reynoldswriting.com Blog

April Fool’s Day is coming. You know what that means — office pranks (ranging from the mildly amusing to the epic in scope), phony news stories, Rickrolling galore, and other moments of assorted oddness scattered throughout the day. Common sense tells me to hide under the bed until the 2nd, but instead I’m scheduled to give a presentation at my BNI chapter. Somebody must be trying to tell me something.

The trouble with April Fool’s Day jokes is that the difference between making people laugh and making them want to kill you is pretty much a coin toss. You have to know who your friends are, whether they can take a joke, how much of a joke they can take, and whether the joke has the potential to cause legitimate harm, physical or emotional. The wrong gag at the wrong moment can burn bridges faster than a swarm of angry, torch-laden medieval villagers.

It’s a tricky business — in real life, and in marketing.

Marketers use misdirection all the time. We’ve all encountered the “informative medical article” that turns out to be an ad for a nutritional supplement or an exercise machine or the Miracle Insole That Will Change Your Life. We’ve all been swerved by TV commercials that look for all the world like a trailer for a compelling new movie until the action hero draws a Big Gulp instead of a laser pistol. We get duped, we follow along, and when the curtain rises on the truth we say, “Ahhh, I see! So that’s where you were going. Very impressive (or funny, as the case may be). I’m sold.”

That’s what you say, right? Or do you react differently?

Let’s say you were doing serious research on that medical topic for a journal article with a tight deadline, or a business colleague who needs data, or your grandma who desperately seeks relief for her rare, terminal toenail disease. You get to the end of the “article” and find you’ve been duped. Still smiling?

Or let’s say you’re sitting in the movie theater, watching that killer trailer and making a mental note that you’ve GOT to tell your friends about this film and pre-purchase tickets for the preview — only to find yourself viewing a commercial instead. If you admire creativity, you might concede the cleverness behind the effort and return your attention to your popcorn. If, on the other hand, you really wanted to see that movie….

Don’t get me wrong. Misdirection works, as long as the intended audience (a) is in the mood to follow the rabbit trail wherever it may lead, and (b) might have a genuine interest in what they finally find. But you must know your audience, just as you must know whose door you’re propping a pail of water on top of. And whether they’re dressed for a funeral that afternoon. Yeah, I sweat the small stuff.

By the way, if you disagreed with the content of this blog — I was just kidding. If you liked it, then I was serious.

Does your business fill a need? Does it help people? Does it solve a problem?

Of course it does. And that makes you a professional problem solver. We all need professional problem solvers — people who know way more than we do about how to resolve a given issue relatively quickly and effectively. Some of these professionals even share their knowledge and insights with us just because they can. These folks are the ones we really trust, the ones we go to time after time. They are OUR experts.

You may already have established that relationship with your clients. Now, how would you like to build the same relationship with thousands or millions of people you’ve never even met?

Take Bob Vila, for example. Everyone recognizes and acknowledges him as a master craftsman, an expert in the field of home building and remodeling, and I can assure you that 99% of the people who hold that opinion have never met him, hired him or worked with him. So why does everyone agree on his expertise? Because he shares it with us through his website, books and TV appearances. He’s always doling out useful information, in return for which we say, “There goes a guy who knows what he’s talking about. I could do worse than to take his advice.”

You can make yourself known as a trusted advisor too, by establishing your expertise in your field to a wide audience. Write articles, blog posts, and direct-mail or email pieces that solve common problems or answer common questions pertaining to your field (or hire a ghostwriter to translate your diamonds in the rough into polished gems). Hand out information. Help people. Add value.

Who will we trust first — a salesman who sends us generic monthly offers, or one who provides us with valuable insights and helpful tips on a regular basis? Which one is more likely to become our go-to guy when the time is right to do business?

You are a problem solver. Something about what you do brings people relief and makes their lives better. So share your gifts with the world — and receive a world of gifts.

Spring is on its way. That means spring cleaning, and not only for homes. Have you scrubbed all the old 2009 yuck out of your business yet?

Sometimes a business needs polishing or calibration, just as a piece of precision equipment might need periodic readjustment to remain in perfect working order. Have you allowed some slack into the mechanism? Have small inefficiencies conspired to create large problems over time? Allow me to suggest a few areas to check for signs of dust:

Time management. Do you have a firm grip on your schedule? Are you focusing on the daily activities that actually earn you money, or are you passively reacting to every emergency that decides to have its way with you? Stop and examine your calendar like a surgeon examining an X-ray. What items cutting or grafting to make your schedule perform for you the way it should?

Money management. As you can imagine, this relates directly to time management, but it also requires attention on its own. Has your business expanded beyond the capacity of your current money management plan? Have tiny extra expenditures here and there drained money from your budget in ways you never noticed? Now’s the time to pay attention. It may also be time to see where your business needs deeper investment before it can grow properly. Are you marketing yourself effectively? Do you need more staff or another location?

Strategy management. Sometimes a business requires a major shift in its target market, processes, or strategies. In my own business, for instance, I’ve decided to shift my primary focus to working directly with marketing companies instead of business owners. To that end, I’ve had to develop some new marketing incentives and strategies, such as a Preferred Vendors program that will offer special rates to marketing agencies, web firms and other “frequent flyers” that use my services on a regular monthly basis. Has your business evolved in a way that requires a new approach?

You may not be fond of cleanup chores — most of us aren’t — but I bet you appreciate a clean house.

Sometimes the most magical films are the ones with no magic in them — at least not “magic” in the storybook sense. The Japanese animated film Whisper of the Heart contains no magic spells, wizards, witches, demons or gods, and with the exception of one fanciful dream sequence it remains rooted in the real world of a few middle-class kids and adults in 1990s Tokyo. And yet there is magic here — the magic of people deciding what they want to be when they grow up and then transcending themselves to make it happen.

Shizuku loves books. While her classmates occasionally hit the school library to do their homework or prepare for their high-school entrance exams, she’s there every day reading story after story. She also enjoys writing poems and song lyrics for her friends, and they seem impressed by her skill. But that’s as far as it goes, until one day she realizes that someone named Amasawa has already checked out all the books she’s currently reading.

Intrigued by this mysterious stranger with similar literary tastes, she decides to find out who he is. Seiji Amasawa turns out to be a classmate she’s never even talked to before, except to trade the occasional insult. The real surprise occurs when she learns that this “typical teenager” builds violins — and he’s serious enough about it to apply to a school in Cremona, Italy, the Mecca of violin making. As she slowly falls for this ambitious boy, she realizes that she’s reached a crossroads in her life. He has a dream — does she? He’s going halfway across the world for 10 years’ hard study to become a violin maker — is she ready to get serious about becoming a writer?

Shizuku makes a decision to push herself by writing her first full-length story in the two months that Seiji is visiting Italy for his initial evaluation as an apprentice. Anyone who has ever pushed themselves into uncharted territory will recognize the image of the girl slumped over her desk 24 hours a day, pen in hand, neglecting her schoolwork, not eating, not (intentionally) sleeping, and scared to death she doesn’t have it in her after all. She doesn’t know what she’s doing, she hates the story’s second half, she’s ready to burst into tears when she hands the manuscript to Seiji’s kindly old grandpa to read — but she’s done it. She’s a writer.

At some point, this movie seems to say, we have to take that first step forward into the danger zone of What Am I without waiting for the bright light of certainty to illuminate our path. I believe that’s true. It’s true for writers, violin makers, entrepreneurs, or anyone else who seeks to transform his or her life.

This movie reminded me of how scary it can be to write that first story or attempt that new thing, whatever it may be. Writing is frightening. Going for what we want is frightening. Living is frightening — if we’re doing it right.

So it’s time to create a marketing campaign for your business. You know you need a website, so you put one together. You create a prospect database, you get a logo designed, you make a bunch of business cards, you join the local Chamber….then what?

Print marketing will probably play a significant role in your efforts to reach your target market. But out of all the different types of print pieces out there, which one makes the most sense for which situation?

Let’s take a look at some of the options:

Postcards. The great thing about a postcard is that it’s relatively cheap to mail, and you don’t have to worry about how to make the client open the envelope because there’s no envelope to open. Your message makes its point the instant the prospect’s eyeballs make contact with it. A direct mail postcard must deliver its point concisely and compellingly in a small amount of space, so it works best for specific offers, coupons or announcements. You can also hand out postcards in lieu of business cards if you’d like to make a little extra impact at that mixer or other networking event. Be aware, however, that a postcard can provide just enough extra size and bulk to make it annoying in settings where everyone is handing out business cards, so it may get left behind “accidentally.”

Onesheets. A onesheet is a general-purpose flyer with a strong sales message, some information about your products or services, and a call to action followed by your contact number, website URL and email address. More than a business card, less than a brochure, a onesheet gives readers enough solid data to get excited about your company and want to know more. The great thing about onesheets is that you can create a different sheet for each product or service in your lineup, then mix and match the right sheet with the right clientele. You can even distribute different arrangements of them in the form of portfolio books. If a product in your lineup drops out or a new one comes along, it’s just a matter of adding or omitting a onesheet instad of rewriting an entire brochure or booklet. The downside to onesheets is their full-page paper format. Set a score of them down on a luncheon table and watch them become soggy, stained messes that no one will want to take home. (Put a stack of them near the door instead so people can collect them on their way out.)

Brochures. A brochure offers a more detailed overview of a business than a onesheet can provide, usually assigning separate panels to different products, services, or other information categories. Brochures work better when they can be read instead of skimmed, making them ideal for offices, waiting rooms, or take-home reading. They’re a logical follow-up piece to a onesheet, and they reinforce your professional image as an established company. Unless the content in them is absolutely “future-proof,” however, you’ll find yourself updating the brochure periodically, an operation that may entail redesigning, rewriting and reprinting the thing.

Booklets. Booklets represent the big time. These multi-page guides usually provide in-depth information on a comprehensive suite of services or products, giving prospects a complete set of answers to most any questions they could possibly have. The booklet format is useful for content that just won’t fit comfortably into a brochure. Booklets cost more to design and produce than brochures. They’re intended as long-term marketing tools — but if the information needs updating, get ready to pay.

So which print piece is right for you? At some point or other, maybe all of them. You’ll need to think about how who your prospects are, how to reach them, and how much information they need before they’ll buy. Good luck!