Why Santa’s Marketing Works Better Than Yours
Sean D’Souza (of Psychotactics.com) is an interesting guy who happens to hail from New Zealand. He’s always discovering alternate approaches to marketing. “Why Santa’s Marketing…” is one of his brainstorms in the guise of a short article, a three to five minute read. I recommend it, as well as many of the other free articles on his site. Not too many people manage to work Santa Claus and marketing into the same sentence…
Getting Stalled too Often?
Seth Godin recently published a new blog entry titled “License to Stall”. It’s a good read, and useful to anyone who is finding their marketing effort more difficult than necessary. Recommended. Here’s the link.
Losing Money Because You Don’t Own Your Name?
Although many people may have the same name as you do, only one of you will be able to own the .com version of that name. For many people with common names, it’s already too late – http://johnsmith.com is already taken, for example. But all is not lost if your name is already in use as a domain. Here are a few tips:
- Use a name with a different suffix (the technical term is tld). For example, if the .com name is take, try using .net, .us, .org, .info, .ws, .me, .tv, or one of the many tld’s available today. Although not everyone will remember your web name as easily as the universal .com, the search engines will recognize and index domain names with any tld.
- Try using a hyphen in your domain name (john-smith.com). It is rumored that search engines slightly favor hyphenated names, so you may find this to be a small benefit.
- Use a nickname if people tend to know you that way. JackSmith.com or JackieSmith.com may be available. You also may find your initials will allow you to find an acceptable domain name, especially if you are known by those initials.
- Usually even the most common names can be combined with another word to make a domain name. For example, at the time of this writing, JohnSmithBlog.com was still available. Good words to use – blog, home, site, team, co (or company) are all recognizable and memorable.
- When publishing your domain name in print or on the web, use JohnSmith.com instead of johnsmith.com. This helps people to see the natural break in the words. It’s amazing how many web sites fail to capitalize on longer web names by forgetting to use capital letters to break up the words in their domain name. Domain names work equally well, whether or not they are capitalized.
You get the idea. Experiment a little with your name, and you can usually find a domain name that will be recognizable by search engines. Once you have your domain name, point it to your bio page at your main web site, or develop a one-page personal web site, and feature a nice link to your main site (or the site you are currently promoting).
Your domain name will be worth thousands of dollars to you, over the years, just for the simple annual fee involved to register the name (less than $15.00). It’s the least expensive advertising you’ll every buy!
“Steve Pickering, here with a brief note. If you’re having trouble finding a good domain name for your business, or personally, I offer coaching to assist you in finding the best names to use. Please send me an email, and I’ll be happy to help. My fees are very reasonable.”
Consider a Sunset Sale
January is coming, and for many businesses, the traffic cycle changes. Retailers hate January because it’s so much slower than the previous two months. Some other businesses are back to normal because everyone is back to work, and serious (at least for a few days) about their New Year’s resolutions. Still others have a great January planned because their business cycle makes January a month of demand.
Whatever your business, consider having a “Sunset Sale” at the end of January. Why? It helps people to think of you. Promote your sale during the entire month of January. Talk about it. Write about it. Tell your local newspaper about. Send a press release to someone at the Wall Street Journal. Have a pre-sale for your best customers. Cross-promote with other businesses to generate extra traffic and to share expenses for advertising, supplies, prizes, etc. Run your sale all night, or 24/7 for the last week of January. Invite people into your establishment for tea and cookies, coffee and donuts, or hot dogs and sauerkraut. If you’re on the internet, offer a free e-guide, or 30 minutes free consulting, or a list of unique links. Build your e-mail and snail-mail lists.
The key thing is, do something different, and do it at a time when no one else is doing something. That way you’ll stand out. Make people feel a little bit better about themselves because they see you hustling and making things happen. Don’t wait to have a Valentine’s or President’s Day Sale because everyone is promoting then. If you do your “Sunset Sale” well, you’ll have so much business in February, you won’t need to compete for share of mind.
Who knows what will happen? Any action during a slow business period is noticeable to your employees, your customers, your prospects, the press, etc. Just do it. It works. Try it, you’ll see.
P.S. You don’t need to name it a “Sunset Sale.” Make something up that’s catchy, that will make people notice. It could just as easily be a “Sunrise Sale” or whatever you want. Be creative, be outrageous, maybe even a little crazy.
Walking Softly on the Telephone
Sometimes we need to “Walk Softly” as we use the telephone. We have all been victims of Telemarketers who call at inconvenient times. You know the type – can’t pronounce your name, obviously reading from a script, mispronouncing words, talking forever, won’t take accept “NO” for an answer… The phone call from hell.
Many of us shy away from using the telephone in business just because we don’t want to be associated with telemarketing. There is a better way, however.
How many clients do you have in your computer who haven’t spoken with you for three or more months? Have you ever considered calling them just to see how they are doing? You could ask them how that widget machine is working, you know, the one they bought from you last year? Or you could wish them a Happy Birthday, or ask about her son’s graduation, or mention the article you saw about the in the paper… There are dozens of reasons you could call, just to show you care. You don’t need to talk about business. Just connect with them, find out how they are doing, perhaps discover a few things about them that you didn’t know.
If you think about it, how many times have people who have sold you things in the past bothered to call “just because”? Would it make you feel better if you heard from some of your vendors occasionally?
Take a soft walk around your client base from time to time… Don’t talk about business. Ask about something else. Engage them in conversation, be interested in THEM and the things that are important to THEM. Then send them a Thank You card… “Thanks for the conversation… It was great catching up with you… Hope your daughter’s wedding goes well.” Make a goal to just talk with one person in your database every day, and send them a card to thank them for the call. Let them know that you are glad to have them as an acquaintance and client. They’ll love you for it…
