Stop Interrupting and Start Attracting….
This post is an excerpt from a report released by www.pullnotpush.com:
What if you didn’t have to try so hard to get your message in front of a large audience and instead focused your message on the exact people who want to hear it? The latter is exactly what Pull Marketing is all about. While it might be new to you, you have probably felt the experience of Pull Marketing some time in your life.
Any time you have chosen to work with a business based on other factors besides price and convenience, there has probably been the seed of Pull Marketing planted.
Pull Marketing simply put means ‘attracting, and not promoting.’
Pull Marketing is…
· Focusing more on education rather than the hard sell.
· Accepting that all prospects are at different steps in the buying process.
· Creating your products and services around your customers’ needs.
· Opening up opportunities for your prospects to get to know, like, and trust you.
· Focusing on relationships rather than shear numbers.
· Using technology to help you get found.
· Recognizing that you must give before you can receive.
Pull Marketing is NOT…
· Relying on interruption techniques to get your prospects’ attention.
· Forcing your prospects into your sales process as soon as possible.
· Creating your products first and worrying about demand later.
· Hiding behind your business and being anonymous.
· Relying on a huge database of cold leads.
· Using technology to blast your messages to anyone who will read them.
Pull Marketing is like putting on a new pair of glasses and seeing your business and yourself in a completely different light. It means looking beyond titles, affiliations, certifications, and jargon and looking directly at what makes your business tick. You know you’re doing Pull Marketing when your words have more to do with helping prospects rather than money in your pocket language.
At its highest level, it means that your business has developed beyond being status quo and
transformed itself into an actualized entity all on its own.
Why Does Pull Marketing Matter In Today’s Economy?
In the not so distant past, companies with the biggest marketing budgets won the most
business. Barrels of money could be funneled into direct mail, trade shows, radio and television
advertisements, cold calling, and event sponsorships. That type of marketing just isn’t what it
used to be especially since everyone’s budgets have shrunk due to an economy that has made
its presence known at all levels and in all industries.
The challenge many businesses have to face is how to stick out in a market when capital is at
an all time low.
While Pull Marketing has been around since the dawn of business, shrinking marketing budgets
have brought it back into the spotlight for businesses of all sizes. Pull Marketing is getting it’s
time in the spotlight because it has been responsible for turning business with meager budgets
into supremely profitable ventures. The only change that a down economy has made on
marketing is that businesses like yours have to take a deep look at their organization and find
out what their core message is.
Sharing and connecting over the issues your business spells Pull Marketing success while
shouting out your qualifications to anyone who will listen falls flat.
How Can Pull Marketing Help Me Stand out From My Competitors?
Competition is a reality for all businesses. Without it, we wouldn’t have any impetus to
innovate and take risks. Pull Marketing allows you to innovate in the way that you interact with
your prospects and customers. It changes the dynamic from finding ways to broadcast your
message to anyone who will listen into positive interactions that are based on interest in what
you have to offer and a general sense of benefit for both parties involved.
Pull Marketing allows you to connect with people who make your business successful.
If you take the time to implement a Pull Marketing strategy, you create a loyalty that doesn’t
require you to drop your prices levels. You create a story of your business in your prospects’
and customers’ minds that yours is the one they should turn to in a time of need even when
there are multiple options available.
Will Pull Marketing Work For My Business?
It’s easy to think that something like Pull Marketing will only work for certain types of
businesses. This type of thinking is a giant step in the wrong direction. No matter what industry
you’re in, what products you sell, what services you offer, or whoever your clientele is, Pull
Marketing is something that will always work. Relationships with others are the heart of your
business at all levels. As long as relationships matter (and they always will!), Pull Marketing
can have a powerful impact on how your business operates and brings in new clients and
customers.
How Do I Implement A Pull Marketing Strategy For My Business?
Understanding Pull Marketing in theory is easy. However, putting it into practice requires a
paradigm shift. We have created 7 Universal Laws of Pull Marketing that you can follow on a
daily basis. These rules have shown to be simple and repeatable across all industries and
individuals. There is no magic to making any of these work. Most of the time they just require a
healthy investment of time and concentration.
The 7 Universal Laws Of Pull Marketing
1. Content Comes First
Before you can worry about Internet Marketing terms like analytics, landing pages, conversion
ratios, and etc, you need content to get yourself found online. Creating content isn’t
impossible. It’s not painful. And it doesn’t require a Doctorate in English to be successful. What
is does require is the ability to be relevant and current. Then, it requires choosing a medium
that you feel comfortable with. You’re not limited to writing anymore. With audio and video
creation becoming easier every day, there’s no reason why you can’t make content creation a
daily habit.
A failure to create content means your messages will resemble advertising and push marketing
rather than Pull Marketing. All of the other Universal Principles of Pull Marketing stand on top of benefit oriented content. Trying to participate in Pull Marketing without making content creation a priority means all your other efforts will crumble.
There are no fancy tools for implementing a content creation campaign. The most important
tool you’ll have is a calendar that helps you make creating content a priority and that keeps
you accountable. Your success will be determined by your ability to see content as an essential
part of your business and not just a task that you dread doing.
2. Authentic Story Telling Rules
Your business has a story to tell. Every day, you’re helping people with problems or making
their lives better through the products you have to offer. Your services and products are more
than just the day to day source of income. They represent you as a person and where you are
in your development. There is story there. A major part of Pull Marketing means breaking down
the barrier between you and your business. No longer can you expect to hide behind a title or
responsibilities.
Your first action here is taking a look at your blog. Are your posts dry and lifeless? Does it seem like they were written by a robot and have none of your unique voice? Put some personality in your next posts. The best way to do this is to share anecdotes from your daily life. Make it personal.
Sharing the story of your business through your words and personal experiences adds a
dimension to your business that most prospects are not used to seeing. You will stand out in
your market even if there are hundreds of resources out there related to the same niche.
3. Tools Are Not Connections
You probably know that being active on social media sites like Twitter and Facebook is where a
lot of Pull Marketing is going on. But don’t be confused by those tools. Pull Marketing would
happen even if there were no social media sites around. In reality, a Twitter account is
worthless. A Facebook Fan page is a piece of junk. However, a Twitter account that helps you
form better connections with the right people and a Facebook Fan page that allows you to
interact with prospects on a more personal level are filled to the brim with value.
The first step to creating connections is to find blogs related to your niche. Read them.
Comment on them. And most importantly, find out if the blogger is on social media so you can
engage them even more. Finding people who you resonate with isn’t always the easiest task.
Participating in the blogging community gives you a chance to find out people who you know
share your views on the world. Do this and you’ll lose any doubts of who you’re supposed to
interact with when you log in to social media sites.
As you start to grow in your Pull Marketing strategy, you will find that followers start coming
your way and you don’t have to worry about seeking them out on your own. The most effective
tool you’ll have when this happens is investing your time in following up and striking up
conversations. Pull Marketing requires you to seek out opportunities to be authentic and talk to
people who want to hear what have to say.
4. Grow Your Community And Leads Will Come
The true successes in Pull Marketing are those who see themselves as a leader of a community
rather than a business owner trying to bring in money. Pull Marketing requires you to have a
passion about what you do because it takes a lot of work to mobilize people and get them to
participate. When you achieve this goal, you start to develop followers who believe in your
message and the message of your company. When you align your message online with
something others can be passionate about, you don’t need to worry about where your next
leads will come from. Your community will draw in leads automatically.
The first step here is creating a free offer like a whitepaper, e-course, or video series designed
to help (and not to promote!). After that, you need a way to capture emails so you can follow
up with visitors who download your giveaway.
When you have access to their email address, it’s important for you to see that these people
are now members of your community. They saw something in your giveaway that they
resonated with and now it’s up to you to foster the relationships. The last thing you want to do
is rely on a push marketing model where you blast emails at these community members.
Instead, target your emails around the problems they’re having or create opportunities for you
to get to know them better.
5. Time and Social Capital Are BFFs
Pouring money into a social media campaign is the last thing that guarantees success. Your
capital is not built in a factory or mass produced. Your capital is the social connections that
come as a result of investing time in content creation, story telling, making connections, and
growing a community. All of these require an investment of time more than anything else. Pull
Marketing isn’t an alternative to hard work. It’s still hard work. However, it’s hard work that
matters and builds upon itself for years to come.
Your best tool here is going to be developing a social media schedule. Even starting off with 30
minutes daily can make a difference if you’re participating and getting to know the people
behind the Tweets and the status updates. In the beginning, it might not seem like this time is
effective. However, when you compound your efforts over weeks and months, you build up momentum that feeds straight into your social capital.
6. Numbers Lie
The things that matter most in Pull Marketing are not visible on a Twitter page or Facebook
profile. You don’t need to worry if you don’t have the thousands of connections that a guru in
your niche has. Your goal is to do everything mentioned above and more respectable numbers
will start to appear.
To start creating real connections, try using a tool like TweetDeck as you get involved in social
media. TweetDeck allows you to create groups of people based off parameters of your choice.
Create groups for the people that you enjoy interacting with most. Make sure to be up to date
what is going on with them and their lives. Ask questions, share your stories, and show that
you’re genuinely interested. A solid connection like this pays off more than any service that
promises you 3,000 followers in 3 minutes.
7. Problem Solvers Prevail
When Pull Marketing starts to draw your prospects into your world, it’s time for you to start
being the listener. By monitoring the conversations you hear others having and seeing what
their needs are, you are uncovering an opportunity to show how your products and services
can be beneficial to them. This doesn’t mean hitting them over the head with sales messages.
Pull Marketing requires connecting with your community to find out their needs and developing
solutions that they actually need rather than you trying to sell them what you think they need.
One of the best tools for Pull Marketing will be the generous use of online survey tools like
SurveyMonkey.com. Remember, Pull Marketing places the needs of your prospects before your
personal interests. A well designed survey can help you get inside their minds and let you know
exactly what issues they’re facing in their daily lives.
Try to collect as many anecdotes and questions as possible when using a tool like
SurveyMonkey. Not only will this help you in creating your products and services, you’ll also know the exact points you should touch on when you’re creating the marketing messages for
these products and services.
How Can I Measure My Pull Marketing Campaigns?
When you look at the Universal Laws of Pull Marketing, it might not seem that it’s possible to
actually measure the success of what you’re doing. However, Pull Marketing has caught on so
much that solutions have now been created for business owners like you to measure the
success of using the power of relationships and attraction strategies when trying to generate
leads and customers.
To measure the success of a Pull Marketing campaign, we suggest using a tool like HubSpot.
Here’s why…
7 Reasons We Couldn’t Do Internet Marketing Without HubSpot
1. HubSpot allows us to do market research that used to require 5-7 different tools.
2. HubSpot gives us a chance to see what our competitors are doing so we can optimize
our own campaigns.
3. HubSpot helps us measure exactly where our site stands in the search engines.
4. HubSpot makes adding new web pages, landing pages, and blog posts easy.
5. HubSpot tells us exactly where our web traffic is coming from as well as showing us if
it’s quality traffic.
6. Using HubSpot makes measuring ROI from social media sites like Twitter and Facebook
a reality.
7. HubSpot’s built in reporting tools turn hours of spreadsheet work into a few simple
clicks.