Revenue Journal®

Here's a video that demonstrates the perfectly orchestrated sales pitch, shot and delivered professionally.

Personas do have their place. When you're designing a product, you have to make decisions about what to put in and what to leave out. Personas can help with that process.

But once the product is designed, and it's time to create your web page, write selling copy, and train your salespeople, personas can get you into real trouble. They can make you think you're addressing the buyer properly, when in fact you are probably ignoring who the buyer is, what the buyer really wants, and, in many cases, insulting the buyer.

You see, if I'm the buyer, I already know who I am. So I'm not the least impressed if you think you know who I am. Besides, it makes me feel a little creeped out anyway, that you're so determined to know everything about me you can describe me to your buddies around the conference table.

Do you really have to know all those things about me to sell something to me? I mean, c'mon. What does it matter how old I am or how much money I make? I just want to buy something to fix a problem. I don't want my personal space invaded.

Not only that: Is it going to be a fun to buy your product, or are you going to make it a hassle?

There's a joke - you've probably heard one of the many versions of it - that I think of as the "demo" joke. My favorite version is the one starring Bill Gates:

Bill Gates died and found himself standing in front of St. Peter, who was sizing him up.

"Well, Bill, I'm not sure whether to send you to Heaven or Hell. After all, you helped society enormously by putting a computer in almost every home in America, and you gave away a lot of money. But, you also created that evil Windows program. It's a close call, so I'm going to do something I've never done before: I'm going to let you decide where you want to go."

Bill replied, "What's the difference between the two?"

St. Peter said, "Well, I'm willing to let you visit both places briefly, then you will have to decide."

"Fine, but where do you think I should I go first?"

"I leave that up to you."

"Okay, what the Hell," said Bill. "Let's try down below first."

The better your content, the more you will sell.

A pretty simple concept to grasp, especially when we think of the buying process from the buyer's point of view. Most people who are buying something for the first time go straight to Google. They type in the search phrase they think will give them the right result, refine it if needed, and then start drilling down - mostly on the sites that come up "above the fold" on the screen. We all know this.

And yet, as I work with clients to improve content, and as I see content from the buyer's point of view, I am dismayed by how un-seriously managers take their own content.

What is the most important part of every email you send - whether to one person or to your entire email mailing list? The subject line.

What's the second most important part of every email you send? Your signature.

Marketing is often considered a very subjective exercise. But the expectations and behavior of email recipients have created certain absolutes associated with subject lines and signatures. Use them well, and you will add a lot of success to your work day. Use them poorly, and you will generate inefficiency, confusion, frustration, and a lot of wasted time - in your day and in the working days of your recipients.

It took a while before the Web really changed the way people bought things, but it has happened. Now people go to the Web first and research the heck out of a subject before they buy.

They scrutinize, analyze, and agonize. They Google and re-Google, fine-tuning their search term until they start getting the desired results. They know exactly what they want and they keep searching until they finally find it, then compare their options, read the reviews, and consider the price and the functions. Once they are satisfied they have found the right product and are comfortable with the company selling it, they place an order.

I'm sorry to say that, over and over, I am finding business owners struggling to make sales because their marketers - in-house or outside - are trying to use yesterday's marketing and selling methods on today's buyers, who have definitely moved on.

Buyers have specific questions. If you're not giving them specific answers, you're not going to capture those sales. All technology aside, this is the biggest difference between "old" marketing thinking and "new" marketing thinking.

The best way to illustrate this is with an example.

George Lucas, being interviewed recently by Kara Swisher of The Wall Street Journal, was pontificating on the difference between circus and art. He said that YouTube is circus - which the movie industry calls "throwing puppies on the freeway," because you just create something and put it up and see what happens. He then said that art, on the other hand, is "where the person contrives the situation and tells a story, and hopefully that story reveals the truth behind the facts."

This comment really caught my attention, because that's exactly what good marketing is supposed to do: reveal the truth behind the facts. And if you think about how George Lucas spins his stories, you realize how far marketing is from the ideal he describes.

I've mentioned before that I buy a lot of software online. Recently I undertook an extensive search for software I could use to efficiently build outlines for books and other large, complex documents, because the outlining function in Word is pitiful and slows...the...creative...flow...to...a...crawl, and has a klutzy expand/contract outline function.

I must have looked at 25 programs, and trialed at least 10. For all of you out there selling software online, I have some very specific advice for you, from a buyer's point of view.

Marketing is a force. Like any other force, it can be used for good or ill. There are many people who say that marketing itself is evil. Not so.

Marketing is only evil when the power of marketing is used to misrepresent or hide the truth.

I supposed I could stop here, because that really is the essence of it. But I'll go a little further to and provide an example.

If you want to see a perfect example of a company that makes it easy to buy, take a look at Home Reserve. What an exceptional site this is. Let's look at what they do right.

First, the home page.

What's the first question when you're shopping for furniture? Cost. Most people have a specific budget in mind for a given room or situation. And, that's the first big question Home Reserve answers, right on top.

As you come to this site, first your eye goes to the two people, and, immediately, to the prices. Then to the pictures and the fabric swatches.

Home Reserve uses the circle motif to draw your eye to important areas of the site, including the shop button, the photo gallery, and the swatches. One thing I find interesting about this is how the first circle you see is emotionally comforting - the two people obviously enjoying each other as they look at color swatches. Does this encourage you to assume that all circles will be emotionally satisfying? Hmmm."

Here's the first sentence of a website selling an email security solution:

"In today's business world, email has become critical to daily commerce. But, it also contains serious threats, threats which have increased dramatically over the last few years. You can't afford to ignore those threats."

Whoever wrote these words has obviously never spoken to a real IT person, who has been fighting an endless battle against spam for years. Actually, even a technophobic grandmother who does nothing but email on her computer knows that email contains "serious threats" which have "increased dramatically."

I'm in the midst of rewriting about 50 "sales plays" for a client. These are intranet-based instructions for salespeople making outgoing calls to potential clients. Each "sales play" describes the product or product combination being sold (the "offering"), the target audience for that offering, what's included in the offering, why the client should be interested, and suggested voicemail, phone call, and email copy that the salesperson can use when pitching the offering to a client.

Rewriting these sales plays is reminding me how impossible it is to be a salesperson who is depending on copy written by copywriters who have never had to make a cold call. The plays I'm changing, although each one is written about a different product, all use the same language. They all talk about the customer's need and the product's benefits.

The president of a small company recently sent me an email. "We've done well in a lot of areas of business, but what we haven't done is sorely inhibiting our growth. We need to master marketing and are committed to doing just that. Will you point me to the best learning tools?"

I'll bet you can guess where I pointed him…right back to his own customers. Here was my reply:

A typical business person begins the day…

Booting up computer…OK, 200 emails that I am expected to respond to…18 phone calls I must make today…7 hour-long meetings…this email says that we can't use the approach we all finally agreed upon…sigh…phone rings…boss…wants me to call into a meeting he's holding now…there goes my "quiet" time…calling in…hmmmm boring…why did he think I needed to hear this?…May as well do something productive while I'm listening…briefcase handle broke yesterday, need a new one…let's see…Google…typing…

briefcase leather black computer pocket Briggs & Riley

Hmmm…MSN Shopping shows a bunch of them, looks like…clicking…ah, good…wait, boss is asking me a question…yes…yes…yes, we've got that under control, I'm sending you the project plan…email to boss…OK, back to briefcases. Man, they're expensive. Better sort by price…OK…I'll look at this and this and this…

We all know that this is the reality of a busy person's day, and the reality of a busy person's buying process. Yet we write as if they are sitting around with their feet up, luxuriating over every precious word of our promotional copy, like a recreational shopper with too much money and all day to spend it.

I was evaluating at an attractive-looking website while talking on the phone to the entrepreneur who created it. As I clicked around, I realized that the website suffered from a common problem. "I'm sorry to have to tell you this, but this whole website is about 'dead chicken parts, fried in grease at 200 degrees,'" I told him. "What's missing from this site is 'finger-lickin' good.'"

In other words, the entire site was all about the process behind his product, rather than the satisfaction his customers will get from the product.

He's going to change the site, after he interviews some customers to find out what they consider to be "finger-licking good" about his product.

What is "finger-licking good"?

Your website is a building with many rooms, and each room has a door. Each door has a sign on it, supposedly identifying what's behind the door.

Let's assume a visitor in your building is looking for the restroom. He's in a hurry. But some self-important people have been naming the rooms in your building. As your visitor attempts to find the restroom, he whizzes right past a door labeled "Executive Corporate Relief Center.

"If the door had simply said "restroom," your visitor would have gone right in.

Our first Revenue Journal podcast, in which I interview Brian Livingston, President/Editor of WindowsSecrets.com, who was just named Entrepreneur of the Year by MarketingSherpa.

Your website is one of the most important "employees" in your company. It is your company's most important salesperson and service person.

What kind of employee is it? Is it friendly, helpful, and knowledgeable? Or snarly and surly, thwarting the customer (and sabotaging the sale) at every turn?

I just bought a new laptop and its associated software and accessories. As I purchased and configured the computer, I was reminded again how stark the difference is between companies with a helpful website and companies with an obstructive website.

On the good side of the equation, we have CDW, the large computer company based in Illinois. I was considering buying my new laptop from them, but became convinced it was a good idea after talking to Jim Sterne. He told me he had gotten a cold call from them one day, which quickly turned into a warm call, which caused him to go to their website, and actually buy something. He has continued buying from CDW, over and over. Having now gone through a very pleasant and successful buying experience with them, I can understand his enthusiastic loyalty. More on CDW in a moment.

New marketing vehicles rise up, get overused, and fall out of favor faster than ever. Email has been through all those phases. Pay-per-click is currently in the falling-out-of-favor phase. Blogging is still on the rise. Blogging is being touted as...

Here I am, money in hand, looking for a specific software solution.

While visiting about a dozen sites, several times my efforts to download are thwarted by a glitch in the process - where something should work just fine, but for some reason, it doesn't.

I usually send an email to the company when this happens. I seldom receive a reply.

Way too many software companies are asleep at the switch. They're so busy trying to get new leads, they ignore people who are much further along in their buying process.Not a good idea. It is the active buyer, the one who is perfectly willing to pay you - today (as in NOW, this minute) - who interacts with your site and sees screens like this one:

"You want a service that fits you perfectly," the headline says. "We tailor to your size."

What service?

The rest of this ad, which appeared in The Wall Street Journal Online Edition, doesn't help answer this question. There's a picture of a tape measure - one of the most worn-out clich�s in the history of advertising, online or off.

There's a link to "More information"; again, totally useless. There's the great, informative tagline that probably cost the company $30,000 to create: "Making more possible." Gee, who else could that tagline apply to? Only about 3 million other companies.