If you’re anything like most business owners, you spend a lot of time thinking about how to get more customers through your door. Marketing is critically important to your business, but should you do it yourself or should you get someone else to do it?
Let’s look at the top three reasons to outsource your marketing effort.
1. WIIFM? – how many times have you been to a store, visited a website or sat through a presentation thinking “these people just don’t get it”. Most likely the reason was that they were talking seemingly endlessly about themselves – when what really matters to you is YOU. Certainly their product, service, etc might be of interest, but it’s what it does for you.
Throughout your whole experience with them, you’re trying to make what they’re saying apply to you. If all they’re doing is talking about themselves, you’re likely to dismiss what they’re saying as irrelevant. Only the better marketers know how to apply the WIIFM principles well.
2. Good marketers understand how to bring how to bring your best points to the front and centre of your customer’s minds. If you’re like many clients, you might find you’re too wrapped up in the detail of what you’re selling – or in love with your product. Which is great from a passion perspective, but often it means that you might be burying the most compelling reasons your customers need in order to buy from you.
A client and I were talking about a marketing piece he’d mocked up. After half an hour of talking me through it (it was a very busy brochure), it emerged the strongest reasons to buy were the free personalised trial and the product’s environmental benefit (which was exceptional).
After two brief looks at the piece whilst we were talking (which is sadly more than a customer will usually give a brochure), I found the FREE offer buried in the middle of page 2 and the environmental message was entirely missing. Needless to say, those messages are now front and centre.
3. Better outcomes. Working with an experienced marketer vastly increases your likelihood of achieving the outcomes that you’re after for your business. Don’t just look at their work from a ‘how it looks’ perspective – it might just be ‘pretty’ work. Ask them what it achieved for their client – you’re looking for answers like -” this campaign”…*
- uncovered 32 potential new pieces of business waiting to be signed
- achieved media coverage of $1.5 million
- became the top selling non-fiction book
- reported to be one of the most-successful infomercials of the year
- increased overnights to the destination by 20%
- changed the product from being an ‘untouchable’ before launch to rocketing it to number one in a reasonably mature category in six months.
Ask for hard numbers – if they can’t give you any – maybe it’s time to talk someone else.
* these are actual results from my real campaigns.
These are just the top three, but there really are loads of reasons to outsource your marketing effort – more coming soon. If we can help, please let us know.
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