The question I always ask next is, “Why do you ask?”  This is sort of a snotty response, and it doesn’t endear me to the sales team, but it has a purpose.

In my experience, too many sales people simply take the value proposition given by marketing and restate it to the prospect.  This is the worst use of a value proposition.  If you are in Marketing and you enable your sales team this way, then you are not helping.

A value proposition is a list of reasons why a prospect might benefit from buying your product or service, and it usually contains a number of elements.  The first is identifying a need, the second is some sort of differentiation, and the third is some sort of proof.

For example, “If you want fine flavor, then the smooth taste of Camel cigarettes is what nine out of ten doctors recommend.”   Parsed, the need is fine flavor and health, the differentiation is smooth taste, and the proof is that doctors recommend them.

While value propositions are good for internal dialogue and evaluation, as you know, simply stating the reasons why you should buy a product or service is bad sales form.

When a prospect asks you, “What’s your value proposition?”  They are simply saying, “I don’t have time for this… just give me the Cliff’s Note version, and I will decide.”

But the process they are going through is: 1) Do I really have this need? 2) Is this really any better? And 3) Do I really believe this, or do I trust you?  There is no way that a single “Statement” or “Value Proposition” will ever do justice to a prospect in answering these questions.  But if you fail to answer any of these, your sales and marketing efforts will falter.

So instead, slow down, and go back to basics.  Take your Value Proposition and turn it into a set of questions to determine whether the prospect has the need you believe your product or service can fill.  Then determine the prospect’s perception of the value to satisfying that need.  If it’s worth solving, then look at what their current vision is for solving that need.  Only then can you begin to explore an alternate vision and differentiation.  Your differentiation may be simply that you are not spouting a value proposition, but guiding the prospect through a process of discovery and helping them see things differently.  Proof doesn’t come until the prospect has a vision of capabilities they might need.

But please don’t just give your value proposition.  You might as well sit back, light up that Camel, and wait for good health to flow your way.

Do Great Things!

Lee Stocking
Prairie Sky Group
Making Sales Cry With Qualified Leads
lee.stocking@gmail.com
651-357-0110 (Cell 24×7)

This is essentially what is happening to many businesses as the result of the Internet.  Yet, when I talk to B2B executives about their Internet efforts, I get three different responses.

The first group, let’s call them Luddites, doesn’t have the willingness, the time, or the resources to focus on their web presence.  While they may have a website, it is little more than a cardboard storefront.  They still believe that their current marketing approach will work, and they are riding this horse hard, even though their businesses are increasingly failing.

One of these little drug stores has figured out a way to get found and motivate people to drive five miles off the freeway and stop.  It’s called Wall Drug.  How did they do it?  They put up signs all over the world and made their business a novelty.  Imagine, they offer free ice water.  It took a long time and cost a lot of money for the signs.  The other 20,000 drug stores in small towns didn’t do as well.

The second group, call them the Reluctants, believes that the web is sort of a necessary evil.  It’s complicated, and they pay some technical geek to do some SEO and “stuff.”  Sometimes they are proud of their site, though they don’t know how to measure the results of their investment.

One of these drug stores formed a chain, put up a store on every corner, and got bigger through volume and lower prices.  Their cost structure is wacked because of the cost of their physical presence.  They have some Internet services.  They can be found online.

The third group, call them the newly Awakened, understand that their business strategy and their web strategy are irrevocably linked.  The world has changed.  They are seeking to change their business model and gain access to this new world.

One of these drug stores decided to take a different approach.  They decided to use the Internet to access those that were looking for solutions to particular health problems or access to particular drugs.  They sell online, but they decided to improve the customer experience online and offer access to pharmacists and even doctors, if needed, at no extra cost.  They deliver anywhere in the US, anytime, even after normal hours so you don’t have to get into your car.  Their prices are competitive, and they honor every major form of insurance.  When you can’t afford it, they will help get your drugs paid for.

There is a difference between doing a little Internet and embracing it.  Just as there is a difference between SEO and Web Strategy.  Strategy doesn’t just change the tool from a sign post in Afghanistan to the Internet, it thinks about the way potential buyers find, access and experience the relationship with your business whether you are online or not.

The biggest mistake I see around inbound marketing is the confusion between SEO or getting found, and the experience and customer relationship in the interaction.  You can get found with SEO, but no one will visit you on the net if you don’t have a sound strategy.  For example, you may have all the keywords you need, but if you don’t write for people and offer them something useful, no one will spend any time on your page or convert.

Start with a strategy.  Strategy for the web, as with any strategy, has to be pervasive across your organization.   And it has to be more than just a set of tactics or SEO.  Though free ice water sounds good.

Do Great Things!

Lee Stocking
Prairie Sky Group
Making Sales Cry With Qualified Leads
lee.stocking@gmail.com
651-357-0110 (Cell 24×7)

My reaction was, “Really?”  And not in a good way.

Think about it.  Do you really want to phone it in?  If you are truly passionate about your business, how can you simply hire out the content and voice of your business’s soul?

I believe that marketers and business bloggers need to provide thought leadership, push the envelope, and not just offer rehashed stuff.  Because when you do rehashed stuff, your readers won’t tell their friends about your posts.  It will be boring.  Your readers will drift away from your blog.  Your posts will wind up like my insurance agent’s newsletter.  I will never read his stock subject, “Summertime Grill Safety.”  I might look at “Five Ways Not To Blow Yourself Up.”  But no newsletter or blog service will ever come up with that title.

Like every other industry, the marketing business can also follow the path of mass production.  Figure out how to produce more at a lower cost, offer it for a lower price, and then spend the money you make “marketing or advertising” your service to the masses.  You may sell something.  So will a hundred other organizations.  They will all be the same.

Yes, occasionally there is a technical discontinuity that happens in the marketing business.  For example, the creation of websites becomes more automated and doesn’t require experienced html programmers.  This can lead to lower costs for putting up a site, and suddenly there are website companies springing up from South Dakota to Manila.  This doesn’t mean you can’t take advantage of improvements in technology or marketing.

We are told that blogging helps generate leads, and social media helps leverage your content.  I believe this to be generally true.  But you need to do the hard work.  Thank you to those that do it.

So if you are contemplating blogging and want to generate leads, I would advise against using a blog mill.   You might just as well lock yourself up with everyone else… or blow yourself up.

Do Great Things!
Lee Stocking
Prairie Sky Group
Driving Sales With Customer Focused Marketing
lee.stocking@gmail.com
651-357-0110 (Cell 24×7)

PS: For those of you who want to stop the other kind of mill you can visit this site.

Why?  The answer is simply that this is the way our brains are wired.  We make snap judgments because it has somehow helped us survive, pick a better mate, avoid a harmful conflict, or negotiate a better position.

Even in the digital world, many inbound and outbound marketers forget the axiom about first impressions.  It’s especially true when encountering trigger events, such as registering for a newsletter or webinar.  However, unlike your hunchback, there are things you can do to make a good first digital impression.  Here are five steps.

Step 1.   Be responsive

Marketing Sherpa data says that immediate response to a trigger event will get you double the response rate compared with waiting twenty-four hours.   Fall-off continues with more time.   If you are batch and blasting or filtering trigger events, you are losing traction and should consider an automated response.   Simple thank-you emails with a little personal touch (hope you enjoy the webinar, or let us know if you have specific questions) go a along way toward establishing trust.

Step 2.   Deliver value

Nothing pleases prospects more than getting something of value they didn’t expect. Sure they registered for a webinar, but what if you gave them a complementary whitepaper or assessment in your response?

Step 3.   Be explicit about your communications

Let them know how frequently you will communicate, what you will communicate, and how you will protect their information.

Step 4.   Open the door

It’s also important to make sure they’ll receive your communication.  A step to ask them to white-list you or test your communications guarantees that your email will get through.

Step 5.  Keep your communications short, sweet and relevant

Really.  Respect your prospects.  Just because you have their email doesn’t mean they want to see the latest photo of your new CEO.  Underscore relevant.

Do these things and soon you’ll have enough clients and customers to have that hump removed before face-to-face meetings.  What hump?

Do Great Things!

Lee Stocking
Prairie Sky Group
Making Sales Cry With Qualified Leads
lee.stocking@gmail.com
651-357-0110 (Cell 24×7)

Recently, my son-in-law proudly informed me of his number one page ranking for his new furniture outlet business.  I was impressed and ran a quick Google search to confirm it.  Sure enough, he was number one.  However, I was more impressed with the number two search rank which had a value statement in the search response promising me I’d get the best design at an affordable price.  My son-in-law’s statement said he had 10,000 square feet of warehouse space.  I didn’t much care, because I wasn’t looking for a warehouse.   When I dutifully went back to my son-in-law’s number one ranking and clicked it, I was taken to his home page.  I’d been searching “sofas.”  This confused me a little.  When I did find what I was looking for, it took me four or five extra clicks.  Then there was no action I could take except to look at a picture of a sofa.  His competitor took me immediately to what I’d searched for and then offered me design help.

In the Prairie Sky Group business development model, there are three vertices to a strong prospect triangle.  One is inbound marketing, one is outbound marketing, and the other is sales.  All three are required for success.  But each individually is a product of a number of steps.  As you recall your grade school math, when you multiple a number or fraction between zero and one by another between zero and  one, the product is smaller.  It’s our job to get each of these steps as close to one as possible so the product is as high as possible.  This is very difficult.  It’s also why we need to test and retest in any campaign or sales approach.  Decrease the resistance.  Make each step an advance.  Incremental improvement in each of these steps leads to more qualified leads and greater close rates.

Did I mention that my son-in-law and daughter eloped?  That’s another story.

Do Great Things!

Lee Stocking
Prairie Sky Group
Making Sales Cry With Qualified Leads
lee.stocking@gmail.com
651-357-0110 (Cell 24×7)

I started the Prairie Sky blog as an experiment.  I had some grandiose ideas, a few ulterior and selfish motives.  I wanted to see if I could create 25 posts with a small investment of time.  I wanted to test the conventional wisdom that you need a blog to generate traffic and leads.  As goals, these turned out to be important, yet not as important as I thought they would, so I keep asking myself, why I blog?

I thought my blog would be about the technical aspects of how to create leads.  I have a few posts on these subjects such as how to create a name based gender-assigning algorithm, or 30 tips for running a webinar, or how to create an automated marketing campaign or great landing page criteria.  I will expand some of these because I’m involved in the technical details of tools and trade every day.

But rather, it is the soft subjects of sales and marketing management, messaging, motivation, understanding clients and culture that I have gravitated toward.

One reason is that I see such a poor understanding of the fundamentals amongst my clients, especially at the management level, that the tools and technical discussion seems wasted.  For example, it doesn’t matter if you have a competitive keyword analyzer or generator if you haven’t thought your story through and written for humans.  It doesn’t matter if you can run an automated campaign or create a landing page if you don’t understand your prospects.  So I have leaned toward the basics.

This doesn’t answer the question of whether you should blog.  But if you are thinking of starting a blog for your company because it will make you famous, create a jillion leads, sell more product, it is just one step.

In some ways, I am surprised at reaching the 100 mark.  This is small in comparison to many, though more than most.  I’m not sure what I expected… perhaps a band and fireworks.

I’ve learned a lot.  In the end, the reason I blog is because it’s simply the right thing to do.  It allows me to connect and help other people, dialogue (internally and externally), test ideas, and serve our marketing community.  I am compelled to do it.  I recommend it.

I’m excited to see where it will lead next.  Thanks for your support.

Do Great Things!

Lee Stocking
Prairie Sky Group
Making Sales Cry With Qualified Leads
Lee.stocking@gmail.com
651-357-0110 (Cell 24×7)

1.     How can I support my sales team more?

2.     What is my real customer experience?

3.     What can I learn about my clients and customers?

4.     What core messages do I want to deliver internally and externally?

5.     What things about my business make me uncomfortable, why and what can I do about them?

6.     What three things will I spend less time doing?

7.     How can I keep my commitments?

8.     How can my team have more fun?

9.     Who will I mentor?

10.  What am I thankful for?

Thank you for your encouragement and comments throughout the year. Have a healthy and bountiful new year.

Do Great Things!

Lee Stocking
Prairie Sky Group
Making Sales Cry With Qualified Leads
lee.stocking@gmail.com
651-357-0110 (Cell 24×7)

On the other hand, I do believe in spending time reflecting on your marketing, sales or personal plans.   Every year, I take a week off to do this.   Yes, really, a whole week. I do this in a one-room cabin in the north woods.  Removed from the distractions of emails, meetings, kids, or whatever other personal demons you may possess; the pace of life changes, and the mind calms.  I read, I hike, I sleep when I want, I listen to music, and eat simple meals.  I don’t use my cell phone or talk to others.  It’s a week of silence.   If I’m lucky, I may find out something about myself.  I may find out what I thought I wanted was not what I really wanted.  Or I may find myself, asking new a new question that leads me down another path.

It works for me.  It may not for you, but it’s worth trying to find our what allows you to gain perspective.  Otherwise, you can try making New Year’s resolutions.

Do Great Things!

Lee Stocking
Prairie Sky Group
Making Sales Cry With Qualified Leads
lee.stocking@gmail.com
651-357-0110 (Cell 24×7)

I recommend you put this book on your Christmas
list for any marketing or sales people you know.

Lee Stocking
Prairie Sky Group
Making Sales Cry With Qualified Leads
lee.stocking@gmail.com
651-357-0110 (Cell 24×7)

In Norman Maclean’s, A River Runs Through It, he tells a story of two brothers growing up in rural Montana and fishing the Big Blackfoot River in Montana.  The book is a lyrical and beautiful story, and I highly recommend the book over the movie.  In one passage, the older brother, Norman, after watching his younger brother Paul catch an enormous fish while being swept into the rapids, remembers:

“However one closeup picture of him at the end of this day remains in my mind, as if fixed by some chemical bath.  Usually, just after he finished fishing he had little to say unless he saw he could have fished better.  Otherwise, he merely smiled.  Now flies danced around his hatband.  Large drops of water ran from under his has on to his face and then into his lips when he smiled.

At the end of this day, then, I remember him both as a distant abstraction in artistry and as a closeup in water and laughter.

My father always felt shy when compelled to praise one of his family, and his family always felt shy when he praised them.  My father said, “You are a fine fisherman.”

My brother said, “I’m a pretty good with a rod, but I need three more years before I can think like a fish.”

How does this relate to sales and marketing?  Simply, that if we want to be better marketers and sales people, we need to “think like a client.”  Too often, for example, marketers think; how can I send more emails, rather than how can I provide content that is valuable to my clients?  Or sales people think; how can I close this deal, rather than, is this the right product of service for my client?

How is your company** geared to think like a client?  From your call answering message, to your website navigation, to your ease of doing business, if you want to catch (develop) clients, you need to think like a client.  The first step is to look at your business and interactions as they would.

Do Great Things!

Lee Stocking
Prairie Sky Group
Making Sales Cry With Qualified Leads
lee.stocking@gmail.com
651-357-0110 (Cell 24×7)

* Like fish portraints?  Shop this guy: http://www.fishartist.net/fish-artist-gallery.htm

** Footnote:  An old colleague, Dave Peterson, once told me he could tell the profitability of a set of manufacturing companies to +/- 1%  within ten seconds of walking onto the manufacturing floor.  He based his estimates on the neatness of the floor which gave him an estimate of the facilities process efficiency.  I can now apply Stocking’s corollary to the Peterson Rule:  The profitability of a company is directly proportional to the client experience.