Reading With Steve: Selling The Invisible by Harry Beckwith

September 16, 2015September 17, 2015 by Steve

How is a service business like a product business? According to Harry Beckwith, the question no longer even relevant – every business is a service business.

In his marketing classic Selling the Invisible: A Field Guide to Modern Marketing, author Beckwith proves this fundamental truth, and reveals what marketers must do to win and retain customers. The content is broken down into 11 thematic sections, each containing a number of very brief anecdotes that demonstrate a fundamental marketing lesson.

Beckwith has a genius for storytelling. He has selected stories that are so compelling they make the resulting lesson seem obvious in retrospect. His skill reinforces these lessons in a way that textbooks cannot, and his consistency and brevity give the lessons more power than any how-to blog. For this reason alone, Selling the Invisible should be on your bookshelf. Pick it up, turn to any page, and gain a valuable piece of knowledge.

I count 162 lessons. If there were 365, a daily flip calendar would be the perfect format (and the perfect gift for any marketer).

This book is remarkable for its ability to foresee, and shape, future trends in marketing. Though published in 1997, Selling the Invisible anticipates the digital marketing future by imparting concepts we take for granted today: Set your business apart, think continuous improvement, disrupt yourself before your competitor disrupts you, marketing is everyone’s job, improving your service is improving your marketing, market to your core competency, dominate your niche, et cetera. Beckwith proves these maxims without the B-school terminology, and without digital examples. Yet the fact that these concepts are accepted wisdom today, and part of any business school curriculum, points to Beckwith’s influence and foresight.

Most powerful is the core message that every business is a service business. This means that the marketing imperatives of an electronics maker and a software designer are the same. Businesses of all kinds keep customers based on the level of interaction they provide, on their attention to detail, on the strength of their brand. In 2015, businesses also face the leveling plain of social media, with its immediate feedback and direct customer service. Surely Beckwith could not anticipate this coming technology, yet he prepares his readers for it perfectly.

I was pleased to see Beckwith spend time with concepts of organizational behavior (again, he does not use the academic term). The science of organizational behavior uses empirical psychology to show how humans make decisions. Mastery of this discipline gives any marketer a huge advantage. Beckwith uses the section he calls “How Prospects Think” to explain such concepts as familiarity bias, recency bias, anchoring, and the halo effect. He offers the best 15-minute introduction to marketing psychology I have seen.

Even in a universally strong volume, the section on positioning stands out as a tour de force. Start with a fanatical focus on the one thing that distinguishes your business, and then position outward from there. If you cannot find this one factor, look harder until you do find it. Beckwith declares that differentiation is the starting point of any communication strategy. It is hard to disagree with him.

I particularly enjoyed Beckwith’s stories about making your marketing exciting, a concept he terms “vividness”.

With very few exceptions, each story hits home and illustrates its lesson well, but a few fall short by offering a point that is too breezy. For example, Beckwith tells the story of a passionate salesman who wins every deal by being his authentic, charismatic self. This engaging vignette closes with the advice, “You should copy him”. Suppose you are not the natural salesman of this story? What if you are affectless, and not affectionate? It cannot be possible to imitate a presenter whose very power is his authenticity. The story is terrific, however the lesson does not follow so easily. Just a few of the stories fall flat in this way.

Selling the Invisible is visionary, a series of parables that have stood for 18 years with no diminution of their power. I believe this work will still be essential for future generations of marketers.

Remember, Beckwith tells us, that your first competitor is indifference. Your alternative to reading Selling the Invisible is to read nothing at all. That choice would be a mistake.

Buy the book.

PHOTO ATTRIBUTION
Liverpool Central Library Picton Reading Room by Michael D Beckwith modified using CC BY 2.0

Want a Wealth of Attention? Think Socks

September 15, 2015October 1, 2015 by Steve

In technology marketing we often think bigger will be better. Complexity must be cool, and sophistication is sexy. But with everyone locked in an arms race to one-up each other for attention, sometimes the best attention comes from going back to basics.

Such as socks.

This week is Dreamforce, the giant technology conference and be-in for those of us in the jeans-with-suit-jacket set. The expected attendance this year is 150,000. The show is so big Salesforce rented a cruise ship.

So it’s no surprise that there are lots of companies vying for everyone’s attention. On the expo floor, exhibitors are up to their usual tricks to one-up each other.

Did your team come dressed in matching outfits? There’s somebody else with a full farm getup. I didn’t catch what this company was selling or how coveralls and fake cherries were related to their product.

Did you hear about the sponsor that’s giving away a Tesla? Yes? Somebody else is raffling off a Maserati. I don’t see their logo anywhere on that ride.

And there is no shortage of costumed characters. This robot was coming over to fist bump me. But mascots don’t talk, and I couldn’t spot this one’s company in the mob.

In short, these cries for attention didn’t make a huge splash at Dreamforce today. No doubt some people are talking about these tactics, and they are surely better than nothing. But they lack uniqueness.

What did stick out was a more understated approach on display at WealthEngine. Like hundreds of vendors, WealthEngine has a swag giveaway. Rub the scratch-off to win one of the four prizes: power pack, adapter, selfie stick… or socks. The booth staff told me the socks were the most desired item.

After visiting WealthEngine I stepped to the side and watched people coming to their booth. Sure enough, socks were the biggest draw. I stopped a few attendees who were out for swag. When I mentioned that WealthEngine was giving away socks they became animated.

“I’ll remember WealthEngine,” one woman told me, “because nobody else is giving out socks.”

In retrospect, socks are an ideal giveaway item for this company in accordance with the MEDICAL method.

They are memorable because socks will go in a drawer for years – even if you only wear them for Halloween. No one keeps or remembers squeeze balls.
They are exciting because you laugh when you first see them. Pens are dull.
They are differentiated because no one else is handing out socks. A dozen companies are giving away t-shirts.
They are informative because they have the brand right on them. Candy and coffee are consumed and forgotten.
They are consistent with the brand. WealthEngine’s website invites visitors to schedule a free demo: “Try us on for size and see how we fit!”
They are actionable – to the extent any giveaway can be – because the brand is printed on them. See the socks, go to the website.
Finally, they are localized – again, to the extent possible – because this company can serve any industry. A company giving away only tech junk may imply that it only helps technical clients.

In the technology arms race, WealthEngine differentiated itself with the lowest-tech swag possible.

The lesson here is not to go print socks for your company. Rather, it is to use your show giveaway as something more than a way to get people into your booth for a conversation they’ll quickly forget. Use this overlooked aspect of event marketing to stand out and to further your product marketing strategy.

When I think about socks and WealthEngine, I imagine that the company is trying to say several things about itself:

Socks are one-size-fits-all. We are able to serve your organization no matter your size.
Socks are simple and useful. Our service is easy to understand and will add value, not complexity.
Socks are comfortable. Your buying experience with us will be low-stress and easy.
Socks are considerate and practical. Everyone needs new socks. Your grandmother puts them in your Christmas stocking because she loves you. We hope this giveaway will lead to a corporate relationship that is equally fulfilling.

Socks are just right for WealthEngine. What is the promotional item that could set your company apart?

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Localization: Talk To Your Target Customer

September 14, 2015 by Steve

This is the story of Quokka. I started it when stories were the most valuable currency in Silicon Valley.

Back in 1998, I was a cub reporter for the now-defunct San Francisco Independent newspaper. I was sometimes sent to cover events that showed up in our daily stack of press releases, including the frequent (and extravagant) launch parties of Internet companies.

One of these was thrown by Quokka, a company that promised to revolutionize sports media using the Web. I arrived to find scores of guests chatting in a colorful lobby, munching on a mountain of crudité and an ocean of shrimp. A band was playing somewhere.

The CEO took the press around the company’s new offices. He proudly showed off a 5,000 square-foot floor, full of new cubicles, which he promised would be full of employees within months. A constellation of satellite dishes graced the roof. Quokka, he said, would be the number-one site for all live streaming sports, providing a real-time experience that traditional networks could not match. The site would attract action junkies, loyal team fans, and statheads. It was the next ESPN, in short. And that’s roughly what I wrote.

Quokka ended up going public in 1999, and produced websites to broadcast sports events exclusives. They produced coverage of the 2000 America’s Cup race and the 2000 Olympics, a high-water mark for the company. Then the tide went out.

By the end of 2001, the company had shed two-thirds of its staff and pivoted to a model of providing network infrastructure to other content providers. Quokka limped along until 2007, when it finally sank under the waves.

Now, 17 years later, I can finish the story of Quokka Sports.

Everything To Everyone

Quokka presented itself as the sports destination for everyone. It was the source of action sports and mainstream sports, the place for live streaming and real-time statistics. Quokka would be the best at delivering the network technology and at creating the content. In other words, the site was going to be everything to everyone.

While the company may also have tried to do too much technically, it also made a serious marketing error in presenting itself this way. By attempting to speak to almost every consumer on the Internet, the company only succeeded in exhausting its voice. A man on the street who yells at everyone convinces no one.

Quokka failed at localization: specifying its message to a tightly defined audience of desired customers. If Quokka had localized its market, it would have tried to do fewer things, and may have been able to gain true traction with a customer base. The company could have succeeded as a network infrastructure play if it had focused from the start.

Unfortunately, Quokka was riding a bubble that demanded making the biggest splash possible. And the biggest splashes often sink the fastest.

Be Something To Somebody

A B2B company is likely to have a small prospective audience of potential buyers, particularly compared to a consumer business. Make sure you segment your market carefully and know who your customer is, then design your messaging to speak only to this niche. Several tips can keep you on the right path.

Make your target audience as small as possible. The more specific your audience, the more precise your message can be, and the more intensively you can try to reach this audience. People who will not buy your service are not prospects – they are a waste of your effort.
Feel free to specify your audience by naming it. If your target customer is an IT administrator for a hospital, for example, you might title your sell sheet with, “A message for hospital IT administrators”. This device can feel forced, however it is appropriate in many cases.
Speak your audience’s language. If your target customer uses specific acronyms or terminology, use them also so your prospects know you understand them and are talking to them.
While using specific language, avoid general weasel words such as “premiere” or “best-in-class”. These terms don’t help your reader understand if she is the right audience, and even suggest that you don’t know who is. No one believes these words. However, factually accurate terms (“#1 most popular”, “leading choice of hospital IT administrators”) can be fine if they contribute to your goals of excitement and differentiation.
One useful device for localizing your content is to tell a hero’s journey story, a case study of success form the point of view of your ideal customer – the hero. Your target reader will identify with the story, which will probably be more memorable than any benefit statement told from your own perspective.

Segment the Seven C’s

Effective localized content is only possible if you have accurately segmented your market, so you know who you are trying to speak to and why they will listen to you. There are many frameworks for segmentation, and any of them can be effective if the outcome is a specific addressable market that is small enough for you to reach with your available resources.

You will know your content is properly localized to your market if prospects are taking action and if every channel and group you target is responding.

Your business can’t roam the whole world and effectively win and retain customers. So cast your net in the very best place you can find, and you’ll be able to catch all the fish you can handle.

What is your most effective method of speaking to your specific, targeted audience? Tell us about it in the comments.

P.S. The image atop this post is of a quokka, an Australian marsupial that may be the most absurdly photogenic furball on the planet. Those links are so cute they are probably NSFW. You’ve been warned.

PHOTO ATTRIBUTION
World happiest animal, Quokka by Jin Xiang CC BY 2.0