anything if they don’t buy your story.

You can talk at people until you are blue in the face and it won’t do any good.

You can “logic them” and “feature them” and even “benefit them” but your results will still be negative.

If your Web site or landing page starts with an “I” you are going to lose.

If you don’t make yourself memorable, communicate the problem you solve in their terms, tell them how you do it in their language and explain how to get your help in a couple minutes or less, you lose.

If you don’t make it easy for them every way you can, go back to your day job.

The secret is your story.

It makes no difference whether you are doing e-commerce for a product or a service. The distinction doesn’t matter.

Passion is what matters.

Why are you passionate about this thing you are selling? How did that happen? Want to bet that your experience is similar to other folks that might be interested? Have you watched someone’s eyes as you tell them the concerns you had about it? Have you noticed how they start nodding when you talk about how the change it made in you made you feel about yourself and your family? Have you noticed how you don’t have to sell but rather just take orders.

Your passion plus your story plus a formula.

Imagine you are in a room with a crowd of other folks that are entrepreneurial– consultants, coaches, professionals, guys and gals starting companies and people charged with launching a small company’s new product.

The speaker says:

Target “Are you the one that has to be sure that there is paying business in the pipeline? Do you find yourself looking for another place to network or a trade show to attend just to meet a few new prospects? Are you tired of waiting for leads from your web site or all the social media stuff they told you would work?

And even if it did isn’t that little voice in your ear saying things that make you doubt you’ll ever get this thing off the ground? Makes you feel like a failure that doesn’t take care of his family doesn’t it?

Ever wake up in the middle of the night worried about money to keep the business afloat and to be able to give your kids a college education?

We all know that people do business with people they know, like and trust.

Problem Would you say that your problem is building trust fast enough especially if your budget is zilch?

Guide I know what that’s like. I was the CEO of an ad agency dealing with national and international clients but my board and I agreed to disagree and I went from the corner office, the BMW and the expense account to a makeshift office in a spare bedroom.

I felt rejected. Put out to pasture. Trapped. I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to pay the bills.

I knew that I could help the little guys, the small businesses that couldn’t afford a big agency. I knew I could help them do it without breaking the bank.

First I had to get to trust. I had to find a way to reach them without looking desperate. But I had more bills than money.

I resorted to asking those pearls of contacts I had to help me get some business.

I sent a letter to just 60 golfing buddies. Six responded. Two wished me luck. Two referred me to prospects. And two gave me engagements.

That was in 1990.

I’ve learned a lot along the way. The most important is this:

  • What you know is significant
  • Who you know is important
  • But the single most critical factor in building a business, a career or a life of joy is who trusts you.

You can do what I did.

I can show you how.

It’s called Marketing Without Money.

Would you like to hear more about that?”

Jerry Fletcher Keynote in ColombiaJerry Fletcher is a beBee ambassador, founder and Grand Poobah of www.BrandBrainTrust.com

His consulting practice, founded in 1990, is known for Trust-based Brand development, Positioning and business development on and off-line. He is also a sought-after International Speaker.

Consulting: www.JerryFletcher.com
Speaking: www.NetworkingNinja.com

Get all the Brand Success Stories. Sign up at http://www.brandbraintrust.com/home.html

 

 

How to Build a Killer Brand

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How to Build a Killer Brand

Heart in sightsIt has been one of those months this week.

Planning. Candid conversations. Decisions to hire and fire. Web site assumptions and dialogues. Quality constraints and requirements. Analytics that spiral positive and those that went down in flames.

Brands suffer the impact because brand building is really not for innocents. Either you really understand marketing or you don’t.

Taking careful aim is at the heart of killer brand development.

What not to do.
Here are some mistakes I witnessed this week:

  1. Put a group of strangers in a room, brief them and expect them to walk out as a functioning collaborative team.
  2. Drop the ball on a project because of bad digital filing habits.
  3. Give a web developer 6 chances to respond to basic direction before deciding to fire him.
  4. Consider video approaches without looking at cost as part of the equation.
  5. Become ecstatic over an increased click through rate that didn’t generate sales.

The Killer Solution

Experience over the last 50 years tells me that to build a brand that captures hearts and minds successfully you have to understand how marketing professionals work in teams and their expectations of management. Clarity is what will make you successful.

Be perfectly clear that :

  • The owner/founder/CEO/President—the leader of any small firm owns the brand. Her or his understanding of the Vision, Mission, Position and Value Proposition is what will be applied to all organization communications.
  • Direction on any major project should be in writing and agreed to in advance. The directional document should be the reference point for approvals. Staff can provide additional information but is encouraged to do it before any work is done. If there is concern over the materials delivered the reference point is the direction.
  • A digital “paper trail” needs to be kept and used as the reference when anything goes sideways (as well as a way to assure continuing process improvement). With small clients I had eliminated my Action Reports on all meetings. I’m reversing that decision.
  • Budget, Quality and Outcome are interrelated. There are significant differences in delivery of digital capabilities, video production, and all communication vehicles based on what a firm is willing to pay, the level of excellence of the work and what the expectations of the item are. Too often, even though we have much better visibility of analytics the end results are not the key factor in evaluating marketing efforts.
  • Business Development objectives are the real measurements. Everything done in marketing needs to acknowledge contribution to the target numbers. Be as concrete as possible. For instance:
  • Optimize web site to make it as easy as possible for visitors to self-select the action which will give you a way to connect with them over the time to build a relationship leading to a “sale.” Track all actions. Track actual “sales” to determine the apparent customer journey.
  • Direct Social Media activities to continually tested landing pages that capture data to build relationships over time. Track actions by landing page. Track “sales” as with web site. Review results and test all contact activities to find the ones that lead to “Sales.”
  • Build better ongoing relationships with customers by monitoring opens, comments and direct contacts due to blog and newsletter postings. Modify content to take advantage of proven highest interest. Keep tracking.
  • Test automated sequences in support of direct sales staff. Monitor results.

Trial to buy ScorecardPost status versus your corporate goals on a scoreboard visible to all members of the firm.

Weekly results usually work best. Keep it simple: New info sign ups, New trials, New customers/clients.

Those few items will keep everyone in the game.

 

Jerry FletcherJerry Fletcher is a beBee ambassador, founder and Grand Poobah of www.BrandBrainTrust.com

His consulting practice, founded in 1990, is known for Trust-based Brand development, Positioning and business development on and off-line. He is also a sought-after International Speaker.

Consulting: www.JerryFletcher.com
Speaking: www.NetworkingNinja.com

Get all the Brand Success Stories. Sign up at http://www.brandbraintrust.com/home.html

Brand is Collaboration

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Brand is collaborationMom’s birthday card to me summed it up perfectly,

Cover: It’s your Birthday and it’s all about you today, so enjoy it.

Inside: Because tomorrow it goes back to being all about me.

Personal brand is a collaboration.

It is all about you…and all those that come into contact with you. Mom’s card, cogent but acerbic is what you have to keep in mind about those personal contacts. She trusted me to see the humor. She trusted me to know she was just joshing because we’ve been collaborating for more years than either of us care to reveal.

A product/service brand is also a collaboration.

It, too, is based on trust.

Brand is the outcome of Trust.

If you own, manage, consult, coach or serve an organization professionally you are part of a collaboration.

To make that collaboration work, you have to trust:

  • Yourself—Overcome that little voice that niggles at you asking you to reconsider or go back to zero or just doubt. Find that part of you that can evaluate an idea, act or gesture based on maintaining the integrity of your mission and commit to sticking to it.
  • Your Staff—These are the people that make things happen for the organization particularly those in direct contact with buyers, clients, customers however you refer to them. Staff makes the personal connection. You all need to be on the same page.
  • Your organization—It doesn’t matter whether it is for profit or not, small, large or somewhere in between. The organization is the part of the equation that can provide the consistency of integrity and honesty that are the hallmark of Trust and a positive Brand.
  • Your clients/customers—In today’s social media world they have a greater capability (and responsibility) to help others see your brand accurately. Their reviews are important. They can make or break you. Make sure you stay up to date on what they are saying about you.

There is one simple way to assure effective collaboration.

Listen.

Listen to what your brand partners have to say.

Listen.

Pay attention to their questions, concerns and problems. Delve into their secret desires and what they think feel and believe.

Practice active listening.

Play what they say back to them. Make sure you heard what they actually said. Too often we proceed based on our own expectations and assumptions.

Collaborate. Your brand will be better for it.

Jerry Fletcher is a beBee ambassador, founder and Grand Poobah of www.BrandBrainTrust.com

Jerry FletcherHis consulting practice, founded in 1990, is known for Trust-based Brand development, Positioning and business development on and off-line. He is also a sought-after International Speaker.

Consulting: www.JerryFletcher.com
Speaking: www.NetworkingNinja.com

Get all the Brand Success Stories. Sign up at http://www.brandbraintrust.com/home.html

 

Brand Building in Bad Times

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Get real!

You know you’re going to have a Brand whether you like it or not.

You know that a certain number of people are not going to like your product or service no matter what you do.

You know that there is a large number of folks that quite frankly don’t give a damn.

Evaluate!

Put your efforts where they will do the most.

Do a customer analysis. Determine their geography, demography and psychography.

In other words:

Geography—Figure out where they come from. This applies whether it is within a few miles of your location, via the internet from anywhere on the globe to specific parts of the city or the country in question. Knowing where your customer lives, works, shops and plays will give you insight into marketing, product development and Brand building opportunities.

Get out of your office and immerse yourself where your customers are. Go there and find out what their lives are like. Get firsthand knowledge of all the factors that make up their brand experience.

Demography—Understand the basic information about your customers specifically: age, gender, sexual orientation, race, income, education, marital status, religion. All of those factors can, in part, control their interaction with your product or service.

For instance, is your gender specific product most frequently purchased by a spouse as a gift? Can your packaging or promotion be changed to make it easier for older folks to read and understand? What if College is not the objective they have in mind for the kids? The more you know the easier it will be to build your brand.

Psychography—That’s just a fancy word for understanding what they think, feel and believe and not only about your product or service. In the USA there are only two major political parties but within them there are divisions which, if they gain ground, could make the country similar to most other democracies where the rule seems to be multiple parties.

The point is not the possibility of multiple parties but rather the clusters of opinions that set factions apart. Can you tell the folks that build your brand exactly what your best customers think, feel and believe? The better picture you can paint of their desires, dreams and desperate cravings, the better you can build your brand. Better still, have your marketing staff or consultants join you when you go visit customers.

Concentrate!

Marketing is best defined in my view as

“Go where the money is. Sell what they want to buy. Do it again.”  
           Jerry Fletcher

Put your marketing and sales efforts where your customers are geographically, demographically and psychographically.

Do you want to sell the farrier or the horse owner? Are you oriented to the soccer mom or the city socialite? Do you want to sell the technology phobic 60 plus business owner or the offspring that will be taking over the business?

You decide. The better you understand your customers the better you’ll be able to build your brand.

Jerry Fletcher, Speaking in olombiaJerry Fletcher is a beBee ambassador, founder and Grand Poobah of www.BrandBrainTrust.com

His consulting practice, founded in 1990, is known for Trust-based Brand development, Positioning and business development on and off-line. He is also a sought-after International Speaker.

Consulting: www.JerryFletcher.com
Speaking: www.NetworkingNinja.com

Get all the Brand Success Stories.
Sign up at http://www.brandbraintrust.com/home.html

Positioning Versus Branding

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The return of:

The Marketing lunch bunch

“So I did a search and all these ads for hotshot designers came up, I said. They equate a logotype with a brand. Has the world gone mad?”

Bubba took a sip of his draft and just chortled. “Ol son,” he said with a tiny southern twang, “Hope springs eternal. The good lord set the task of namin’ things to them as was in the garden and we been tryin’ to do right by him ever since. Those youngins just don’t understand that a brand is about reputation as much as anythin’ else.”

Kate looked over her glasses at him, harrumphed and said, “Reputation is only part of it. It starts with a name, one people can remember and with products or services they want to buy…maybe. But if you treat them badly, if your sales people don’t listen and help them you won’t get a chance to have a reputation.”

Chris added, “And it doesn’t make a bit of difference if it is on line or brick and mortar. Every time we run a test the biggest jump in conversions comes from making it easy to get the information they want in the way they want to get it depending on where they are in the sales cycle. In some cases we know they want to talk to somebody that is knowledgeable right then and there. Even if you don’t get the sale, you need to be helpful because they don’t forget.”

Gail kicked me under the table and said, “Fletch, aren’t you going to say anything about positioning?”

“Okay,’” In my view it all starts with knowing everything you can about possible customers and deciding what your mission is going to be with regard to those customers. Your mission is a touchstone for you and the people that work with you to deliver the product or service. The unique way you present that product or service to prospects, and the world for that matter is your position. If you adhere to those two things, especially if they are in sync, you will build trust. See video here

Trust is at the core of what you offer a potential customer. It is wrapped round by the product, the price, the passage or distribution methods you choose and then wrapped in a name. Yes, people remember the name and the logotype for it. They can remember a personality and associate a lifestyle with that name.

But Brand is not something you decide. It is the sum total of what customers, prospects and others come to believe about you. Your brand is what they think not what you would like it to be.”

Bubba, began clapping and said, “You’re mamma raised no dumb children ol’ son. My job for most of my days has been trying to get clients to understand what their brand really is. You just said a mouthful and the most important part is that Trust is at the core. Everything I do in the way of promotion is to build and maintain that trust.

_____________________________________________________________________

Jerry FletcherWhy a dialog blog?

  • Because I can
  • Because I want to share
  • Because I like to entertain as I convey knowledge
  • Because the characters are conflations of real experts
  • Because it forces me to look at business development through multiple lenses
  • Because many of my former readers are hectoring me about bringing them back…especially Bubba
  • Because it is fun.
  • Because I prefer conversations to commercials. (Yes it is written in American English and one sort of regional dialect. If you don’t understand, ask me. That is the beauty of being on www.beBee.com Let’s connect there.

_____________________________________________________________________

Jerry FletcherJerry Fletcher is a beBee ambassador, founder and Grand Poobah of www.BrandBrainTrust.com

His consulting practice, founded in 1990, is known for Trust-based Brand development, Positioning and business development on and off-line. He is also a sought-after International Speaker.

Consulting: www.JerryFletcher.com
Speaking: www.NetworkingNinja.com

Get all the Brand Success Stories. Sign up at http://www.brandbraintrust.com/home.html

The Skin in the Game is Your Brand

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Success All the e-mail said was, “Being successful developing and commercializing technologies and start-ups is a given or I wouldn’t have contacted you. I appreciate your offer but I don’t do business with people or groups that don’t have skin in the game.”

Skin in the Game according to Investopedia

A term coined by renowned investor Warren Buffett referring to a situation in which high-ranking insiders use their own money to buy stock in the company they are running.

Your Brand is at stake every time.

Every consultant puts skin in the game every time they accept an engagement. If their recommendations fail they will lose Trust with that client and with every one that client tells. The skin they have in the game each time is the lifetime value of their brand. That value is always greater than being allowed to invest in the startup without having legal control.

Value, like Brand, is perceived.

Your value to clients depends on their situation, how much information you can elicit to make a proposal and how strongly you believe in yourself.

Here’s the suggestion that was rejected:

“I’m not a stranger to new products. I stopped counting successful introductions at 207 and that was years ago. I’m willing to invest an hour on Skype to determine how viable I think the product is. But, full disclosure, I’m too busy on paid retainers to take on any additional work without getting paid for it. If I believe your product has the positive value that Digimarc had (I named the company) I will give you the same deal I gave them, a monthly retainer plus a stock bonus. Call or e-mail if you want to take the next step.” 

Skin in the game is a two-way street.

In my experience, the proposition is always essentially the same: Give the start-up the benefit of your time, knowledge and wisdom for a percentage of the company in the future. In other words, we want all your value for as long as it takes but we don’t want to pay for it and, oh yes, you’ll have no say in how the company operates.

Does that sound fair and balanced to you?

Without candor there is no trust

In a conversation with any entrepreneur or start-up if they do not believe in their offering it will show. If they are not cognizant of a marketing problem I may be able to help merely by pointing it out. Should they have been short-sighted about how the company will be run as it moves into the future I may be able to suggest both interim and long term solutions. My initial conversations with start-ups are based on both of us being truthful with each other with the objective of making them successful.

The skin in the game is your brand… and theirs.

Your Brand has established value or they wouldn’t be talking to you. Theirs has little or none. In my view the fees for services is a negotiation.

They need to build a business. You need to be paid.

How you get paid is another matter. If you believe in your brand you should be able to determine the value of your services to the prospect and be paid at that level via any combination of cash, stock or ownership you can agree on.

What say you?

Jerry Fletcher Keynote in ColombiaJerry Fletcher is a beBee ambassador, founder and Grand Poobah of www.BrandBrainTrust.com

His consulting practice, founded in 1990, is known for Trust-based Brand development, Positioning and business development on and off-line. He is also a sought-after International Speaker.

Consulting: www.JerryFletcher.com
Speaking: www.NetworkingNinja.com

Get all the Brand Success Stories. Sign up at http://www.brandbraintrust.com/home.html

 

 

 

Brand Clarity. Say What?

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Business card Brand Clarity

Pull one out

Reach into your pocket or your purse or that fancy carrying case and pull one out. That’s right, get one of your business cards in hand.

If you don’t have one, that is your first mistake.

I’ve heard every argument you can imagine from the adherents of the digital world about why those little bits of pasteboard are obsolete. But when confronted with the need for their people to network to build the business even one of the largest companies in that sphere relented and allowed two divisions to have business cards.

Your business card is the most basic item in your brand development toolbox.   

It must answer the contact questions, sure, but look at what else you can glean from one:

  • The company name may be well known, memorable or ho hum
  • The logotype may tell you if the company or individual is inspired or insipid
  • The title will tell you whether the person or organization is imaginative or ordinary
  • The weight of the paper can influence your perception of how strong the business is.
  • The colors will indicate how approachable they are
  • The address, if you know the area, may tell you how solvent they are
  • The positioning/tag line should tell you what they do, how they are unique, and who their product or service is for

A business card can touch three senses:

Sight is the most obvious

Touch is not considered as often but

  • The weight of the paper can make a significant difference in how the person or organization is perceived.
  • The slickness of the card can be interpreted as a level of sophistication
  • Raised ink, once considered high quality is now seldom felt

Smell is used very infrequently. Women in fashion have been the primary users in my experience.

Look at your card. How clearly is your brand represented?

  1. How would you describe the name? If you are the entrepreneur/founder/owner of the business? Does it have your name in the company name? Does it include a generic descriptor? (Dot’s Bookkeeping, Feingold Financial Planning, Maxfield Marketing Counsel).
  2. Look at the design. Is the logo professionally designed? Is it an original based on your company’s information? Too often people go for the low-cost on-line option and wind up with a design that has been sold over and over printed on low-cost stock that is used for high print runs. Does it reflect your company? Does the perception provided the prospect meet their expectations?
  3. Study the positioning/tagline. Is it the same one used in other marketing materials? Are you comfortable with it? Does it naturally lead to conversations about you, the company and the products/services you offer? If you were a prospect would it separate you from your competitors?

How clear is your business card about your brand? What say you?

Jerry Fletcher Keynote in ColombiaJerry Fletcher is a beBee ambassador, founder and Grand Poobah of www.BrandBrainTrust.com

His consulting practice, founded in 1990, is known for Trust-based Brand development, Positioning and business development on and off-line. He is also a sought-after International Speaker.

Consulting: www.JerryFletcher.com
Speaking: www.NetworkingNinja.com

Get all the Brand Success Stories. Sign up at http://www.brandbraintrust.com/home.html

 

Three Scary Brand Questions

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I told them I was going to make them uncomfortable.

# Scary Brand QuestionsA client asked me to speak to the students in the college level class he is teaching. He asked that I give them some basics about brand which they will be able to apply to change viewpoints about themselves and the departments they lead. These are guys and gals that want to become CIOs.

My advice came from these three questions:

  1. Who are you?
  2. What do you do?
  3. Why should I care?

I’ll bet answers don’t flow swiftly off your tongue.

That’s because we don’t think this way. Take the first question. Most of us begin with our name. Some go on to tell you their title and the organization they work in. Others tell you where they were born or grew up. Ex-military usually say so. Each of us answers differently and in doing so reveal a great deal about our personalities. Often, if people just wait you’ll reveal occurrences in your child hood that changed you for life.

You can’t hear what you are saying.

Yes, you may be able to repeat the words. But what is the meaning hidden within? Why was that event in your childhood so important for the person you are now? What do the decisions you discussed have to do with how you are seen now?  Why did you reveal these things? How are you hoping the information will be used?

The trick is to have someone tell you what you told them.

Suddenly, you will see yourself as others see you. That is what Personal Brand is all about.

You are not an “elevator speech.”

What you do is not who you are.  In North America, “What do you do?” is the most asked question. Unlike other parts of the world we tend to equate the two. www.beBee.com may help you cure yourself of this.

Conversation or Commercial?

Major corporations hire me to teach their executives how to Network. All of them assume I’m going to teach some form of Elevator pitch. I don’t. Wouldn’t you rather have a conversation than have someone blurt a commercial at you? 30-Second Marketing makes you more memorable, builds trust in you and lets you know when you should ask, “What do you do?”

I used to answer: “I build websites that make rain.”

So what?

That is the question my sales mentor asked me. You’d do your pitch and he’d say” So What? Why is that important to the customer?”

I responded, “You know how since your niece or nephew went off to college you can’t change your web site? What we do is build you a site that you can change words and pictures on as much as you like. And we’ll be sure you can’t screw up the navigation.”

Good Question.

“Why should I care?” makes it easy to picture a prospect thinking that. Usually manners keep them from actually saying it.  But they think it…just like you do when someone obviously doesn’t understand your interest (or lack of it). Next time you begin to list features and benefits, Stop. Ask, as if you were them, “Why should I care?”

When it comes to Brand you’ve got to speak in their terms, not yours.

Get Scary.

Partner up with a friend. Answer the three questions. Give each other honest feedback. Notice how your brand becomes easier to understand for you as well as your friend, not to mention prospects, clients/customers and colleagues.

Jerry Fletcher is a beBee Ambassador and founder/Grand Poobah of www.BrandBrainTrust.com

His consulting practice, founded in 1990, is known for Brand development, Positioning and business development on and off-line. He is also a sought-after International Speaker.

Consulting: www.JerryFletcher.com
Speaking: www.NetworkingNinja.com

Get all the Brand Success Stories. Sign up at http://www.brandbraintrust.com/home.html

 

 

Brand is a Choice

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Brand is CVhoiceEver take part in an on-line group?

You can call it a hive or a chat group, a fan page or even a mastermind. It all comes down to the same thing: somebody is trying to get traction for an idea or viewpoint.

You made a choice.

Why? What connected with you to cause you to sign up or opt in or get involved?

Often we join in because we’ve been wooed by profits raining down or we’ll get access or influence we might never enjoy on our own. We decide to get involved and then we rationalize.

Emotions control us more than we think.

For your brand, what you think, feel and believe are not important.

Don’t let emotion control how you brand yourself, your business and your products.

Why your customer selects your offering is the single most important consideration. Their choice is what defines your brand.

You have to get them to accept your view or idea before they will buy. Sometimes that takes a while. You have to be less of a funnel and more of a colleague.

Incorporate these 3 special marketing tips in your approach:

  • Make it easy for folks to understand. Give them resources that head where you are trying to get them to go. Use games and incentives to keep them interested. Let them add things that will help others come along.
  • Use your influence in this group and others to crank up the energy. Start a feedback loop with all the social networks available to you.
  • Get endorsed. Ask for good reviews. Have the contacts in group ask their friends and colleagues to help put your group over the top.

It works. Here’s an example:

Liam Austin, the founder of Small Today started a LinkedIn group in 2008.

Today, with over 100,000 members, it is the second largest group for small business owners on the platform.

A year ago Liam realized the group hadn’t yet seen its full potential.

Liam and his team created the LinkedIn Success Summit to give small business owners a chance to listen and learn from the very best. The experts and influencers that most of us wouldn’t have the chance to question and learn from otherwise.

Small Today followed with a summit on e-mail and another on Instagram. Each summit generated over 30 hours of video training and an Action Guide that includes a short summary with key-takeaways from each session.

After recognizing that “the money is in the list” Liam started to build his own email list.  He grew his list by 48,000 people in 8 months.

The original subscription for Small Today was $27/month. Today it is $70/month.

Do the math.

Jerry Fletcher is the founder and Grand Poobah of www.BrandBrainTrust.com

Jerry Fletcher, Speaking in olombiaHis consulting practice, founded in 1990, is known for Brand development, Positioning and business development on and off-line. He is also a sought-after International Speaker.

Consulting: www.JerryFletcher.com
Speaking: www.NetworkingNinja.com

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