Clarity Digital Marketing Dallas Fort Worth

Experts in Defining Your Digital Marketing Strategy

Brad Besancon

Do You Define Yourself or Company Brand on a Daily Basis?

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If Your Personal or Company Brand Is Not Clearly Defined, It May Get Hijacked

Transcript

Robert: If you don’t tell your own story, someone else will tell it for you.

Brad: Absolutely.

Robert: If something is happening around your company and you’re not out there, your competitor, an upset customer, they will tell that story for you.

Brad: One crisis.

Robert: Right. If you do not define yourself, if you haven’t defined yourself in the bio, the description on your webpage, all your social media, somebody is going to define you in the terms that you do not like.

Brad: And it’s a daily thing or a weekly thing for companies out there in the digital world. You say it all the time. Be your own publisher. Be your own – pump out good quality content. What does that mean? Well, that’s back to audience speak and understanding all that. We’ve talked to that ad nauseam.

But you’ve always said – we’ve had a couple of clients where there has been a midlevel crisis I would say because of a couple of complaints.

Robert: Yeah.

Brad: What are some of the things that happened that we had to spend six months fixing it?

Robert: Well, they sat with the lawyers for days. Days, twiddling thumbs. You cannot do that. Literally, it’s seconds. There are precious seconds or you’ve lost it. It has gone away on you. You have to immediately show that you are what – you’re aware of the problem. You’re dealing with the problem. You don’t have to take a stance about the problem necessarily. But you better show people that hey, we’re on it.

Brad: You got to have a plan.

Robert: Right.

Brad: Right? The bottom line is in – United Airlines.

Robert: Yes.

Brad: In a matter of seconds, literally seconds, maybe minutes on the high end, their reputation was destroyed when that gentleman was taken off the plane.

Robert: Well, I mean here’s what every company, anybody in business needs to know and they need to – they need to school their – all of their employees on it. You’re always on camera now. You’re on – it is –

Brad: Every action.

Robert: Every action you take is being scrutinized by someone who has got their cell phone out. It’s going to be on social. It’s going to be – you need this awareness that you are always on. You’re always subject to being criticized, evaluated and hey, sometimes, good things happen and people put them off as well.

Brad: And guess who else has got that camera. Your competitors and that’s the whole key of the discussion is putting yourself out of business before they do.

Robert: Yeah.

Brad: So have those conversations.

Robert: Oh, and, you know – hey listen. If I’m a guerilla marketer and my competitor, like a United, that happens, oh, I’m going to get out there on the backend of the dark web and everything else.

Brad: Yeah.

Robert: And I’m going to really –

Brad: Lots of stories.

Robert: Yes. I’m going to really boost that.

Brad: Lots of stories.

Robert: I’m really going to help it.

Brad: Yeah.

Robert: Yeah. So there are a lot of people that are better than the Russians at this.

Brad: Yeah. And they do it every day.

Robert: Yeah, yeah.

[End of transcript]

Debunking The Rule of 7 Impressions

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Is the Rule of Seven in Marketing Outdated in the Digital Age?

One of marketing’s oldest concepts is the rule of seven. It states that a prospective buyer needs to hear or see the marketing message at least seven times before they buy it from you.

Brad and Robert explore that rule today.

Transcript

Robert: Hello. I’m Robert. This is Brad and we’re here today with Clarity to debunk the “rule of 7”. That you got to have seven impressions before somebody will buy something. What’s wrong with that in the digital age?

Brad: Yeah. I don’t know if there’s anything wrong with it. But there has been a lot of talk recently. A Forbes article really highlighted what’s really critical in today’s kind of marketing world, if you will, with the consumers.

You know, and one of the key things they said was is that only about three percent of your clientele or your particular audience, that we always like to say, is ready to buy. So why are we hounding and hounding and hounding and hounding all these people? I mean I think at some point, you do have to reach a large audience. So you have to have reach and impressions. But how much benefits are you actually getting?

We always get told ROI, ROI, ROI. So you have to think about that. One of the things the article highlighted, which is what we’ve been saying for a while, is with product or your brand, you have to kind of create a journey through that sales funnel, right?

Robert: Yes.

Brad: Old school sales funnel and that experience and that journey with your product or your service, by basically just becoming a resource for them, information on how to use the product, things that are associated with your product or service, it doesn’t necessarily – it’s about your product or service.

Robert: Well, give your current customers and your prospects helpful, useful information to solve the simple pain points in their life and then –

Brad: Everyday things.

Robert: If you build their trust, then you might get that call. They might become –

Brad: Yeah. I think the key is, is that building that trust will eventually – you have to – the bottom line is you have to connect at a different level and just come buy my product and we can solve the problem A, right? You have to also be B, C, D, E and F nowadays because the consumer is education, you know.

Me and you were talking earlier about a headset. You know, Robert bought a headset. He didn’t just go buy a headset anymore because somebody says, “Hey, this is a good headset.” He goes and reads reviews. He goes on price checks. He goes and checks on products, service.

Robert: Yes.

Brad: Maybe even a warranty or whatever. So it’s an educated customer. So you have to play a different role.

Robert: And then after I had it, one of my friends called me and said, “You know, I really need a headset like yours. I drive a lot and all. What do you have? Will you send me a link?”

Brad: Link. Yeah.

Robert: Send a link to Amazon. And you know what? He bought it. He looked at comparisons. His friend had suggested it. That’s how digital has done the paradigm shift.

Brad: Yeah, it’s all in the palm of your hands that we’ve always talked about. It’s mobile, mobile, mobile. It’s right here now.

Robert: But talk to them about the – well, first off, I like what you say. You talked about you got to make the connection where.

Brad: Yeah. It has got –

Robert: In the heart.

Brad: It can’t just be in the pocketbook anymore. You can’t just sell on features and benefits and say, “Well, this is a great product and this is a great price.”

It has got to be – you’ve got to hit them here. I recently bought a new set of golf clubs. Not new. They were used. But one of the things that always comes up with golfers and any kind – anybody that has a hobby, whether it’s bike riding, mountain bike riding, golfing, camping, appearance is important, right?

Robert: Oh, yeah. You like the look of the club. When you hold the club in your hand, it sits on the ground. It looks good on the ground. It feels good in your hand. You swing it. You hit the ball. Same thing with everything. I sit on the bike. It feels good. It rides good. I go to the next brand. Maybe it doesn’t feel the same or whatever.

So it’s making that connection at different levels amongst the whole experience around that product. So sure, I may be on a mountain bike that’s $4000. But I might have had a better experience from a product standpoint on one that was $800 because it fit better.

Robert: Yeah.

Brad: And I liked it more or whatever. I’m still in the same place, right? I’m still in the same environment. I’m still in the same mountain. But because the product made a different connection with me, in my heart if you will, then I bought that product and I had a better experience.

Robert: So I think you’ve said the most important thing here to close the zone and it’s that people don’t buy features and benefits. That comes into it later. They buy experience.

Brad: You’re buying an experience. So if you’re not creating experiences in social and your website and information and content – it’s always about content – then you’re losing audience.

Robert: That’s the Clarity Clip of the week. Focus on experiences.

Brad: Have a good one, guys.

[End of transcript]

Is ROI The Problem In Your Company’s Social Media Marketing?

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We Are Often Asked, “What Is The ROI of Social Media?” Here’s the Answer.

Sean Jackson, the CFO of Rainmaker Digital, offers on how companies should think about the ROI of all digital marketing.

Transcript

Robert Riggs: What has happened in the digital age though that businesses want to immediately jump to talk, talk, talk, sell, sell, sell, never listen, never even listen to what the customer might even want or the prospect might want and all – like ROI, what’s the ROI?

Sean Jackson: Right. So I think that’s being primarily driven – since you used the financial term, ROI, then that’s the problem because that means that a sales organization is being tasked with delivering results on a quarter by quarter basis and it is all about driving that immediate return rate and it’s a financial drive that is doing that. It is not a marketing drive that’s doing that.

Brad Besancon: Right, yeah.

Sean: And I think you see this most often with companies that have received a lot of funding or they’re under some sort of financial pressure and they’re saying –

Brad: A big boardroom.

Sean: Right. You got to go sell and you got to get out there and we need numbers. But it really is a trade-off between short term results and long term success. So I think when you look at long term success, people are saying we need to listen because we don’t care about the next quarter or the quarter after that. We care about the quarters that are happening four years from now, five years from now.

Brad: Yes.

Tips On Listening In The Digital World From Sean Jackson at Rainmaker Digital

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Are You Tuned Into Your Digital Audience? Tips For Listening From Sean Jackson

Transcript

Sean Jackson: People don’t buy the product. They buy the idea that the product delivers.

 

Brad: That’s right.

 

Sean: And that is so important. So if you’re selling an idea, not a product but selling a true idea, then it really means that you have to stay tuned not only to those new people, but the people that have already bought off on the idea.

 

Brad: Yes.

 

Sean: Right? Because those are the people that are already invested in the idea. They want the idea to fulfill something in their life and the more that you can talk to those people, then they will not only help spread the word but they’re going to continue to repeat buy.

 

This is true no matter what market you deal with, B to B, B to C. Whatever acronym you want to come up with, that rule holds true no matter what.

 

Brad: People still buy from people.

 

Sean: They buy from people and they buy from people who care about them.

 

Brad: Yeah.

 

Robert: OK. So if you’re facing the challenges of “listen,” you’ve got a podcast Digital Entrepreneur.

 

Sean: Yes.

 

Robert: That you host weekly and we hear this discussed there and we hear also their marketers talking about the pressures of ROI and all. You give out great advice for how to handle that. So I encourage everybody to seize this.

 

Sean: Please!

 

Robert: Please, listen to my podcast.

 

Sean: Rainmaker.fm. It’s the Digital Entrepreneur.

 

Brad: Well, we’ve been talking about making a connection. We give ourselves –

 

Sean: That’s right.

 

Brad: We give ourselves

 

Sean: But I often think that that is the way that we can always grow is by learning more, right?

 

Robert: Right.

 

Sean: And understanding information and hearing from others that have been there, done that and now with the beauty of technology, we can share it via video, via audio, via whatever.

 

Brad: Yeah. It’s solutions, right?

 

Sean: Right.

 

Brad: You’re trying to fix a solution or sell a solution or connect with a solution or whatever it is. So –

 

Robert: Top three tips on listening, what do you do?

 

Sean: I think actively listen means that you’re not just nodding your head. You’re actively trying to understand what they said and that means that you’re putting a lot of your preconceived notions behind and not trying to fill up your head with, “What is going to be my response to what they just said?” It is, “I’m going to listen, taking a pause.”

 

The second key to listening is to also be thinking through the why. Go through the next level of whatever they say. Bring it out to them but never use the word “why”. “Why” is an accusatory term. What is it? How is it? Those are the ways that you can really get people to draw out.

 

The third way of actively listening – and it’s funny. It’s called “parrot back what they just said”. If you parrot back the last three words someone says, then they will expound even further.

 

Robert: Yeah.

 

Sean: And if you use a question at the end of those last three words, then of course they will repeat it and then expound upon it further. So I think when you look at active listening, combined with really what is the next layer of questions, combined with asking what they just said back to them, you will find they will give you much more and the irony being, they may actually convince themselves that you are so empathetic to what they have, what their needs are, that they want to only work with you.

 

[End of transcript]