Lead Optimize Outsourced Marketing

Ken Cook of Hartford Business.com just wrote a great article with 10 tips to build lead generation. What I appreciate most about the list is that it includes various methods to build lead generation for your business and could be used as a good guideline for integrating lead generation into your sales and marketing plans next year.

Tips to Build Lead Generation

1. Work with associations where your target customers are members.
2. Find partners whose services are complimentary to yours.
3. Ask existing customers for leads and referrals.
4. Create an education program that helps your customers with their businesses.
5. Attend very targeted trade shows.
6. Conduct surveys with clients and prospects that focus on their needs.
7. Build a system to prioritize sales leads.
8. Consider conducting a webinar.
9. Consider telemarketing - better for simple sales.
10. Be involved with your salespeople and train them more.

As you begin sales & marketing planning for next year, keep these lead generation tips in mind. To make your website more effective for building sales leads, give me a call. You can email me at chris@leadoptimize.com or call (832) 628-0987.

One of the most basic marketing strategies is the correct use of features and benefits to sell a product or service. Corporate sales training programs, online education programs, and business school curriculum always include this key selling technique. It is a fact that customers are more responsive to benefit-focused selling points, versus feature-based. While the words “benefit” and “feature” might sound like they mean the same thing, they do not.

Benefits and Features – Definitions

These two words cannot be used interchangeably. There is a very important difference that is subtle but distinct.

Features – What a product/service has. Your list of features should include all technical details, product specifications, and product descriptions. Answers: “What does it have?”

Benefits – what a feature means. Benefits solve a problem. Answers: “What will it do for me?”

Benefits Sell

It is vital to be able to recognize the difference between a feature and a benefit, because features tell and benefits sell.

By looking around at business advertising – e-commerce sites are often the worse offenders – you will see that many business owners missed the boat on the features vs. benefits lesson. A little bit of time spent focusing on your product and what it really offers (that is, how it really helps) can result in huge payouts.

Why Selling Features Does Not Work

To most customers, the first response to a salesperson or marketing approach selling features is to tune them out. Picture buying a riding lawnmower. What can I do with it? What problems is it going to solve for me? Perhaps later in the purchase decision process I might want to know about technical specs but first and foremost is “what’s in it for me?”

In other words, a buyer’s thought process is ordered something more like this:

1. How does it help me? (benefits)
2. How does it do this? (features)

Why Selling Benefits Works

People make purchasing decisions largely because of the positive emotions tied to product benefits. If I am buying that riding lawnmower, tell me about how the super-fast cutting action will save me hours each summer so that I can enjoy the pool with the family. I will surely be happier when I do not have to strain my body pushing a mower after a long week’s work. With this riding lawnmower I can just sit back and relax, and get the lawn mowed at the same time! That is selling benefits.

The Difference Between Benefits and Features: Another Example

Here is an example of selling a family car. Notice the difference between the two approaches below:

1. When selling a vehicle based on features, it might look something like this:

“The new 2008 model van has a V6 engine, antilock brakes, a LATCH child seat safety system, traction control, and front/side airbags.” This rambling list of features may interest some people, but 99% are lost at the word “van”.

2. People buy when the seller talks their language. Sell using benefits:

“The 2008 is loaded with top-of-the-line safety features to protect your family in the events of near-misses or accidents. The easy to use LATCH car seat system is actually bolted into the frame so you can rest assured your children are safely secured. This van has consistently earned one of the highest safety ratings available and, as with all of our cars and trucks, you will still be able to stop and go precisely as you command with a state of the art traction control system and powerful V6 engine.”

The Benefits of Benefits: Benefits Sell More Products

As with anything in business, a little bit of planning goes a long way when you are ready for action. The wonderful thing about planning for sales and marketing is that you can start it at anytime. After reading about the importance of focusing on the right perspective, set aside some time to sit down and make sure you are showcasing the most important benefits of your product and service. Follow up with the features.

Your company does important stuff. You have big things going on. You are about to change the world or, at least, introduce something that will change something for someone. Let “the press” help you tell the world about it with your press release.

Writing a press release to share your big news with the world is a great way to drum up attention, traffic, leads, and more business. Press releases are the communication strategy used to standardize how organizations alert the media to important news. The following industry secrets will help you master the art of writing and presenting powerful press releases that will get your story accepted by the media.

The Goal When Writing a Press Release

A press release is successful when the media picks up your story and makes it news. With that, your goal when writing a press release is to spin your news in a way that gives the editors what they want. You are essentially “pitching” your story to the editors and they want news people will read - stuff that attracts readers. To be used, your the press release needs to be:

1. Read by the editor or reporter (unique enough to be noticed among the masses)
2. Considered for publication and rewriting (Interesting enough to not get thrown away at first glance)
3. Selected for publishing (valuable enough to get people reading)
4. Fit into the content schedule and overall coverage plan (luck can play a role here)

Selling Your Press Release

With those nasty looking steps blocking your successful press release, writing a press release can seem futile but don’t get scared. There are ways to be better than the next press release so consider the above list with your mind set in solution mode.

For starters, press releases should not be dry in voice or presentation. For me, the phrase “press release” sounds dull and boring and I always imagine black and white news print or a stuffy looking woman in a suit and a glue-on smile at a podium reading a press release verbatim in front of microphones (not sure where that comes from but it’s there). On the contrary, press releases should be intriguing and incite action.

Writing a press release should be handled the same as any other marketing or ad copy. Make it short and sweet, present the facts and figures clearly and up front, use words that sell, and send it in a snappy envelope. In fact, overnight it as this indicates importance because it arrives in a special package and has to be signed for.

Either way, don’t expect your first submission to be accepted. You might have to submit 20 press releases (or 50 or 100) before your story is picked up. In case I am not being clear on this point, the lesson here is that persistence will be required when writing a press release.
Do’s & Don’t of Writing a Press Release

• DO cover the who, why, what, when, where, why, and how
• DO get to the point. Avoid flowery descriptions and unnecessary words
• DO add quotes – perhaps from yourself or a customer
• DO format professionally, and proof it for spelling and grammatical errors
• DO plan and prepare the message before writing a press release
• DO keep it to one page
• DO NOT write an advertisement. Write in an unbiased, conversational, and informative tone
• DO NOT write in the first person (“I”)
• DO NOT forget the headline. A great headline will get your press release read
• DO NOT issue press releases that are too light on content; the content should be newsworthy
• DO NOT be overly casual. When in doubt, refer to an AP style book

Press Release Strategy

You have to spin the message in a press release so that is appropriate. For example, the opening of a fish market is not necessarily worthy of a news story. But a story about how the owners invented an award-winning shellfish harvester that protects the other species of fish and wildlife when in use is news that a local newspaper might want to report.

When planning a press release ask yourself these questions:

• Who is the target audience of this information? Who do you WANT to target?
• Why is your news of interest to the public?
• What problem does your product or service solve?
• What are the keywords that your target audience uses when searching for your product/service?

Sample Press Release Outline

In the simplest form of a press release, state the problem, position yourself as the answer to the problem, and make a call to action. For a more detailed, longer release, consider this outline: