Examples of Excellent Marketing
I'm sure you have watched those infomercials that take over our television set every night after midnight. They haunt the late-night viewer until 6:00 or 7:00 AM. Then, if that wasn't enough, the 24-hour-a-day shopping networks will try to part you from your money.
Even though you can pick up a lot of great marketing tips from this type of television programming, this is NOT the only way to market your product or service. Let's look at another excellent example . . .
Some of you may remember the television show, Dallas. If not consider your favorite soap opera like As The World Turns, or Guiding Light. Every single one of these shows have something in common: They all leave every show with a cliff-hanger that is designed to make you want to tune-in the next day to see what happens.
This is a perfect example of subtle marketing. Subtle marketing doesn't ask you to part with your money. Instead, subtle marketing asks you to part with your time which is essentially the same thing. Because when someone parts with their time because you emotionally control them (sort-to-speak), you have that potential customer in the palm of your hand. Now, all you do is transfer that energy into selling your product or service and you will have a customer for life.
It's a known fact, that repeat business is the key to making the big bucks. If you offer a shoddy product and do not give your customer's a reason to do business with you again you will spend your life continually working to replace new customers. This takes a lot of energy especially money on your part. Consistent marketing to local new customers will never prove to your benefit.
However, where the problem comes in is that business owners who have a shoddy product and find themselves in this position, never admit the truth. Or, perhaps some of them don't know how to not have a shoddy product. They don't have the knowledge of how to improve their product or service without a loss in revenue so they will believe they are backed in a corner with no way out.
Don't ever believe for one second that you are ever backed in a corner and can't move. There is NO SUCH THING as this situation in the mind of a leader. Every leader knows there is no problem without a solution that exists. It may take a little longer to find the answer to one problem and less time for another. But the fact remains there IS a solution to every problem. Plain and simple!!
All you have to do is have the desire to look for a solution. You can't look for the solution in the middle of a mess. Instead, you have to develop the ability to stand outside the problem and view it from a bird's eye view. If you can't do that you should hire or look for someone you can trust that can. Because once you look at the whole situation, rather than a piece of it you will be able to solve just about anything.
The infomercials, Dallas and the other soap operas, mentioned previously, are excellent examples of hard and subtle marketing methods. Each works differently because each one is marketed specifically for the product or service they are selling. The soap operas use subtle marketing because they want people to watch their show tomorrow. Infomercials use hard marketing methods because their interest main interest is making money.
But they use a subtle approach to their hard-sell methods by making the product sound as if the viewer cannot possibly live without it. That's why they have customers call in and tell about their experience with the product. The customer feels special because they get to talk on live television. This feeling is directly related to their ego which in turn parts them with their money. Take some time and think about it.
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