It’s obvious that business owners are a huge target for advertising companies.

And as print media continues to produce dropping response rates (generally speaking), with Yellow Pages’ print business struggling for survival, the focus has switched to online marketing.

In my experience, it’s common for sales people from advertising companies to use a strong mix of guilt, fear and pressure to get business owners to part with $5,000 to $20,000…normally without asking many questions about the business they’re trying to sell to.
Problem is, most of these websites will never generate an income – let alone earn back the money invested in them by the business owner.

If you’re in a situation where you’re looking to “explore internet marketing”, here’s some quick pointers:

1. Forget the silver bullet - Yes, I know you’re too smart to listen to the “build it and they will come” sales message commonly used. But to be clear, just having a website does not online profits make! Online marketing is rarely a “set and forget” arrangement.
2. Know the purpose of your site – Are you wanting to sell products or services directly from the site, via shopping cart or instant pay system such as PayPal? Are you looking to offer a free bonus / report / sample, in exchange for contact information? Are you simply wanting an “online brochure” which you can refer your customers & prospects too for further information about what you do? Knowing this information up front is essential, before you spend any money on a new website or online marketing
3. Is your website a direct marketing website, or purely a “pretty picture” – Assuming you do have a website already, any online marketing driving traffic to your site MUST have lead capture ability. That is, similar to the previous point, it must have a place where visitors can leave their email address (minimum) and name, along with other contact details as necessary. Rough rule of thumb, ask for just name & email address first to maximise response (people are still very hesitant to leave more than this info before they know you, like you and trust you!) A pretty website will NOT let you maximise your return from any marketing effort you do, as your visitors will be lost forever!
4. Do you have a follow-up system in place - it’s one thing to capture the information from your visitors, it’s another thing to stay in touch with them. Ideally you’d be offering a multi-step marketing system, whereby a visitor can be educated in automated emails… given examples of how you’ve helped previous clients… hints on how to overcome some of the problems they may be facing related to your industry… and maybe (ideally!) an offline direct marketing package or postcard
5. If looking to advertise in an online business directory, what options do you have - there are plenty of online “portals”… websites developed by smart marketing companies targeting a specific industry (eg carpet cleaning), with directory listings sold to such business owners for $200 to $1,000. My personal view on these sites: if you’ve got the ability to post videos, backlinks to your website(s), “free text” about your business, additional images etc, then you may find value in such sites. But… and it’s a big but… it’s important to remember you’ll be competing on a very level playing field with these sites & often only able to compete on price. A dangerous place to be, and a bigger problem than I can explain in this post!
6. Don’t be pressured – if the offer “won’t be good unless you say yes right now”, walk away. Seriously! Online or offline, you don’t want to find yourself in a situation we’re you’ve agreed to spend good money on something you don’t understand (technically or even the true benefits). If a company has to resort to high pressure / guilt / manipulation to get you to spend money with them, they do not care about you or your business… just their sale. They will not be around to answer your questions 5 minutes after the sale

So before you jump in & waste money on any kind of advertising online, be sure you’re doing so from a position of confidence, trust & knowledge – without those things you’re making yourself a more vulnerable target for quick-sale-and-move-on-to-the-next-victim salespeople.

Better still, put a strategy together with the help of a trusted business advisor for your entire online marketing approach, and implement different aspects as your confidence (and profits) grow.

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If you’ve been using the internet for more than a few months, chances are good that you’ve bought or sold something on eBay.

Personally I’ve not been the biggest user of eBay – at time of writing, I’ve got 48 feedabacks @ 100%. And most of this was received years ago.

So when it came time to list some of my electronic items on eBay recently, I felt like I was starting again with the system.

I decided to use eBay’s own Turbo Lister tool, which allows you to setup the listing offline & upload at your leisure. Using what I’ve learned from my direct marketing copywriting, SEO and general marketing experience, I crafted a rough-&-ready “sales letter” template:

• Attention-grabbing headline (granted this wasn’t the typical “4 U’s” model, but it targetted my target audience (PC gamers) effectively
• Descriptive sub-head
• Conversational copy, with humour sprinkled throughout
• A “Here’s what you get” list
• A video of me, and the stuff I was selling – in use (a walkthrough of the major components, & me using the product “live”)

Using this same approach, I successfully sold my Sony PSP for $117, where most were selling in the $80 to $100 range.

But more impressive was the response to my listing of my Q6600 gaming-friendly computer, with monitor + much more.

To my amazement, that listing generated 512 unique page views, and 56 “watchers”!

Now, I’m no eBay guru by any stretch of the imagination, but I have to say, I was well chuffed with that response

When the winning bid came through, the winner’s father also came along to help pick up the computer & components. We had a small chat, and he said to me, “You did a really great job with your eBay listing… it was great!”

We didn’t have time for specifics, but I thanked him for the feedback & replied that I tried my best to be open & honest with whatever I was selling. Video, by the way, is a fantastic way to do this.

Openly this listing had some mistakes. Turbo Lister didn’t “wrap” my ad text, and there are no horizontal scroll bars in eBay listings. This meant that some of my text was “cut off” unless you left-clicked on the sentence & dragged the mouse around…

Secondly, I listed this ad at 11:30pm on a Sunday night on a 7 day listing. This means the winner would likely have to be awake at this same time to win. While I could argue that my target market (young males who play computer games) would not consider 11:30pm “a late night”, it’s still not ideal and probably cost me some $.

Thirdly, I didn’t think through the postage side of such a large, heavy item. I made the dangerous assumption that people wouldn’t want to risk – or pay the high cost of – having the gear delivered via courier (clearly Australia Post was out of the question!) I received numerous requests along the lines of, “Would you be willing to organies a courier to <suburb in Perth>?”

So, here’s what I’ll be doing fo rmy next eBay listing to get maximum response & selling price:

• Keep the same template as the computer listing, but with manually-wrapped lines (to avoid losting words off the page!)
• Make a video which includes my face at the start, providing a quick introduction to me and what I’m selling (to build credibility & trust)
• Keep the copy in line with direct marketing copywriting standards
• List my item at 8pm on a Sunday night
• Think through all possible postage options & questions people may have, and answer them in the sales copy

I don’t list on eBay often, but when I do, I’ll post my findings here. If you pick up one or two tips that help you, my job here will be done!

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Unlike most people, I collect “junk mail”.

Some of it I learn from.

A lot of it, I cringe at.

In this video post I take a look at a few similar pieces of direct marketing I’ve received at my home recently & share my thoughts with you.

There are some valuable lessons to be learned here, so I encourage you to take a look and see how you can apply it to your small business’ direct marketing efforts!

Direct Marketing Copywriter Critiques Local Plumber Marketing

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In Part 1 of this series, I covered some of the ways you could use autoresponders to build your business automatically.

Now I’m going to reveal one of my secrets for writing effective sequences of emails for prospects. Specifically, these are people who have visited your website and requested information, but are yet to make a purchasing decision.

Here’s my formula:

1. Identify the biggest 4-6 problems that your target audience face today, which are solved by your product or service
2. Create a series of 6-8 emails (2 more than your identified number of problems)
3. The content of the emails is as follows (assuming 5 problems have been found:
   
   • Email 1: Introduction / overview of the 5 biggest <topic> problems faced by <target market> and how you can overcome them with the right <product / service type>
   • Email 2: Problem #1 – <Problem faced>
   • Email 3: Problem #2 – <Problem faced>
   • Email 4: Problem #3 – <Problem faced>
   • Email 5: Problem #4 – <Problem faced>
   • Email 6: Problem #5 – <Problem faced>
   • Email 7: Summary & call to action

4. Included inside each “Problem #” email are the following key points:
   
   • Easy-to-read, conversational copywriting. Wording such as, “What we’re finding is that a lot of businesses are grappling to deal with <specific issue>. Perhaps you’re in the same situation today. Well, the good news is that with the right <product / service>, these kinds of issues can be easily overcome… forever.” Remember the cliche (but cliche for a reason), “Advertising is salesmanship in print” as a guide
   • Language that resonates with your target market (i.e. industry jargon & references may likely be appropriate here to relate better to your target market)
   • An option to “speak with a human being” if they wish, rather than wait for future emails
   • A link to another video on the website which runs through an example of how the product / service overcomes this Problem
   • NO SELLING OF YOUR SPECIFIC PRODUCT OR SERVICE (other than what is said by OTHERS in testimonials… below) This is crucial, & many reading this will think I’m completely bonkers, blaspheming, or both. But hear me out – there is a lot of psychology behind this approach. At this stage of the buying cycle, you’re still establishing trust & getting the prospect comfortable with YOU and your COMPANY. Product comes after this… and price is last on the list!
   • One testimonial at the end that addresses the specific Problem being discussed. Eg, if the problem is “spending too much money”, your testimonial should explain how your customer saved $3,279 per month in just 3 months. It goes without saying these have to be real figures – you’re only hurting yourself if you fabricate these kinds of stats! You can use two or three testimonials if they’re relevant to the specific problem, but avoid stuffing the same testimonial in all emails (never repeat them in these emails if at all possible.)

5. The emails can be scheduled in your autoresponder program (such as Aweber.com) to go out every day consecutively, or there is an advanced approach I’ve discovered which seems to work even better (sorry, some things have to say a secret… you understand!)

The idea with this approach is to provide your prospects with a non-threatening way to get to know you and your company better, and the kinds of services / products you offer. Then, by the time they’re ready to make contact with you, they’re far more qualified & informed than if you “hit them up” with an order the moment they stumbled across your website.

So… is this all more work for you?

Damn straight.

Is it necessary in a negative, sceptical “been ripped off one too many times” world?

Absolutely.

Can someone else do it for you, so you don’t have to add anything more to your already over-flowing To-Do list?

Definitely. I can even suggest someone…

Until next time…

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Welcome, dear reader, to a brand new year!

While it certainly pays to be hopeful and positive, I’ve heard (from more than one reliable source) that this year is going to be… well… life-changing for many. September / October 2011 we’re likely to see some massive changes in the world economy, based largely on the US’ current (estimated) $14 TRILLION debt. To put that in perspective, in 2004 it was around $6 trillion.

Did you catch that? Around 7 years to jump $8 trillion dollars! I guess wars do cost money after all, huh…

Anyway, the big lesson for anyone this year has to be: build your nest egg now.

2011 Marketing Plan

Look, I’m no economist. I barely scraped by in my “Introduction to Financial Accounting” classes in uni (and hated every minute of it.) But I don’t need to be Warren Buffet to know that we can’t continue along the path we’re heading without some kind of major shake-up.

As a business owner, you’re in a better position than the employee to respond to this situation. After-all, you have the power to give yourself a pay-rise any day of the week instead of once per year (or worse!) You can introduce new products or services… increase your prices on your existing offerings… sell non-competing company’s products or services to your client base via joint ventures or other arrangements…

So – what’s your marketing plan for 2011? Will you finally “get around” to building that website with lead capture & autoresponders? Will you make an offer to your customers to entice them to sign up with you online? Will you launch your Facebook, YouTube, & Twitter accounts? Is this the year you’ll discover for yourself the power of video marketing, and how much Google loves the combination of WordPress and video?

What about offline marketing? Will you be sending any postcards to your customers or new prospects? Outrageous sales letters, perhaps? Are radio, TV or newspaper advertising on the horizon for you this year? Is 2011 the year you’ll give the Yellow Pages the flick, or the year you’ll ramp up your investment due to the large number of your competitors who won’t be listed… giving you greater exposure?

Whatever your plans, I hope you have plans – not just for survival, but for major growth!

And of course, you can always leave a question in the comments area below, or perhaps take advantage of my free 15 minute marketing consultation offer (at my company site) if you’d like to kick around some ideas.

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