By Craig Klein, SalesNexus.com CEO
The varied reasons to put off creating an email marketing program are as diverse as the businesses that need to implement them. If you are like most companies, you tend to spin your wheels for a long time before you let the email marketing vehicle take off. It can often be difficult to pinpoint what is causing the delay.
Let’s get personal. Sometimes the best way to recognize our business habits is to relate them to our personal habits. Below is a list of personal dysfunctions that you know about yourself or someone you know.
- Your Exercise Habits
Most of us have had the experience of beginning an exercise program only to abandon it within months (if not days). We are smart enough to know that a short-lived exercise routine will not yield good results. Yet, we will try a new email marketing strategy for a short time then use the excuse that “It didn’t work.” Seriously???
- You Meet Someone New
One of the quickest ways to turn off a new acquaintance whether romantic or personal is to try too hard at the beginning. Many a sitcom on TV has portrayed this kind of overanxious, friend-needy behavior. We can laugh at the humor of this way of meeting new people. Some of us can identify someone in our own lives that has tried way too hard to engage in a relationship immediately after being introduced.
Today’s buyer will have the same comical (and business killing) reaction to a company that tries too hard to sell their product or service. Communication early in a relationship needs to be focused on getting to know one another. The same is true for your business.
- It’s All About You
This is one of the most common and seriously egregious methods for selling in the current sales environment. After decades of push media advertising, aka traditional advertising, few companies have learned the “art of seduction”.
A switch to pull media is required. That is why a properly executed email campaign has so much power. Send your new sales leads something seductive and interesting then measure your results. There is no doubt that being seductive is much more effective than pushing the buyer to purchase what you have to sell.
- You’re Afraid
Change is scary. For most of us change is always scary.
The internet-enabled buyers have changed how they respond to our marketing efforts. A company can no longer throw money into buying ads that tout the wonderful benefits of the products and services they offer. It simply does not work anymore.
The new methods require you to develop content or pay a professional to create it for you. These are new territories for a business to explore. Most companies are simply not prepared to operate in this new environment. The search for solutions often results in paralysis from analysis.
The good news is you can start right now…make lots of mistakes…measure what does and doesn’t work…adjust and redevelop…and get it done faster than continuing to analyze what to do. Stop being afraid and take action.
- You Want to Fit In
Being all things to all people is a losing battle. It always has been but in today’s marketplace it is truer than ever. A narrow niche outperforms a general category of business on the worldwide web. The days of being able to promote your multifaceted, one-company-fits-all approach to business are over.
If your company is already multifaceted then that’s good. Simply chunk all the facets into smaller programs and promote them in a narrowly targeted email marketing campaign. The ideal customer for one segment of your business will be different than the others, so make the content specific to the narrow group of customers you want.
Hopefully, the analogies about your personal life have helped you understand your procrastination. Recognition of the problem may be just the boost you need to get started. Which of these personal habits is showing up in your business?
Craig Klein is the founder/CEO of SalesNexus.com which is a leading provider of CRM, email marketing, and lead generation solutions for business-2-business sales teams.
