Category: Uncategorized

Unleash the Potential of Word-of-mouth marketing (WOM)

Posted on by Harm Stratman

Today’s discussion will revolve around the potential of word-of-mouth marketing (WOM), incorporating a six-step strategy for success and over 30 distinct methods to boost your WOM marketing efforts. So, let’s dive in!

Here are the six key steps to maximize the potential of word-of-mouth marketing (WOM):

  1. Comprehend your customers’ values and priorities, which will provide insight into why they might be interested in your Product/Services .
  2. Gain knowledge about different consumer types: innovators, early adopters, early majority, late majority, and laggards.
  3. Determine the necessary decision stages for the adoption of your Product/Services .
  4. Utilize the insights gained in steps 2 and 3 to identify the effective choice of words and word-of-mouth strategies using the Decision Maker Matrix (we’ll explain this shortly).
  5. Amass the resources required to maximize the impact of your word-of-mouth marketing (WOM).
  6. Design and implement your word-of-mouth marketing (WOM) campaign.

The Decision Maker Matrix is an insightful tool, developed by George Silverman after years of experimentation. It primarily maps out various concerns you might face when dealing with different types of consumers and formulating a decision process for each one.

Now, let’s explore the 30+ strategies to maximize the potential of word-of-mouth marketing (WOM):

Rely on Experts

Experts come in various forms, and their insights should be integral to your WOM marketing campaign. Some potential expert sources of information include:

  • Customers
  • Suppliers
  • Subject Matter Experts
  • Sales teams
  • Expert roundtables
  • Expert sales groups

Seminars, Workshops & Presentations

Such venues present excellent opportunities to gain insights. Attendees at these events are usually open to providing feedback, enabling you to collect valuable information. Some potential events include:

  • Guest speaker programs
  • Seminars
  • Webinars
  • Group sales events
  • Dinner meetings
  • Peer sales groups
  • Expert panel video conferences
  • Trade show events

Referral Selling

As discussed previously, a referral program can support business growth in numerous ways. By employing the following strategies, you can uncover the key actions required to generate positive word-of-mouth:

  • Testimonials
  • Networking
  • Referral Selling Program

Emerging Media Platforms

The idea of “emerging” media platforms involves using new and rising media sources to spread the word about your Product/Services  and services while actively listening for feedback. Most social media platforms fall into this category:

  • Facebook and its associated tools
  • TikTok
  • Instagram
  • YouTube
  • WhatsApp
  • And numerous others

Utilizing Traditional Media for Word of Mouth Marketing

Traditional media is a powerful platform to gather feedback. These channels remain mainstream methods of communication with the public and customers. Some examples of traditional media outlets include:

  • Customer service
  • Public Relations
  • Placements
  • Events
  • Promotions
  • Word of mouth via ads, sales brochures, or direct mail
  • Salesperson initiatives, star sales teams, or peer training
  • Word-of-mouth incentive programs (“Refer-a-friend” programs)
  • Customer gifts that can be shared with their friends (articles, how-to manuals)

Internal Word of Mouth

  • Foster word-of-mouth communication and feedback sharing among employees, friends, and family
  • Provide incentives or commissions for successful word-of-mouth marketing (WOM)

As evident, there is an array of strategies to enhance your positive word-of-mouth marketing (WOM) efforts. If you require assistance with any of these aspects, don’t hesitate to try our FREE test drive to access exclusive resources that can help you put this whole thing together.

Call me and I will show you how to be more successful without breaking the bank!

Have a great day!

Harm Stratman

704 737 3785

Fadeaway and get Results

Posted on by Harm Stratman

Fadeaway, as a result.

We’re going to go through the 5 essential keys to a successful and reusable marketing campaign launch. Once you have these basics down, you can use them over and over again.

The 5 essential keys are:

  • Define your Unique Selling Proposition (USP)
  • Put an effective sales offer to work.
  • Avoid the marketing pitfalls.
  • Use a world-class marketing perspective.
  • Get results!

We’ll go through each of these, so you can see exactly how to use them and how they all affect the overall outcome of your marketing campaign.

Define your Unique Selling Proposition (USP)

Take the time to ask yourself some questions from the perspective of the customers/clients. What would it take to get your attention? What needs do you have that need to be met? What are the promises you want to be fulfilled?

Once you know the answers to these questions, you can start creating a plan to meet these needs. Then take a look at what USP your competitors are using to help you develop your own USP. Your USP is what you are “promising” your customers/clients. This is what’s going to set you apart from your competition.

 

Put an effective sales offer to work

To develop an effective sales plan, you need to:

  1. Put together a headline that gets immediate attention.
  2. Share benefits of your products/services speaking from the customers’ perspective.
  3. Identify the specific needs met by your products/services.
  4. Make it easy to do business with you by offer guarantees.
  5. Share your specific sales proposition.
  6. Walk your customers/clients through how they should respond and act.
  7. Motivate with a call to action.

This all means that you need to put together what makes your products/services special and compel customers to buy. If they don’t feel like they NEED your product, they won’t buy it. You need to answer a question, solve a problem or feed an obsession.

You need to provide them with all the information they need to make an informed and confident decision. Buyer’s remorse is one of the worst things that can happen.

 

Avoid the marketing pitfalls.

There are 5 major marketing pitfalls many businesses fall into, and you should avoid:

  • Ignore market testing and push on with an inaccurate plan.
  • Offer an incomplete case, or reasons, throughout their marketing plan.
  • Overlook the needs of their prospective customers/clients.
  • Fail to diversify their marketing options.
  • Fail to get market opinions on their offers.

These are all areas to avoid. If you’ve been working through these lessons, avoiding these pitfalls should be easy and natural.

Use a world-class marketing perspective.

A world-Class marketing perspective is important, especially if you want to attract customers/clients from all over the world. You can do this with some different techniques and activities:

  1. Keep a marketing journal and scribble down anything innovative you see.
  2. Keep encouraging your marketing department, or yourself, to try new things and dump the ones that aren’t working.
  3. Order from your own company under a different name and analyze the process of ordering, shipping, online store, customer service, and the product itself. This will show you where the areas for improvement in the customer experience.
  4. Read every quality ad you can find and keep a file for future ideas to consider.
  5. When out in public, watch how consumers behave in different situations and how they consider their purchases.
  6. Step down a notch or two and work on the front lines with your sales and customer service staff.
  7. Continuously acknowledge your staff, vendors, and customers. Everyone works and shops better when they feel appreciated.
  8. Always listen to feedback from employees and customers.
  9. Continuously test markets, ads, and marketing techniques. This is the only way to stay successful and know what’s working and, more importantly, what’s not.
  10. Offer more information in your marketing than anyone else. The more information you offer, the more products/services you’ll sell.
  11. A great marketing plan can only get better. Continue to fine-tune and refine your marketing plan based on testing results and feedback.
  12. Be classy in your marketing. Make sure your marketing and advertising fit your company image, products/service, and quality.
  13. Improve your best marketing areas and drop those that aren’t working.
  14. Focus on what you say, not how you say it. The best marketing ideas turn into the best marketing naturally.
  15. Develop all your ads, campaigns, and sales materials with attention to compelling and factual information.

By using these techniques, you can put your name out there to the world and become one of the top brands in your industry.

 

Get results!

The last area we are going to talk about is the best-satisfied customers. If your customers aren’t satisfied, you’ve wasted all your marketing resources and all chance of positive word-of-mouth advertising. You can satisfy your customers by:

  • Providing quality products/services
  • Providing high-quality customer service
  • Providing a low-pressure, highly informative sales experience
  • Taking all the risk away with a great guarantee

 

To generate more business, there are a couple of simple techniques that work every time:

  • Build your database with a contest.
  • Do regular mailings with sales, discounts, or other incentives.
  • Find other creative ways to keep your current customers coming back for more.

 

“As long as the reward is directly related to your product or service, you can’t lose. Why not get started today? It’s so simple, it’s so seldom done, and it’s so profitable. And that’s the bottom line.” Jay Abraham

It is so simple! So, why aren’t you starting today? We can help you put together a great marketing plan that will get you results. Try our FREE test drive and find the tools and resources you need and used by some of the biggest names in the marketing world.

 PR Equals Free Publicity

Posted on by Harm Stratman
  There are three principal areas of public relations you can use to boost your advertising results ten-fold over your paid advertising. The key to public relations lies in:
  • Public relation or publicity
  • Merchandising
  • Promotions
 With a solid plan in place that encompasses all these areas, you’ll have a great approach to use public relations in the best way possible.  Public relations include all that is the media. Don’t limit yourself. The attention of newspapers, television, radio, magazines, bloggers, ezines and more is equally powerful. Online marketing is as, if not more, important as conventional media. Here are the steps to get noticed by the media:
  1. Put together a press release for your company. The press release should be relevant to your target market and address consumer interest, not just announce your business.
  2. Compact your press release to include one hook and one angle. Choose the most attention-getting to make sure the media person you are sending it to is interested in reading it.
  3. Put your press release in professional formatting. With press releases, you need a dateline, the most crucial information at the top, facts, figures and wrap it up with contact details, including who and how. Print the press release on your letterhead.
  4. Send your press release to all television and radio stations, local and metro newspapers, national newspapers, industry magazines, and any other form of media that reaches your target market. Don’t forget to include relevant blogs, ezines, press release submission sites, and industry professionals.
More importantly than a perfect press release is to make sure you have addressed the needs of your target market in the products/services you offer and make that clear in the press release. If you provide people a solution to a problem, a way to avoid a problem, and an opportunity to enhance their lives, the media and public will be interested. If you have a connection (or the ability to get a connection) with a celebrity, this can practically guarantee you’ll get attention. Make sure you are offered newsworthy information and then follow up with media outlets to make sure they are publicizing that information. “One of the most powerful techniques every business should use is free publicity. As the name implies, there is no cost, just the time and effort required to attract attention to your business.” Jay Abraham Our FREE test drive can show you how to put together press releases that work! Check out how the pros do it and craft the perfect press releases for your business.