Sell to a Gen X? Be Straightforward and Show Some Love
Photo by 愚木混株 cdd20 on Unsplash You want Gen X customers or clients? Take the time to understand them. To reach them, adopt two strategies: authenticity and acknowledgment. If you betray a Gen X – or fail to value Gen X patronage – a Gen Xer will turn his or her back on you, badmouth […]
Stand Out in Your Market: 12 Sweet Branding Trends
Photo by Dollar Gill on Unsplash If I see another boxy advert, without movement or life, I will scream. Sure, if you have a super-conservative brand (think bank, investment firm, attorney, auditor…), and you want to SCREAM “tradition, we never change, steady as a rock, fun-police,” then it’s your role to be dull blue-suit no personality. For […]
Successful Entrepreneurs Know: Brand Before Business – or Bust!
Photo by pmv chamara on Unsplash You had so much energy and joie de vivre when you launched your business. This morning, you surf the classifieds to find a j.o.b.. The wind is gone; your sails are flaccid. You had a good idea. You gave it the college try. Wait. As a business coach and […]
Marketing Magic: Hit ’Em Where They Need It
(Image courtesy of Anastase Maragos on Unsplash) You are a content creator or marketing expert. Perhaps you’re an entrepreneur. And high-ticket marketing efforts carve out a pound of flesh from your budget. Often, your ads and posts, commercials and pitches, miss the mark. You post, you pay for ad space, you cut checks for your 1099 marketing […]
Make Your Customers Cry, Shiver, or Laugh – Or Lose Them
Photo by Tengyart on Unsplash We’ve all seen the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA) End Animal Cruelty commercial, starring Sarah McLachlan and her song Angel. The commercial, an example of an emotional appeal to trigger the cognitive bias of an identifiable victim, haunts us with images of shivering, starving, abandoned […]
Don’t Panic Post Everywhere: The Why of Social Media Management
Photo by Jas Min on Unsplash For so many of my clients, primarily Gen X entrepreneurs, posting on social media is a source of panic. They are aware they should be, have to, need to, to keep up with their competitors. But doing so is daunting, time consuming, and confusing. Let me clear up some […]
Drop the Facts and Figures: Touch Them!
(Image courtesy Yoann Boyer on Unsplash) Powerful marketing relies upon emotional appeals. Although, as an intelligent, cognitively complex person, I would like the world to rely on logic, it does not – and I can’t proffer logical arguments to increase sales for my content clients. These emotional industry tricks are the route to profitability: Read […]
Tech is Dooming Small Business: Saving Mom and Pop
Image courtesy of Luca Bravo on Unsplash Have problems with your website? Is coding a challenge? Confused about how to post effectively to social media? Yeah, me too. As a premature participant in the Big Quit, in 2019, I embraced the risk and launched my photography business. What was a hobby became enticing: people were […]
Persuade Them Powerfully
A recent study from the Journal of Marketing makes it clear: Feelings over Facts when persuading last-minute donors. The researchers found at the start of a campaign, logic motivates donors: I’ll donate if the organization proves its initiative is likely to succeed. But at the end of a campaign, to reach that big goal, emotion […]
Gaining an Edge with 2023 Consumer Trends
I’ve read several consumer reports to discover how to help my clients rock their marketing efforts – so I thought I would share them with you. We should begin with the umbrella principles for today’s marketing arena: Personalize content and emotionally connect with your audience. To personalize, you must first: Know thy audience. You must […]