Referral Marketing - Affect Selling - Simply Effective Marketing

by: Peter Sandeen

Choosing Business Gifts

Many businesses give business gifts to their partners and customers. Business gifts vary from post cards and pens to expensive wines and luxury holidays.

If you run a small business you won’t even consider the more extravagant gifts. But you should remember your partners and customers somehow.

How do you then decide what to give as business gifts?

I can’t give you a straightforward answer since it’s different for every business. Fortunately figuring out what to give isn’t all that complex.

Click to Continue »

by: Peter Sandeen

Review: Enchantment by Guy Kawasaki

Enchantment: The Art of Changing Hearts, Minds, and Actions by Guy Kawasaki

Rating: 5/5

After reading a few pages I knew I’d love this book. My belief turned out to be justified. The book is about enchantment and it is enchanting.

Guy Kawasaki worked at Apple when the first Macintosh was released. He’s job was to be the “chief evangelist”, marketing to put it simply. Later he’s worked for and started a few companies and written several books.

Enchantment: The Art of Changing Hearts, Minds, and Actions is his latest book. It describes, in wonderful detail, what makes something enchanting. It explains how you can be enchanting, make your product or company enchanting, and how to resist enchantment. And it is all done in an enchanting way.

The structure

There isn’t a plot to the book. Rather it tackles one aspect of enchantment at a time. This works perfectly well, though I usually prefer books written in “story” format.

Guy Kawasaki obviously knows exactly what he writes about, the book is a pleasure to read. Ideas are reinforced with examples, expert opinions, and studies.

Because of the simple one-idea-at-a-time structure, I’ll use the book as a reference book for a long time. Though I think some of the chapters and headings could’ve been a little more descriptive to make finding single ideas easier (fortunately there’s an index at the back that helps with this).

It almost seems as if there’s nothing about enchantment that isn’t described in the book. But still you’d like it to be longer, just to keep reading.

What is enchantment?

Guy Kawasaki describes enchantment: “Enchantment transforms situations and relationships. … It changes skeptics and cynics into believers.”

An enchanting person is someone you instantly trust. Someone who’s example you want to follow.

An enchanting product is one you believe in and tell all your friends about. One you’re willing to defend if others threaten its idea.

Apple is probably the most obvious example of an enchanting company/brand. They have a loyal following of enchanted people. Whenever a new product is released millions read the news.

But what makes Apple enchanting?

How to be enchanting

This is what the book does so well. It gives you an endless list of ways to be more enchanting. All the usual ways to interact and common situations are explained.

Want to enchant customers? Explained. How to create a movement? Explained. Want to score points in the eyes of your boss? Explained. How to use Twitter enchantingly? Explained. And so on and so on.

The risk with this kind of a book, or any business book, is to be too theoretical. Guy Kawasaki manages to mix in just enough theory to be trustworthy, but not too much to be boring.

Throughout the book, it’s clear the author understands and lives what he teaches. He uses examples of his own experiences, but not too many to seem arrogant.

Who benefits from the book

I’d say anyone who is in contact with other humans, will greatly benefit from reading this book. It’s one of the few books I’m sure to read again… and again.

As far as I know, no one has written a more comprehensive book about enchantment. Though many have written about social behavior and other related topics, no one describes what creates that sudden feeling of enchantment.

If you want a more theoretical view to enchantment or to just understand it better, there’s a list of books Guy Kawasaki recommends. But reading “Enchantment” will be enough for most people.

The end

As I wrote this post, I realized just how enchanted I was by this book. I could’ve gone on and on about what I liked about it.

To be honest the book isn’t perfect. But the flaws are small:

I would’ve liked colored pictures for example. I think colors would’ve made the book more enchanting
And I hoped for a short checklist of the most important ideas. After reading the book, I have too many ideas and a short “where to start” checklist would make taking action easier.

Buy the book

Buy hardcover from Amazon

Buy audiobook from Audible (click here for a free trial = one audiobook free)

by: Peter Sandeen

The Most Successful Product Launch Ever – Modern Warfare 3

The most successful product launch ever is currently Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3. It’s a video game that created over $775 million in revenue in five days.

You could say, “Wow, Activision made $775 million in five days!” But you’d be mistaken.

They didn’t make that in five days, five weeks, five months, or even five years. It took them over eight years. But most businesses never make that much money. So, what made Call of Duty so successful?

Road to a successful product launch

1. The product is and always has been the best. The first game in the series was released October 2003. Since then many have tried to copy the game, but with little success.

It’s not that Call of Duty would be the best video game. It’s just the best in its niche.

2. Listen to what customers want. The developers behind Call of Duty have always listened to their customers. They’ve asked for opinions and read online forums, to understand what they can do better in the next game.

They’ve always delivered a better experience than before. The market leader is the market leader only as long as they keep getting better.

3. Their product becomes more valuable as more people use it. Most people enjoy the multiplayer part of the game more than anything else in the game. In the multiplayer you play against other people. So, the more people play the game, the more people you have to play it with.

There are some similarities to email. If you’re the only one with email, it’s useless. The more people have email, the more important it becomes. And because email is so popular, fax is becoming obsolete. The same thing can be seen in video games. If your friends play a certain game, you want to play it too because no one’s playing other games.

4. Pre-release hype. When Activision announces a new installment in the series, it creates buzz among players. They want to see how the new game will be better than the last one. Video clips, developer interviews, etc. all create something to talk about. And something to wait for.

Since the game is so popular, it takes a minimal effort to create buzz. Loyal customers and industry media’s do it for free. As the release date comes closer, more trailers and other content add to the anticipation. By the release time, everyone who want’s the game, knows when it’s released.

Would you add something to this list? Share your ideas in the comments.

Read more about:

by: Peter Sandeen

Surprise To Get Referrals

I went to an organic food store a few days ago. At the counter I noticed a paper plate with a dice on it. A hand written message said, “Dice hours Mondays 10 a.m. to 12 p.m. Roll the dice and get a price if you get ’6′.”

I asked the cashier what can I win. He responded, “Try and you may get a surprise.” So I rolled the dice and got the number six; I won a small organic chocolate bar. I started thinking about the cleverness of that idea.

They’re going to get some referrals and they’ll sell more of that chocolate. And maybe they’ll even get more customers to come there at an otherwise quiet time.

Their investment is almost non-existent: one out of six customers win a small chocolate bar. I’m sure this creates more referrals than giving them away.

Traditional product giveaways also have much higher costs. You need to pay for someone to offer the products to the bypassers. You’ll end up giving away lots of products. And it’s not memorable.

I can see why new products are promoted like that: you’re more likely to buy coffee you’ve tasted before. But still the ”Dice hours’” return on investment is surely higher.

Create buzz

I believe the game with a dice is more effective than just giving away the chocolate bar. Why is that more effective when five out of six customers don’t win? Precisely because of that.

You only have a 17% chance of winning. If you win it’s surprising and you’ll tell friends about it. If you don’t win you’re still likely to tell about the game because you don’t know what you could’ve won.

Many companies concentrate their social media advertising to competitions. “Like us on Facebook to enter the competition” and “Tweet this for a chance to win” can create a lot of buzz.

It’s common to see Facebook or Twitter filled with competition entries if the prizes are compelling enough. Even more hype is created when “Send this to your friends to get another entry into the competition” is added to the mix.

Surprises and prizes are interesting and people like them. The return on investment can be extremely high with a clever competition (though I object thinking about the ROI of marketing).

How could you surprise your customers? You don’t have to give away anything. Just think of a way you can surprise customers and you’ll get referrals more than before.

Have you been surprised positively by a business? How and by which business? Share your story in the comments below.

Read more about:

by: Peter Sandeen

Know What You Promise and Deliver That – A Poor Example By GoDaddy

I had an unfortunate experience with some customer service people yesterday. I needed help with switching the way Affect Selling is hosted.

It was previously on a “shared” server and therefor it was really slow at times. Now it’s using a “Virtual Dedicated Server” from GoDaddy.com.

But that’s not the point here. The point is that GoDaddy advertises their customer service on their website. But they don’t deliver what you’d expect.

What do you advertise?

Though I believe great customer service is the best way for a business to succeed, not everybody has to offer that. You can offer lower prices if there aren’t so many customer service people waiting for someone to need their help.

Whatever it is you advertise about your product/service, is what people expect you to be good at.

If you advertise customer service, the promise is that you’ll do everything you can to help customers. That you’ll offer the best service possible.

With that expectation they’ll be disappointed if the service isn’t wonderful. This is true also if you advertise cheap prices, fast delivery, ease of use, or anything else. People expect to get the best of what you talk about.

Poor example

The GoDaddy email customer service doesn’t live up to any sort of hype. They reply quickly, but that’s it. I guess they should read my series of posts about email customer service.

The answers were too technological for me to understand (and I did tell them I’m not that tech-savvy). And they did their best to avoid doing more than the bare minimum.

For example when I asked them about the PHP version on the server (I had no idea what that meant), they told me I can read an article about it. Or they could do the necessary updating for $49.99.

I decided to read the article. I didn’t understand it so I read another and another and another article to explain what the first one meant. Finally after a few hours I managed to update the PHP version on my server.

Now that I know how it’s done, I could do it in a minute. So, they would’ve charged me $49.99 for that one minute. Instead of just doing it, they replied to my email, and another email, and a third email about the process. They spent more time answering my emails than it would’ve taken them to do the update.

When the installation of WordPress didn’t go smoothly, they told me to find answers elsewhere since it’s a third-party application. Again when I finally found the reason for the problems, I could see it would’ve taken them a minute or two to fix it. (I have to thank the people at WordPress forums for help.)

I do understand and appreciate the low prices GoDaddy offers. But I cannot understand why their email customer service isn’t better. The people there obviously have the technical know-how. They just don’t seem to understand what their job is.

What should you advertise?

What are you good at? Really good at? When you advertise your customer service, people expect it to be great. But you should still exceed that expectation.

Exceeding expectations is the best way to create loyal customers and referrals.

You need to surprise people regardless of their expectations. If you advertise cheap prices, then either be surprisingly cheap, or offer additional free services for your customers.

“Good enough” isn’t good enough. If you’re not confident you can exceed expectations with something, then you shouldn’t talk about that at all. Or if your customers are likely to expect more from you than you’re able to offer, than warn them in advance. Don’t let people build up anticipation, and then prove them wrong.

Avoid and/or explain

I was disappointed with the GoDaddy customer service because I expected more. I’d be fine with doing all the server configuration by myself, but since they “advertised” their customer service, I expected to get help.

They could just add a “warning” to their sales page for the server that said, “You’ll need to understand how to configure your server on your own. Optionally you can hire us to do it for you.”

If I would’ve read that before making the purchase, I wouldn’t be so frustrated with them now.

You cannot always cater to your customers’ every need and desire. But when you can’t, you need to try, and then explain why you can’t do it.

Don’t please everyone

Many businesses fall into the trap of trying to please everyone. It’s not going to happen. You can only ever hope to please a small portion of people.

You should deliver what those people want. And do it well. When you attempt to please everyone, you will probably become mediocre at everything. And you’ll end up pleasing no one.

All marketing should target someone, not “the general public” or “the masses”. It’s possible you’ll end up selling to “the masses”, but there’s a squirrel’s chance on an eight-lane highway you’ll get “the masses” to embrace your product immediately after launch.

This is what GoDaddy has done. They’ve become so big, they can profitably “target” everyone. They offer the lowest prices and a variety of services. But they do nothing particularly well (except pricing).

Then there’s Synthesis, a high-end web host. They offer hosting options for WordPress users. And they do this one thing exceptionally well.

If you’re just starting a blog, you’ll run away from their site when you see the prices. But if you’re serious about creating a blog and you want the best solution for it, then they offer just the right thing. (They don’t even offer email because “it’s not their thing”.)

What’s your thing?

What is it that customers buy from you? Is it quality? Is it cheap prices? Is it the experience? Figuring this out might be the most important thing you can do for your business.

Don’t waste your resources advertising something you won’t deliver. Instead focus intently on your core idea; what you’re the best at.

To survive you need to be the best at what you are about. But that’s not enough. You also need to understand how to make people believe you’re the best.

Check out the Premeditated Marketing Guide for ideas on how to get your message heard and believed.

And finally tell what is your thing. What is your business about, really. Do you compete on price or quality or something else? Share your story in the comments below.

by: Peter Sandeen

Customer Evangelists: Your Most Valuable Marketing Asset

Customer evangelists believe in your story. They tell your story forward. They’ll happily challenge your competitor’s evangelist’s views. And they’ll always believe they won the debate.

Customer evangelists are your best customers. And they’re your best marketing asset as well; they’re the backbone of referral marketing.

How does someone become a customer evangelist? It takes five steps:

They’re exposed to your story.
They find your story compelling.
They find proof your story is true.
They see others are wrong when they don’t believe your story.
They feel they get something out of fighting for your story.

But what’s your story? Your story is what your customer evangelists say about you.

For example Apple’s customer evangelists say Mac’s are easier to use, faster, cooler, and safer than other computers. That’s Apple’s story.

So, how to create customer evangelists?

1. Tell your story. Tell it to anyone who’s willing to listen. Turn your story into an elevator pitch (30-60 sec) and into a tagline (max 10 words). When you have them ready, you can easily tell your story whenever you have the chance to do so.

2. Make your story interesting. Mediocrity is useless. A “normal” story will be forgotten before you get to the end of it. No one will tell it forward. Additionally the story should make a promise. It can promise quality, functionality, feeling, or anything else as long as it’s compelling.

3. Provide proof for your story. Social proof is the most effective proof. Tell how others are making their lives better by using your services. You can also use statistics or specifications if necessary, but turn them into stories as well. “It’s like I found an additional hour into my day, when the new Mac cut the processing time to half.”

4. Tell a different story. It must be noticeably different from your competitors’ stories. The story, and its difference, should be clear to anyone who could ever become your customer evangelist. They need something to believe in, that makes them different from those who don’t already embrace your story.

5. Create something to be gained. Your customer evangelists need to gain something when they fight for your story. Feeling important and different will only carry them so far. Create a membership program, give discounts, or acknowledge your evangelists. Do something to show your appreciation.

Most importantly: always remember that you can never know who will become your customer evangelist. So, always treat everyone as if they already were your most valuable customer.

Read more about:

by: Peter Sandeen

Follow-Up Instructions

You know your products better than anyone else, right? Much of that knowledge could be useful to your customers. But there’s no way you could share all of it while selling.

Create a series of instructions you can send via email. You can then make sure your customers get the most out of your product.

At the same time you stay at the top of your customer’s mind. If your emails are useful you’re seen as a valuable source of information.

Your emails should be closely related to your product. But don’t write a product manual. Instead write about the problems your product solves and demonstrate how to do it.

When your message answers a question you give a reason for people to share it. If they know someone who could benefit from your solution they now have an easy way to help them; just forward the email.

Another benefit of sending emails is that you’re keeping an open line of communication to the customer. Remember to encourage them to contact you if they have any questions.

AWeber is the most popular solution for creating and sending the emails. And they send similar instructional emails to their customers.

Read more about:

by: Peter Sandeen

Expect Exceeding Expectations

Surprising customer service

A few days ago I tried to buy an audiobook from Audible. For some reason I couldn’t finish the purchase. I saw an error message each time I hit “Purchase”. So, I contacted the customer service via email. Within hours I received a reply. They didn’t know why I couldn’t make the purchase. So, they had made it for me without any cost to me! At the end of the message was a question, “Did the support Customer Care provide exceed your expectations? If yes, please click here: … If no, please click here: …” Obviously I clicked the first link. Then I realized they expected to exceed my expectations. If they had only met my expectations I would’ve clicked the second link. I would’ve been happy if my expectations were only met, but I wouldn’t write about it here.

Set your expectations high

I’ve written about turning customer complaints into referrals before. It’s a goal I’ve set for myself in that specific situation. But why wouldn’t you expect to exceed your customers expectations in everything you do? I’m convinced it’s the best way to get referrals. The old idea, “Meet customer’s needs and expectations, and you’ll succeed.” isn’t valid anymore. If your competitors are consistently exceeding your customers expectations you’ll lose. Why would anyone ever buy from you if you only meet their needs if they know of your competitors? Now you know why you should expect yourself to exceed expectations but how can you do it?

Do unexpected things

By definition you need to do something unexpected to exceed expectations. I didn’t expect to receive a free audiobook. When I did, it surprised me and I immediately decided to tell others about it. And the next thing I did was that I purchased another book (the problem was gone). The cost of the book cannot be more than a few dollars for them. With that they turned me into a customer evangelist. Here I am advertising a company I have no stake in (well I am their affiliate).

Customer inquiries is just the obvious opportunity to exceed expectations. If you want to be remarkable you need to surprise whenever you can.

When the customer first contacts you. Give them something as a sign of gratitude. A free sample of your product or maybe an E-book can be the first pleasant surprise for them. Even small stuff can be unexpected and memorable. The point is to get them hooked. If you surprise them immediately they’ll expect to get similarly exceptional service from you in the future. Why would they go anywhere else if they don’t believe anyone can match the experience you offer?

When you’re negotiating the sale. You can surprise with services and solutions they didn’t know of. You can do some research for them. Or you can offer to provide additional free services if a deal is made. Again the idea is to surprise them. If you sell televisions delivering them can be unexpected. But add a free sound system planning to it and you become worth talking about. And you’ll often sell a sound system too.

When you finish the project/sale. This is the most critical moment. The feeling they’re left with is the feeling they’ll carry of you until something changes it. After finishing they’ll talk about the project the most to others. They’ll either say you were fantastic or not. Which do you want to be? You can easily be remembered if you give them something valuable they didn’t expect to get. What you choose to offer should be related to what you do, but it doesn’t have to be your own service. For example offer a month of free cable TV after setting up the television. It shouldn’t be too difficult to make a deal with a cable TV provider to make this possible and beneficial to both parties.

After the project/sale. Wait a while after finishing negotiations/project/sale. Then make contact in some way. At the very least send a post card thanking them for their business. You could also offer a discount or a free sample of a related product. People don’t expect to receive anything from you after paying. Consider contacting your customers at their work. You can make their day happier and get referrals when they can immediately tell their colleagues what just happened. Don’t try to sell anything at this point. People expect that any contact you make is just a sales effort. And they don’t want that. A gift coupon or a discount can be okay. The feeling should be that you only wanted to check that the TV and the new audio system are working.

Get referrals from every customer

It may seem like an impossible goal, but you should still aim to get there. Getting referrals is a relatively simple process:

You need to be worthy of the referral. You are worthy of a referral when the customer wants to give it. You should’ve done something they want to talk about. So, what do people talk about the most? Things that surprised them somehow. If you’re what surprised them they’ll talk about you. This works in the opposite direction too; they’ll tell all their friends if you were a surprisingly poor choice for them.
The customer needs to know they’re expected to give referrals. Not all people are bloggers or outspoken in other ways. You should tell them you expect them to give a referral. You should set this expectation early in the sales process. You can say something like, “I believe we can exceed your expectations so much that you’ll want to tell your friends about it. And I do understand that if we under deliver, you’ll tell your friends about that too.” At the same time you’re asking for a referral and increasing your credibility.
And you should encourage them to do so. I’m a strong advocate of after-sale-contacting for several reasons. Maybe the most important of those is that it’s one of the best ways to get referrals. It’s unusual to be contacted by a sales person after you’ve bought something. And if their offering you free training, or asking if they can do anything else for you, you’re likely to talk about it.

Do you have experiences you could share with others? Have you seen exceptional services somewhere? Do you offer them or have you received them? Share your thoughts in the comments below.