The Ultimate Sales Machine - Chet Holmes [76]
Tying some of this together, they also created a brochure that mirrored the data in their core story. It also featured beautiful art of interest to hospitals. This company executed at the top of the game, showing remarkable pigheaded discipline and determination to see the vision come to fruition.
Exercise
Look at your core story and make a list of the data that would be of great interest to the readers of your target publications.
It’s even easier if you are in a specific vertical market. Let’s say you market to dentists or chiropractors, or even manufacturers. Every market has trade publications that focus specifically on that market. For most markets there are only a handful of these outlets and you can get to know the editors well if you talk to them every single month.
One article, properly placed, can work for you for years. I got an article in Success magazine that said, “Karate master Chet Holmes breaks sales records wherever he goes.” A photo showed me doing a karate kick while standing on a table in my office overlooking the Bay Bridge in San Francisco. Yes, I wish this article had given more substantive information, but I’ve used it 1,000 times in other media activities. If you go to my Web site, you’ll see that article represented there prominently. I’ve also used it as a mailer to my dream clients. It has been a nice bonus to my career—but only because I used it properly in all my marketing efforts.
Exercise
List all the ways you could use an article that has been or will be written about you or by you. Here are some ideas:
Use it as a promotional piece.
Have salespeople show it to prospects.
Use it as a direct mail piece.
Include it in your brochure or core story.
Hand it out at trade shows.
Use or quote it in your advertising.
PR newswire (www.prnewswire.com) is an amazing tool if you’re writing press releases. It goes to every single media source on the planet for hundreds, not thousands, of dollars. I used it twice and ended up in The Wall Street Journal both times. The staff helps you write the press release because they know what will be picked up. Another secret to writing an effective press release is to mention a Fortune 500 company in your copy. You have to be very careful about liability here—and that is your responsibility—but if you have a legitimate reason to mention them, it helps in getting your article noticed by the media.
Marketing Weapon 5: Personal Contact
You can advertise to me, direct mail to me, or send me an article, but now I’m on the phone with your company. This is the most potent form of marketing. None of your marketing efforts will have as much impact on your client as personal contact with your salespeople or customer ser vice reps. Since personal contact is such a powerful marketing weapon, we’ve devoted several chapters to it specifically and included more tips to help you improve this area in your business throughout the entire book. So for now, let’s move to…
Marketing Weapon 6: Trade Shows and Market Education
Done properly, a trade show can take you from obscurity to the top of the market in a single event. Trade shows offer an awesome opportunity to really stand out and get noticed. Done improperly, trade shows can be a waste of money. You can’t imagine how many people tell me that a trade show they went to wasn’t worth it. Then they learn what you’re about to learn and it changes every thing.
There are only three rules to having a great trade show, but there are 100 ways to capitalize on those rules. In order of importance, here are the rules:
Get noticed.
Drive traffic.
Capture leads.
Now let’s go deep.
Rule 1: Get Noticed!
What can you do to really stand out in the crowd? Nothing, including great products and superb selling, will matter if you can’t get noticed. Most trade shows are boring—booth after booth of folks hawking their wares. What you have to do is be the fun booth—the place that looks