Mapping out your Master Strategy

If your business is like most businesses out there, you may sporadically do some unconnected, unrelated promotions, but have no real master strategy. 

As I'm sure you have discovered, this approach produces varying outcomes, and offers virtually no measurement or accountability. 

And when these random promotions DO capture leads there’s typically no system for handling them. They'll get misplaced, left so long they go cold, or mishandled because there is no follow-up system and no one has been assigned responsibility.

This results in massive wastage of marketing dollars, and massive inefficiencies, and ‘leakage’ of sales opportunities that should have been in the bag.

Now, this may not accurately reflect your situation. But even if there is a shade of truth in this scenario, you need to fix it now! 

TEN STEPS to a Lead Generation Master Strategy

A Lead Generation Master Strategy involves mapping out a series of highly logical steps, from lead to sale and beyond. This should be done before even considering the ‘creative’ elements of the pieces. 

1. Set Sales Targets. How many new sales (as distinct from repeat customers) are required in a given period to achieve the revenue targets outlined in the overall marketing plan. Define this targeted figure and you can work backwards to determine the activity required to get it. Starting with …

2. How many leads are required? Determine the conversion rate of leads-to-sales which will determine how many LEADS must be generated to achieve the sales targeted in step 1. 

3. Determine the ‘acquisition allowable cost of a lead’. As a simple example, if the company is prepared to invest $1,000 to get a SALE, and 1 in 10 leads turns into a sale, then the ‘allowable’ to get a LEAD is $100. Simple concept, but few companies know these figures.

4. One Step or Multi-step? Clearly, the bigger the buying decision, the more steps will be needed from initial lead to serious prospect. EACH promotion will have its own strategy. A website generated enquiry for example, may be followed by a qualifying phone call, sending of information with a promise to follow up, a follow up phone call, fact finding meeting, demonstration, proposal, further follow up call … and so on. It’s a system, not ad hoc activity. 

5. Sales Processes. What process will maximize sales? This depends on the nature of the product or service, and how ‘warm’ and ‘pre-educated’ the lead is. 

6. Target Markets. The correct selection of target markets impacts on your outcomes up to 1,000% or more. This one fact provides you with more leverage than virtually any other in your entire marketing thrust. What are your best target markets for new leads? The logical ones are not necessarily the best. 

7. The Matrix of Activities. When the various media options are selected, a matrix can be drawn up. This matrix shows at a glance all the efforts to be tested, dates, response lead times, and most importantly, the cost per lead and cost per sale from EACH promotion. Like the conductor of an orchestra (with the overall objectives as your music sheet), you can increase the intensity of various promotions, add new ones and reduce or fade out others as the individual performances are analyzed.

8. The Allocation of Responsibilities. Once the processes have been flow charted, responsibilities need be established to ensure that the processes identified actually happen.  

9. The ‘Creative’. Being creative is fun. But actually, it should be the LAST thing you focus on. Here’s a key fundamental truth: Once the strategy is right, the creative will come. But good creative with poor strategy will never work effectively. 

10. The Review Process. At key points in the implementation of the Master Plan, perhaps monthly for some objectives, perhaps campaign by campaign for others, review the outcomes. Are you achieving what your overall plan requires. If not, what change in direction do you need to take to get back on course?

This approach takes discipline and constant attention. But it’s so analytical, and structured … it forces you to be more successful in your marketing. And how bad can that be?

Complaints!! Bane or Bonus for Business?

Can you imagine a company that loves getting complaints? Even to the extent of giving the customer something minor to complain about, just so they can handle it?

It may sound like a crazy proposition. But some leading companies overseas, and here as well, will go to that extent. And it makes good sense. They know that a customer who is disgruntled, and doesn’t get satisfaction, will often say NOTHING to the company, but will sure tell a lot of other people. This causes damage that could have been avoided.

On the other hand, if the customer complains, and the company is seen to do everything it can to fix the problem fast, then the company is a hero and can promote the fact. (“We’re not perfect, but we’ll do everything we can to keep you happy when something goes wrong!”). What’s more, the customer becomes their greatest advocate. The important thing is to KNOW when a customer is disgruntled to have a policy firmly in place for fixing complaints then to ENCOURAGE customers to come forward.

One bank overseas ran an ad that showed a person looking at the reader with the headline: “My salary is paid by the bank, but I work for you!” … with the theme that the bank was more than a big impersonal monolith… it cared.

Think of a number of cases where you’ve stepped in and fixed a problem, to be profusely thanked by the customer. Are you missing any complaints that could be spreading around the community? Maybe now’s the time to SEEK complaints.

Featured Report: 40 Hot Tips for Improving Your Marketing

Inside this free report are 40 hot ideas for increasing the effectiveness of your marketing. These ideas have been drawn from a multitude of sources over time. They are the results of campaigns conducted by various leading advertising agencies and marketing companies.

How were the comparative results obtained in some of these examples? 

By using split run tests. Only ONE element (e.g. offer, headline, photo) is changed in the campaign in any one test. By isolating a feature like this, marketers can accurately track which version worked better and by how much.

A note of caution...

These results should be taken as indicators only of what might occur if re-done right now, today. Human nature doesn’t change, but lots of other variables do. And the test results apply to a multitude of different campaigns and products. So, take the results more as guidelines as to how you might trial changes to your own marketing, to lift response. That said, I'm sure you will find great value in reading about these 40 elements that have been tested, and how they have increased response rate time and time again.

Use the contact form below to request this free special report.  Ensure that you enter into the contact form the name of the special report so we know which one to send you.

How to own your market...

Here is a classic example of the power of creating a ‘reason for being’.  This case study is from our archives.  The concepts are as relevant today as then.  The client, of all things, was a grave headstone mason.

He'd approached us with a problem.  His Yellow Pages ad, he felt, did not do justice to his business and his life mission.  His ad was just like all the others ... page after page of sameness in the classification ...  Big logo up the top, the same bullet points as everybody else and a big phone number at the bottom.

It didn’t tell the full story ... his special story.

And when people called, what do you think they focused on?  Not surprisingly they tended to focus on PRICE.  Obvious when you think about it because all the ads were fundamentally the same, so price was the only thing they could focus on ... John Smith (not his real name) was convinced we could help him tell his story so he could break away from the 'price trap'.  And to be honest, the more we probed him about his business, the more fascinating the story became.  Our resulting headline read:

‘When you want a monument to your loved one that’s as special as they were ... speak with John Smith’

This ad created a very special personality around his business.

• It spoke of the fact that his monuments ‘are cut from stone, rather than pre-made blocks’ ...
• That ‘you must be 100% delighted with the finished work or you don’t pay’
• That you get to approve the layout BEFORE work begins ...

Compelling reasons to commission him.

But here’s the interesting part.  Do you think the OTHER stone masons listed in the Yellow Pages cut from stone as opposed to pre-made blocks?  They might …

Do they guarantee their work or does the client take the risk?  Do they let you see the drawings before work begins?  They might …

The point is, their ads DON’T SAY if they do or they don’t!

And what that means ... the one who DOES say these things, ‘owns’ those ‘reasons for being’.  The unique selling proposition of cutting from stone ... and the unique selling proposition of having a 100% delight guarantee.

This ad superbly pre-empted the market ... and positioned this company perfectly in that niche in the market that HE wants to serve.  (Below is a reproduction of the ad.)

 

Two things happened after this ad appeared ... first, the number of calls from the Yellow Pages increased.  Not dramatically, but they did increase.

Second, and FAR more importantly, the people who rang as a result were a different type of person ... they didn’t focus on price.  They simply asked, “When can you start?”.  They had been educated to what this remarkable stonemason is about ... creating beautiful monuments.

How OUTRAGEOUS are you prepared to be in your guarantees?

When a client phoned me, he was obviously frustrated. "We’ve got the world’s best auto security locking system, but our ads barely pay for themselves” was his opening remark.

 

I just happened to have a copy of the magazine he’d advertised in, so I grabbed it. His ad had a good position, right hand page, early in the magazine.

The headline on his ad was ‘STOP THIEF’ (set under a big red stop sign). The copy then opened up with “No longer is your car at risk with the such and such security system”, followed by a list of bullet point features (incidentally I changed the name of the product for reasons you'll see below) …

Fairly standard stuff … features like: Easy to operate, self-locking, etc. But then, ‘hidden’ in the third bullet point was the statement: ‘Ignition suppression which completely and totally makes it impossible to start the car when then system is activated.’

My first reaction was that the client had lost a powerful opportunity to sell his system. He’d fallen into the trap of trotting out a bunch of fairly standard features, while what I saw as his BIG benefit was hidden away in the third bullet point.

Interestingly, while he was on the phone, I started flicking through the other ads in the magazine. Lo and behold … there was another ad a few pages further on … and its headline was ‘STOP THEIF’, and it too had a bunch of bullet points. This second ad was for the much cheaper security device, a steering wheel lock. No comparison to Mike’s high tech solution, but because they both had similar bullet points, appearing to be a competitor.

I challenged him: “Mike, you claim it’s impossible to start the car?”

“ABSOLUTELY IMPOSSIBLE!” was his emphatic response.

“OK, here’s the deal”, I responded with my entrepreneurial adrenalin starting to surge through my veins. “I’ll write you an ad FOR NOTHING, and let’s see how it works. You run it and if it beats your old ad, and you continue to run it, then we can talk about a fee.”

It didn’t take more than twenty minutes to write the new ad. There was a man in a suit standing in front of a very expensive sports car … and the headline read:

I was convinced it would absolutely blitz the marketplace. Perhaps get him loads of PR too, as the media picked up on this outrageous guarantee. I was really excited with this ad, and eagerly sent it to Mike.

Now, for the real test. The only place that counts. The market.

So, how did my ad work against his original bland ad? Well, I’d love to tell you my ad with the totally outrageous guarantee statement did create an avalanche of orders. I’d love to tell you that … but I can’t. 

You see, for unspecified reasons … Mike never ran my ad. I’m still trying to figure out why. (I think I really do know!)

Still, this should serve as a challenge to YOU. Are your communications bland? Are your ads making the same ordinary statements that your competitors are making, that keep your great product or service in mediocrity?

Think outside that box! What are your compelling guarantees? What COULD they be that’d set people’s imaginations on fire? What sets your product or service apart that will bring prospects to you in big numbers? What is it about your product or service that takes the focus right off price, and has people knocking at your door, saying “I WANT THAT!”?

Taking advantage of a marketing opportunity...

This blog entry will pick up where the last blog entry in the white paper series left off, and give you one more example analysis to get your 'creative marketing juices' flowing.

Example 4#: A white paper that was created in a matter of days to capture a 'window of opportunity'

I was visiting our UK office just when the Global Financial Crisis was beginning to gather momentum in the media.  Businesses were going into panic mode and yet I knew I could give them very simple, basic ‘survival’ guidelines that would help insulate them from the downward spiral.

So on the flight home, I wrote a special report called the '10 Proven Strategies to Boost Your Sales and Profits (& Recession-Proof Your Business)’.

Essentially the white paper was a temperature check for the prospect's business, with strategies, statistics and case studies that clearly articulated how not only to 'weather' the GFC storm, but to grow and profit despite it.

In reality, this white paper would have probably been a great tool for our prospects at any time, but because of the media attention around the GFC, it really struck a nerve.  We were being inundated with online requests – consistently up to three or four every day in the early days.

After the initial flurry, we stopped actively promoting the white paper. Yet we still get requests coming in, and have over 370 new prospects on our database since we have made the report available. And while I was involved in creating a new venture and not looking for ‘consulting projects’ per se, I think you’ll agree it would have been a very fertile field had I been seeking them.

Here's a sample of the white paper:

This is the final blog entry in the white paper series. If you'd like help with crafting your own red hot lead-generating white paper, call me on (+617) 3300 6909, or simply use our Results Corporation contact form to drop us an email.

You also might want to request our own new white paper - '21 Tips on Creating an Effective White Paper'.

Marketing and the Pareto Principle

The Pareto Principle, or 80/20 Rule is not new.  In 1941, Joseph Juran named it after Italian, Vilfredo Pareto, who’d observed that 80% of the country’s income went to 20% of the population.

In 1979, American Airlines identified that just 80,000 of their 25 MILLION travellers (3.2%) were generating 65% of their business!  This revelation saved them millions on wasted advertising.  

In fact, that revelation changed the face of marketing for airlines and many other industries with “frequent buyer” clubs.  

Savvy businesses reap huge profits by focusing on their ‘A’ clients who spend the most.  Hard to believe with this knowledge, the vast majority of businesses still don’t even segment their clients into A/B/Cs, let alone tailor communications to the ‘goldmine’ 20%.

A new take for small businesses on following up your leads...

A quick entry for today...

Mark Hartley of The Tree Doctor of Rooty Hill in Sydney (yes, Rooty Hill!) really took upon himself to follow up every lead, even 'dead' leads, until they told him not to.  He simply DIDN'T give up.  

Result? He converted 32% of the old leads on the first follow up! And a further 10% in subsequent approaches. He estimated that one idea was worth around $80,000 in additional sales to him. An idea worth following up on, don't you think?