Posted by: Troy White
February 19, 2008
Issue #357

If You Don’t Know It,
How Can You Expect
Your Customers To?

In this issue:

• Computers are destroying everything!  Discover what is running through your potential customers mind in an average day – and why it means an incredible opportunity to you as the entrepreneur …
• The S-O-M formula that puts you heads and tails above everyone else in your field …
• 3 key factors that make today’s buyers decide to buy from you …
• How to help your best customers weed through the confusion in their mind … and the 3 different models you can re-design your marketing around …
• And Much More!

Fellow business builder,

It has been slowly creeping up on us, many still unaware it is such an ominous force. 

It has been lurking in the shadows for quite some time, snatching away wanderers who venture off the beaten path.  And now it has poked its head out, and shown its face to everyone.  And you as a marketer had better be paying close attention. 

What is it? 

It is the real reason people are buying from you and your competitors.  It is the real reason people make decisions.  And it is the scary fact that most people have no clue what it is that they really want. 

Don’t get me wrong here; we all know we want something.

Maybe more money, more love, more friends, more material things – but deep down, below the physical aspects of what we say we want, is something that burns.  A deep passion that is needing to be fulfilled – but unsure of how. 

Advertising and marketing helps customers see some of the areas our products and services can help them with … But not all.

In fact, based on what I have been seeing, the big thing people desire is not being fulfilled. 

Our world is in a state of turmoil and people are trying to find deeper meaning with those they befriend, by the products and services they buy, and by the state of mind they find themselves immersed in.

Imagine what would happen, what could happen, if you could peek inside your customer’s mind and see the exact thing they are looking to fulfill with your product.  It may be a one word sentence that is bouncing around inside their mind, and when verbally stated, makes everything crystal clear. 

Much of this problem is caused
by computers and the Internet …

Sorry, it had to be said. 

This is a harsh reality for marketers to understand: the proliferation of digital messages and media has created a serious lack of feeling connected. 

People spend hours and hours every single day glued to some form of digital box.  It may be a computer screen you stare into for 8 hours a day.  It may be a Blackberry or iPod you glance at every 32 seconds, hoping for a new message from … anyone.  It may be the television at home, where your trance-like state takes away another 3 or 4 hours a day. 

Whatever your vice is, this endless technical quicksand is sucking away your ability to think properly about your present state of mind. 

It used to be that we invited these intrusions into our life – we were the ones controlling how often and how much of it we experienced. 

But no more. 

Now, the computers have the control, for the most part, and they tell us what we should see and how often we should see it.  Texting.  Instant messaging.  Twittering.  Facebooking.  Myspacing.  RSSing.

The list goes on and on – each of them a serious opportunity for marketers – but also a serious threat to the sanity of our potential customers.  

We all understand that technology enables us to break any barriers of time, space or distance.  I can click a button here in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, where I am – and 9 seconds later a customer in Lilongwe, Malawi, Africa, can be watching a video I created just for them.

Try thinking through all the things
that need to happen
 for that to actually be possible!

It hurts to think of all the computer systems, wires, software, programmers, and technicians it took to set up all that infrastructure. 

We now take it for granted, and actually get quite upset if it takes 18 seconds instead of 9.

But it leaves this gaping wound in need of repair …

Our minds have started taking over the physical aspects of much of what we do and interact with.  Our work can be all digital.  Our spare time can be all focused on a digital world.  Our friends are digital.  Our best customers can be digital, and can do business with us for decades without ever actually meeting them in person.

So, what does this lack of physical interaction
 mean to us as marketers?

It means that your customers want something more from you than you are probably giving them.  Yes, you may be selling them some great products and services.  You may be entertaining them with your newsletters, e-zines and blog posts. BUT, have you ever thought through what it is that they really want?

They want you to help them get in a certain state of mind. 

Much of what they define as an enjoyable relationship with you is defined by the state of mind you help them achieve.

Think about the following people, and you will start to understand what state of mind they leave their customers with:

Oprah Winfrey

Richard Branson

Bill Gates

Warren Buffet

Martha Stewart

JK Rowling

Each one of them instills a certain one or two word image in our mind on what they help us achieve (or at least what they stand for in business). 

Which is my exact point to today’s article …

… Your customers want a single person to follow. Someone that helps them steer through all the mud out there, all the confusion in our world, all the loss of connection they feel.

Someone who helps them feel
the way they want to feel …
Safe, secure, and much less overwhelmed.

We may think consumers like all the choices they have right now – but they don’t. 

Think about yourself: When you want to go out an buy a new ________, and you find out that there are 475 choices you have … each with varying levels of options and prices … does it not make you feel like saying “FORGET IT!”? 

It does to me.  Show me a simpler path that saves me time and I am all over it … It makes ME feel good when I get the problem solved fast, without having to choose between 475 different options.  Some people get off on spending all their time making choices like that, most don’t.

So how do you move to a role
that your potential customers want?

Think about yourself as a market healer. Someone who helps them heal the pain and confusion that this overly-wired-world has caused. 

When they are making their decisions on what to buy, and who to buy from, they look at 3 factors for their decision:

1. How the product performs and is built
2. What the price and value return is
3. The state of mind they leave the transaction with

Product performance is important, but not all that important.  It is a given, in their minds, that your product must be somewhat well-built and must deliver on at least some of your promises.  They are smart enough to know that if your product is junk, the word will spread incredibly fast and you will be out of business in no time.  Even if you do have a leading edge product that no one else can beat, it won’t stay that way for long. Someone will outperform you soon enough. You know it – so do they.

Price is important, but definitely not the deciding factor.  Look at all the high priced goods and services being offered out there … low price is not a winning game to play.  You can gain market share by being the lowest price provider, but it is an impossible game to stay the leader in forever. Nor is it the real reason most will buy from you.

But the state of mind you leave them with – now THAT is a game you can control, and win. You must have a quality product or service, priced at a point that your target buyers are willing to pay, and see value in.  But when you combine that, with the ability to help them heal the wounds and confusion they feel … when you help them feel a different state of mind while dealing with you … when you offer them something highly unique that makes them feel good … and when you help them see the justification that your way is THE way … then you can build a very successful long-term relationship with your clients.

How will dealing with you help them improve the quality of their life, inside their own head? 

Will you help them end forever the confusion they feel? 

Will you put a stop to meaningless bombardment of their senses – without some form of serious return on their senses?

What state of mind do you help them achieve? What is making them crazy – and how do you help them heal that?

These are not easy questions to ask and find answers to – but they ARE of critical importance to all of our businesses.  Consumers are changing how they buy, and who they buy from. 

Here are 3 different models that may help you find the ideal solution:

1. Heal their state of mind with an actual cure.  Help them alter their state of mind. Help them feel more connected with a group of like-minded individuals.  Help them feel a greater, and more solid sense of self.  Help them see the vision, then give them the path to follow and achieve that vision.
2. Fix the cause of the problem.  Much of the skepticism out there today comes from those who bought into a promise, but were treated poorly in the process. Leaving them with a significant pain that prevents them from enjoying any of their future purchases. 

   Take Saturn for example.  They came into a field of some very disillusioned car buyers.  People were sick and tired of car salesman treating them like dirt. They were tired of haggling over price, always feeling like they were taken advantage of.  They were tired of feeling like they were taken advantage of, and would never again hear from the person they just gave $40,000 to. 

   Saturn comes in and provides a very high quality car, at a non-negotiable price, and offers them the chance to become one of the family.

   The rest is history and Saturn continues to lead the field in customer satisfaction and customer state of mind marketing.

3. Become the healer and front person for everything that you do.  Become their Richard Branson.  Give them someone to look up to for advice and for a clear path.  When you do this right, YOU become the brand, not your products or service. 

   In fact, individual product branding is becoming more and more difficult, and brand buyers are becoming less and less loyal.  They want more – they want YOU.  They want what YOU stand for.  They want to become part of YOUR world. 

   This is where you position yourself and your beliefs in the marketplace – and attract people who are looking for a leader with that point of view.  A point of view is not tied to a specific product category, it goes much deeper than that. 

   Think back to the list from above …. Think about Oprah, Branson, or Buffet – you know what they stand for and who they really are. 

   Become a leader like them that is not scared to take a stand and help guide them through the maze of decisions they are being asked to make.

Your clients are mental! 

They live in a mentally driven world – and a large percentage of what they do and see in the average day is a mental image, not a physical interaction (e-mails, texting, websites, videos, television, etc). 

We all live in a mental world, how far you let it control you is your ultimate choice. 

But we all, as marketers, have the power to help them through the confusion we have created – and those who do will come out on top, and their customers will be their greatest evangelists.

Learn how to become their healer … it is everything they want from you.

Please let me know your thoughts, and if you have any further topics on this you would like to see discussed.

To your success,

Troy White
Editor, Small Business Mastery
Supplement to THE TOTAL PACKAGE

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A Final Note:

If you have specific subjects you would like addressed, or have any comments on what you have seen here, please submit a comment below and I will see how I can help.

"Don’t wait. The time will never be just
right.”

–Napoleon Hill

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5 Comments »

1. Comment by Glen Kohlenberg — February 19, 2008 @ 5:25 pm

   Troy this is great stuff and I can use it everyday.
   I sell mainly to the 54+ market in home improvements in Florida and it has been a challenge this year.
   Clients get 4-5 bids now where before 1-2.
   They do there internet homework also.Clients are alot more educated.

   I tell my design consultants to sell the life style and the sizzle.
   Great post Troy thank you.

2. Comment by nita — February 19, 2008 @ 10:37 pm

   Hi Troy,
   I just attended a talk by Paul Theroux,a novelist and travel writer. He said that being connected does not necessarily make you a good writer. Now u say that being connected does not make you a good marketeer. This is so true. the human touch is what we all crave.

3. Comment by Angela Verley — February 20, 2008 @ 4:55 am

   Hi Tony,
   I am very excited by your article today. I have done a lot of research as I want to set up a business that really responds to clients needs and you have said it all in a nutshell.

   Thank you so much. I feel very encouraged by your wise analysis.

   Love and blessings,
   Angela

4. Comment by Tia Dobi — February 21, 2008 @ 12:07 am

   Troy how do you suggest selling the “characterisation” to clients who want to be everything to everyone, stay bland? (Which is a personality type). Thank you.

5. Comment by Franck F Silvestre — March 4, 2008 @ 12:51 am

   I totally agree Troy. I receive countless message with the subject: "I need help".

   People are confused and need guidance from an expert and friend.