“Ready, aim, fire” vs.
Cowboy Marketing
NoSpin Debunker
#48: July 22, 2002
Some
time back, a lot of business folks jumped on the bandwagon deriding the
traditional “ready, aim, fire” approach to planning and decision-making. The
thought process being that people were getting tied up in their underwear going
“ready aim,” “ready aim,” “ready aim,” ad nausea, and never taking decisive
action—certainly not a good thing. So instead, the pendulum swung to the other
end of the spectrum. It became more fashionable to advocate shooting from the
hip and taking action—any action--for action’s sake. Hence, the rise of cowboy
marketing ( no disrespect
meant to Clint). Yippee yea!
Before
you pull your Marketing trigger you better be READY
Let’s
assume that you’ve got a really exciting, new product or service. Maybe you’ve
come up with a unique new pitch and concept to re-price and/or rebundle your
current products and services e.g. with a time limited offer. Let’s assume that
you’ve got the right target audiences chosen as well.
Now
you’re itching to pull the trigger on some a big promotional barrage to get the
word out using direct mail, or print advertising, or email, or fax, or other
media etc. or various combinations.
STOP! DON’T
SHOOT!
Before
you pull that trigger and unload with your big promotional campaign, go over the
following checklist so that you’ll be ready for what may happen next—generation of
leads, inquiries, and buy orders.
I
keep seeing companies that finally get the itch to tee up some potentially good
promotions. They’ve got a good solid product (or service), package, and price.
But they ignore the needed preparation for what is going to happen next. They
aren’t ready because they have not carefully planned for the consequences. As I’ve mentioned so many times in
previous Debunkers, Marketing is not just promotions. It’s a team selling
game—with the end result being a “buy.”
So
before you pull that trigger trying to hit new or existing clients for more
business take check off the items below. Make sure that:
1)
Your “new” messages are consistent across all of your marketing
vehicles.
For example, if you’re doing a big direct mail campaign and print ad campaign
directing people to visit your web site, you can’t have a site that is filled
with dated, conflicting product and/or pricing information. Nothing confuses and
turns off a potential customer more than key messages that don’t match up.
2)
Your own people know about the campaign and how to respond to
inquiries
from new prospects and existing customers. Develop a set of 10-15 questions and
answers applicable for Sales and Administrative folks (and possibly IT or
whoever else might field an inquiry). Do some informal testing to see if they
are paying attention to the FAQ’s. Get them excited about the campaign—it
shouldn’t be surprise to anyone in the company.
3)
Your products are super easy to buy.
As Harry Beckwith says in his classic book, Selling the Invisible, “Some
Marketing experts recommend that in creating a direct mail program, you should
devote half your time to creating the reply form.” The same goes for any online
ordering form and ordering process. You almost can’t make it easy enough for
your customers to buy. The buying experience needs to be fast, easy and
understandable (without lots of complicated options and instructions), and
minimally invasive (without gobs of extraneous information required).
4)
Your ordering and fulfillment systems work at scale.
If you’re taking web-based orders, make sure that your tech folks have pounded
on your ordering system and stress tested it for at least double the volume you
might optimistically expect. Make sure that you’ve got enough manpower to handle
the load of potential inquiries and orders and a contingency plan to ramp up
just in case the business is a lot more than anticipated.
5)
You have a plan for IMMEDIATE follow-up:
a thank-you letter, note, phone call or email and possibly additional valuable
information based on key contact data that you are capturing about those new
prospects. You’ve created some interest and a good impression—now create some
“buys.”
6)
You’ve got the goods for delivery.
If you’re selling physical goods of any type make sure that you’ve got the goods
to deliver even faster than customers expect them. Customers hate
back-orders.
OK Now Fire!
All
just common sense? Yes, but remember here, the point is NOT to over-plan, and
wait, wait, wait to pull that trigger. It is though, to have the discipline to
be ready and well prepared to handle the fallout of your promotional
campaign(s)—especially if you don’t do a lot of promotions. Get ready and aim
(but don’t freeze up) before you fire, and you’ll bring in a lot more quality
prospects and sales. Or keep shooting from the hip with your promotions and
watch your customers leave and competitors eat your lunch. Your choice. Ya
hoo!
Please let me know what YOU think about this
debunker! And
please add these unconventional business professionals to the Debunker mailing
list.
If you would prefer to be removed from this email list, let me know.
Tom Ranseen
NoSpin Marketing
615.383.7157