I Don't Know How to Market

That was the opening sentence in a one-hour phone consult yesterday with a new booklet author. And it was repeated about a half dozen times in the first 2 minutes of the call, seemingly reinforcing the concept. Not wanting to make a client wrong, my immediate response was little more than "ok" before starting to shift gears.

I asked the person about any professional association memberships. Half a dozen were mentioned, including previous speaking engagements at some of their conferences. There was the opening. There is always an opening. We talked about contacting the people who brought the booklet author into those conferences to speak, and how the booklets and other formats of that content could be an ideal match for the association's interests in member benefits, conference handouts, and generating new revenue from some vendor members. The light bulb was going on with my client, including asking me great questions about ways to contact other people and how to position everything. And we were off and running.

Two things happened that allowed the booklet author to move beyond the belief of not knowing how to marketing:

1. I used the words "visit with people" and "exchange currency for product" instead of ever saying the word "selling." Silly as that may seem, it worked. It lifted huge barriers.

2. We jointly identified pre-existing relationships as a starting point to discuss how the booklet author's products could be useful to already-known organizations. This is typically so much easier than approaching someone cold.

By the end of the hour of consulting, the tone changed completely from "I don't know how to market" to "where is the best place to start?" What a difference! Nuance? Maybe. Motivation and positive action? Definitely. Go visit with people to talk about exchanging currency for products and services. See what happens.

Until next time,
Paulette - looking for what works
www.tipsbooklets.com