Don’t just say it one way

If you look at the BBC website newsdesk, you’ll see lots of different links to their news items. It looks like there’s lots of news there, but in fact there isn’t. If you investigated further, you’d find that quite a lot of the links go to the same news article. Why is this?

People view the world in different ways. That’s why we’re all unique. Therefore if you want to reach a wider area of customers, you have to think more outside the box. Most of this can be accomplished with research, hence why there’s websites for finding out the most popular keywords for your website (and your marketing literature). As people think differently, you need to promote your business in a similar vein. Not everybody will respond to the same stimuli, as coaches trained in NLP will confirm.

That’s why there are many newslinks going to one source: to capture more of an audience. Each headline or link has been carefully sculptured to fit in with a certain type of person, in the hope that it will encourage more to respond favourably. They’re designed to work on many levels, in order to increase the success rate of getting their news out there (and this has proven to work).

How can you do this for your own business? If you were able to describe your company in many different ways, how many extra customers could you attract? How could you market your product or services through a variety of avenues to encourage a wider target market? Or even vary the product or service themselves perhaps? Hmmm.

I have said in the past that one way to promote your business is through your ‘perfect customer’. It is much easier to get your prospects to relate themselves to your ‘ideal’ than for you to adapt to their inexhaustible brain patterns. But I’m going to complicate things further by saying you should still promote your ‘ideal customer’, but in more ways. Allow your extremely varied customer base the chance to understand how you help Tom Jones, or whatever you’ve called your ‘ideal’, so that they all get a chance to relate to his predicament, and the solutions you provide for him. Even vary the solutions in which Tom is able to achieve his success; promote from different angles, view points, attitudes, methods, presentations, but all with the same role model.

And to find out these different ways? Don’t forget to use the power of questions, and the qualities of ‘test and measure’…

How to get your successful leaflets to look good

The misfortune of the single leaflet (or postcard) campaign is that there is limited space for what you have to say. By choosing only one shot at your potential customer market, you will have to cram in a lot of information into a relatively small space to get the full message across.

The initial reaction, after scanning the grey mass in front of them, is that readers will look for a way out: get rid. Even if all the marketing criteria are met: headline, sub-headline, bullet points, call to action, special offer, contact details, the fact that they are virtually sitting on top of each other defeats their objective.

When laying out your leaflet, the first thing to consider is your margins; wide borders navigate the eye towards a focal point: the message inside. Adequate white space provides sufficient elbow room to allow the leaflet to breathe, so each marketing element has a chance to succeed.

Next, consider which kind of picture you are going to have. Background images can backfire: one particular advert had a relevant picture behind all its text, but it was so complex you couldn’t make out what it was trying to say. Presented by itself it would have been easier to understand its message, therefore providing a more effective contribution.

Another problem with a complex background is that it detracts from the words in front of it. Messages are not easily understood if they have to compete with their surroundings. Clean, clear backgrounds, preferably white or pale in colour, combined with a darker colour for the words, will have far more impact for quick recognition and readability than the reverse.

Pictures should be relevant, and not just a smiling tele-operator who looks good. It’s easy to get a picture off the net that will do, but then it may be so popular that everybody uses it, thus reducing your impact. A good quality, well produced photograph is vital, with excellent focus and presentation within its own frame; a home produced job with camera shake or low resolution taken from a mobile phone will not cut to the chase.

And finally how the leaflet is prepared for the printer will make or break a good campaign. Customers respond to quality, and an obvious product of the office ink-jet will certainly not provide the impression you are looking for. Neither will a leaflet whose pictures are not converted to the printers’ resolution, as failure to do so will result in flat, 2D, uninteresting images that also suggest low quality.

Also the kind of paper or card used will make a difference: good quality with a clean finish will easily sway the customer to read, absorb, understand and therefore take action – ultimately resulting in a sale.

Want versus need – your customers’ choice

All marketing advisers harp on about finding out who your target market is. This is extremely true, and a little bit of customer analysis certainly wouldn’t go amiss to keep your focus on track. The aim of your business is to serve your customers, and having worked out what kind of customer you want, you then have to go about finding what your customer wants.

Customers aren’t interested in you. They couldn’t give a tinker’s toss about your business, how long it has been running, how good your sales are, whether you’ve met your end of year targets, etc, etc. This information is important to you, but not to them. Your customer is only interested in what they want. Not what they need (or what you think they need), but what they want.

People buy on want. They also buy on impulse, a special offer, getting something for nothing, getting a huge saving – as long as it is good for them. Customers are incredibly selfish, and if they can’t see how they are going to benefit from what you are offering, they will go elsewhere.

So you need to supply to their wants. You need to research into the latest fashions, crazes, must-haves or whatever, and provide those incentives, freebies, and fantastic deals to get their attention. Research into their lifestyles, explore their businesses, and find that gap or niche in the market that sets you apart from all the other businesses out there plying for their custom.

Remember the customer is king (or queen) and you must play on their natural selfishness. Very rarely do we go with need (except in an emergency), and in this materialistic world we are generally spoilt for choice. That’s why you need to think outside the box and create scenarios that offer a situation that works with want. For example, a slimmer will want to get down to size 10 so she can wear that little black dress; the home-styler will want those curtains because they match the furniture; the house-buyer will want that idyllic cottage out in the country; your customer should want your product or service because it will make their life better.

It’s also important to get your marketing material copy correct. I see so much literature that focuses on the business (I, I, me, me) and not the customer (you, you, you, you). Turn the tables and put yourself in your customers’ shoes, or better still, get a friend to act as a critical customer, so you can find the right words and images that will get their attention, strike home, educate what you are offering, and, above all, ply to your customer’s wants. And don’t forget the power of the headline, the importance of benefits rather than features, the enticement of the call to action and the necessity of clear contact details.

Don’t divorce yourself from design

My friend Annie O’Neill (The Divorce Coach) took advantage today to have a free health check on her paper publicity.  She had produced three A5 four page leaflets, one which covered everything, and two others that concentrated on specific areas.

I advised her to have a large, relevant headline and her name and website address clearly on the front page.  This is so that the reader immediately understood what the leaflet was about, and even if they didn’t open it, they knew who the author was and how to find them on the web.

Inside I suggested the text should be put into columns. This is because quick reading benefits from shorter lines, especially as the leaflets were to provide information purposefully for fast scanning to see if it is relevant to the reader.  Sometimes putting benefits into bullet points is applicable here to facilitate the scanning process.

All the images should be relevant and colourful to draw attention to themselves.  Sometimes the pictures say as much as the words (as well as their captions which are also as important) and good quality in both content and presentation provide that professional edge for a good impression.

If your budget allows, getting your leaflets properly printed certainly contributes towards your public image.  But if you are unable to do this, make sure of the quality of the paper, the clearness of the font (typeface), the crispness of the printer’s performance and the colour control to ensure a better publication.

Don’t forget, if you want to know more, or to book your own health check, go ask Alice!

Many Layered Word Cake

Last week I ventured into the world of words in business. One aspect to consider is the words used in a website. Your webpages should be relevant to your campaign, so research into your target audience and then produce benefits for them: find the pain and offer a solution.

Dont’ forget to elaborate on your individuality or speciality, and you can make it more important by relating a successful scenario, or provide a series of examples and think up a brilliant call to action they cannot refuse. Gather customer details in return for something of value, to be used to form a relationship. But above all eliminate the complication factor: take your customers by the hand and gently lead them in the right direction: make it obvious but not condescending, enticing and relevant, worth-while but not dull.

Investigate into relevant website keywords by taking a step back and thinking like a potential customer; undertake research into what people type into a search engine to find your business and go to websites like Wordtracker.com to find out what the latest trends are and how surfers think.

If keywords are the building bricks of a website, then the tags in the code (behind the scenes) represent the mortar. These use the keywords to provide the necessary food to please the ‘spiders’ (search engine robots) and give them something varied and interesting to do. Links also contribute to spider happiness and come in the form of anchor, incoming or contextual (internal, external or descriptive), leading to lots of activity rewarded by recognition and eventually a higher search engine position!