The Marketer’s Lost Touch

Garth Beyer

While studying up on some public relation strategies in regard to various businesses focused on beer I’ve found one consistent bit that leads me to believe there are still a lot of marketers with a lost touch, especially when it comes to press releases.

Erik sums up the typical press release well, “We have something new (usually beer) and we think what we have created is pretty cool. Would you like to share this news with your readers?”

I’ve seen emails, Twitter direct messages and FB posts with the a similar paraphrased marketing message.

For the marketers reading this who believe this kind of “outreach” works, you’ve lost your touch (or perhaps never had it to begin with).

The duty, privilege and opportunity of any marketer is to craft a unique message per person. Journalists, businesses and now even bloggers won’t give a damn about your press release unless you give them a reason to give a damn about you or you first somehow show by any means other than a press release that you care about them and understand what they cover.

Most press releases have an exceptional story to tell or have an update on a really exciting product, but unless you talk to people the way people talk to people, your story won’t get told. Good marketing is a conversation. Great marketing is turning strangers into friends.

 

Stay Positive & Don’t Go Losing Your Touch Again

Oh, and this seems like a fair place to let you know I have a tumblr blog where I document bottled beers I’ve had. I rate them, describe the taste for you and share the memory of when I first tried the brew. Feel free to stop by.

 

Hey, Your Humanity Is Showing

Garth Beyer

Noticing humanity comes natural, so natural to the point you may say you don’t even notice it.

You may think adding that extra characteristic of humanity, of vulnerability, of doodle, if you will, will take away from the formality, credibility and technicality of your business. It doesn’t.

I opened the Great Lakes philanthropy booklet today (what could be more human that this?) and the message from the president ends with his signature (ineligible). Following is his name and title in print (eligible).

You may see things like this and, as I have, wonder “what’s the point?” After all, you can’t read it, there’s almost no point to it.

On the contrary.

Would you believe just having a badge or ribbon-like image on a book cover makes it more likely for people to pick up and believe in? The text within the image doesn’t quite matter. It can say “runner-up finalist” or “enjoy the read.” The image adds a dimension of credibility to it just as the signature adds a dimension of humanity to the letter.

The same, I’m arguing goes for all small humanistic prints of ours: a signature, a typo, a hand written newsletter, a behind-the-scenes video or one-on-one unscripted interview of an employee. No one needs to ever mention the video to another or point out the signature; these marks don’t need to stand out, they simply need to be there. Every person notices them whether you or they realize it or not.

A final example: People love technology, but when you take all the humanity out of it, you’re removing what people connect to. When Apple talks design, they aren’t talking about how pure and inhuman the device is, they’re talking about all the human qualities they’ve put into it.

 

Stay Positive & People Connect Through Nonverbal Communicational Ques, Not Cords

Only Look Down At Those You’re About To Bring Up

Garth Beyer

It’s difficult to follow someone who you know you are better skilled than. It’s a universal condition. It’s exactly why we need to work on ourselves before leading at something others are better at leading.

On a happier note, nothing moves you up quicker than bringing those less skilled than you to your own level. Growth happens when you teach who you can, not just who you want.

 

Stay Positive & There’s No Division Between Leading, Teaching And Learning

The First To Introduce

Garth Beyer

It feels good when someone tells a friend about a particular product or service and then notes that you were the first to introduce them to that product or service.

Businesses have a grand opportunity right now to leverage word-of-mouth marketing like this. Think of your business as the friend who was the first to introduce them and instead of to a product or service, to a definition, a way of doing something a certain way, a style.

Think what your customers Google and go to YouTube for, then create that content for them. YouTube is great for “How Tos,” but if they don’t need to leave your page to figure something out, you and them both win not only in that they stay on your page, but they will refer to you later.

Lands’ End does this by having a link to definitions of terms they use. Now when I’m out shopping with a friend and they touch a pair of pants saying “Wow, this fabric feels pretty high quality,” I can say, “Yea, those are chinos. It’s a twill fabric made 100 percent of cotton.”

“How do you know that?”

“I read it on Lands’ End’s website.”

This tactic is proficiently used by writers. Just about every writer’s website I’ve been to, no matter what they write on, they always have a blog post about “how to be a writer,” just in hopes to have some reader somewhere share a writing tip with someone else, referring to where they heard of the tip.

Of course, this isn’t exactly a tactic directly for making profits off your product or service, it’s more of a tactic for branding and getting your name out there. For some reason, though, there typically ends up being some type of correlation between your profit amount and the number of people who know about you.

 

Stay Positive & Do You Really Need Proof?

Pitch Matters,

Garth Beyer

but not as much as the product.

It makes sense when you consider what the audience, not just wants, but is paying for.

Sure, you can work your way to presenting like Steve Jobs, but until then, it’s better to work on delivering a product people can truly care about. If you asked Jobs, he would say it’s not worth presenting if you don’t have a product in your pocket that steals your show.

Last night my team pitched our media strategy to Lands’ End. We worked up to the hour before our pitch perfecting what we had to offer (the product). With no time to practice, our pitch was rough around the edges. There were plenty of places we could have improved, certainly, but our strategy, our “product”? Nailed it.

Lands’ End chose our agency over the other, who, in my fair judgment, had one hell of a presentation. Everyone knew it was rehearsed well. The Lands’ End marketers (judges) noted their pitch was great, but our product was better. After all, that’s what they showed up for; not our pitch, rather, what we had to pitch.

 

Stay Positive & Product First, Show Second

 

Assorted Links

Garth Beyer

1) Rules for marketing in the new economy (read)

2) Start somewhere (read)

3) Warby Parker 2013 Annual Report (read/click/havefun)

4) What we already know (read)

5) Creativity inspired productivity (read)

6) Starting social media from scratch (read)

When Thinking Of What More

Garth Beyer

Most of the time, it doesn’t need to be about what add-on you put on the product or what extra app you create for it or even using a bit higher quality material. When you think of what more you can offer someone, think of how you can be more generous.

What makes people happier?

Getting more of something or getting a meaningful gift along with what they ordered.

 

Stay Positive & Think This, For Example