Tweet

GENERATING LEADS, BRAND, RELATIONSHIPS, AND TRUST AT THE SAME TIME

Written by: Mike Schultz

Article Overview: By Mike Schultz Relationships. Trust. Delivery of superb value. These are core ingredients of a successful service firm. Talk to 100 service firm marketers and leaders, and they'll all tell you (and most of them believe it, even if they're wrong) that their firm is in the top of their industry in each of these categories. Why, then, do service firms typically do such a poor job of bringing relationships, trust, and value into their marketing mixes?

GENERATING LEADS, BRAND, RELATIONSHIPS, AND TRUST AT THE SAME TIME

By Mike Schultz

Relationships. Trust. Delivery of superb value. These are core ingredients of a successful service firm. Talk to 100 service firm marketers and leaders, and they'll all tell you (and most of them believe it, even if they're wrong) that their firm is in the top of their industry in each of these categories.

Why, then, do service firms typically do such a poor job of bringing relationships, trust, and value into their marketing mixes?

I live in Boston and I read the Boston Business Journal. For better or worse, law firms, accounting firms, consulting firms, and professional services firms of all types are flocking to the print media to improve their "name recognition" and get their message out. Of course, since they all believe that they're at the top of the food chain when it comes to relationships, trust, and value, they share this in their advertising copy.

The copy usually reads something like this:

"For over 143 years, the firm of Flugelhorn, Ocarina, Nyckelharpa and Zither has provided innovative business advisory solutions to the Boston area entrepreneurs and business leaders. Our efficient and effective solutions stem from our deep knowledge of our areas of expertise, our customers' businesses, and our dedication to exceptional customer service.

"You don't need services, you need solutions! And not just any solutions, solutions that deliver value. We focus on delivering a unique level of value to our client base. You deserve the best, and we are the best. In today's competitive environment, you can trust FONZ to help you succeed."

Pretty sharp copy, if you ask me. They covered core topics that make them such a great service firm and they communicate it all so well. The FONZ is cool! Right?

Clearly this is bad marketing all around, but it doesn't come from a bad place. It's just weak execution of good intent.

Win Friends and Influence People

Let's assume for the moment (even though I have not conducted a friendship satisfaction and loyalty survey) that I have some good and genuine friendships – friendships that have grown over time with people I trust, that I like to interact with, and that I expect to interact with over the long-term. Hopefully, they feel the same way about me. We have good relationships.

Fast forward to now. I'm at a party. Since I'm always looking to make new friends, I consider this party a good opportunity for friendship development. When I meet people, I give them my friendship elevator pitch (which is quite polished, I might add).

In my pitch I let them know that I'm looking for long-term friendships built on trust, reliability, and mutual benefit. I note for their convenience that my friendship activities tend to focus on martial arts, fly fishing, golf, traveling, and a number of other areas they might find of interest.

Strangely enough, I don't seem to get too many friends with this approach.

Do It, Don't Say It

A consulting firm executive once told me that he needed to get his prospects and customers to perceive that his firm was credible and distinctive. I believe that a lot of service firm executives have this same thought, so they end up writing ads that say, “I'm credible and distinctive.” Or “I'm trustworthy.” Or “I'm innovative yet solid.”

If service firms want their clients and prospects to believe that they're credible and distinctive, they need to demonstrate that they are credible and distinctive. Simply communicating it is not only not enough, it can create the wrong impression. (When I see ads like this, I think to myself, “If they're this self-centered, and this bad at marketing, how good are they really at their core services?”)

How can you demonstrate your value to them, you ask?

Understand your value. Unlike what many marketing consultants say, this value doesn't need to be unique. It just needs to be genuine, distinctive, and valuable to them. You don't need to be the only person to have innovative financial consulting processes, yours just need to be worthwhile in specific situations to specific clients who might need them.

Make the value tangible. The value a client eventually realizes from you might be your efficient and effective solutions that helped them grow their revenue and strengthen their business. But I don't know what that means or what to do with it. Instead, communicate that your innovative approach to financial restructuring has successfully freed up over $2.2 billion dollars of capital tied up in businesses.

Make the process and outcomes tangible. Along with making your value tangible, clients want to know what you are going to do, how you are going to do it, and what outcomes they can expect. It's easier to lead the prospect down the path you want them to go when you show them the path and destination itself.

Don't market the relationship. If you go directly to, “Let's get married, have 8 kids, and retire to a nice condo in Boca,” you're not likely to get too many takers on your offer. The saying, “coming on like gangbusters” comes to mind. You have a number of hoops to jump through before you have the right to state that your firm is the firm to be trusted with a prospect's most challenging legal needs (or whatever those needs may be).

Create experiences with you. Instead of marketing the whole relationship, start by dating. At first, the experience might be that you make an offer to them to read your white paper. Perhaps you offer that they attend your seminar. Maybe you have a business meeting to discuss a particular topic of interest to them.

Offer value in the experiences. If you have a white paper, a seminar, a meeting with a client, or whatever offers you choose to make to clients, don't make them thinly veiled sales pitches. The best selling you can do is actually providing value – starting right with your marketing copy – to clients. First impressions go a long way, and if a prospective client decides to invest even five minutes in reading something you wrote, make it a worthwhile five minutes.

If, after the five minutes, all you did was try to sell to them, their first impression will be “these people aren't worth my time.” And that's not the right impress to make when time with you is what you're selling.

Brand by Doing, Not by Telling

Back to the beginning of our article, why don't all of these ads touting firms' “trustworthiness” offer something of direct and immediate value? Where's the white paper? Where's the seminar? Where's the webinar? Where's something, anything, that you can offer them that might actually be worthwhile right now?

From a marketing perspective, not only will these value-based offers create a perception in the mind of the prospect that you are a source of value; they'll create leads for you. If you write an ad and put it in your local business journal without a call to action, a bunch of people will see your ad and then do nothing. Add in a white paper, event, or something else of value and you get the chance to start a conversation with these people that can lead directly to new business.

Much of professional service firm marketing these days is so focused on creating “brand” that they miss the point of what a brand really is - a reputation for quality and value built one by one with clients. So instead of branding by telling people that you're trustworthy and valuable, start being trustworthy and valuable and demonstrating that to potential clients. Do that, and building the brand you so desire will take care of itself.

And with the same money you're spending to build the brand, you can generate leads, relationships, and trust at the same time.

Related Articles
  The Advantages of Lead Generation for your Business
  Tips In Generating Leads Through Social Media
  The Best Workplace Relationships - Who Is Responsible?
  Companies are Investing in a New Kind of Customer Service.
  Why Every Business Can Benefit from Blogging

Article Tags: accounting firms, boston area, boston business journal, business leaders, competitive environment, consulting firms, core ingredients, effective solutions, exceptional customer service, innovative business, law firms, marketers, mike schultz, nyckelharpa, ocarina, poor job, professional services firms, successful service, top of the food chain, zither



Related Forum Posts
Single mother business - Hi Evan, Every problem can be solved. Check these four 'T' points: 1. THINK that you are important. Therefore one can do anything one sets her mind to. This can be applied to many different types of businesses. Perhaps she has set her mind on a specific market. With the help of the internet one can explore avenues of possible area to fill the need. 2. TRUST yourself that you are able. It doesn't matter, if you make a mistake. You know your strength and weaknesses. Concentrate on strength, this is your potential. 3. TEAM-UP with somebody. Perhaps a friend, who has some experience in this. You can get good advice and encouragement. There are Nay-sayers out there, just ignore them. Look for positive and achievers These can be a great strength. Finally, 4. TIME for your children. When you have a routine set up, you can plan ahead to be with them. As they get older, they will understand the reason for you to work. Kindest Regards Beat "Unlock People's Potentials!"
Re: Email Marketing, Permission Based - I agree that a double-opt-in (i.e. confirmed opt-in) system of email marketing is the best method. Of course, having people confirm their subscription is no guarantee that they will read your email! Signing up subscribers is only the FIRST stage. The next thing you need to get is their TRUST, and the best way to "get" is not to "sell" but to "give"... - give freebies - give useful, valuable tips - get the subscribers to feel that opening your mail is something WORTH SPENDING TIME ON. Entertain them, make them laugh, but always give them something of value connected to the niche market that your newsletter deals with. - invite feedback - use the [[firstname]] tag, and don't be afraid to use it in the newsletter title field either! Cheers, David H
Re: Is facebook adverts effective? - We have done it for our online live tutoring services. But, I have decided not to use it again because we could know that there were around 250 clicks in a week ,but we could not see capitalise a single student. We targeted UK based 24-30 or something. We actually received a very few (I think around5 out of 250 clicks!) ... They too seem to be Indians and Pakistanis residing in the UK with a full time student visa, which prevents them from taking online lessons from us (then why they clicked our ads and even contacted us mean, I think, they do not going to lose anything!) ... So, I realised that our target market UK based PART TIME ACCA and CIMA students do not use FaceBook to browse ACCA and CIMA related sites although they use FaceBook. So, as our website is for ACCA and CIMA courses, probably it might have been shown in ACCA and CIMA FaceBook groups, where FULL TIME students were browsing it. So, I think it is we, selected the wrong medium .... Not to blame FaceBook I think .... So, it mainly depends on your target market, where they reside and actually from that area/country, truly would your target group see your adverts ? Much to consider ....
Re: How much is social media part of your marketing strategy? - The magic word: TIME If i had more time... but since I don' have it i go strictly to other marketing methods, that brings in more targeted traffic, like article marketing.


Share this article with your friends. Fund someone's dream.

Leave a comment below or share on the left and you'll help support entrepreneurs in Africa through our partnership with Kiva. Over $50,000 raised and counting - Please keep sharing! Learn more.

Tweet

Newsletter

Get advice & tips from famous business
owners, new articles by entrepreneur
experts, my latest website updates, &
special sneak peaks at what's to come!

Name:
Email:

Popular Articles

Online Business Ideas: A Look At Various Options

How do I finance a franchise?

Join Conversations Politely, Part 1

Suggestions

Email us your ideas on how to make our
website more valuable! Thank you Sharon
from Toronto Salsa Lessons / Classes for
your suggestions to make the newsletter
look like the website and profile younger
entrepreneurs like Jennifer Lopez.