The trend to remote meetings and videoconferences is dangerous.
Marketers, salespeople and business owners are in danger of losing their connection with their prospective customers, customers and centers of influence.
In order to sell effectively, you have to understand the problems, fears, desires, objections and conversations of your ideal customers. Robert Collier called this “entering the conversation already taking place in your customer’s mind.”
The best way to do this is to eavesdrop on customer conversations and by studying the words they use. Press the flesh.
It’s hard to do it while isolated in your home office.
There are online substitutes like virtual masterminds and social media groups. They just aren’t the same as observing in person.
One of the most successful marketing pieces ever mailed is the Coat-of-Arms letter created by Gary Halbert.
The letter began: “Dear Mr. ___________, Did you know that your family name was recorded with a coat-of-arms in ancient heraldic archives more than seven centuries ago?”
Gary Halbert sold millions of dollars of family coat-of-arms merchandise (including to my family) starting with that “lead generation” letter, one of the most-mailed in history. The offer was a reproduction of the earliest-known coat of arms for the family name, together with some history of the family name, for $2 during 1971.
Gary Halbert didn’t develop the letter solely from his imagination. He went door-to-door to learn how real people responded to his presentation, and then put it in print.
It’s no coincidence that many of the most prominent promotional writers had experience selling “nose-to-nose, toes-to-toes” to customers at kitchen tables in their homes. Selling items like encyclopedias (Gary Halbert), stoves (David Ogilvy), Fuller Brush products (me), Amway products (Dan Kennedy), Kirby vacuum cleaners, water softeners, burglar alarms, fire alarms, solar panels and more. These opportunities seem to be more limited today than they once were, but they still exist.
As a marketer, salesperson or business owner, find out where your ideal customers congregate, like trade shows, conventions, athletic events, bars (think Cheers), service clubs, fraternal organizations, charity boards and events, churches, synagogues, mosques, or temples. Then go to those places, talk to them and, more importantly, listen to them.
You might learn the problem, “hook”, or phrase that establishes an emotional connection with your customers for more effective marketing communications.