Category: Sell

Marketing With Engagement Devices

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Marketing With Engagement Devices

Most salespeople will tell you that one of the most difficult parts of the sales process is getting past people’s initial defenses.

We all have a powerful force field we can project quickly that shields us from unwanted sales attempts. It’s an interesting psychological super power we all develop.

Of course some customers immediately want what we have – and they know, like, and trust us, so selling to them is easy. But other people aren’t interested and are much harder to work with. How do you get them to consider your offer?

The Old-School Marketers’ Trick

Turns out marketers have been trying to solve this problem for a long-time. One easy (and ethical) technique they’ve discovered is the “engagement device”.

It is a device that gets prospects to engage with you or your offer. If done well it allows the prospect to learn about your product without getting defensive.

You can’t (and shouldn’t try to) sell stuff to people who don’t want it. But you can (and should) allow people to know about your product or service so they can decide if it’s right for them.

The Best Engagement Devices

There are a few engagement devices that work incredibly well because they not only get you into a conversation with the prospect; they also give you further insight into your prospects opinions, attitudes, and interests. It’s a win-win. When you know people’s opinion you can refine your product or service for them.

Let’s look at three examples of the best engagement tools and how to apply them to your situation.

#1 Online Polls – Doing an online poll as part of the sales process is an easy and fun engagement device. You can use www.polldaddy.com for free and you don’t even need a website to use it.

If you read my special email last week, or visited https://makesellgrow.com you probably noticed I’m using several polls to collect people’s opinion about my newest ebook. I asked people to help me decide on the cover color, title and sub-title. Here is what one of the polls looked like: 

Screen Shot 2014-05-05 at 9.23.59 AM

I did this because 1.) I really needed the help to decide on the final choices 2.) I wondered what would be the most appealing to most people. 3.) I wanted a way to discuss my new book project in a way that was engaging.

#2 Comment Contests – You’ll also notice that I added a comment contest to the article with the polls. This had the extra benefit of getting people to share their opinion in writing and also explain their thinking in a more in-depth way. Offering a fun reward is also a nice way to boost participation.

#3 Surveys – Doing a survey of your existing or prospective customers gets them involved in the process in a fantastic way. You can use a site like www.surveymonkey.com for free.

How To Use These Methods

So at this point you might be thinking – I sell doll clothes on Etsy, how am I supposed to use engagement devices to help sell my items? The short answer is – use the engagement devices wherever you are communicating with prospects and customers.

Email: The best option is probably email marketing. Etsy allows you to collect email addresses via your “About” page, and they explain those details here.

Of course we’ve outlined our email marketing strategies previously in our Email Marketing Power ebook, (it’s just .99 cents on Amazon).

Social media: Facebook is another great way to use engagement devices. Of course we’ve always loved Youtube for contests. You could say a design contest is a form of a comment contest – and it is certainly an engagement device.

Blog: You can also use these types of tools on your blog. Don’t have one? Consider using Wix.com, Weebly.com, or WordPress.com – all of them are free – and for some reason they all start with the letter “W”. I’m not sure why.

Bottomline – get people to join you in a conversation about your product today with engagement devices.

Do You Have A Question?

This newsletter is written for you! So feel free to submit a question today. Submit it here. We are honored to partner with you!

Jason & Cinnamon

 

 

Overcoming Your First Objection

overcome objections

Hate Selling?

Many people hate selling with a passion. Do you?

If so, you’re not alone. Why do we hate selling so much?

  • Maybe we’ve gotten forced to sit through an awkward timeshare presentation where they really turned on the pressure tactics right in front of our kids.
  • Maybe we’ve been ripped off by a dishonest salesperson and couldn’t get the money back.
  • Maybe we’ve gotten befriended by someone only to find out that it was just part of their multi-level marketing program. That awkward dinner at their house pushed us over the edge into pure hatred of salespeople.

Here is the problem – one of the easiest ways to add income from home is to sell products or services. But if you hate selling, you’re going to avoid those options like the plague. And some of them are actually really good options. So the first objection you have to overcome in order to make money from home is your own objection to selling.

Here are five truths that might help you find a break-through:

#1. Fulfilling Demand Is Easy – Creating It Is Hard. The best salespeople find starving people and give them food. They sell things people really want. Everybody loves that type of salesperson. They simply fulfill existing demand. These smart sellers only work with people who have such a clear felt need, and true desire for the product, that the selling is easy. They’ve set themselves up for success as servants rather than scammers. We all hate the pressure tactics, the awkward questions, and the leading conversations that are part of an ugly selling process. Smart salespeople don’t participate in ugly selling.

#2. Only Sell What You Truly Believe In. Just wanting to make money, and being passionate about a product because the commissions will help your monthly budget, isn’t enough. If you’re going to speak with conviction and sincerity, then you’ve got to be a huge believer in what you’re offering. Frequently that means looking for deeper meaning and the impact of your product or service, not just the obvious utility. Will your product strengthen a family’s bonds? Will it give someone a second shot at life? Will it create memories that will last a lifetime? These are powerful motivators.

#3. People Under Pressure Do Stupid Things. Generally the “ugly” pressure tactics you’ve encountered in life are the result of a salesperson feeling a huge burden to make a sale. Maybe they’re broke and need the commission money to feed their kids, or maybe their boss said if they don’t sell something they’re going to get fired, or maybe they’re trying to win a contest or outperform someone else. You can avoid this entirely by putting yourself in a position to never act out of self-interest or urgency, and only act out of the best interest of your customers. If you try working for a company that creates these types of pressure situations, find a new opportunity.

#4. Listeners Make Great Salespeople. The best selling skill you can possibly cultivate is the skill of listening. Why? Because listeners hear what people need and can propose laser-beam focused solutions. Listeners hear whether someone is ready to buy, and if not, avoid any awkward sales pitches. Listeners let people articulate their need for a product, which results in them selling themselves. Listeners spend more time with prospects, which is one of the keys to selling. If you’re a good listener, you’ve got a great head start on being a good salesperson.

#5. Sales Is A Performing Art. No one expects a total rookie to be good at selling. Sure, it helps if you’ve been a courtesy clerk at a grocery store, worked at a restaurant, or in a retail store. Those environments train you to be attentive and helpful. But if you’re brand new to it, expect there to be growing pains. Give yourself permission to learn, find a product or service that gives you a good environment to learn in, and dedicate yourself to only using the ethical techniques.

If you use wisdom to evaluate both the industry you work in, and the people you work with, you’ll be off to a great start. If you vow to let your light shine through the sales process, and give yourself permission to start learning how to do it well, you can be successful without compromising your integrity.

Quick Question: Have you learned to overcome your objections to sales and marketing, or are you still struggling with it? Let us know what you think about selling – leave a comment below.

Pricing Principle #9 – Free Is The Most Powerful Price

cover 11This is a continuation of our Pricing Power – 10 Proven Pricing Principles posts. If you like this topic, then you can see the prior posts here. Read the introductory post to understand the purpose of this set of articles and how they came about.

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Pricing Principle #9 – Free is the most powerful price!

[ This post has been truncated so that the full collection of pricing principles can be placed on the Kindle platform as Craft Pricing Power. For the spring of 2014 you can download it for free on the last Friday of every month. Get it here. ]

Pricing Principle #8 – You Maximize Price Through Differentiation

cover 11This is a continuation of our Pricing Power – 10 Proven Pricing Principles posts. If you like this topic, then you can see the prior posts here. Read the introductory post to understand the purpose of this set of articles and how they came about.

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Principle #8 – You maximize price through differentiation.

[ This post has been truncated so that the full collection of pricing principles can be placed on the Kindle platform as Craft Pricing Power. For the spring of 2014 you can download it for free on the last Friday of every month. Get it here. ]

Pricing Principle #7 – Price Is Relative

cover 11This is a continuation of our Pricing Power – 10 Proven Pricing Principles posts. If you like this topic, then you can see the prior posts here. Read the introductory post to understand the purpose of this set of articles and how they came about.

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Principle #7 – Price Is Relative.

[ This post has been truncated so that the full collection of pricing principles can be placed on the Kindle platform as Craft Pricing Power. For the spring of 2014 you can download it for free on the last Friday of every month. Get it here. ]

Pricing Principle #6 – Willingness To Pay Is Influenced By Time & Place

cover 11This is a continuation of our Pricing Power – 10 Proven Pricing Principles posts. See the prior post, #1#2#3#4, and #5 here.

Principle #6 – Willingness To Pay Is Influenced By Time & Place.

[ This post has been truncated so that the full collection of pricing principles can be placed on the Kindle platform as Craft Pricing Power. For the spring of 2014 you can download it for free on the last Friday of every month. Get it here. ]

Pricing Principle #5 – Your Price Can Vary Depending On How Presold Your Prospect Is

cover 11This is a continuation of our Pricing Power – 10 Proven Pricing Principles posts. See the prior post, #1#2#3, and #4 here.

Pricing Principle #5 – Your Price Can Vary Depending On How Presold Your Prospect Is. If your prospects are eagerly awaiting your new product, then you can charge a lot more than if they aren’t familiar with you or your product.

[ This post has been truncated so that the full collection of pricing principles can be placed on the Kindle platform as Craft Pricing Power. For the spring of 2014 you can download it for free on the last Friday of every month. Get it here. ]

Pricing Principle #4 – Align Pricing & Business Goals

cover 11This is a continuation of our Pricing Power – 10 Proven Pricing Principles posts. See theprior post, #1#2, and #3 here.

Pricing Principle #4 – You’ve Got To Align Pricing & Business Goals.

[ This post has been truncated so that the full collection of pricing principles can be placed on the Kindle platform as Craft Pricing Power. For the spring of 2014 you can download it for free on the last Friday of every month. Get it here. ]

Pricing Principle #3 – Align Pricing & Marketing

cover 11This is a continuation of our Pricing Power – 10 Proven Pricing Principles posts. See the prior post, #1 and #2 here.

Pricing Principle #3 – You’ve Got To Align Your Pricing Strategy With Your Marketing Strategy

[ This post has been truncated so that the full collection of pricing principles can be placed on the Kindle platform as Craft Pricing Power. For the spring of 2014 you can download it for free on the last Friday of every month. Get it here. ]