Goldilocks and The Three Types of Marketing

Once upon a time there was a business owner, whose nickname was Goldilocks. She was looking for ways to grow her business and went for a walk to see what she could find.

Pretty soon she came upon a marketing trade show, so she walked right in.

In the great hall many types of marketing offers were presented but they all basically fell into 3 categories.

The first involved no real strategy to speak of, just getting some brochures and business cards and doing a lot of cold calling.

When, on the rare occasions someone would listen, a structured presentation was used and when the prospect said “no” a lot of old, tired, high-pressure tactics were used to try and close the sale.

“This type of marketing is too hot!” Goldilocks said.

The next type of marketing also involved no real strategy, just attending a lot of networking meetings and Chamber of Commerce mixers, in the hope that a needle in the haystack could be found in that someone would be there who would need the products and services she sold. “It’s free”, she was told but this completely ignored the value of her time.

“His type of marketing is too cold,” she said.

So she looked at the last category of marketing which involved a deep strategy that was focused on a specific group of people who were openly looking for the things Goldilocks offered.

This type of marketing used a website that told a story to these ideal prospects about how their problems were about to be solved and positioned Goldilocks as the expert who could solve it for them.

The strategy used a combination of search engine optimization, paid advertising and social media marketing to send ideal prospects to the website, which was focused on converting that traffic into leads for Goldilocks to sell. The marketing investments were designed to attract great clients whose lifetime value ensured the marketing produced a healthy return on investment.

“Ahhh, this type of marketing is just right,” and she happily decided to implement it into her business right away.

The moral to the story? Marketing has changed.

Gone are the days when you can “show up” at a business by cold call selling and hope to get enough presentations and close enough business to accomplish your goals. Most business leaders and decision makers are simply too busy to stop what they’re doing, re-arrange their priorities and make time to hear your pitch.

Also gone are the days of crossing your fingers and hoping that networking meeting and Chamber events will produce enough prospects for you to achieve your ultimate outcomes either. In most cases the one who attend these functions cannot buy from you anyway, and your best hope is that your Chamber contact will introduce you to the owner of their company.

What now works is being known as an expert, being liked both personally and professionally and being trusted to help my business to grow. How can you get there from wherever you are today?

By using the Internet as the information resource that it was designed to be and having a great, information rich website that speaks to the needs of your ideal prospects. By sharing your knowledge in forums where prospects for what you do are known to be and by attracting those prospects into your sales “funnel” or process. All of this involves a strategy.

Don’t have one? I can help you. Go here, tell me a bit about your business and we’ll set up a time to talk.