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An Introduction to Trojan Horse Marketing

An Introduction to Trojan Horse Marketing

The Tale of a Fortified City

Paris, a Trojan Prince, kidnapped Helen of Troy who was reputed to be the most beautiful woman who ever lived. When her husband discovered that she was missing, all of Greece took part in the ensuing war. They sieged the huge city of Troy for years, but they couldn’t figure out how to get inside the gates.

We all know necessity is the mother of all invention. After 10 fruitless years, they came up with the Trojan Horse. It was a big wooden horse on wheels, big enough for a bunch of Greek soldiers to hide inside. They pretended to retreat and sail home, acting like they had given up and left.

When the people of Troy opened their city gates and the found the horse, they didn’t know what it was. The Greeks planted a spy to trick them into believing it was a gift, so they brought it in. It was so big that it couldn’t go through the gate so they tore down a piece of the city wall to get it in.

During the night after everyone had fallen asleep, the Greek soldiers came out of the Trojan horse, killed the guards on the walls, and signaled to the other Greeks to come attack Troy. The Greeks could get in now because the walls were torn down. Troy was conquered and the war was won.

How does the Trojan horse apply to marketing?

When the Trojans saw the a huge wooden horse, they brought it in. Why? Because they perceived it as a gift of some value. They took it inside. The Greeks used the Trojan horse to win over the Trojans. I’m not advocating violence, but I am pointing out the genius behind the idea of using the ‘gift’ as a way to get to your prospect’s wallet.

An Introduction to Trojan Horse Marketing

Let me introduce you to a marketing principle called Trojan Horse Marketing. The reality is, when people see a marketing message or a promotion, their walls go up further.

Trojan Horse Marketing is defined as getting your promo message across, past the prospects’ barriers which have been erected to block out those promotional messages to begin with.

Trojan horse marketing works in the real world. Why? Because even if your prospect has strong walls and fortresses, when they see your Trojan horse, they see it as a gift from heaven, and they bring that gift inside the barriers. That’s what Trojan Horse Marketing is about.

It’s about how to position your marketing as a Trojan horse; as a gift; as a welcome distraction from life; as an answer from heaven.

Ask yourself, “Am I a Trojan horse in my marketing?” Down the line, I’ll talk more about how to express Trojan Horse Marketing - in email, in blogs, in different forms of promotions.





An Introduction to Trojan Horse Marketing - To learn more about this author, visit Michael Reining's Website.

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John Power
John Power, founder of Biltmore Franchise Consulting, has extensive experience developing and marketing franchises and business opportunities. He has been in and around franchising for over twenty years. From 1980 through 1990 he conceptualized, organized, and developed the American Video Association. He grew AVA to 2,000 national members, before selling the company it 1990. It was later merged into another home video marketing company. From 2000 to 2005 he worked as a contract marketing and human resources consultant to several local and national companies. In 2005 Mr. Power began working as a franchise development consultant on a full-time basis. Since that time he has helped more than three dozen companies initiate and develop their franchising program. He notes that there are many companies interested in developing a franchise program, and who need his specialized assistance. Mr. Power is a “hands-on” franchise consultant. He said, “I am the ‘nuts and bolts’ person who tends to the details for my clients.” Mr. Power holds a B.S. degree with a major in Marketing. See: www.biltmorefranchise.com You may contact Mr. Power at: jpower@biltmorefranchise.co - Visit John Power's Website

Dave Kurlan
Dave Kurlan is the founder and CEO of Objective Management Group, Inc., the industry leader in sales assessments and sales force evaluations, and the CEO of David Kurlan & Associates, Inc., a consulting firm specializing in sales force development. Dave has been a top rated speaker at Inc. Magazine's Conference on Growing the Company, the Sales & Marketing Management Conference and the Gazelles Sales & Marketing Summit. He has been featured on radio and TV, including World Business Review with General Norman Schwarzkopf, in Inc. Magazine, Selling Power Magazine, Sales & Marketing Management Magazine and Incentive Magazine. He is the author of Mindless Selling and Baseline Selling – How to Become a Sales Superstar by Using What You Already Know about the Game of Baseball. He created and wrote STAR, a proprietary recruiting process for hiring great salespeople, and he writes Understanding the Sales Force, a popular business Blog and is a contributing author to The Death of 20th Century Selling and 101 Great Ways to Improve Your Life, Volume 2. - Visit Dave Kurlan's Website

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Stephanie Robey is President and CoFounder of Pivot Positive, LLC - an Internet marketing business focused on helping people start work at home ventures. Previously, she was employed at The Search Agency with over 20 years experience in graphic design and 10 years experience in online marketing. She was responsible for launching the Conversion Path Optimization (CPO) unit where she and her team have conducted hundreds of optimization tests for online companies across multiple verticals.

She is a successful entrepreneur having started and sold 2 companies and remains on the board of directors of the third, PhotoSpin.com   Stephanie began her career in the direct marketing realm creating and producing direct mail for many of the major cable television companies and directly attributes her understanding of Internet marketing to those early offline experiences.  Stephanie is a graduate of San Diego State University with a BFA in Graphic Arts and also holds an Executive MBA from the Graziadio School of Business and Management at Pepperdine University.

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Joe Dager is President of Business901, a progressive coaching company providing no-nonsense direction in areas such as Lean Six Sigma Marketing and organized referral marketing. What others say: In the past 20 years, Joe and I have collaborated on many difficult issues. Joe’s ability to combine his expertise with “out of the box” thinking is unsurpassed. He has always delivered quickly, cost effectively and with ingenuity. A brilliant mind that is always a pleasure to work with.” - James R. If you want to learn more about Business901, start a conversation with us. We can be found @ Web/Blog: Business901.com Web/Blog: FundingYourNonprofit.com LinkedIn Profile Follow me on Twitter - Visit Joe Dager's Website

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Jay Kubassek
(Jay's Full Bio: EvanCarmichael.com/jaykubassek)  In five years, Canadian-born entrepreneur Jay Kubassek went from selling mufflers at a Midas franchise to revolutionizing Internet marketing with the 2004 launch of CarbonCopyPRO, a online marketing education company, now worth over $20 million with customers in over 160 countries.

 

As an independent film producer, his upstart film fund Aliquot Films is currently producing a films with Spike Lee and Abel Fererra (starring Ethan Hawke and Dennis Hopper.)

 

Jay's entrepreneurial spirit is irrepressible. He’s the owner of five companies, a professional speaker and trainer, international real estate developer/investor, extreme sport enthusiast and emerging philanthropist. 

 

Jay resides in NYC with his wife Jamie, son Milo and dog Cooper.  Visit Jay's official website: www.JayKubassek.com - Visit Jay Kubassek's Website

John Alexander
John has taught keyword research and SEO skills to small groups of business owners and Webmasters from over 80 different countries world wide since 2002. John is also the Director of Search Engine Academy ; Co-director of Training at Search Engine Workshops offering live, SEO Workshops with his partner SEO educator Robin Nobles, author of the very first comprehensive online search engine marketing courses at SEO Training Online and the SEO Workshop Resource Center.
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Michael Reining
(Visit Michael's Website) Prior to MindValley Media, Mike was the Head of New Ventures Strategy at eBay where he conceived of the strategies that led to the investment in Craigslist, the launch of Kijiji.com and the acquisition of Skype. Mike has an MBA from Stanford and previously worked for the Boston Consulting Group. He is also a certified Google AdWords Professional. MindValleyLabs Internet Marketing Blog: http://blog.mindvalleylabs.com/

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