Forget age and early senility; the reason prospects don’t reach you is because you don’t have their attention. That’s it. Somewhere along the way, you made the decision to keep your organization and all of the positive attributes and unique selling propositions less visible and perhaps even obscure to prospective customers in your own territory. Yes, you probably had good reasons for this. You don’t have the money available to promote. You’re too busy to confront marketing strategy. Or perhaps you rely heavily on the creative work and effort put into the region by your sales team.
Well, none of those are acceptable barriers; none of them, because all they accomplish is marketing prevention. That’s the barrier built within your own organization that stands between you and the market share you desire. It’s the concession to your competition, and the willingness to keep successful actions like frequent promotional outflow turned off and hoping your light brigade of reps take the hill on their own.
Yea. This is a false idea that comes up quite a bit in just about every type of supply channel imaginable. In most small to mid-sized independent resellers, a sales rep cannot be expected to effectively contact, reach and touch enough prospects in your territory to generate the level of influence and activity needed to advance expansion. They can network, charm and cajole to the best of their abilities and gain some very good traction here and there. However without the air cover provided by marketing, they’ll be less effective in reaching targets and goals. No offense intended people. It is what it is.
Repetition and frequency are the essential ingredients to a good marketing mix, and if you’re not thinking with this, you’re keeping your prospects in the dark even if your rep or reps are the brightest beacons in their field. The light beam needs to move far and wide in order to be noticed, and one rep rowing diligently over a vast gulf will not make you stand out enough to be considered by new customers, especially those who are caught up in their own currents, routines and buying habits.
Think with at least the law of three. When you want to catch someone’s attention, what do you do? No, you don’t whisper, that’s an ancient perfume commercial. You stand up. You wave. You say “hey check this out!” This is the attempt to become real to that prospect. The second time around you want to have the prospect recognize or understand what you’re trying to get them to look at. Then finally, you want to gain their acceptance or at least affinity and agreement to be in communication. It takes all three points on this triangle in order to nurture share of mind, brand awareness and positioning. It takes all three points sometimes just to get a dialogue going, and it takes time and persistence to change people’s minds.
One-hit wonders don’t work in promotion. Just ask anyone who tried to send out one direct mail piece or run one ad in the local media and see what they say about the traffic it generated. It won’t be a long conversation, I assure you.
Tim Votapka is the Marketing Director at Prosperity Plus. He may be reached at 631.382.7762 or by tvotapka@prosperityplus.com.