selling / thinkit creative

Be real: the importance of authenticity in what you say

By Patrick Gant

Photo: i'll make ya famous by Roof Topper

Photo by Roof Topper on 500px

Organizations of all sizes in both the private and public sectors are working harder than ever today to be more service focussed.

That includes the messages they develop when communicating directly with customers and clients.

It’s rooted in good intentions.

But far too often, people fall short in delivering on what ought to be the underlying promise of good service: being useful and authentic.

“Have you found everything you’re looking for?” I’ll bet you’ve been asked that countless times at the checkout counter at a chain store. I hear that question so often now that I answer “yes” almost like an involuntary reflex…even in cases where, in fact, I haven’t found everything I was looking for.

I’ll bet you’ve done the same thing.

What’s worse is when you instead say “no” and it quickly becomes apparent that the person who cheerfully asked you that question in the first place hasn’t a clue what to do when someone indicates they actually have not found all that they were looking for.

Efforts at being useful stop being meaningful when they’re perceived as something that people have to do rather than want to do.

Too often, businesses get too caught up trying to turn good service into a process: a series of methodical steps that everyone is expected to follow on every transaction.

There are two problems with that approach. First, processes are designed to give you identical results every time. Sure, we all like to see consistent good service, but the real test of that kind of promise takes place when things aren’t working the way they should.

What do you do when that customer hasn’t found what they were looking for, or something in your transaction hasn’t gone the way that it should? Your next step there matters far more than adhering to any kind of process.

If all you have to rely on is a batch of template messages, your customers or clients will tune into this faster than you’ll ever anticipate.

They will become conditioned to ignore what you’re saying.

The second problem is that processes strip away the kind of sincerity that you ought to be building with your clients and customers.

People like to be made to feel special.

They like it when you notice things before you even have to ask. And they’re far more likely to respond in kind when you demonstrate with actions that service is something you work hard at providing, rather than just repeating something that you’ve been told to say.

There’s no substitute for being real.

Rethinking the professional speaker’s one-sheet

By Patrick Gant

Photo: Gawker Media

Now that so much marketing is digital, the professional speaker’s one-sheet is looking more and more like an anachronism.

It was a time-honoured tool for generations, consisting of a headshot photo, a brief bio and an overview of your area of specialty.

It was a speaker’s key marketing tool. It got the job done.

The traditional one-sheet was designed based on three assumptions: it would be almost exclusively used as a paper-based product, you could reuse that product for a mass audience, and it was an acceptable, unidimensional substitute for introducing yourself personally to someone.

Let’s challenge those assumptions.

So much about the way we market has changed. Today, it’s more relationship-based, far, far less dependent on paper, and people learn a lot more about you faster than ever.

On top of all that, there are tools out there that just everyone has to quickly (and regularly) create a more engaging, personal introduction with your audience.

I’m not saying you should blow-up your one-sheet. Far from it.

The copywriting sales mastery that used to go into that product is as vital as ever. And if you don’t invest in developing a professional product that’s engineered to sell, you’re leaving money on the table.

But you do have to stop thinking about it as a static, single sheet printed on paper.

If you are a professional speaker or presenter, this is still one of your top marketing products. It just has to catch-up with the way people make decisions today. That’s at the root of professional speaker marketing (and it’s why it’s a fast-growing part of our business here at thinkit creative).

Think of your product—your bio, photos, benefits statement, testimonials and areas of specialization—as modules. These are components that you can rearrange and tweak to suit the interests of a specific speaking engagement. Put them all in a folder and generate digital products on the fly. There are pros who can help you with this.

Don’t stop there. Consider shooting a short video and posting it to a special webpage on your site…just for that upcoming speaking event. Link it to you what you send. Integrate what you have to say with your other material on your website, LinkedIn and Twitter profiles (among other sources).

Static, mass-produced products are out. Personalized, interconnected and flexible digital products are in.

The truth about the act and art of selling

By Patrick Gant

Photo:Lenore M. Edman

It’s a particularly noticeable behaviour among public-sector and not-for-profit organizations: too often when ramping up marketing efforts, people shy away from the word “selling.”

It’s understandable why they don’t want to see it spelled out overtly in their copy (more about that in a moment), but even at a deeper, strategic level, many organizations treat the word as if it’s kryptonite. They figure that since they are not in the sales business, they don’t want to it to seem like they are selling to people.

The sentiment is well placed, but it’s rooted in false assumptions.

The truth about selling is that it’s something we all do. We’re all hardwired to persuade and to be persuaded. What turns people off, however, is empty rhetoric. When something sounds salesy, it’s a sign that an element is missing from your message.

Selling is not a dirty word. It’s just not always done as well as it could be.

To better understand this, let’s make a distinction between the act and the art of selling.

At its simplest level, the act of selling is the act of exchanging one thing for another. It does not have to be about money or goods. But what must always be present is an idea and the attention you ask of your audience to focus on that idea.

The art of selling, on the other hand, is a more subtle undertaking. As jazz legend Duke Ellington once said: “You’ve got to find some way of saying it without saying it.” Therein lies the challenge for copywriters and marketers of all kinds.

Selling—when it’s done right—should never feel like selling at all. Let’s face it: no one likes to feel like they’re being pitched to. We like it even less when someone resorts to age-old sales tactics. That’s artless selling.

The buying experience is transformed when selling is about more than meeting someone’s quota or target. People like it when someone communicates through words and actions an understanding of the problems they face, and makes the effort to be genuinely helpful in offering solutions to those problems. That power comes from packing your message with empathy and emotion.

Whether you message is about a product, service, idea or a vision, you engage in an act of selling to reach and persuade your audience. How skillful you are in the art of selling is what will determine in large part how successful you will be in those efforts.

Q&A: What is copywriting, anyway?

By Patrick Gant

Copywriting is the act of writing text that is used for the purposes of selling a product, service or idea.

Selling in this sense does not necessarily involve a financial transaction. Rather, it’s about being persuasive—motivating an audience to take a specific action or specific steps that you want them to take.

Copywriting is a science. It is also an art.

On one hand, it relies on proven, time-honoured methods and techniques of gathering an audience’s attention, presenting a business case to them, and convincing them to respond to a call-to-action. On the artful side of the equation, it involves inventiveness and a talent for playing with words in a manner that is memorable to an audience. These two disciplines combined have the potential to inform and entertain an audience. It’s a powerful combination, when done properly.

Traditionally, a copywriter would ply his or her skills in creating direct-mail products, advertising, commercial scripts, billboards, brochures, postcards and sales letters. They often worked in partnership with musicians to develop jingles (and many still do). With the rise of online media, new products have become part of the copywriter’s domain, including web copy, banner ads, email blasts, landing pages, multimedia scripts and presentation content.

Elements of copywriting are also found in feature article writing, social media content, white papers and technical writing, in which the selling imperative isn’t as great, but the need to attract and retain a reader’s attention remains as important as ever.

[Update] Interesting fact: While copywriting has been the home of many successful writers for the duration of their careers, it has also been an important launching pad for many notable fiction authors.

Making it easier to buy things: the magic behind the Mac App Store

By Patrick Gant

About a week ago, Apple launched its Mac App Store—essentially an offshoot of its App Store for iPod/iPhone/iPad. By all accounts so far, it’s been a pretty successful launch, scoring one million downloads on its first day alone.

Even some developers who had initial reservations about this new way of buying software are being won over.

I can see a few things that are putting wind in the sails of those who’ve partnered with Apple on this experimental venture. First, pricing is fair but competitive within the App Store—particularly among small-sized apps that do one thing really well, as opposed to the bloated swiss-army knife approach that so many developers used to impose on their applications. Second, apps are presented compellingly as impulse buys. Not hard to part with $4.99 for Angry Birds. Plenty spend more than that on a fancy cup of coffee these days. The third factor is licensing, or rather, the lack of it with Mac Store Apps. No more having to save licensing codes. Buy the app and it’s yours.

Clearly, there’s lots to celebrate here for Mac developers, but there’s a lesson here that every business can learn from, too.

You sell more when you make it as easy as possible for your customers to buy from you.

(Photo: Apple)