When Lincolnshire Fireworks came to us in late september asking for a site to promote their annual Fireworks Display on November the 6th we felt they had ‘left it a little late!’

The designs and development of the site went smoothy and swiftly with it’s official launch on 12th October 09. Visitors in the first few days we a steady growth from Zero to 30 people per day by the 27th October. The addition of SEO by design101 (and external advertising) the following 10 days saw a boom in visitors with over 1100 hits in one day, and a total of over 4000 visitors have viewed the site in the last 10 days.

Ticket sales have been amazing with over 300 transactions, purchasing an average of 3.5 tickets per transaction. Resulting in a viewer to purchase percentage of an amazing 13%!

The idea of providing some incentive to the sale or appointment is as basic as it gets.  Newspapers use this extensively – sign up for a subscription, and get your free Shamwow!

When I was in University, students used to sign up for the Sears cards so they could get the free food storage set – and never seemed to realize that if all they consumed was pizza and warm beer they had no need to store any food at all – and that the interest rate on the cards was 29%.

Most of my friends had Sears cards.

So to incent, or not to incent?

First, ask yourself a few questions about the proposed incentive:

1.  Is it immediate.  Can they get the incentive either now, or very soon.  The longer they have to wait for it, the less potent it will be.

2.  Does the value of the incentive seem ‘atainable’?  The discussion today centred around how it was MUCH easier to get people to fill out a ballot for a $50 drug store gift card, than it was to get them to fill on out to win $10,000.  Very few people can conceive of actually winning $10,000.  Most people know what they’d do with $50.

3.  Does the incentive have a greater utility/higher perceived value than the item you are selling.  If so, you have a serious problem.  It may seem obvious that if people at least want the item you are giving away, they will take the one you are selling, just to get it.  It doesn’t work that way – The students signing up for the Sears card knew – that next April, when the student loan money had run totally dry, that a couple hundred bucks at Sears would get them a really snappy new interview suit for the summer job hunt.  The food savers were nice, but they were just a bonus – it was the $500 of available credit that was drawing them in.

Similarly  newspapers tend to give away quite extravagant gifts when you sign up for the newspaper.  Get a three month subscription, and you can have a Shamwow that sells for $29.99 in stores!

The problem is, not many people read newspapers anymore, but when you offer to give away something people want, if they buy something they don’t want – it creates what psychologists call “cognitive dissonance.”  A sense of “that’s not quite right” that not only leads them to walk by the booth, but to associate your product or service with desperation tactics.

4.  Have you fooled yourself into thinking “free” is a value?  To most people, free is a pretty scary word, because poor salespeople have trained them to expect a brutal ‘time share’ sales pitch will be attached to it.  And the larger the ‘free’ item, the worse they expect the pitch to be.

“Sign up for our free draw” = Sign up for a month of pestering phone calls at dinner.

“We’d like to offer you a free subscription” = We’d like to qualify you as a prospect, and sell your name to anyone who wants to buy it.

“I can come by and do a ‘free evaluation’ of your _____________ needs/situation.” = I can come to your house, and not leave until you have a) signed the contract, or b) set my hairpiece on fire.

In these cases, if they don’t see any value in the product or service, the word “free” is going to send them screaming for the exits.

Instead, try offering huge amounts of value up front – asking engaging questions about who they are and what they do – what their current situation is.  Try asking one good “Killer” question that not only positions you as an expert, but gets right to the heart of why they need your product.

Then if you feel the need to give away a Shamwow…that’s up to you.

by Ed Albertson,
Vice President of National Accounts at Carew International, Inc.

Here’s our commercial at To the Hilt Online Solutions:  We offer advertising design and placement with geo-targeted and behaviorally-targeted objectives. . . we can design programs that reach your sphere of business and the demographics most likely to patronize your business. We have many other services as well, establishing an online reputation management system, assisting you with search, video marketing and mobile marketing. Most business owners know they should be online, but scratch their head at how. We can help with that. We believe in starting with the basics and moving into the specialized advanced media with a business strategy for greatest impact.

Consider adding online marketing to your current media mix and if you aren’t advertising in this tight economy, take a look at online.  Know what you are spending your money on with actual metrics to manage your return on investment.

  Participation and interaction on the internet sites continues to evolve. A few years back, most people spent the majority of their time checking email. We then began to surf and shop more. Now estimates say that 10% of all media time is spent in social media and blogging sites interacting with user generated content. That is very significant. The growth of social media sites and where that growth is coming from is very significant too. It may surprise you.

   The experts agree that consumers have changed and the way advertisers reach consumers needs to change as well.  Word like: false, promotion, uncredible, loud, and out of touch surround advertising attitudes–false was the most frequently used term.  For years, advertisers have reached consumers with a one way message cleverly designed to gather the audience attention, often neglecting to communicate a real benefit or reasonable action to engage the consumer. Today the playing field has changed. It’s no longer just advertisers who have multi-million dollar ad budgets that are the only ones who can participate. Everyone can participate. Participating correctly with today’s consumers is what makes it work. Successful advertising must add value, be authentic and a two-way conversation. There are many options to do this using online advertising tools.

   It makes sense, right?

   Advertise where the consumers are engaged and interested, right?

   Fish where the fish are, right?

   Social Media has emerged as an important part of the advertising conversation. Social Media sites serve a dual role as consumers and publishers of content. Most are set up to highlight the user, not the advertisers. Speculation is that the clean content  hosting is one of the reasons that sites appeal to users. (Ever see one of those sites with advertising flashing, popping and talking to you?) Companies are beginning to learn how to engage and attract social media users using member communities where the consumer opts-in by becoming a member, builds a network, and invests their time.

   Facebook is hands down, the largest social media site in the U.S.  The surprising thing is that nearly 40% of its world wide user base is between the ages of 35-49.  That’s parents and career people and home owners…not college students. The fastest growing Facebook population is 50+.  The adolescent stigma of social media has finally been broken. Anyone who believes that it’s just a bunch of kids is seriously behind the times. Now, not only are the numbers of mature consumers growing but the time they spend online has grown and much of that time is spent with Facebook or another members community site: Bebo, My Space, Linked In, Twitter, Blogs… and more emerging every day in this fast growing lucrative segment of the internet. Overlooking this category for advertising to reach geographically and often behaviorally targeted users is a mistake.

   How you set up your business’ participation in social media does make a difference. Also, often participants will create fan sites and you definitely want to be involved, engaged and aware of what the dialogue says.

Fan Page for St. Louis Cardinals on Facebook

This is NOT the official St. Louis Cardinals fan page designed and placed by MLB Cardinals, yet it has ten times the fans and comments as the official site. People visit here to comment on the most recent issues, post pictures of their kids with hot dogs at the ballpark. It’s a great page and a perfect example of a Fan Page on Facebook, and if the Cardinals are smart, they are aware of this site, monitoring it and attempting to control their online presense.

Business posted Fan Page for restaurant on Facebook

    Here’s an official page posted. Granted it is not for a baseball team with the emotional fan base of the St. Louis Cardinals, but with a significant viral campaign this page could really take off and be a significant marketing tool for the restaurant. Just seeing this logo a few times on your profile might remind you that this business exists the next time you are in the area and looking for a great sushi place in the Westport area. 

   The point is, there’s a lot of ways to influence, advertise and participate with consumers. Look above in these examples. There’s ads available there too that can be geotargeted to reach people in your immediate market. These type of ads are available on most social media networks.

Here’s some sites you might want to visit to continue the conversation about Social Media. We want you to keep your mind open and we will discuss marketing tactics and give you a plan to reach these very participatory consumers.

http://www.smartmarketers.com/2009/01/generating_leads_with_social_m_1.html

http://www.webinknow.com/2008/06/facebook-and-yo.html

http://www.buzzmaven.com/2009/04/hard-social-media-lessons.html

http://www.twitip.com/10-easy-steps-for-twitter-beginners/?goback=%2Ehom

  All of these authors are very credible. Take a look at these articles and if you want more information: more articles and reference material contact us and we will be happy to share more. We keep a library. If you’d like to sit down and have a discussion about how your business can begin reaching online participatory consumers, we will be happy to schedule an appointment to meet. We strive to be “Your Simple Online Solution.”

   We are active with the local small business community. We are always eager to share our expertise with business owners. The fact is, that much advertising and public relations online can be done by anyone with the time and inclination to learn. We are happy to share a few suggestions with free advice for a business owner who needs to improve their web prescence. Free. Yes, free.

   The fact of the matter is, some people are going to need our services, because they don’t have the time to learn Google Adwords or Social Media Optimization or research a video ad service. We have the comprehensive programs that will work for different levels of investment and engagement in online marketing. Our packages are flexible and allow the business owner to decide (with our help) where to focus. We manage the analysis of campaigns and work with business owners to adjust campaigns as needed.  Some business owners will do this for themselves. (And we will encourage them to do so.) Some will be too busy running a company to do it themselves and see the value proposition that we offer by helping to care of this part of their business.

   The start-up part of this business has been the hard part for us. The working with customers to help their business grow is where our natural talents lie. We look forward to moving forward from here. We walk the walk and talk the talk. This blog is part of our plan for our business. Content rich online presence is optimum. We work to make this blog (and everything else we do) informative, but also very content heavy so that people looking for information might be able to find us through our localized advertising online.

    We have a business to build too. So, here’s an example of a 350×250 standard advertising unit that we created and have now placed on various networks to gather interested business  decision makers and give them the opportunity to see what we are all about. We are not a creative house, in that we are going to sell you a fancy website, but we are a creative house in that we will help you target your customer base and help create units that help you reach them. You’ve seen internet advertising. Sometimes it’s about branding and sometimes it’s about immediate call to action for the consumer to interact with the business. We can help you with both. Here’s another one we have for our business.  It’s a banner ad and is made to the IAB advertising specs, so it can be placed on many various sites who support banner ads. Here’s another example–of course this is our style, not yours, but yours can be built by our creative department. If you click on it here, it connects you with our website. Simple.

   If any of this interests you, we should have a conversation about opening some internet doors for your business. You have our contact info.

   What does this have to do with anything? Everything. I think that we often look the other way rather than taking that first little step into something new thinking that it’s too hard or we will do it wrong. That first step, or stroke, is a leap of faith. Once we start it’s no longer painful, we get used to fixing as we go and letting the results guide us toward the result.

   Many of you reading this are business people. How hard is it to step out of your comfort zone and try something new?  What’s more, when has it worked and made a difference in your business? When has it failed? That business is your baby, your livelihood, sometimes even your life. What I do know is that you took a risk and had faith enough to begin that business, so you are probably my type of people.

   I have always enjoyed talking to people with an entreprenuerial spirit. I’m not one to sit back and collect a paycheck. I tease that I’ve never had a real job in my life…I’ve always been a salesperson. I have always viewed that as a noble profession. Sales with ethics is helping people get what they want. I reap what I sow and sometimes I’ve been really good at sowing some great ideas with brave businesses who see the reason to leap to the next level with me. Often it was difficult to start, but the end result was worth the trouble. I look at that canvas sitting on the easel and it’s hard to remember when it was white.

   I use this example on purpose. It was hard for me to step out of the corporate world and take the leap into my own business. I’m not sure why. I’ve often been the innovator in my company. I have always passed my ideas up the ladder and often they have made money for my company. At some point I started to look from right to left and believed that I knew something that few others do. My experience is broad and I am a student of my industry and the businesses that comprise media. There wasn’t going to be the perfect job for me unless I created it. My partner Richard felt the same way. So, we made that first step like you did when you went into business. We had to.

   Now, we have a noble cause in mind: Helping you get what you want. If you have a website, or not, we should have a conversation about today’s participatory media and how to reach consumers. You made the first stroke when you started your business. This new layer might be a little difficult to start, but  it’s worth it.  At To the Hilt Online Solutions it’s our job to help you get what you want. That’s what we do.

Simply put, the goal is quality not quantity.

I’m pretty active on LinkedIn (www.linkedin.com/in/jasonaallen) and there is a phenomenon there of what are called “LIONs”  or LinkedIn Open Networkers.  These are people who will accept an introduction from anyone (LinkedIn’s equivalent of a friend request in Facebook) and tend to also send them out pretty indiscriminately.

To them, the goal is to have the biggest network possible.  To me the $1,000,000 question is:  What’s the point?

Isn’t the point of a network to know your contacts well enough that when one of them asks for a referral to another one of your contacts (hey, I hear Joe could really use a good plumber, do you mind passing my name along?) – that the referral is meaningful.

Otherwise, the whole thing turns into a popularity contest.  This isn’t American Idol – it’s your business network – and to me, quality trumps quantity every time.

So to get to my point – I spoke with four people tonight…as in, more than just “Hi” or “Which way is the bar?”  Of those four, three of them were interested enough in my service that they would be receptive to a call, or even coffee in the next couple of days.

I could have run around the session like a madman, firehosing my elevator pitch all over anyone who would listen -and  in that instance I would be much like the Web Design salesperson I met at the Hamilton event a few weeks ago.

“Hi, what do you do?”

“Well, I’m a sales trainer, I specialize in helping small business people get in front of more clients, and to get better results when doing so…what do you do?”

That was my first mistake.  It was another four minutes before he paused long enough to gulp down another breath of air…then he resumed talking.  He ended by thrusting his business card into my hand, and insisting on getting mine…which reminds me of a girl I knew in University who was frankly, very attractive.  Every evening before she went to the bar (and it was nearly every evening) she would memorize the phone number of a local gas station…cruel, but effective.

That’s kind of how I felt with this sales person. ‘ Can I give him someone else’s card?’

Either way, I promptly wrote something much more important on the back of his card…because that’s what happens when you don’t ask good questions, and talk at people non stop…it makes your prospects want to write more important people’s phone numbers on the back of your business card.  The worst part is, that he probably had no idea he was doing it…either that or he thinks he’s a great sales person, because he’s a great communicator!

F.Y.I.  Being a good talker doesn’t make you a good communicator.  Being a good talker is often a barrier to being a good communicator.  Being a good listener makes you an amazing communicator.  But if you don’t ask questions first, then there’s nothing to listen to.

You don’t have a cost problem

I’m curious why so many small business people try to solve a problem using the wrong tool. If I were trying to hang drywall in my basement (what a memory!), I wouldn’t get upset that my hammer was useless for driving in the drywall screws. I would just change tools.

So then why, in this economy, is everyone trying to solve a revenue problem by cutting costs?

If you look at a P&L, it’s go two columns, income and expenses. For most businesses, there aren’t a whole lot of costs that can be reasonably cut without impairing your ability to serve the customer. Usually, any kind of large scale cost involves cutting staff, or at least reducing their hours. This in turn leads to a poorer customer experience, which leads to more people going down the road for the 10% discount, and less revenue, causing you to need to cut more ‘etcetera, etcetera, etcetera…’

So doesn’t it make more sense to focus on the other side of the balance sheet?

Let’s examine a myth to start with:

Focusing on revenue is pointless, because nobody is buying. Wow! Really? Nobody? Nobody is a pretty absolute word. That means that not a single revenue generating transaction has taken place in your industry in how long?

We all know that that is patently ridiculous. People are still spending, they just spend less, and spend it more cautiously. So what to do?

Anyone who grew up in a family with lots of brothers knows the phenomenon of a particularly delicious desert (say, a pie) being put on the dinner table, and the hungry looks starting. The analogy for the economy is pretty good. There is still pie on the table, and yes, there are just as many hungry brothers. But this time the pie is a little smaller.

So what do you do? Do you sit back and wait to see what will be left after all the brothers are through with it, or do you get in there and start throwing elbows, and make sure you get what’s coming to you?

Get a gold star if you chose answer b.

People are still making purchases – but admittedly they are not doing it as easily, or as often. So what to do?

How about creating value in every interaction? How about keeping quiet about ‘how long you’ve been in business’ or how you’re the ‘leading provider of blah blah blah.’ Instead, everything that comes out of your mouth should focus on what’s in it for your customer to do business with you. What results have you created in the past, and what results can you reasonably assure them you will get?

That’s really all anyone cares about right now. Value is not the main thing, it’s very nearly the only thing. Yes you still need to be personable, and honest, and conscientious, and keep your promises. But that’s not going to earn you the business, that’s just the admission ticket for the discussion.

Value is what you need. More importantly, value is what your prospects need. Give that every time and you will find that your piece of pie hasn’t really shrunk all that much at all.