How to Make Passive Marketing Media Proactive!
Passive marketing media includes print advertising, internet websites, television, radio, billboards, and yellow pages to name a few. We put the message out there, hopefully in front of our target markets, with the hope that someone will take our bait. As with all passive marketing, it never makes the sale. Passive marketing is only the attracting vehicle to our product or service. To get someone to buy, we need to have a proactive interaction to collect the check.
Let’s explore some cost-effective ways to drive your target market to your passive advertisement.
- One your methods might be to attach an article (that you originate or one you choose from another resource) to your website. (Be careful when choosing another’s article. You need to have their permission to use their article, and you need to give them credit for writing it.) You can offer the article to your clients or potential clients. By attaching the article to your website, people will usually scan your site when going to your website to read or retrieve the article.
- Many of us have developed catchy phrases that we use publicly at networking meetings and events. How about using them in a catchy sentence when sending an email to strategic alliances, clients, or business associates. A business associate I knew used a tag line “I hold up banks!” His business was manufacturing decorative cement blocks to hold up “earthen banks” as in retaining walls. He might choose to start an email to his strategic alliances, clients, or business associates with “We continue to work with people to hold up banks.” This is a strategy that helps your supporters, those people in your sphere of influence, help you get all the prospects and referrals you deserve.
- How many sole proprietors or independent contractors can afford yellow page and billboard advertising? Not many! These are normally left for the big companies and corporations with large advertising budgets. How about sharing the investment in billboard advertising? You can then share the leads from the billboard investment. Frequently we can find billboard advertising in high traffic area. When shared with as few as four to 10 people, the cost per month can be as little as $200 to $1000 per person. I know of an insurance company that used this strategy. Eight independent representatives found a high traffic billboard on a stretch of Highway 101 in San Jose, California. For about $4000 per month plus the artwork, they split the cost eight ways. Daily traffic volume along this section of Highway 101 was nearly 200,000 commuters. Eight agents shared thirty to fifty leads every 30 days. Making a minimum of two sales per month from this billboard put them in the black. Caution, make your billboard message short and to the point. Have it be a message that is results oriented, in front of your target market. Use an 800-telephone number with a message available 24/7.
- Combine strategies mentioned above. Mix and match to form new ones. How about using them at networking events you attend? Have people you meet go to your website to read and download your significant article. During the course of your conversation at the networking event, ask permission to send the article. After the networking event, send an email acknowledging meeting that person at the event. Again, ask permission to send the article. (Asking permission in the email avoids ever being accused of SPAMMING. Recognizing that SPAMMING does occur and places you in a negative light. Asking permission to communicate gives you instant credibility!) Once you send the email, let a day or two pass. Then follow up with a telephone call asking if they received your email, the article, and if they have any questions or comments.
Following these simple techniques will allow you the opportunity to take a proactive approach to passive marketing.
Gerry Rose runs INTEGRITY Networking Solutions in Oceanside, CA. He works with realtors who want to attract the right prospects and their affinity partners who want to generate more referrals. More than 10,000 businesses have been presented the INTEGRITY Networking Solutions system in San Diego, Riverside, and Orange Counties.
Gerry’s stimulating presentation Unlimited Prospects, Unlimited Referrals is ideally suited for small business owners, home-based businesses, and independent professionals who want clearer direction and want to attract more prospects, develop dynamic systems, and strengthen their companies’ accountability. Gerry does one on one consulting, conducts a range of keynote speeches from thirty minutes to full-day education workshops.
His books, Unlimited Prospects, Unlimited Referrals, 101 Tips to Attract Prospects, 101 Tips to Generate Referrals and Unlimited Prospects, Unlimited Referrals, Giving Your Clients What They WANT, So You Get What You WANT are currently available. Unlimited Prospects, Unlimited Referrals, Using Your Time, Energy, and Creativity to Create Value, will be available in 2006.
Gerry has more than 20 years’ experience directing business owners how to grow their businesses. He is a networking dynamo. Those who know him will assure you that he does a great job of bringing people together—which is why he started Integrity.
Involved with networking organizations since 1984, Gerry is an Accomplished Toastmaster, a member of Toastmaster International, and has chaired numerous chambers of commerce and non-profit organizations.
Are you truly committed to attracting the right prospects and generate more referrals? If so then contact INTEGRITY Networking Solutions for availability and information. You can contact Gerry by mail at 1610 Quiet Hills Drive, Oceanside, CA 92056. Direct dial (760) 439-4623; e-mail to gerry@integritysd.com. For more information, go to www.integritysd.com
