Marketing Archives - Write Approach Marketing

What do people want?

It’s the age old question isn’t it? What do people want?

It can’t be summarised in any two word sentence or buzz phrase unfortunately. You’d like to hope ‘World Peace’ would be up there, but hey, even that is not for everyone. Sadly.

The truth is, if we want to start our expedition into the territories of what people want, it’s going to take a bit of time and some good tools. Pack a bag. We’re in for a hell of a trip.

Which people?

If we’re delving down into what people want, we’d better narrow down who we’re talking about. There are a lot of people out there and they all want different things.

So, who do we choose? Or maybe a better way to think of it is, who chooses us? If we have a message to get out, we have to know who it it IS and ISN’T for. It’s not for everyone, that’s for sure. There are always going to be people who aren’t picking up what you’re putting down. And that’s OK. Everyone is different.

A great place to start is with your existing ‘best’ customer. You know the one. They LOVE your work. They talk about you to ALL their friends. They come back to you time and time again. And if they’re like my best customer, they pay their invoices on time. (And as your ‘super’ customer, you make sure you know how much they you value them. Right? Great!)

“But, woah up there,” I hear you say. “Aren’t we talking about new customers? You’re talking about one I already have.

Well, yes. And no.

Build your ‘dream customer’

The dream client/customer you already have is a great way to work out how to reach the others that are like them.

Your existing customers give you great insight into potential new ones. You already know how they like to operate, you know (or can find out) how they found you. You may even have had some in depth conversations with them about the things that matter to them. They may have shared some concerns with you. All this helps build your knowledge of who they are. Knowing who they are helps us understand what they want.

Demographics vs. Psychographics

Knowing our customer demography (age, gender, religion, ethnicity etc) gives us a small piece of the puzzle. Psychographics give us deeper insight. These allow us to see our customer’s WHY. (And we all know how important our WHY is, right?)

When we know our client/customer’s values, beliefs, behaviours and culture, we can better understand WHO they are.

If this still seems a bit vague, let’s get specific and talk about an old friend, Jolene.

Demographics	Psycho-graphics	Psycho-graphic Type
Female	Outgoing, cheeky	Personality
Aged 20-25	Doesn’t care what people think	Opinion
Red Hair	Believes flirting is harmless	Beliefs
Single	Loves getting her nails done	Interests
School Drop Out	Sneaks extra cigarette breaks	Behaviour
Bank Clerk	Loves Country Music	Passions

We know a lot more about Jolene by adding her psycho-graphic traits into the mix, than by merely understanding her demographic ones.

From these traits, we can make some assertions about what Jolene wants. It may well be way more than that she wants a man. She may want affection, belonging, control or fun. She might value health, good looks and luxury. She may desire power, romance or even revenge. (Maybe she had her eyes on Dolly’s man WAY before Dolly even knew him. )

The example may be a little wild, but the key thing is starting to understand what goes on for our customers and clients that makes them tick.

Meeting people’s needs

Once we can see the kind of people our customers really are, we can begin to understand what it is that drives them. From here it’s our opportunity – and some might say responsibility – as ethical business people and marketers to help our customers achieve what they want.

If we come to understand what matters to our ‘dream customer’ (and yeah, I know Jolene may not be IT for you), then our goal as marketers is making our customer’s dreams come true. If being skinny is what matters to your customer, understanding that it stems from longing to be accepted may change our stance on how we communicate to them.

A customer’s desire to have the most unique birthday cake for their child may be based on a desire to show or maintain perceived status amongst their friends or to feel that they have done a good job as a parent. A customer’s desire to start saving money might be because they want to buy a house – or it could be that they are looking for security, a sense of control, peace of mind or respect.

If we choose to see our customers as human beings with hearts and emotions, rather than a set of statistics, we’ll get to the heart of what people REALLY want. If we can fathom that, then the way we communicate to our customers is much more nuanced, more human and more caring.

This is marketing we can be proud of.

Better marketing – first things first!

Ignore the ghost of marketing past

If we want to do better marketing – marketing we can be proud of – first we have to recognise what it is, and what it isn’t.

In the past we’ve been led to believe that our marketing has to reach the maximum number of people. They’ll just have to see what we’re offering so that they’ll take it. If we tell (or sell) them enough features or benefits, they are bound to snap it up, right?

For some people, that’s true… it will be right for them and they may relate and sign up or purchase what we’re offering. That’s normally a pretty small number if we’re mass marketing though, because we’re yelling our message out at a whole lot of people who aren’t ‘our’ people. The effort (and expense) is wasted, and actually rather annoying, making people even less likely to engage with us in the future.

We can do better marketing than interrupting people when they are watching their favourite TV show. — The way we were: outdated, interruption style marketing.

I first studied marketing more than twenty years ago. The “Four Ps” – Product, Price, Promotion and Place – were everything. If those things were ticked off on our ‘marketing plan’ then we were sorted. We shoved our message in front of as many people as we could and hoped that if we annoyed enough people our sales and (more recently) our click-through rates would cover a multitude of sins.

We’re not in Kansas anymore, Toto

Fortunately, in the era of technology and innovation we’re in, we don’t have to operate that way. With the resources we have, we are able to put our message in front of people we want to see it. More importantly, we can (and should) put it in front of the people who choose to see it.

If we continue to pursue the narrow definition of marketing we had in the past, we are relegating ourselves to the definition of crazy. You know the one “if we keep doing what we’re doing, we’ll keep getting what we’ve been getting”. Changing the flavour (or the tactic) used to annoy someone – no matter how new and shiny it is – will still annoy them. We’ll continue to be frustrated by our lack of results and have to live with marketing that we’re not proud of.

Marketing changes when we come to the realisation that we are here to serve others and to help them solve their problem (whatever that may be). To do that, we must know who they are, where to find them and then have their engagement and permission.

If we re-frame marketing starting with why we’re doing what we’re doing, it gives us a compass for what we do and how we do it. “Why am I providing the service that I am? Why am I selling what I’m selling?” What is it that truly drives you, gets you out of bed in the morning, or gets you the most fired up*?

If we know our ‘why’ and can define our ‘who’ then perhaps the new marketing mix starts with ‘Purpose’ followed closely by ‘People’ and what they give to us: ‘Permission’.

What’s it all about, Alfie?

Your purpose is to make an impact, you’re seeking to make change happen. It might be behavioural change (educating people to use less plastic, for example), it could be introducing a financial literacy curriculum into schools, or even changing the way a group interacts. That change might seem insignificant or it might be (literally) world changing, how big the change is doesn’t matter. Marketing is how that change can come about.

Marketing is the act of making change happen.
Seth Godin

If we want to do work we’re proud of, we have to understand the change we seek to make and find the people who want to take the journey with us.

Why, why, why…

If we really want to get back to ‘first things first’ then it’s about finding our reason why.

Before we can even start to think about marketing plans and reading the latest ‘how-to’ guides and getting our heads around what the next ‘quick fix’ of marketing is, we really have to understand the true reason we’re doing what we’re doing.

What is the change that you are seeking to make? Who can you help?

Helping passionate small business owners understand how to reach the people who need them and supporting those business owners to do better, more meaningful, ethical and welcome marketing, is mine.

What’s yours?

Write it down somewhere. Stick it up on your wall next to where you work. And please, if you would, let me know what it is – either here or on my Facebook page.

I’d love to know how I might support you to share your why.

*Simon Sinek explains this beautifully and simply in his “Starts with Why” TED Talk

12 months on

"This is marketing" bestselling book by Seth Godin — Seth Godin’s bestselling book, “THIS IS MARKETING” which was compiled based on the seminar I participated in. Feel so grateful to have been a part of it.

12 months ago, I commenced Seth Godin’s “The Marketing Seminar” and 120 or so days later, I finished it.

Except, that I didn’t really finish it… Getting to the end of the supplied content was somewhat aptly called ‘Commencement’ and there’s a good reason for that. It was just the beginning.

It was the start of me seeing things very differently. The most important thing for me to rediscover at the time was that marketing doesn’t have to suck the enthusiasm and life force out of you just to ‘make a buck’, and for me making a buck comes secondary to doing stuff that matters.

It doesn’t have to suck to make a buck.
Heather Smith

Although marketing is how I earn my living I felt like earning it was draining me of my will to live (metaphorically speaking, of course). Each day I felt less and less motivated to do it. I felt fake, insincere, and like I was doing things I really didn’t believe in (because, let’s face it, I probably was). My nasty inner voice kept saying to me “who am I to be telling people how to do this stuff “.

If people want to know, how can I NOT tell them?

The Marketing Seminar changed all that. I had several ‘ah ha’ moments during the seminar, one of which was about the true value of empathy (I’ll talk more on this another day – it’s several topics unto itself). The other most valuable insight was that I was doing people a disservice by NOT sharing what I know, and that by helping people do better marketing I can help them achieve their dreams. I’m not talking about airy fairy ‘buy more shit to fill up my house’ dreams. I mean the kind of dreams that change the world (even on a small scale) or even the kind of dreams that allow you to do your really fulfilling work for the people who need what you’re offering.

That nasty inner voice of mine is wrong, I’m the perfect person to share what I know with others who want to see their change happen. Not because I’m better than anyone else but because I want to help them know what I know. Finding out WHO you need to reach, what matters to those people and sharing your story with them is the way to see change happen.

And that is what marketing really is.

And I can help with that…

The only thing worse than starting something and failing, is not starting it in the first place.
Seth Godin

12 months on is better than never

So, it’s been 12 months since I did ‘The Marketing Seminar’ and this is where it starts, where the rubber hits the road. This is the first of (I hope) 52 blog posts for the year (and email communications if you’re on my email list) because it’s time for me (albeit 12 months late) to make a start on helping you reach the people you seek to serve.

But wait, there’s more…

Like the six free steak knives you never knew you needed, I’ve also got something to offer… I have a spare copy of “This is Marketing” by Seth Godin and I don’t need two of them.

Head on over to my Facebook page and tell me (in a comment on the post for this article) what your biggest frustration is with your marketing. I’ll post my spare copy to the person who I think it can help the most.

No comments to show.

Damage control

There’s a lot of damage control going on lately. Cambridge Analytica blames the media as they move towards bankruptcy.

Closer to home, AMP Limited is likely wishing they’d never heard of the Banking Royal Commission, whilst Executives ‘remove themselves’ from the scene.

Whether proven ‘guilty’ or not, the damage is done.

Damage to those businesses, but also to something I consider much greater.

Damage to trust.

It’s a long road back once trust is lost.

So, how can we ensure that we don’t end up losing trust?

Empathy.

Seeing the other side

If we put ourselves in someone else’s shoes, we view things from their position, it’s different. It’s perspective. It’s enlightening.

When we lose sight of how the people around us view things, that’s when things can get really tricky. We risk becoming insular. We take the risk that we only have input from our own (often limited) worldview. We can learn plenty from those around us.

Imagine being a customer of one of those big entities now – perhaps you are one – how does it feel?

I imagine I’d be angry (class action kind of angry, perhaps)…

And on the other side of the coin, imagine participating in a meeting, office cram packed with staff, and being the one brave enough to put your hand up in front of all these people and say:

“Actually, no… We can’t do this to our customers – we can’t charge for stuff we don’t do, we have to find a better way to deal with it. Let’s stop charging them fees and let’s help them deal with this change in circumstances. Our integrity is on the line here…”

That sounds simple enough, but tough to do. It’s tough to have the courage to stand up to your peers and supervisors (over and over again).

That’s the person I want working for me though.

That’s probably the person that your customers want working for them too. The person who can see things from their point of view, who has empathy for their situation.

Taking the time to do this, working ethically, considering others, communicating even when it’s uncomfortable, building relationships that are valued, is hard work.

Building trust is hard work.

Losing it takes a lot less effort, so much so that it can happen without us even noticing.

The building of trust

To future proof our business, to protect our customers (who are, let’s face it, the reason we can be in business) we have to be deliberate about acting with integrity. Our marketing is an essential part of this. If we offer a service, that’s what we have to do. If things go wrong with those plans, we must be accountable for them and communicate openly and honestly. How would OUR customers feel if they were paying for a service they didn’t get…

We may be on a smaller scale than those in the news, but we are not so different as we might think. We face similar challenges, risks and everyday things that can go wrong, and it’s our choice to behave in a way that is deserving of our customer’s trust.

If we want to build a resilient business that serves our clients/customers and has them as its focus, it’s time to start damage control now.

Damage control starts at Day 1 by showing up and being worthy of trust, and it goes on every day until it’s natural.

Go, be inspired. And inspiring…

Heather x