Thanks to the internet, good marketing results and rising sales incomes can be much loftier than merely incremental. Like other investments that compound, good marketing should expand and multiply itself exponentially over time. When you truly determine, define and tap deeper into your market, an extremely powerful business asset materializes. Think virality.

Question: Do you feel your company’s marketing should be producing better than it does? If so, you may have become a member of a very old club no company should ever join…It is time to revoke your membership.

About a hundred years ago, a successful merchant at the time (think Macy’s), and considered to be a pioneer in marketing said this:

“Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted.
The trouble is, I don’t know which half.”
-John Wanamaker

Obviously, marketing that disappoints has been around since advertising was born. Though John struggled with his a century ago, the waste remains prevalent and antagonizes most companies today.

Companies should always be questioning themselves.

In fact, a majority of managers know (or at least sense) that their company’s marketing fritters away glorious amounts of time and money today, but don’t know what to do about it.

Do you believe your financial and time commitment to marketing should return more than it does?

Sound marketing principles deliver superior results and getting good at them is as important as the need to attract new customers itself. They are as joined at the hip as can be. Good marketing results won’t manifest without them.

Optimizing your company’s marketing practices will maximize investment returns and increase your top-line sales revenue. Guaranteed.

Part of the reason for so much squandered time and money is that marketing and advertising are inexact art and sciences. Though art can never be made perfect, increased and measurable returns on marketing investment (ROMI) are always attainable. Creative advancements (the art), new forms of content delivery (media) and extensive analytics development (the science) make standout results possible.

Today is truly the age of the consumer. Customers define markets like never before based on their own perspectives and experiences, beginning with how well product marketing and advertising speaks to them.

If your company can empathize with people, the opportunity to make its marketing performance more precise and effective than ever before has arrived.

If this sounds like superhero stuff, that’s because it can be that. 

Increasing sales while using the same budget tends to have a superhero effect. As it should. The even better news is that improved marketing, once tested and published, begins delivering positive results almost immediately.

Like most things, ROMI improvement does take incremental steps. But more effective market connections tend to begin delivering returns before very long.

The opportunity and starting point is to decide that you can and are determined to optimize your company’s marketing, so it will perform and produce as well it possibly can.

Now is a great time to begin working towards that success goal.

Some interesting industry data:

• “Our marketing specialists found that up to 60% of digital spent is wasted every year globally. Up to 35% of all web activity is fraudulent or artificial and 54% of online ads are not even seen by a human due to viewability issues.”…Proxima
  
• “Billions of digital marketing dollars are being wasted as online advertisements miss their intended targets entirely.”…CNBC
  
• “Advertising for cars fares poorly, with only 45 percent reaching their intended audience, followed by ads for computers and electronics and shopping and retail (all near 49 percent). The best-performing sector is travel where still only 65 percent of online ads reached the right people.”…Nielsen
  
• “93% of CMO’s say they are under increasing pressure to deliver measurable ROI.”…Leapfrog Marketing Institute
  
• “Only 8% of companies say they can determine ROI from their social media spending.”…CMO.com 
• “50% of companies find it difficult to attribute marketing activity directly to revenue results.”…CMO.com
  
• “40% of marketing departments think their companies’ marketing is ineffective.”…CMO.com 
• “81% of companies would increase spending on digital, mobile and social channels if they could better track ROI.”…Proxima

Good Marketing Results Are Attainable

Are too much of your company’s money and time being wasted today? No matter what volume of business, your marketing budget is a precious commodity.

It must produce for you. It’s your investment back into your own company. You need it to help you grow. You don’t want to just survive; you want your company to thrive. If your marketing disappoints, today is the perfect day to stop tolerating it.

So what are some ways you can finally enjoy good marketing results?

The real opportunity is not to just trim waste. Your objective is to turn financial and time decay directly back into sales income; the reason why you execute marketing in the first place.

Does your company adequately manage and track your marketing and its performance every day?

Answering these Ten Questions will help with your evaluation (PDF version for print):

TEN QUESTIONS TO ASK OF YOUR MARKETING

• Has our company developed clear and complete buyer profiles (personas) that identifies researched insights-driven demographics, income levels, interests, behaviors (including internet), what prospects read, watch, listen to, where they live and go, and more, for purposes of reaching ideal customers and clients (precise market targeting)?
• Do we currently measure, record and archive the effectiveness of all published marketing content, routinely abandon or fix the poor performing offenders and optimize (exploit) those that do well?
• Does our company perform marketing effectiveness audits to quantify the true return on our marketing investments and identify how we can transform the segments of ineffective budget spending into new sales revenue flow?
• What platforms (direct, indirect, organic, paid) do we use (social media, Email, print, direct mail, paid ads, etc.)? How are we monitoring and measuring the ROMI of each? How can we evaluate, reform or dismiss initiatives when they don’t perform well?
• Does our marketing staff think of marketing from a scientific perspective? What meaningful metrics are we using? In what ways? To what extent? And to what degree of depth?
• Knowing there is a good chance that 40-60% of our marketing budget is being wasted, what is our overall strategy going to be to Make our investment of time and money do its job better?
• How good are we at attributing our marketing activity directly to our sales revenue results?
• What marketing measure tools and techniques are we using? Which ones need to be retired? What can and should we do to evaluate and acquire updated tools and techniques for our company?
• What are the top three things our marketing department should stop doing immediately?
• How well are we marketing to our current customers and how are we encouraging referrals?     

“What we measure improves.”
-Peter Drucker

Additional open-ended questions for your team:

If you (the team) had a magic wand, what would you change about our marketing department?

What exactly do we want our company’s marketing results to look like and how can we get it there?

Kind regards,
Jim Campbell

In-The-Flow Marketing
Email: Jim@In-The-Flow.com
Phone: 310-487-4306
Website: In-The-Flow.com

P.S. While you’re evaluating your current marketing, be sure to download our free 40-page Ebook, “How To Turn More Consumers Into Brand New Customers For Your Company.” The principles I use for The 30-Day Marketing Makeover and much of everything else I do is in this Ebook. I believe it will help you more than you may imagine. 

The post How To Speed Up Your Desired Marketing Results appeared first on In-The-Flow Marketing.

Simon Sinek put his finger on the best way for companies to encourage more consumers to want to become customers:

“Good marketing offers us a view of the world.
Bad marketing offers us a product to buy.”

His first sentence is a reflection of where the opportunity to grow exists for companies. The second sentence shines a bright light on the problem; something we probably all have witnessed or experienced at a point in our careers…

That trying to sell products and services too soon and too quickly to people is offensive and possibly the biggest culprit for bad marketing.

We’d probably agree that it’s not a nice way to approach human beings and it’s a poor business practice:

Here’s The Problem…

People will engage when they can sense and fully believe that their motives, desires, wants and needs are going to be fulfilled at an emotional level. They also want the feeling that they can expect a pleasurable experience.

Companies that begin relationships with ‘hard sells’, before any level of trust is ever established can expect mostly “No Sale”…

When people are shown the respect we all deserve, then genuine and trusting relationships can start being developed.

   Here Is The Fundamental Solution:

“The Bridge To Get There“

So, what is the “Holy Grail” and how can a company like yours solve this problem and actually create “The Bridge To Get There” for you and your consumer markets?

Those are the right questions and the detailed answers, including the “How-To’s” are included in this brand-new, 40-page Free Ebook:

“How To Turn More Consumers
Into Brand New Customers For Your Company”

Not only does it share more about “The Bridge To Get There” it also explains exactly how to create the model for your company with a real-time tutorial that demonstrates it.

If you’d like to make it a faster read, just head directly to Chapter 6, page 18. That has the same title as the Ebook, “How To Turn More Consumers Into Brand New Customers For Your Company”

I hope you will read it, will do it and benefit from what is included. I think it will make great sense and will work well for you. I truly believe it is “The Holy Grail” for visceral marketing that succeeds. 

Consumers >> Prospects >> Customers

Over the years, I’ve studied scores of books written by the legends and icons of the marketing industry; both past and current.

And as great as they are, and though I still respect them immensely, none of them really seems to speak as directly to this marketing and sales solution as well as this Ebook does.

I sincerely desire for you to have absolute booming sales results coming your way at all times!

In-The-Flow Marketing
409 N. Pacific Coast Hwy #268
Redondo Beach, CA
Attn: Jim Campbell
Email: Jim@In-The-Flow.com
Phone: 310-487-4306
Website: In-The-Flow 

We also offer “The Marketing Strategy Blueprint” for company owners and other decision-makers who prefer that I do what’s contained in this Ebook and much more for them. Please click, call or Email if you’d like to discuss how you can quickly begin generating more sales leads for your company by adding more visceral (emotional) language to your marketing. 

The ethical and visceral marketing principles and practices that In-The-Flow employs, causes success to be as close to inevitable as could possibly be guaranteed.

The post Attract and Engage New Customers With Emotions appeared first on In-The-Flow Marketing.

Do you ever feel exasperated by how much time and money you spend on your content marketing and the disappointing returns it delivers back to you?

Take heart, most other companies feel the same about theirs too.

One reason why content marketing tends to not produce well is we’ve reached “information saturation” and it’s now almost impossible for consumers to judge one company from its competitors, no matter what the industry.

The cause is this…

Though the general idea of content marketing is sound, even when people consume your content, they usually don’t make purchases as a result of it…. certainly not as often as most companies prefer.

You’d probably be correct If it feels as though nothing is really setting you apart from your competition, especially if your company produces informational content largely because it’s such an “endorsed” strategy.

People just aren’t persuaded much by information alone. The good news is that your competitors are likely experiencing the same dilemma.

So what to do?… 

And how can you break away with something much better than what the rest are doing?…

Here’s where the transformation of your content can begin:

First, you can begin by adopting the fact that we all are primarily emotional beings and… 

…Emotions are unconscious feelings which guide all people.

…People are very emotional about solving problems and fulfilling their desires too. 

…Important decisions are not made based chiefly on information, rational thought or logic.

…All significant purchase decisions are ultimately made only after emotions have ruled.

…And all communications (all kinds) to your consumer markets should contain emotional aspects within them that speak to people as the emotional beings they are.

…Embracing and acting on this will be highly advantageous to you.

Lack of emotional connection is mainly why content
marketing is such a drain on resources…

Judgments of consequence are made based on unconscious emotional thoughts and feelings. And people will not respond when they are spoken to as mere “targets” whose main purpose is to purchase someone’s products and services.

It’s not that content marketing isn’t a good idea. It is more a problem because the ability of companies to make emotional connections of any kind is so rare…

The conscious mind is linear in thought and focuses on single tasks and logical facts. The unconscious mind is dynamic, is highly perceptive, involves the five senses, imagination, central nervous system and more. 

Think when the waiter brings over a tray of desserts and your eyes fixate on the chocolate cake and how your emotional systems light up with the good feelings and memories of all things chocolate. 

Your rational mind may try to dissuade you, pointing to the facts that chocolate cake is high in calories, fattening and not healthy but logic falls victim to feelings of intense pleasure because the unconscious brain assigns a higher value to the enjoyment of eating cake.

The unconscious mind values feelings more than the facts presented by the conscious mind.

Brands are a lot like cake in that we assign value based largely on how a brand makes us feel with conscious thought receiving little chance to affect decisions.

Unconscious feelings typically overrule conscious thought.  

This is also why we can’t fall in love with someone when there isn’t any “chemistry.” There is nothing we can do to consciously change that. Feelings will weigh-in first and they overrule logic and conscious rational choice forever.  

When we go grocery shopping, we walk out of the store mostly with the same brands from week to week. Our emotions have already established themselves as being comfortable with their previous choices and drive our preferences each time. 

None of this is to advocate manipulation of any sort. However, I do encourage you to begin including emotional elements within your marketing to demonstrate that you understand people, their emotions and feelings and desire to have emotional relationships with them that last forever.

Consumers are ignoring the ordinary and have been for a while. Companies can no longer bore people into buying products with information, facts, benefits and features.

Though that is still precisely what most other companies do and is where a wonderful opportunity for you exists.

Marketing should include planned elements of emotions that create visceral connections and develop more likability and esteem. The better you can demonstrate that you understand people, the sooner they will accept, respect and trust your company and its brand as a result.

The feelings you nurture with emotional marketing will introduce aspects that fascinate and captivate people and create positive impressions about your entire business.

The strong emotional connections you develop with your markets will become a unique, almost invisible component of your brand. Something most of your competition isn’t able to do…

And this is where I can have a great impact for you. To show you how easy it can be to begin adding these emotional elements into your current marketing DNA.

To help boost your company into engaging with your markets emotionally and become irresistible to them which happens when people sense you understand them fully.

Email your name and company website to me (Jim@In-The-Flow.com) and I’ll illustrate, in detail, how you can start developing strong emotional bonds with your specific markets that will last forever.

Which is exactly what they want too…

Kind regards,
Jim Campbell

In-The-Flow Marketing
Attn: Jim Campbell
Email: Jim@In-The-Flow.com
Phone: 310-487-4306
Website: In-The-Flow.com

The post Why Content Marketing Fails and How To Fix Yours appeared first on In-The-Flow Marketing.

You may know the joke about the guy outside a bar who was seen scuffling around on the ground under a corner streetlight. A policeman came along and asked him what he was doing. “I lost my keys.” the man said. The officer started to help him look, but after about ten minutes the exasperated policeman asked the man, “Are you sure you dropped them here?”

“No, I dropped them way over there, by my car,” said the man while pointing at a parked car twenty yards away, “but the light is much better over here.”

Why tell that story? Because no matter how hard he looks, the man is never going to find his keys there – and this same principle applies to your company’s business and its marketing, advertising and sales success. You don’t want any of your marketing efforts spent attempting to make contact with new clients in places where they won’t be reached. This may seem obvious, but can you estimate what percentage of your advertising has a chance of resonating with potential ideal clients today?

Would Facebook Ads Help You Reach More Customers, Clients or Patients?

Consider if you’re currently investing marketing dollars and if you’re reaching people who don’t want, need or perhaps can’t even afford your products. Not a desirable scenario.

Frankly, companies missing their markets entirely is much more common than precise market targeting is. People tend to not be good at targeting precisely well enough to grow their sales. This is not an area for anyone in your company to be sloppy, lazy or under-informed…

Sadly, most marketing budgets evaporate with only small or no returns as a result. That’s because precision market targeting is difficult until you get the hang of it and that requires the right tools, knowledge and work habits.

When your company does attain this expertise, it will change your business life in ways you’ve only imagined. Guaranteed.

Many things can harm a company, but there’s one that’s especially deadly – the inability to reach qualified new clients. The good news is that they’re easier to find and connect with when precise targeting is employed.

We’ve all seen karate demonstrations when a person breaks a wooden board or even a brick with his foot or hand. It’s always impressive, but with the right training, you and I could probably do that too.

That’s an example of the power of focus; the same kind of focus that is vital to you and your company’s long-term business. And a high focus is the same force you want to utilize to craft your marketing vision and the methods that will help you reach more ideal clients…

How Does Facebook Advertising Make Precise Targeting Possible? 

For most companies, products and services, Facebook Advertising is now the greatest online marketing resource for reaching your well-defined types of individuals and businesses. Facebook accomplishes that by helping us to make contact and market to extremely specific demographics, behaviors and interests within the Facebook and Instagram communities (now 3 Billion strong worldwide).

If your company has been in business for a while, you have a good feel for who your ideal client is. In fact, you know them extremely well. Naturally, you would like to attract as many more like them as possible. Which is where (and only where) you want your marketing budget spent on. Likes, Shares and Retweets are helpful but not the end objectives. 

You don’t want to spend any more time or money on those who wouldn’t really be interested, or worse, couldn’t afford what you offer. Never again.

While that may seem almost too simple for even second thoughts, it’s (repeated for effect) extremely important to keep reminding yourself of this fundamental principle. That being to seek and find only people who want and who can afford what you have to offer them.

Would It Help If You Could Duplicate Your Best Customers?

This is where all marketing and sales campaigns should begin: “How can I clone and multiply my best clients?” Think left to right. Get extremely clear with who and where your market (ideal clients) is, customize your marketing content very specifically towards them and then take that to the media platform……Markets >> Messaging Content >> Media

Some may like to argue for other advertising platforms; for instance, Google Ads can be terrific for some products. No disagreement there. You probably know that Google Ads are based primarily on the results of internet searches and, depending on competition, can be quite expensive if not carefully done and monitored.

Facebook Advertising, being a social media platform, has created an environment where advertisers can reach individuals in a more personal and private way and tone. Facebook members, now conditioned and accustomed to seeing ads, are usually in a relatively relaxed and open state of mind.

Like Google Ads, Facebook Advertising needs to be done well too, is a tasteful form of interrupt marketing without people feeling like they’re being intruded upon. Facebook will ensure that it stays that way too, which is good for all of us. Bless their hearts for that.

More Details About Facebook Advertising:

Imagine your current and future ideal clients. Could you build detailed profiles (“buyer personas”) and ads for your company if you were able to locate and make contact with the people who fall within these explicit descriptions below?

NOTE: All of the categories below each also have detailed subsets which further help enable advertisers to attain precise market targeting for their companies, products and services. This is vitally useful as you now get to choose your audience to present your company’s terrific marketing content to.

• Geography (Cities, States, Countries)
• Gender
• Education
• Ethnic Affinity
• Income
• Net Worth
• Liquid Assets
• Home Ownership and Value
• Other Living Situations
• Household Composition
• Family Status
• Relationship Status
• Parental Status
• Employment Status
• Specific Employers Industries
• Business and Industries
• Political Affinities
• Sports Affinities
• Social Issues
• Other Personal Finance
• Entertainment Preferences
• Fitness and Wellness
• Drink Preferences
• Food and Cuisine Types
• Restaurant Preferences
• Hobbies and Activities
• Home and Garden
• Pets (all related subjects)
• Travel Preferences
• Automotive and Vehicle Types
• Fashion and Accessories
• Shopping Preferences
• Beauty Products Preferences
• Sports and Outdoors
• Technology Preferences
• Other Electronics
• Purchase History
• Other Purchase Behavior
• Charitable Donations
• Gaming Habits
• FB Advertising Spends
• All Media Preferences
• Buyer Profiles
• Many more…

Precise market targeting is the most important element of any visceral marketing campaign. Yes, quality content is key as well, but if your company can’t reach real qualified prospective customers including with the means to purchase, then it won’t matter how great your marketing content is. We need both. 

The list above only scratches the surface for what Facebook Advertising delivers to business and how it can be used to achieve incredible levels of success to many companies.

If this information causes you to consider the possibilities, I’m excited for you. You may owe it to your bottom line to evaluate Facebook Advertising further.

I have been working with Facebook Advertising since 2008 and can help by providing more depth regarding this tremendous business resource to you. All I need to know is what your products and services are, where you sell them and where you would like to sell them.

Call or Email and I will get back to you. It won’t cost you anything other than a little time to learn more about Facebook Ads and what they can do for you. 

Kind regards,
Jim Campbell

In-The-Flow Marketing
Email: Jim@In-The-Flow.com
Phone: 310-487-4306
Website: In-The-Flow.com

P.S. In addition to Facebook advertising and other visceral messaging, precise market targeting and media approaches, we also offer “The 30-Day Marketing Makeover” for company owners and other decision-makers who prefer that I do what’s discussed here, and much more, for them. Please click, call or Email if you’d like to discuss how you can quickly begin generating more sales leads for your company.   

The post How Facebook Ads Will Grow Your Sales appeared first on In-The-Flow Marketing.

To find ideal clients is the life-blood for all business. All companies want rising sales but also face some level of client attrition over time; the direct opposite of growth. In either case, one of the solutions for both (improving sales results while overcoming some attrition) is the same: more precise market targeting.

Precise market targeting can help any company find new and ideal clients. It can also guide your marketing to become vividly clear about another important marketing fundamental. That each of your products and services has its own distinctive market and should be targeted precisely as such.

To understand and better execute this principle is certain to boost your company’s lead generation and sales rates. How could it not?

In other words, your company should work to get away from indiscriminately throwing a proverbial “big net” over large populations of people, while hoping the right ones are paying attention and will respond. As you likely already know, hope is never a good business strategy.

Precise targeting is a change that is extremely important to the success of both your online and offline marketing efforts; to Identify your ideal clients deeply and to be able to speak to them directly. 

Please adopt a goal that only people and companies that represent the true market for your company’s products and services should be hearing from you. No solace can be taken from high volumes of website visitors if your sales numbers aren’t yet satisfactory.

Increasing sales revenues is always the true marketing end-game and you’ll be pleasantly surprised how much your business starts to thrive from this simple shift in perspective and habit.

There is no reason to ever knowingly spend or allow time and money to be wasted reaching wrong markets. Your objective should be to reach only your company’s own services and products purchasers. Precise market targeting can do that for you.

Precise market targeting maximizes the results of your investments.

It doesn’t seem to be understood by many; that attempting to reach a unique market by spreading a wide marketing net is extremely costly for companies in many ways. And to keep doing makes it worse. It’s a significant leakage. Perhaps a frustration for you already?

The wide net practice is a mistake most companies make in the beginning until the correct way is grasped. Some though, perhaps most, never get to reap success with this principle and continue poor targeting practices forever. It can literally crush small businesses and even larger companies too. It’s not a good way at all to find ideal clients. 

Certainly, some qualified prospects may be reached with the big net but, for the most part, too many of your ideal prospective clients won’t see your offers and too many non-qualified individuals will.

That is worth repeating. Too many of your ideal prospects don’t see your offers and too many non-qualified people do.

Has your company ever generated large volumes of website visitors but received virtually zero leads or sales as a result? Those “great” website visitor traffic numbers that get most webmasters excited is fool’s gold. Please don’t be fooled by it.

Find ideal clients with better targeting and less money and time spent.

There’s often a tendency to blame the website for its inability to “convert” new clients. Certainly, that notion can be accurate too, but taking a hard look towards how well your business is doing at targeting and reaching your real market is an important element to consider and optimize.

This is not to insinuate that receiving 100% of well-targeted prospects is possible. It’s not. That’s an unattainable ambition but should be your stretch-goal nonetheless. It’s also how better habits are formed.

Wouldn’t it be nice to know that a high percentage of your website visitors, phone calls, Email inquiries, even word-of-mouth conversations are between people who want your products and have the financial means to purchase them too?

Think about the wasted time and money that would go directly to your bottom line or invest elsewhere in your company to help scale any area you’d like.

So, how can you do precise market targeting?

It starts with verifying that your company’s valuable marketing currencies (time and money) are effectively dedicated to the essential elements and your most desired objectives: The job of business marketing is to attract and create the opportunity for you to meet prospects and for them to become new, qualified (soon to be extremely satisfied) and better clients for your company.

Let’s imagine you sell expensive homes or cars. Naturally, you benefit greatly (sell more) if the majority of those who visit your website are high income – high net worth individuals and families. Frankly, from your company’s perspective, these are the only people you can really serve anyway. Showing homes or automobiles to people who can’t afford them won’t benefit anyone. 

You will also gain even more just by knowing it to be the case; that most of your visitor traffic is truly qualified and nobody is wasting valuable resources (time and money).

*NOTE: Why is precise market targeting extra important? Because you want to be able to then also retarget those who visited your website. They were qualified, they showed up, but didn’t buy. Not ideal, but that’s actually OK. That doesn’t mean they never will. Perhaps they were distracted or want to think about it more. Retargeting helps you to keep in touch with them, to help ensure they will think about you more today and continue to consider doing business with your company.

**NOTE #2: When precise market targeting is on the minds of everyone in your company, the precision also ensures your marketing content producers accentuate more about what the client would experience, feel and enjoy (benefits) and less about the product itself (features). This is a bonus byproduct that occurs as a result of the acute clarity that comes when your company members practice speaking directly and only to future clients.

Find ideal clients with precise market targeting.

Naturally, you always want to know and experience the effects (leads and sales) that are delivered when ideal and qualified individuals are consuming your marketing content in whatever form and platforms you utilize; especially with your website.

When your company improves and masters reaching its authentic market and when it becomes an inherent business practice, you will have achieved an enormous victory that can become part of your company’s DNA forever.

Why is this a skill you want to be maintained within your company for the rest of its life?

Because precise market targeting is the gift that keeps giving back to you. For as long as you’d like it to.

Where To Find Your New Clients::

“What Platform Makes Finding New Ideal Clients Most Possible?”

Kind regards,
Jim Campbell 

In-The-Flow Marketing
Email: Jim@In-The-Flow.com
Phone: 310-487-4306
Website: In-The-Flow.com

P.S. To benefit from all resources including our visceral marketing copywriting, we offer “The 30-Day Marketing Makeover” for company owners and other decision-makers who prefer that I do what’s discussed here, and much more, for them. Please click, call or Email if you’d like to know how you can quickly find ideal clients and begin generating more sales leads for your company. 

The post Find Your Ideal Clients With Precise Market Targeting appeared first on In-The-Flow Marketing.

To brand yourself, known too as personal branding, is to create opportunities to make your presence more visible to the world, explain more about yourself, share about your overall values and value and to differentiate yourself as an individual.

The first hurdle is getting comfortable with the idea of personal branding. And why wouldn’t you want to brand yourself?…

You are unique, fascinating and fantastic in so many ways. You are genuinely concerned about the wants, needs and feelings of others and you bring so much good to people and society in general.

Why You Should Brand Yourself

Yes, we’re each distinct individuals, but we all have a lot in common too. We people are inherently social beings and want to know more about each other, especially when we encounter someone who is interesting and, even more, when that certain person (you) has things to share that educates, entertains and inspires us.

Some examples:

• If you’re in business, branding yourself delivers advantages to your career and your company’s brand as a means of helping the business’ reputation for the long term. Branding yourself will help you make instant connections, begin developing rapport, generate good feelings and can help you to share your endearing qualities with new, ideal prospective clients. We should always want to know about theirs too.

• If you share expertise and other information (blogger, internet marketer, etc.), your personal branding will help you to reach niche markets and demonstrate who you are, what you are like, what you have to share and why they would want to get to know you better.

• If you’re an artist, entertainer, your audience wants to know more about you personally, your story about how you rose to become such a wonderful performer and what your visions and plans for the future are. Many of us wish we had started earlier and done more with the arts when younger. Sometimes a little inspiration goes a long way.

We rise higher when we inspire others because that causes us to believe in ourselves even more.

Brand Yourself Strategy

As you start planning and developing your personal brand strategy, it’s important to approach telling your story with great pride and confidence while remaining modest and humble. The world needs to see all sides to you.

Tell your story from an empathetic and compassionate place that will resonate well with people from their perspective. Never boast nor sell yourself short; especially in your own mind. If told well, your story will be quite relatable.

Though you are branding yourself, it’s more about why people getting to know you better will be a great experience for them, and how you can help them with certain aspects of their lives.

If the idea of such a fine balance ever seems overly nuanced, especially in the beginning, know that you will get “there” before long with some personal reflection, thought and practice.

Your Personal Brand Website

Branding yourself is similar to company, product and services branding in many ways. Like product branding, the objective of personal branding is to differentiate yourself (the product) in the world (market) and help the people you’re planning to reach attain their objectives and yours too.

At some point, you will want to have your own personal brand website. If there is any possibility to still acquire a domain name for your website (JohnDoe.com), please do that as soon as possible.

Part of the branding yourself website includes expressing your ideas, your values, other elements of your authentic self (what makes you => you?), positioning yourself in a way that will differentiate you from competitors while keeping all references to your personal brand updated.

Social media platforms such as LinkedIn, Facebook, etc., are good but don’t differentiate, i.e., everybody already has that.

Brand Yourself Summary

Branding yourself is also a way of ensuring that you leave a personal legacy. People will remember you through your essence and what you project, your expertise and the emotional connections you make with people.

Your value to the world is greater than you may give yourself credit for. This is a perfect time to acknowledge and concentrate on what that is, so others can get to know and appreciate you too.

Be proud of your personal contributions to society, collaborate those with your company, business or other profession and demonstrate how you can help and inspire individuals to achieve their goals and objectives with you on their side…

Our brand is who we are and how we do things. People are anxious to meet you and would like to know more about what you can do to help them too.

Your success is my job!

Best regards,
Jim Campbell

Email: Jim@In-The-Flow.com
Phone: 310-487-4306
Website: In-The-Flow.com

P.S. While you are working on your personal branding, I have something else that should help. To assist with your branding, be sure to download a copy of our free 40-page Ebook, “How To Turn More Consumers Into Brand New Customers For Your Company.” Many of the principles I use for The 30-Day Marketing Makeover and much of everything else I do for clients are included in this Ebook. I believe it will help you more than you might imagine.  

The post Why Should You Brand Yourself? appeared first on In-The-Flow Marketing.

Have you ever asked why your company is spending so much time and money to produce marketing content for the little value it receives back?

Most companies wonder the same about theirs too.

The reason is that we’ve reached “information saturation” and it’s harder than ever for consumers to separate one (your) company from the others.

Though the general idea of content marketing is good and people appreciate the information, they usually don’t make a purchase…at least not often enough.

Because nothing is setting you apart from the others…

So what can you do to solve this?

Business is personal and anything said to markets should feature emotion-based aspects that speak to people as human beings, not just “targets” who can purchase products and services.

To create content marketing that fascinates the consumers in your markets and convert your message into new clients is the Holy Grail of copywriting. However, it doesn’t require as much “creativity” as you may think. Good copywriting is more assembly than writing, which means just about anyone can get good at it. 

(NOTE: For the examples below, this article uses In-The-Flow’s markets to answer the questions that produce a vocabulary, phrases and language that arouses curiosity, interest and captures the attention of people in them. Naturally, the answers that apply to your company, products and markets will differ from these.)    

New clients, customers and sales are the lifeblood of all companies and businesses of every size. Consider as many of the things sales delivers as you can: more customers, clients, patients, referrals, revenue, income, business and personal solvency, financial fitness and freedom, growth, achieved goals, personal satisfaction, personal riches, great reputation, high self-esteem, confidence, delight, joys of success, happiness, fame, fulfilled dreams, terrific lifestyle, happy family, beautiful home, great schools and upbringing for the kids, ability to give more to society and causes, a fulfilled life and more.

So why don’t all people and businesses do everything they can to achieve more sales? Why aren’t all companies able to convert their message into new clients? It’s usually a lack of knowing about and having the right tools. With this simple 5-step process, we’ve eliminated that as a reason and made it easy to comprehend and complete at the same time.

Answering these five questions as deeply as you can, will help your company build a vocabulary that will reach customers at their natural feelings, emotions and even subconscious levels. You will immediately begin resonating with more consumers.

Various markets, products and services will produce different visceral vocabularies. The “vocabulary” examples provided here are for In-The-Flow Marketing’s audience and its services. You will see how a vocabulary gets into the more personal and emotional aspects for them and how you’ll be able to convert your message into new clients.

That said, I have to warn you. To convert your message into new clients, there is good thinking and work that needs to be done. This is for people who are devoted to their business for the long-haul. Though you would never be 100% done, you will soon come out of this with a living, working document that will serve you well forever. Maintain and keep adding to it over time. The more you document about your customer, the better this tool becomes and the better you can demonstrate your knowledge about them. Companies grow that are well loved. The results of your work will demonstrate your understanding and love for them and pay dividends immediately.

All you need is this tool to demonstrate that you know people in your markets so well and want them to feel your love and understanding. Sound good? Let’s dive in!

Step 1: Create A Deep List Of All The Things Your Customer Wants That You Deliver
(Make it personal and emotional)

What do your customers want as it relates to your product or service? Make it personal. Get as deep as you can. This will help you to show customers that you know what they want and why they want it. (Examples given are for the In-The-Flow Marketing audience. Your visceral vocabulary will likely differ.)

Vocabulary: more money, more sales, more cash-flow, clients, customers, patients, revenue, income, referrals, marketing that produces, financial fitness, business and personal solvency, fulfillment, great reputation, personal confidence, fulfilled dreams, to be famous, beautiful home, happy and satisfied wife, happy family, proud family, goals achieved, personal riches, feel good everyday, personal satisfaction, great lifestyle, more time for family, well-known and respected, high self-esteem, great schools for kids, great upbringings and childhoods, can grow the business, can build a team, business problems become solvable, future looks terrific, finally experiencing the joy of success, wonderful rock-star type feelings daily, overall happiness, contribute more to their community and society, give more to charities and other causes…               

IMPORTANT- Your customers are always the main characters in their lives; not your company or your product. You are the teacher, the guide in the relationship. It’s important to not position yourself (your company) as the hero. That causes people to shut down quickly.

Step 2: List The Specific Problems Your Customer Wants To Solve or Desires They Want To Fill (Include personal and emotional)

Companies tend to sell solutions to external problems, yet customers buy solutions for their internal (visceral) reasons: emotions, feelings, frustrations, must trust first, must feel comfortable, overall gut feel, etc. Showing that you understand is the first step to establishing comfort and trust.

• ROOT CAUSE ENEMIES OF SUCCESS

Vocabulary: not enough time and money, lack of expertise, hard to make marketing work, poor economy, overall ‘overwhelm’, feels daunting, paralysis through analysis, low enthusiasm, low confidence, haunted by past mistakes, fear of trying new things, other inner blocks, resources strapped, fear of failure, fear of success, fear of unknown, strong competition, complacency, loss of focus, became a “look-a-like”, overall doubt, self doubt, pride, procrastination, lack of self awareness, low motivation, no gratitude, overall negativity, lack of discipline, lack of preparation, no principles of success, no studying, ignore things that shouldn’t be ignored, fear of trying new things, bad social circle…        

• EXTERNAL (The specific problem to be solved or desire to be fulfilled)

Vocabulary: poor marketing results, missing resources and expertise for marketing success, no long-term strategy, overall lack of know-how to make related decisions, other confusing factors and options, low overall confidence…    

• INTERNAL

Vocabulary: feels frustrated, defeated, depressed, desperate, disappointed, confused, self-doubting, dread, embarrassed, envious, agitated, fearful, guilty, hopeless, humiliated, hurt, it’s a grind, impatient, indifferent, insecure, irritated, jealous, confidence lost, lonely, nervous, emotionally overwhelmed, anguished, regretful, remorseful, resentment, resigned, sad, annoyed, skeptical, somber, shocked, suspicious, anxious, uncertain, uneasy, wary, worried, scared, dismayed, failure, floundering…   

• PHILOSOPHICAL

Vocabulary: “You shouldn’t have to be a marketing expert to enjoy the benefits of good marketing and having a successful business, income and lifestyle.” 

“All people who work hard should be able to have and enjoy a business that thrives.” 

“I deserve to work with a marketing expert who knows what they are doing and can 100% guarantee that they can and will produce.”  

Step 3: List The Many Reasons Why You Are You The Best Teacher and Provider To Help Them Solve The Problems or Fulfill The Desires

NOTE– Your customers aren’t looking for you to be the main character in their life. They are looking for a teacher or a guide, the right guide. When a person or company comes along and positions itself as the hero, customers remain distant (fear, feels overbearing, intimidating, no reason to trust established, don’t want to make a mistake, be ‘bamboozled’, etc.).

• EMPATHY (Share Your Personal Experiences And Caring Thoughts)

What brief statement can you make that expresses empathy and understanding? The good teacher (you) expresses an understanding of the pain and frustration of the main character. You want them to have confidence in you and in your ability to help them.

“I know how hard it is. I remember the struggles, so much to know and learn, without a curriculum to follow.” 

“I remember thinking and telling myself many times that I’m going to do whatever it takes, while at the same time, not knowing what that was exactly.”

“I also remember the struggles, even wondering if maybe I should think about doing something else, despite telling myself that I would never quit.”  

“Confidence and enthusiasm challenges. I’d forgotten at times what it felt like to always feel confident and enthused. Even felt somewhat hopeless at times. But I wasn’t going to let those things stop me.”

“They did slow me down at times though. Too much uncertainty leads to short-term focus. Easy to lose the big picture.” 

“Would lose track at times of why I was doing it. Long-term goals would sometimes fade away.”

“At times, I felt that maybe I was working too hard. Paralysis through analysis?” 

“Sometimes I felt lonely.” 

“Being an entrepreneur is lonely.”

“Am I making good decisions?” 

“Is my life balanced enough?” 

“Time/activities management good?” 

“Am I committed enough?” 

“Losing passion?” 

“Locked the world out too much?” 

“Want to let the world back in.” 

Step 4: List The Many Failures You Will Help Them Avoid (Include personal and emotional)

Every human being is trying to avoid a tragic ending. List the negative consequences your customers experience if they don’t use your product or service. Will the main character (customer) succeed or will they fail? It will become your role to ensure they succeed. Tell them why they should choose you.

• WHAT’S AT STAKE?

Vocabulary: continued financial problems, may need to get jobs, negative cash flow, market deterioration, can’t reach people, can’t sell, need to reinvent business and personal, other crisis’, people problems, layoffs, depression, frustration, family issues, marital issues, other relationships failures, stress, company failure, personal failure, diminishing sales, other personal hardships, constant anxiety, sadness, disappointment, regret, concern, OCD, fear, more self-doubt, doubt, broken dreams, broken expectations, crushed hopes and visions…

Step 5: List What Success Will Look and Feel Like For Them After They Buy (How their lives will be transformed)

Never assume people understand how you and your company can change their lives. Tell them what is in it for them. List the positive changes your customers will experience if (when) they use your product or service. Their desires, frustrations and aspirations already exist. You are their guide.

Vocabulary: more money, highly respected, well-known, incredibly effective, rich and productive, to be transformed and transformative in all aspects of life and in business, an inspiration to others, great story to tell, proud, posterity, security, doing good by changing the world, novelty, mentor for others, expert, recognition, constant great feelings, financial independence, reinvention, create jobs, successful brand, status, reach potential, enjoying inner peace, stability of many forms, fulfillment, self-acceptance, contentment, self-actualization, and much more…

Summary: Convert Your Message Into New Clients

To convert your message into new clients comes as a result of creating this new set of words you haven’t used much before. Once you’ve created your visceral vocabulary, you’ll want to analyze your existing talking points and start mixing your elevated vocabulary throughout your website, social media profiles, rethink future postings, Email marketing strategy, lead generation magnets and any other platforms, content delivery and advertising media mechanisms you use. Frankly, this is a good time to review and consider refining your overall marketing strategy entirely. Any new content your company produces should be based on the themes and elements of your visceral vocabulary. You will reach customers at their intuitive, instinctive, natural, emotional and reflexive state. You are demonstrating to them that you understand.

Doing this work will improve your company’s sales forever. You should begin seeing improved results almost immediately and other positive trends will appear in every area now that you’ve established your new marketing vocabulary.

People will feel you are speaking directly to them, and most of them will say to themselves…“That’s me!” 

History is filled with inferior brands outselling better ones thanks to more effective marketing and advertising. Only superior marketing has the power to overcome and reverse the possibility of that. And your first-rate products and services deserve the level of customer marketing and messaging that achieves that. Now you just have to convert your message into new clients

Companies grow when they are loved by many. If what you have to sell matters, then your sales and your personal lifestyle should reflect that in a very positive way too.

With that in mind, we also offer “The 30-Day Marketing Makeover” for company owners and other decision-makers who prefer that I do what’s being talked about here, and much more, for them. Please click, call or Email if you’d like to discuss how you can quickly begin generating more sales leads for your company. 

The ethical and visceral marketing principles and practices that In-The-Flow employs, causes success to be as close to inevitable as could possibly be guaranteed. Now it’s time to Convert Your Message Into New Clients…

Kindest regards,
Jim Campbell

In-The-Flow Marketing
409 N. Pacific Coast Hwy #268
Redondo Beach, CA 90277
Phone: 310-487-4306
Email: Jim@In-The-Flow.com
Website: In-The-Flow.com

The post How To Create Content That Captivates People In Your Markets appeared first on In-The-Flow Marketing.

First, a quick assessment to earn more new business on Linkedin… 

Below are three “Yes/No” questions regarding your current experience with Linkedin: 

• Are you fully satisfied with the results you receive from Linkedin?

• Is Linkedin truly helping you to grow your business or meet the other objectives you’d like for it? 

• Do you receive a steady flow of new leads, sales, qualified visitors to your website, brand recognition, etc., or achieve your other very specific business goals on Linkedin?

If your answer to any was “No”, please take heart and know that turning them all to “Yes” is entirely under your control.  

Because it’s usually not Linkedin’s shortcoming when desired results are not achieved or experienced.

People seem to have collectively established and tend to stick to boring and unnecessary traditional patterns, such as business owners talking about themselves and placing resumes’ on their Linkedin Profiles instead of publishing content that will engage and resonate with prospective clients, customers or patients.

Whether you’re responsible for business strategy, development, running a sales organization, an individual sales professional, recruiting, or anything related to growth, Linkedin should be viewed and positioned by companies and small businesses as a prospective-clients-facing sales tool.

You own it, it’s your media space, you decide how it’s going to be used. Even if you read no further, please embrace that idea.  

___

Generating more new business is something one can absolutely expect from the largest social network for professionals…

Linkedin is an exceptional tool and a resource that will produce astonishing results for you, as long as you:

Acknowledge and embrace the mindset that 100% of your success is dependent on two critical factors:

• The level of your Linkedin content and interactions is always congenial, high-quality, engaging, interesting and of true-value to the viewers of your Profile and Messages.
  
• Your commitment to follow and fully accomplish the processes provided here is consistently high and continual.

When you fulfill these two requirements in a blue-ribbon manner, sales pitches and strong calls-to-action become unnecessary.

Because people from your Linkedin Network will come to you…

And you can pretty much earn as much new business on Linkedin as you’d like, though it does require effort. 

Important Notes About Your Linkedin
Profile and Messages Content

Your Profile and Messages should be approached and developed with the intention of being genuinely cordial, congenial, respectful and helpful to as many qualified professionals as you can.

Strive to proceed with the mindset that you are in business to help people solve problems and fulfill desires that makes their lives better. 

The more you can remove your self from the thought equation the more others will benefit from the upcoming experiences, including you.

Envision and write your Profile and Messages in interesting, engaging, pleasurable to read and gainful (to them) ways. There may be a likelihood for your current Profile to be reimagined and possibly rewritten entirely.

Also, plan and try to write with the idea of teaching about relevant subjects most people may not already know that will be of benefit to them. 

This is an always goal, that helps maintain interest, for your Profile and Messages.

Making an effort to create and offer free gifts (usually digital) regarding areas of your expertise to people in your Network will be of great service to all involved. 

Contributions such as a quality PDF or video that provides quality information they may not be aware of and is of high-interest to them.

Monitor and observe any feedback you receive of any form and be prepared to test, edit and possibly rewrite until you sense your Profile and Messages are resonating with the people from your Linkedin Network.

Most people would like to earn more new business on Linkedin too.

While others on Linkedin would like to sell their products and services to you too, they almost always interact professionally and are open to ideas and offers that will help their careers and lives. Be congenial in your approach and the Linkedin community will respond back to you in the very same way.

An extremely important element is that your Profile and Message content copy piques people’s interest, fascinates and captivates them to its end. If that feels like a tall order, copywriting assistance is available for any business or industry type.

Please Note: Once your Profile and Messages content is written, tested and the processes customized for your business, administrative and other assistants can perform the assignments for you going forward with minimal oversight necessary.

If you follow this model closely, you will receive virtually no complaints or criticisms. When you make a terrific case for your products, people will respond with healthy interest and become clients.

And why wouldn’t they?

Your “New Business” Process For Linkedin

• Define and document detailed ideal client (target) market demographics in terms of decision-maker and buyer roles. Include titles, industries and other determining factors. You are going to reach many interested and qualified buyers. Who are the people who want and need your products, services, etc., and where are they?

• Establish your general strategy for execution and processes. This is dictated by your industry, business type, markets, sales cycle, etc.

• Author, test and refine Linkedin Profile as appropriate until satisfied a suitable number of visitors are reading, remaining engaged throughout and responsive as verified by results, positive feedback received and other indicators (sales, discussions, meetings, etc.).

• Author, test and refine Messages copy as appropriate until satisfied the recipients are responsive, as verified by results monitoring and other indicators. Send daily flow of messages to targeted Linkedin users.

• Compile a list of qualified ‘Viewers To Profile’ (name, title, city, company). Identify 2nd and 3rd Degree Connections for Premium InMail contact.

• Author, test and refine Messages to “retarget” qualified Profile viewers. Appropriate timeframes for scheduling retargeting Messages and other correspondences determined by you as appropriate.

• Add new prospects to your master contact lists (Rolodex, Email list, etc.).

• Send Invitations To “Connect” daily. Develop a growing base and flow.

• Review, retain and document available Linkedin and other analytical data, charting growth, results and other improvements.

• Integrate links to websites into Profile and Messages as appropriate.

• Execute, document and refine your Linkedin strategy for sales results.

• New business and solving problems are usually the end-goal for all involved.    

Engagement and Growth Within Your Linkedin Network

Connecting with people to grow your Linkedin Network should occur in two places, 1) “Who viewed your profile”, 2) Linkedin Search (demographics, etc.)

The “Who viewed your profile” line chart should usually be trending northward and be relatively close to a straight line. A sawtooth effect usually means days were missed or maximum connects were reached. Withdrawing unaccepted invitations will resolve the latter; the oldest withdrawn first.

To perpetually earn more new business on Linkedin your Network should continally grow in number, quality and overall results.

Lastly…

Linkedin analytics are not robust and you won’t acquire much in the way of helpful statistical data. However, you will receive strong indicators when your Linkedin efforts are returning dividends from the positive feedback you receive, the sales cycle interactions you’ll be engaging in and the new business you will be enjoying.

When people begin reporting back that they: “Read your profile with great interest.”, “Informative.”, “Extremely interesting.” “You nailed it.”, “Can we talk?”, “Can we meet?” and other positive returns, then you’ll know that your content is resonating and engaging with your viewers.

Please never give up, no matter what. If you’re determined, you will get it right and earn more new business on Linkedin.

Let me know if you have difficulty getting your Linkedin Profile or Messaging to convert.

Ask me if you’d like In-The-Flow to handle Linkedin for your company as a project. You will be delighted with the results. 

Kindest regards,
Jim Campbell

In-The-Flow
Email: Jim@In-The-Flow.com
Website: In-The-Flow.com

P.S. A copy of this article is available on PDF if you’d like one “to-go”…

P. S. S. Good marketing and good selling!

The post How To Earn More New Business On Linkedin appeared first on In-The-Flow Marketing.