Archive for Core Message
Referral Process Explained – Step 3
Posted by: | CommentsStep 3 = Your Core Referral Message
Service, Product, Retail, Construction, Professional services, Employee, and Volunteer … it doesn’t matter. A referral system should include 7 basic steps that helps you identify and succeed in ways you never imagined. The principles are outlined in a 7-step process that we will communicate this week in leading up to Referral Week. It is the basic understanding on how to apply the Referral Flood program to Your Business or Organization.
Step #3 – Create and communicate your core referral message – your referrer must be able to easily explain the value you bring to anyone who they refer. “Business901 implements marketing systems.” Now, how do you go about defining your core referral message. Is it different than your typical core message?
Your Referral Message must be very concise to your Target Referral Market. If not the effectiveness of your message will be greatly reduced and may even be non-existent. You must develop a message that has the ability to be transferred effectively and rapidly cross the network, much like the game of telephone that played as a child. If your message has to repeated: Short, concise and to the point is important. Where a core marketing message may solicit a "How do you do that?" A core referral message should solicit: Can they do this or a What do they do? More about the answers later.
Looking at my Referral Venn diagram, look at the overlapping of circles. You must envision what core message you want to express to each particular group. The trade organizations you belong to may not have any interest or similarities to the message that you are sending to you vendors. Or it may be the exact message same message you send to each. Why would this matter? By organizing your referral clients according to core message you can start build a referral funnel for each perspective group and see what message and material will be similar to each one. Many companies will develop a referral program without integration and/or try sending the same message out to all. Customizing the program to each sector will make it work but by integrating the process, you will be able to manage it and develop it to its fullest extent.
Improve your production forecast by 50%
Posted by: | CommentsActually most people tell me the their marketing is working, they just don’t have the time. Or, they would like to make it more professional. Or, maybe I could help them with start a blog. Very few people ever admit to a marketing problem. Even the better organizations that have built a great bran
d will leverage it as well as they should. And the single one thing that stops them is understanding their ideal customer, or the term buyer persona. They even spend little time on the process he uses to purchase and the expectations he has of the product.
The most used the excuse I see in developing a buyer persona is that the buyers vary too much. Okay, let’s just try to segment a portion of your customers. Maybe it’s only 10% or if your lucky as high as 50%. But creating some channel will facilitate in mapping out that buyer persona. If we look at how will the purchase was made and determined by that group, it will lead into some very insightful information. But I would encourage you to really try to understand the compelling reason they chose you. That reason alone can clarify your marketing your sales processes, and improve your production forecast.
I know that may sound silly over just one statement but look at it this way. If you could know the compelling reason that 50% of the customers buy from you, what would that mean to your bottom line?
P.S. A quick check to validate this, would be to talk to a few prospects that you lost. Ask them what their compelling reason, not to buy from you.
We use our Lean Marketing Assessment to see where you stand and how well you leverage your core message and it is at the basis of our Product launch strategy. Learn more about these two products.
All Core Messages are not Created Equal.
Posted by: | CommentsI wrote a post recently that All Sales Channels are not Created Equal and talked about the resources that you would have to commit to each one. But today I had an appointment with a new client and was discussing their Core Message and went through an exercise that I thought might prove useful. More importantly, I discovered that you can have more than one sometime and that All Core Messages are not Created Equal.
List your core messages, you can have more than one but keep it short and sweet.
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Which one differentiates you the most?
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Which one screams the loudest?
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Who and what influences whom?
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Which would could prove the most effective?
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Which one has the highest risk attached to it?
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Which one has the Lowest Risk?
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Which one is the easiest to support?
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Which is the easiest to implement?
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In the short term?
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In the Long Term?
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Which one is the most affordable?
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Which of them is most recognizable to your customers?
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what are the best vehicles to reach your audience or constituents?
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Can you combine and optimize?
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If you decide on more than one, what is the best timing to introduce each?
So what is your core message?
Can you move forward without Differentiation?
Posted by: | CommentsCraig Crook was a guest on my show, Connecting Your Passion. Craig’s company is a Learning Center and as Craig calls it -Learning faster than your competitors is the only sustainable advantage. How long can you last as a differentiator?
As an add on to this fellow coach Adrianne Machina @ Tornado Marketing just blogged about Differentiation for Professional Services , she has some great examples, so read the entire blog but here is an example: “When we’re sellers of professional services, we need to be able to articulate how we’re different than our competitors – and that begins with HAVING a difference. If you don’t have a way to differentiate and dominate, you’ll be stuck competing on price. And that’s a problem, because there’s always someone willing to lower their prices, and go out of business faster than you.”
