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The Marketing & Sales Hourglass

Clarity culture in context that really is the new marketing I mean that is that you know building audience attracting the right clients you know that's what we need to think about that's where we need to start but then we're gonna spend a lot of time on this it's really about the complete journey and that we need to consider a lot of times as marketers as salespeople all we think about is you know how do I get the phone ring how do I get the opportunity how do I get somebody to you know tio want to know about my business on dh we have to build the complete end and journey and that has changed dramatically over the years so many of you have probably heard about this you know this concept of the marketing funding right so you get you know, a bunch of people the funnel shape is bigot the top you get a bunch of people in there you you kind of hopefully market to them sell them and force you know, some some amount of them you know through that little choke point in the middle and that you k...

now well uh we're done and a lot of organizations still do this right marketing's here produce a bunch of content run some ads have all this stuff throw it over to sail now becomes you know, a lead. So now we start talking about sales and then the salespeople closed the deal we throw him over to service or shipping or you know, whatever it is that actually doesn't deal in and while you know, linear line toa loyal customer, right, what this in my mind certainly fails to recognize anymore is that we're really no longer and I'm not sure we ever were, but certainly as a small business, we are no longer in control of how people get their information, who they get their information from, and we certainly can't condone longer direct kind of this linear path. This is one of the statistics that I sighed a research study in in in the book duct tape selling is this fifty seven percent of a typical purchase decisions made before customer even talks to a supplier, right? I mean, think about your own purchasing, don't you do that now? You know, you don't 00:02:01.47 --> 00:02:03. I'll show my age here, there might be some people 00:02:03.15 --> 00:02:04. in the internet audience that don't know what the 00:02:04.45 --> 00:02:07. yellow pages actually is, but, you know, we don't 00:02:07.57 --> 00:02:09. pick up that yellow book with phone numbers in it 00:02:10.27 --> 00:02:12. and flip to a thing, so I think I'm going to hire 00:02:12.45 --> 00:02:16. me a dentist today, right? We go online, we start 00:02:16.23 --> 00:02:19. searching, we ask our friends, we go on twitter, we 00:02:19.04 --> 00:02:21. go to all these places on get information and in a 00:02:21.97 --> 00:02:24. lot of cases then we say, ok 00:02:27.07 --> 00:02:29. you know my neighbor bob says these guys were the 00:02:29.15 --> 00:02:31. best let's just find out if they're the best right 00:02:31.3 --> 00:02:34. we then you know narrow down our search to one or 00:02:34.01 --> 00:02:36. two companies and we start finding what does everybody 00:02:36.45 --> 00:02:38. else say about them what are they saying out there 00:02:38.7 --> 00:02:41. you know online and so in many cases when you're getting 00:02:41.32 --> 00:02:42. called 00:02:43.57 --> 00:02:46. you know in many cases you know they've already decided 00:02:46.4 --> 00:02:49. or you know worse you're not getting called because 00:02:49.24 --> 00:02:51. they've already decided right they've already gone 00:02:51.01 --> 00:02:54. somewhere else without you having even the opportunity 00:02:54.71 --> 00:02:57. to sell them so what a lot of marketers you know interpret 00:02:57.32 --> 00:03:01. this advice to mean is you know, more content right 00:03:02.57 --> 00:03:05. just you know, maura's more we've all been kind of 00:03:05.08 --> 00:03:07. that's but that's been sort of the message now is 00:03:07.81 --> 00:03:10. that we need to produce more content andi I'm going 00:03:10.53 --> 00:03:12. to suggest that that isn't necessarily the answer 00:03:12.93 --> 00:03:15. it's not the only answer yes content is an important 00:03:15.93 --> 00:03:20. element of fundamental element of marketing and sales 00:03:20.49 --> 00:03:24. today and in fact I'm going to be talking an entire 00:03:24.07 --> 00:03:26. segment on this idea of content but here's the other 00:03:26.97 --> 00:03:29. half of that cb study the fifty three percent of those 00:03:29.97 --> 00:03:32. surveyed claimed that the sales experience itself 00:03:33.37 --> 00:03:36. was one of the greatest contributing factors to continued 00:03:36.5 --> 00:03:38. loyalty to the brand and I don't care if you are 00:03:40.27 --> 00:03:43. a large organization, a very small organization a 00:03:43.21 --> 00:03:46. solo preneurs you know those two elements can't be 00:03:46.39 --> 00:03:48. ignored they have to go together they have to we have 00:03:48.93 --> 00:03:52. to think in terms of this entire end and journey so 00:03:52.64 --> 00:03:56. many small businesses are totally sales focused I 00:03:56.01 --> 00:03:58. go out you know somebody shows up somebody calls me 00:03:58.19 --> 00:04:01. I go out there and I sell him and they really neglect the entire marketing the actual marketing function um and that it doesn't matter what size your businesses you have both of those functions you have a marketing function and a sales function now the line between those you know mike is you know there may not actually be a whole wing in your office that's you know marketing her that sales but you have to recognize that there that they are separate yet integrated functions marketing is about creating audience is about creating community is about creating attracting people who are interested in your you're why your community your context your clarity and then sales is really about then turning that understanding how to create an incredible experience for that person that you attract so this idea of the linear path you know is no longer suited and this is really I think what the picture looks more like about how we make decisions right and that a lot of that how we make decisions is no longer in our control does that make sense? Every single person every single one of your customers is a publisher now or at least has you know, at their fingertips. The ability to write reviews to actually blawg about, you know their experiences with your business. So so a great deal of our brand or the perception of our brand out there, is dictated by the experience that people have with our businesses, and not necessarily by our cute little ads and things that we do on facebook. And here's your picture out there. The internet here's. Your tweet. Herbal contest moment. I'm just giving you warnings here that the future of sales and marketing is really less about demand creation and maura about organizing behavior. And that's the job that I think we're all engaged and so some of you were kind of saying well it kind of makes sense but explain that to me I've identified over the years seven behaviors that I believe people want to participate in with the companies that they do business with whether that's in a linear fashion or whether that's over the course of three years of getting to know like and trust you but that these seven behaviors are no like trust tribe I repeat and refer what I mean by behaviors is that I believe that that we want to sort of human nature we obviously want to come to know companies that can help us with our challenges or what it is we are doing we we want to think yeah I kind of like them I kind of their story resonates with me their beliefs the things that we were talking about earlier there why that kind of makes me want to know more about them obviously we want to trust the companies that were going to uh we're going to do business with or we're going to really engage to help us in our in our lives or whatever our objectives are it's great I think most of you would say if there was ability to be able to try one of these companies to see what other people have done to see proof that they really can deliver on dh certainly I think we want to deal what you know so many companies are really good at making the the everything leading up to the buying experience great and then it's like okay got your money simulator right? So we we want to work with companies that keep that experience extremely high even after we've said yes even after we've signed the contract I don't know about you but I'd like to find companies that I could go good check that one off my list any time I needed you know remodeling contractor got her person or you know, whatever it is I know I can call these guys write so I can continue to count on them and I think that as human beings we're all pretty wired to when we have a great experience I think we like to tell people we like to to to share our know how many of you shared a great deal that you got somewhere this some company that just totally blew your way totally exceeded your expectations you you almost couldn't help yourself, you know but want to tell the world about that or share that are instagram it or tweeted or put it on facebook all the things that we do and I think that these behaviors no like trust tried by repeating refer again I'll keep saying this over and over again I believe that that are are customers and prospects actually want to participate in these behaviors and our job and I'm going to talk more about this and several other segments in terms of how to create this what I call the marketing and sales hourglass you know our job is to really find ways to let them participate in that behavior so our job then that that's the idea of the concept behind this organizing behavior so there's no longer a marketing and sales and service department per se that we are essentially building an entire end end relationship and that that's really the job of marketing and sales and then has to be even though I've talking about it being separate functions it has to be completely integrated the journey has to be seamless for the end user for the prospect so there's a couple terms that certainly thrown around in larger organizations these days but I think that they apply quite nicely to the business that we're all in you know even as in you know, the one person in the shop the solo preneurs whatever you want to call it so you've probably heard people talk about this idea of inbound marketing before it's kind of all it's been all the rage last five years so the idea behind it is that instead of us going out there and saying, hey anybody want what I've got you know I'm great come and get it that that we're actually putting content out there we're having people share in social networks so that all of sudden our leads or or somebody's going out there and they're searching you know I need a solution for x they are finding content that we've written they found their finding reviews you know about our business so that these leads are actually coming to us and not of the you know the beauty of 00:10:04.864 --> 00:10:08. that of course if it's done correctly is obviously 00:10:08.32 --> 00:10:10. who doesn't want you know who doesn't want the phone 00:10:10.26 --> 00:10:12. to ring without you know without theoretically you 00:10:12.92 --> 00:10:14. know doing anything people just start showing up and 00:10:14.97 --> 00:10:17. saying hey can you help me I mean that's a great great 00:10:17.41 --> 00:10:20. thing right but there's a good chance that if you're 00:10:20.2 --> 00:10:23. followed if you follow this entire system that I'm 00:10:23.12 --> 00:10:26. talking about that that that person is actually showing 00:10:26.09 --> 00:10:28. up pretty educated they already know what you do you've 00:10:28.72 --> 00:10:31. put out this point of view you know they've been eight 00:10:31.31 --> 00:10:33. you've been able to share your story you've been ableto 00:10:33.82 --> 00:10:37. produce and share the content and participate in social 00:10:37.26 --> 00:10:39. media in the ways that I'm going to really reveal 00:10:39.45 --> 00:10:43. and you know very deeply in in the rest of this program 00:10:43.76 --> 00:10:46. and so they show up actually expecting to pay a premium 00:10:47.56 --> 00:10:50. they show up already you know knowing that hears you 00:10:50.57 --> 00:10:52. know here's who I work with you know here's who we 00:10:52.84 --> 00:10:57. can get a result for and so when that happens and 00:10:57.5 --> 00:11:01. and trust me it can happen you know if you work on 00:11:01.95 --> 00:11:03. the things that we're going to we're going to cover 00:11:03.76 --> 00:11:06. and I'm not saying it happens overnight it takes time 00:11:06.95 --> 00:11:09. and I'll just you know be completely transparent it's 00:11:09.77 --> 00:11:14. a lot of work but when that happens what what begins 00:11:14.57 --> 00:11:16. to happen in your businesses you no longer have to 00:11:16.85 --> 00:11:19. sell there is in fact you actually have to resist 00:11:20.56 --> 00:11:23. selling because if if you're educating people of your 00:11:23.19 --> 00:11:25. building value you're telling your story in a way 00:11:25.29 --> 00:11:27. that starts attracting leads and you're still having 00:11:27.99 --> 00:11:30. to convince people that you're the right solution 00:11:30.47 --> 00:11:33. then you probably haven't done the job on educating 00:11:33.43 --> 00:11:36. them and I don't know about you but I know in my experience 00:11:37.66 --> 00:11:40. over the last ten years if I if I had to convince 00:11:40.86 --> 00:11:43. somebody why they should hire me or why they needed 00:11:43.03 --> 00:11:46. me it was probably going to be a bad engagement and 00:11:46.09 --> 00:11:49. so I haven't I haven't done what people talk about 00:11:49.34 --> 00:11:52. his traditional selling in probably fifteen years 00:11:52.56 --> 00:11:56. because if it's not if I do my job in attracting leads 00:11:56.48 --> 00:12:00. the right way and telling my story the right way then 00:12:00.05 --> 00:12:05. I no longer have the need to sell in fact oh repeat 00:12:05.07 --> 00:12:07. this point because it's significant I don't want to sell I don't want to do what people typically talk about in convincing people that they need this because I don't know your businesses but in most businesses you know it's a lot of work to get a client a result and if they're not you know bought in if they're not willing to do the work if they're not willing to follow your processes which of course you have to outline and you have to set as the expectation then you're probably not going to be able to get them the result and if you can't get a client a result on do you know it you know you're gonna have a lot of challenges if you take the money for that right because that's how that's how you create the tractors you know instead of these raving fans so inbound marketing combined now within bounds selling so your individual sales efforts well look a whole lot like marketing but now you'll start using content and social media as a way to actually convert leads that come to you and one of the things that's really been on kind of the out the last few years is outbound market this idea of advertising has really kind of taking a bad rap right? Because everybody realizes the value that if you could put content out there and you can share in social media in such a way that people will come to you why advertise right advertising is expensive on what I'm going to suggest is that when you build the inbound marking in the inbound selling approach outbound marketing or advertising as many people called actually becomes extremely effective again because you're not advertising buy me buy my product you're you begin to advertise your content, your solution, your story, that, again, we're going to talk in great deal about, you know, how to create those components. Howto build that expertise in that platform for authority, but that's actually what you're going to going to start promoting on, then all of sudden advertising becomes quite potent. So content the job then of selling is producing content connection and ultimately conversion 00:14:05.714 --> 00:14:09. so some of the terms that we kind of routinely used 00:14:09.77 --> 00:14:13. to talk about when it came to selling prospecting 00:14:13.13 --> 00:14:15. things like prospecting and pitching and 00:14:17.06 --> 00:14:19. providing information and nurturing and closing that 00:14:19.57 --> 00:14:21. I started off with today 00:14:23.72 --> 00:14:27. listening is the new prospecting we're going to talk 00:14:27.4 --> 00:14:29. in great detail about how to set up these things that 00:14:29.86 --> 00:14:32. I called listening stations so that they can actually 00:14:32.43 --> 00:14:35. be some of your greatest source of lead generation 00:14:35.44 --> 00:14:37. and of lead conversion and of insight 00:14:38.66 --> 00:14:41. teaching now is the greatest way to sell there's a 00:14:41.93 --> 00:14:45. chapter in the book that z actually is teaching cells 00:14:45.3 --> 00:14:48. on dh that's we have to think in terms of you know 00:14:48.02 --> 00:14:50. we aren't selling a product or service we're teaching 00:14:50.4 --> 00:14:53. people how to get an outcome how to get a result on 00:14:53.49 --> 00:14:57. dh we can't do enough of that we don't necessarily 00:14:57.13 --> 00:14:58. mean how many of you feel like you're drowning in 00:14:58.66 --> 00:15:01. information right not not just talking about today 00:15:03.06 --> 00:15:07. but just in general way right we have although we're 00:15:07.21 --> 00:15:08. plugged into all these things where you know we have 00:15:08.93 --> 00:15:11. access now to near perfect information and a lot of 00:15:11.46 --> 00:15:13. us are drowning it we'll think about your customers 00:15:14.13 --> 00:15:16. they are as well and a lot of what they're drowning 00:15:16.17 --> 00:15:19. in is misinformation so you know, our job really is 00:15:19.21 --> 00:15:21. not to just simply say okay, well, I'm producing more 00:15:21.69 --> 00:15:25. information you know our job is to think about how 00:15:25.23 --> 00:15:27. do we actually take the information they're drowning 00:15:27.49 --> 00:15:29. in and provide insight how do we filter it how do 00:15:29.86 --> 00:15:33. we dice it up how do we make it make sense in a way 00:15:33.4 --> 00:15:35. that that takes some of the work out of it for them 00:15:37.89 --> 00:15:41. to me a great deal of what we have to do is not get 00:15:41.42 --> 00:15:43. will not only get good at telling our own stories 00:15:43.7 --> 00:15:46. and marketing which I've shared that idea we have 00:15:46.45 --> 00:15:49. to help customers tell their story you know where 00:15:49.07 --> 00:15:52. they trying to go and that's really the nurturing 00:15:52.25 --> 00:15:55. because it's the you know the most potent 00:15:56.46 --> 00:15:59. sales either a tractor or detract er you know is the 00:15:59.99 --> 00:16:02. stories that are customers or telling themselves and 00:16:02.89 --> 00:16:05. we have to understand how to guide that story to a 00:16:05.82 --> 00:16:08. place you know that really gets them the result coming 00:16:08.88 --> 00:16:13. to us andan the last piece is that really networking 00:16:14.2 --> 00:16:16. connecting and I'm going to share this you know in 00:16:16.38 --> 00:16:20. a later segment but the real new abc is not always 00:16:20.86 --> 00:16:23. be closing it's always be connecting on dh that's 00:16:23.86 --> 00:16:27. really the job your job is a sales person if you will 00:16:27.69 --> 00:16:29. if you were going to tell me okay I've got thirty 00:16:29.3 --> 00:16:31. days I want to go out there and I really wanted I 00:16:31.48 --> 00:16:33. want to you know, up my game you know I would tell 00:16:33.81 --> 00:16:37. you that again this is assuming you could afford to 00:16:37.78 --> 00:16:39. spend your time on nothing else I would tell you you 00:16:39.9 --> 00:16:43. could benefit greatly by going out and actually connecting 00:16:43.56 --> 00:16:46. much deeper to your customers finding out who they're 00:16:46.72 --> 00:16:50. connected to who influences them finding ways to actually 00:16:50.95 --> 00:16:53. help them or connect to them you know with other people 00:16:53.48 --> 00:16:56. that might actually help them get more of what they 00:16:56.38 --> 00:16:58. want out of life are out of their businesses even 00:16:58.58 --> 00:17:01. if those things you know are completely unrelated 00:17:01.19 --> 00:17:04. to your business this this idea of you know, one of 00:17:04.47 --> 00:17:08. the greatest tactics I think in selling today is this 00:17:08.37 --> 00:17:11. idea of connecting and certainly and most of you are 00:17:11.28 --> 00:17:13. business owners but certainly those people out in 00:17:13.33 --> 00:17:16. the audience who the internet audience who you know 00:17:16.14 --> 00:17:18. they make a living working for a company you know 00:17:18.77 --> 00:17:21. selling a product or service that's their complete 00:17:21.55 --> 00:17:25. job you know this idea that these ideas you know are 00:17:25.27 --> 00:17:28. extremely potent for those folks and I think that 00:17:28.31 --> 00:17:31. you know a major shift I think a lot of small business 00:17:31.46 --> 00:17:33. owners and a lot of ways have been doing some of this 00:17:33.25 --> 00:17:35. because this is really just a little more personalized 00:17:35.33 --> 00:17:39. way you know to market and to sell but this is really 00:17:39.36 --> 00:17:41. a shift I think that needs to go on and is going on 00:17:42.17 --> 00:17:46. really universally regardless of industry so having 00:17:46.4 --> 00:17:49. said that do you wantto bring I've got just a couple 00:17:49.7 --> 00:17:51. more concepts I want to finish this segment up with 00:17:51.97 --> 00:17:54. but I thought maybe we hadn't heard from the internet 00:17:54.05 --> 00:17:56. on us for a little bit we've got a couple of questions 00:17:56.03 --> 00:17:58. come in about the material you've been talking about 00:17:58.11 --> 00:18:01. I know you mentioned before about having those those 00:18:01.09 --> 00:18:04. clients that may be difficult this question comes 00:18:04.05 --> 00:18:06. from time capsule and they want to know how do you 00:18:06.2 --> 00:18:09. rectify say past owners of your anthony or past people 00:18:09.48 --> 00:18:12. that you've worked with who've been neglecting sales and neglecting customer service and having built like poor relationships with their customer so anyway for you to rebuild the trust when you're coming up here well I think rebuilds the keyword right that that that he used there on dh sometimes that just that takes one of the greats ways is to reach out and say hey it's you know it's a new day here's how we're going to operate here is you know what let's let's get into you know what the history of working with you has been on dh let me show you you know from that what it's going to be like going forward and obviously then you've got it you've got you've got to deliver you knowing what you promise but in fact I you know you you talked about somebody with past owners I mean I think a lot of small businesses kind of neglect past customers period it means like hey, they haven't called us in order to anything for six months but you know that must be okay right on dh so I think actually making a habit or a practice out of whether it's every thirty days or you know whatever it is reaching out to people and it doesn't have to be hey we've got a new product to sell you it could just be a you know, thanks for your past business it khun b a you know we're just checking in to see did you get you know we'd like to talk to you about the results you know how are they coming you know, maybe we'll do a quarterly check in tow to make sure that that stuff we worked on with you is is coming around I think that that's you know, that's a big part of this end and customer journey it doesn't end you know, after I've used you know this in sales presentations all the time there's sales not a sail until the customer gets a result on that I think if you start kind of viewing it that way then I think you will put mohr the proper energy into creating a better customer experience and to making sure that you're going back there and measuring and quantifying did they get a result yeah now and in the chatroom people also we're talking about testimonials some of these customers how do you feel about that? I feel they're awesome I mean, there were there really kind of one intentional form of content that you should actually be eliciting and using quite actively in your in your marketing and I'll and when we talk about the content segment it will testimonials will definitely come up after you so I'm going on a little warning for those of you they're watching the screen I'm going to show a very scary graphic now on dh it really is a lot of what I've just talked about it a lot of what we're going to talk about but it's a different way to view what I find is that and we'll come back and we'll deconstruct this and we'll slice and dice it you know throughout this entire program but it's some people just learned in different ways and so this graphic for a lot of people is confusing for a lot of people it's actually very meaningful so the idea behind this is that I believe as I've talked about one of the greatest opportunities or one of the greatest priorities of most your businesses is to build a vibrant community and here is how I believe community is actually built internally you heard me talking about clarity you know your why your culture your point of view these these elements internally whether it's you are you know ten or twenty people working with you you know have to be part of you know your culture or of your community but externally then what we're going to talk about later in the program is really your content then and where that content shows up your presence and all the touch points with your prospects and with your customers in this idea of no like trust tribe I repeat and refer you know these elements together sort of converge to build community and the reason I saved this really to the end is have talked about these internal elements were going to talk a little more about these external element but this is also I think in terms of I am suggesting this is a way that you need to look at your businesses to build community but I'm also suggesting this is a way for you to look and this is more relevant to be to be companies but this is a tremendous way to look at your prospects as well if you're again if it's particularly toby to be situation you know this is a way to actually deconstruct a prospector to go into a prospect and really you know by studying you know what is there why you know have can I find some elements about their culture now do they have a point of view where are they putting out content or what is their content? This is a great way to kind of mine you know a prospect for what's going on so you know and I'll use use perfect example because you're you're definitely a b to b a person so this would be a way if you had somebody that called you up or you had something that you were targeting is a client I would suggest that this is a nice tidy way to kind of look at their world and get to know more about them on what happens is when you start kind of adopting this mentality is I think you actually I think again knowing what you do you know, marketing services you know, I think you can actually gnome or I think you could know more about them than they know about themselves you know by taking this view and you actually could use this this little chart or this little graphic as a way to actually write a report about you know, an organization about their health of that organization and I think if you were calling on a business owner that could be a really powerful tool for you to actually share some insight you know about what you've seen so I'm going to leave you with this segment with these seven questions now one of the things that until you guys but I'm also going to tell the student the internet and studio audience is that the last segment of the program I'm going to pick three or four of you guys out and I'm gonna have you up here with me andi we're going to go over some of these were going to go over some of you know how remember and teachers back when you were in school and they'd say and this will be on the test. This is one of those elements. It'll be on the test and I'll try to give you a heads up on other ones. But I'm actually going to ask you to do, you know, to answer questions like this to work on your content, themes, to work on your social media plan. You know, as I present them, I want you to be paying attention so that I could bring you up, then the last segment and say, okay, how did you do it? It'll be like the the public, you know, aural exam for, you know that second so on we can discuss some of these questions in the few minutes that we have really remaining in this segment. But this, I think, is this is sort of the essential benchmark for where you need to be. So you know, where are we now, right, that's usually a good place to least get some baseline on. Where are we going, what's the picture of your business in three to five years if you have any idea. Why are you going there? Why is that picture worth you pursuing why are you going to put in the amount of work that's going to take to get there what values will guide you so we started talking about those that culture and those beliefs and those values you know what are those values going to be how are you going to get there? You know if if you said okay here's the picture on business you know what you're gonna have to do you're gonna have to create three or four products you're gonna have to create strategic partnerships you're gonna have to get x customers know what we're going to be the priorities for how you're going to move towards that that overall objective who needs to do what? What you know do you have do you need to hire people? Do you have to find external resource is do you need to find strategic partners? They were going to help you get to where you're going and again you don't have to know my firm belief and without getting you know there are other programs that are a little more metaphysical than thin this program from creative live but I'm a firm believer that if you create that picture of your business you don't have to know exactly all the details of how it's gonna happen. No, but you have to start moving towards that goal in and really in some cases sort of detached from some of the house, but without that picture, I guarantee you where you're going to stay is pretty much where you are right now, without something to shoot for. Onda last one is what we'll need to measure. How how will we know we're making progress towards that picture? So and I keep using this term picture because I think it's a really, I think, it's a great term, because I think most of us, if you know, if I were able to say, ok, tell me the picture of your business, and you started talking about what looks like what a day, typical day looked like, how your customers felt. I mean, all those kinds of things that we go into a complete picture, I think you can, really. You can create a feeling. I think about your business and where you want to go.