Archive for August, 2010

What’s happening to newspapers and the Yellow Pages?

Friday, August 27th, 2010

Newspapers in decline.

In the first half of 2009, 105 newspapers collapsed, shut down their presses and closed their doors.  U.S. newspaper circulation has been dropping by 10%-20% per year. In fact the Audit Bureau of Circulation (ABC) now estimates that less than 30 million Americans buy a daily newspaper.  The Washington Post, once a powerhouse media vehicle with well over 1 million daily subscribers, now modestly sells less than 580,000 papers from Monday through Saturday.  That publication has fared better than most.  Yet they continue to see declines of at least 5% each year.

If people are not reading newspapers, then they are not reading advertisements.  And, without question, that severely diminishes your potential to garner a return for your advertising investment.

Chart comparing daily newspaper circulation

What about the Yellow Pages?

The first problem with the printed Yellow Pages is that no one uses them anymore.  They are perceived as “anti-green”, clumsy, difficult to read, and the ads do not give you nearly enough information to make a value-based decision.  It’s no wonder in 2009 alone Yellow Pages revenue declined by 7.5% in the U.S.

In response to these declines, Yellow Pages businesses have attempted to create online marketing “packages”.

Comparing monthly online traffic for Google, Yahoo, the Yellow Pages, City Search, yellowpages.com, and superpages.com

Following are the reasons these efforts are failing:

  • While monthly traffic is on the rise for Google, Yahoo, Bing and other legitimate search engines, it is declining rapidly for Yellowpages.com and SuperPages.com
  • You cannot “own” your campaign, see your analytics reports, nor test multiple landing pages
  • Although you will be tied into a year-long commitment, your “campaign manager” could change almost daily
  • Your contract will be carefully written with fine print and disclaimers that cover the Yellow Pages, not your business


So what’s a business owner to do?

A comprehensive internet marketing strategy is a necessity in order to survive and thrive in today’s tough business environment.  Every day people will search online in your product or service category.  And, if they don’t find your business, they will find your competitors.

Search engine optimization (SEO) and a “content” strategy.

While SEO and content strategies are all the rage in message boards and blogs, they take time and effort that many business owners simply don’t have to spare.   Every business should, indeed, update their website with the proper metatags, keywords and title tags.  And you should create content that is valuable to your target audience.  But keep in mind that this type of strategy is like planting seeds in your farm.  It will surely deliver a crop but only after several months (or perhaps) years of hard work and lots of patience.

An easier first step.

An internet advertising strategy will generate interest in your business quickly.  But to generate leads, sales and a return on your investment, you must do the following:

  • Create a landing page or micro-website that provides information and converts an interested internet surfer to a lead
  • Test hundreds of keywords
  • Test dozens of ads varying copy, offers and incentives
  • Place the ads on up to 150 advertising networks (including Google, Yahoo, Bing and others)
  • Keep an eye on where and when you get clicks
  • Determine which clicks turn into leads
  • Pay attention to the leads that turn into sales

Backtrack to tie it all together and maximize your budget.

It is important to backtrack through the entire process.  In other words, once a sale has been achieved, you must determine which keywords, which ads, and which offers generated the initial click; and from what geographical location did the lead originate.  Also you will want to take note of the day of the week and the time of day the click occurred that ultimately delivered a sale.

By doing all of the above, you will be able to determine where to spend your marketing budget in the coming months.  Eliminate keywords and offers that do not turn into sales.  Increase your bids on keywords and offers that do.  Reduce your spend in geographic regions that do not convert and increase your spend in regions that do.  And finally, you will want to increase your bids only during the days and day parts when conversions that turn into sales are most likely to occur.

<<Alert:  We’re selling here>>

Sound too time-consuming and difficult?  We can help.

  • We will make sure your business is seen online
  • We will test keywords, ads, landing pages, geographies, days, and day parts to continually refine and maximize your marketing efforts- and deliver a return on your investment
  • We offer sales coaching to ensure that every lead is handled right
  • We provide detailed reporting
  • Your phone will ring and leads will show up in your email inbox while you run your business

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Posted in Inbound Internet Lead Generation, marketing, Pay-per-click marketing, Uncategorized | No Comments »

A tale of two restaurants.

Sunday, August 22nd, 2010

We love Rehoboth Beach Delaware.

It’s kid-friendly.  The boardwalk has tons of rides, fattening foods and the restaurants are fantastic.

So here’s how one restaurant dropped the ball and another won our hearts.

First… the restaurant that failed miserably:

On a rainy afternoon, we were watching TV and a commercial came on for The Greene Turtle.  I’ve always seen their T-shirts.  And now they were on TV.  Their ad said, “Kids Eat FREE!”  The same thing is plastered all over their website.

I have two kids so what could be better?  Right?

Wrong!!

We went to the new restaurant, had our meal (which was average at best)… and then the check came… but we were charged for two kids meals.

I asked the manager, “what’s the deal”.  And he said, “the Kids-Eat-FREE-deal is only for other Greene Turtle Restaurants… not this one.”  Huh?!?  But I saw the ad on TV.  And I hate TV ads.  And now I have even more reason to hate them.  I got suckered!  So I complained and told him that’s what brought me in.  And he basically said, “tough noogies.”

So do I want to go there again.  NO!

Now, on the other side of the coin… we visited an absolutely adorable little restaurant called HOBOS…. also in Rehoboth Beach.  The owner is amazing.  Not only does she say hello to all her guests…. but she also runs back into the kitchen to cook the meals.  I don’t know how she does it.  She must have a twin!

And… here’s the part that makes her restaurant better than the Greene Turtle (even though they have enough money to pay for fancy TV ads).  When my son and daughter wanted the plain kids Quesadilla with chicken and cheese, the waitress (with goodness in her heart) recommended they split an adult Quesadilla instead.  But when it was served, there was lots of “green stuff” in it.  And we all know that kids don’t like “green stuff”.  So we told the owner, Gretchen, what happened.

She completely understood and whisked the plates away so our kids could have the plain old kids Quesadilla as fast as possible.

She didn’t try to charge us for the adult Quesadilla.  She didn’t argue.  She didn’t debate.

And here’s the most interesting part.  If you go to Gretchen’s website at www.myhobos.com, you’ll see that it’s all about the food and the philosophy.  But it really doesn’t mention her character.  I guess she figured that’s just a basic ingredient all restaurants should have.

The truth is… her character and quick thinking to stand up for basic ideals such as “making the customer feel at home” and “making every meal enjoyable” are what will keep us coming back to visit her.

As you all know, I write slogans for businesses.  Business owners pay MarketSmart lots of money to do so.  And, while she doesn’t realize it, her slogan is actually already written.  And it’s buried at the bottom of one of the pages on her website where it says… “Hobos, where you go when you’re not home.” She’s exactly right!  We DO want to go there when we’re not home.

Nice job Gretchen!  Boo and hiss to the Greene Turtle.

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Posted in Branding, Slogan | No Comments »

PAIN! Why you can’t sell anything to anyone unless they have pain.

Friday, August 6th, 2010

Anyone remember David Sandler?  Not Zig Ziglar, not Tony Robbins, and definitely not Tom Hopkins.  I’m not talking about those famous sales trainers.  I’m talking about the best sales trainer that ever lived- David Sandler.

Google him.  Or here’s my take on one of the best things I ever learned from him:  You can’t sell anything to anyone unless they have pain.  And, if they have no pain, you have no business doing business with them.

Buying is an emotional process.  I don’t care how pragmatic the buyer is…  There is still emotion involved.

“What will my boss think of my decision?”

“Am I making the right decision?”

“Did I cover all the bases?

It’s the salesperson’s job to uncover their pain.  And you simply can’t sell to someone if they have none or are unwilling to let you help.

Sure, you can bid on stuff if they won’t allow you to learn their pain.  But that’s the “quote n’ hope” strategy.  That’s not selling!

Professional selling means you must act like a doctor or detective.

Be confident knowing that you have a great product or service that solves people’s problems.  If you don’t, then quit (FAST!) and find a product or service that actually delivers value to humanity.

Then, after building rapport, you’ve got to start asking questions.  Doctors do it.  And people answer them- honestly.  Detectives do it too.  Remember Columbo?  He’d ask the questions with softening statements…. always scratching his head saying, “I know you’ve been through a lot, and I realize I may be bothering you, and you’re such a nice person so…  can I ask just one more dumb question please sir?”

Questions uncover pain.

If your prospect won’t answer the questions, ask them again in a slightly different fashion.  But stick to your guns and remember- you can’t sell anything to anyone unless you uncover their pain.  Because once you do, then you can finally align your product or service in a way that puts an end to their pain.  That’s how you become a hero.  And that’s how you sell!

By uncovering their pain and presenting a solution that fixes their problem, you close deals.  Or, I should probably say… deals will close themselves.

Check out the interview I mentioned above at SellingPower:

http://sellingpower.typepad.com/gg/2010/02/how-david-sandler-created-his-magnificent-obsession-and-the-killer-instinct-for-selling.html

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Posted in Cold-calling, Lead Generation/Nurturing, Selling, Uncategorized | 1 Comment »

The joy of cold calling- 2 reasons to LOVE doing it! Plus some wisdom from Rocky Balboa

Sunday, August 1st, 2010

Here are two reasons you should absolutely love cold-calling.  One is mine.  The other is a reason I recently heard from a salesman I interviewed on Friday.

1- Progress is happiness:

When I was starting out- selling printing services back in the early 90′s- I made about 100 calls a day.  What kept me going?  I figured out really quick that, each day, I could set about 1 to 2 appointments and find about 5-10 other “interested” prospects with some sort of pain or problem that I could solve.  Of course those 5-10 would need nurturing and follow-up calls to set appointments.

Also, I knew that (on average) a sale would result from 1 out of 5 appointments.

So, if I made 100 calls a day and added 5-10 interested prospects to my funnel each day, I was always making progress.  Sales would happen inevitably.

Sure there were days when I’d hit a skid and no appointments were set.  And then there were days when it seemed like appointments were falling out of the sky- like rain.  But over time the averages always worked out.  If I kept moving forward… if I kept making the calls, I would always progress yet another step closer to the ultimate goal- another sale.

Thus, there was never a reason to hate cold calling because even rejection meant “failing forward”.  “Fail fast and fail frequently”, someone once told me.  Rejection was progress.  Each rejection brought me one step closer to my objective.   If I made 5 calls in the morning and each one was a rejection, I knew I only had about 95 left before I’d set an appointment.  Five more rejections meant I only had 90 remaining.   “Yahoo! I’m getting closer”, I thought with each consecutive rejection.

And I know there are tons of people who might comment on this post saying you should do this or that to improve your batting average.  But that’s not what this post is about.  It’s about the numbers game.  We’ll get to style in another post.   A client told me that progress is happiness.  So, now I say… let’s keep in mind that if cold-calling is a numbers game, then every cold call, every rejection, and every failure is a step forward.  Each one is progress.  Each one takes you closer to finding the person who is in pain and truly needs your help.  If you don’t make the calls, you’ll never find them.

2- Monetize your calls:

I love this one.  So I interviewed this guy who showed me how he broke down his cold-calls to monetize them.  If he ended up selling 1 out of 100 (for instance)… and if each sale was $10,000 (giving him a $1,000 commission).  Then each call was actually worth $10 ($10 x 100 = $1,000).  Ten rejections actually made him $100.  Neat!

Rocky Balboa.

And finally- what does Rocky think about all this?  In the very last Rocky movie, Sylvester Stallone created one of my favorite inspirational speeches.  Here it is:

The world ain’t all sunshine and rainbows. It’s a very mean and nasty place and I don’t care how tough you are it will beat you to your knees and keep you there permanently if you let it. You, me, or nobody is gonna hit as hard as life. But it ain’t about how hard ya hit. It’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward. How much you can take and keep moving forward. That’s how winning is done! Now if you know what you’re worth then go out and get what you’re worth. But ya gotta be willing to take the hits, and not pointing fingers saying you ain’t where you wanna be because of him, or her, or anybody! Cowards do that and that ain’t you! You’re better than that! I’m always gonna love you no matter what. No matter what happens. You’re my son and you’re my blood. You’re the best thing in my life. But until you start believing in yourself, ya ain’t gonna have a life. Don’t forget to visit your mother.“

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Posted in Cold-calling, Lead Generation/Nurturing, Philosophy/motivation, Selling, Uncategorized | No Comments »