Sales and Cigars | Matt Anderson | Think Differently About Marketing | Episode 162

[00:00:00] Hey everyone, Walter Crosby with Helix Sales Development, your host of Sales and Cigars.

[00:00:04] Today's episode is a how to think differently about marketing with my buddy Matt Anderson.

[00:00:10] Matt and I are working on a couple of secret projects to help you folks solve some of the problems

[00:00:15] that we talk about in this podcast. So today we talk about the three big mistakes that business

[00:00:21] owners make when they're doing their marketing, when they're thinking about their marketing. And

[00:00:26] what we share is some of the things that you can go back and sit down with a journal, sit

[00:00:31] down with a cocktail, sit down with a cigar and a cocktail and write out what really is important.

[00:00:38] And we give you the step-by-step problems to solve. We talk about the book and the manual that

[00:00:43] Matt has that I really encourage you to go get. So go grab a cigar, grab a cocktail, strap in for

[00:00:49] another impactful episode of Sales and Cigars.

[00:00:56] So Matt, welcome back to Sales and Cigars and thinking differently about marketing. I appreciate you

[00:01:22] taking some more time. Yeah, thanks for having me Walter. So let me start off with this

[00:01:28] your book. People can find this on Amazon, you know first fix your message. I think that's

[00:01:38] I think that's where we want to start and get people because this is it's not a novel,

[00:01:43] it's not a story, it's a freaking manual for people to go ahead even if they started their marketing

[00:01:50] and it's all jacked up. They go back here and started to beginning, they'll understand, right?

[00:01:55] Yeah, I tried to fill a gap that I saw and have seen in a lot of the clients that I've talked to.

[00:02:03] This book is really designed to be kind of the missing manual for business owners and revenue

[00:02:08] officers, sales managers that you know will tell you the things about marketing you need to know

[00:02:14] in order to be successful. And you know if you thought that some of the marketers that you've hired

[00:02:20] done it wrong, I think you might find that it validates some of your instincts. And if marketing

[00:02:26] just completely confuses you, I guarantee that at the end of the book you'll at least have a pretty good

[00:02:31] handle on why it works and what you need to do in order to get results quickly.

[00:02:37] I honestly think that entrepreneurs and business owners should look at it, read it, study it,

[00:02:43] but it's not going to hurt a marketing person to go read this and kind of readjust their thinking.

[00:02:52] This is really designed for the business owner, for the revenue officer,

[00:02:57] for the salesperson who has some responsibility management marketing to really fill in the gaps

[00:03:02] and just tell you exactly what you need to know and what you need to do to get practical results.

[00:03:08] It's not a ton of high-flown theory, although there's a little bit in there about how marketing

[00:03:13] works that might surprise you. But it's really kind of a step-by-step guide to evaluate what

[00:03:19] you've been doing and figure out how to create a message that works.

[00:03:25] Sales leaders and sales managers and for that matter salespeople,

[00:03:29] this is the responsibility of the business owner to share this information and the story,

[00:03:35] marketing story, the company's sales story. That's their responsibility, but

[00:03:41] if you understand it as a CRO, VP of Sales Manager, it's going to make your job a lot easier.

[00:03:50] It's going to help you craft the right story as you're talking to your prospects and customers.

[00:03:56] Yeah, if you're just starting out or like you're the salesperson and have to create a message

[00:04:01] yourself, you'll find pretty actionable advice in there. But it also is kind of a step-by-step

[00:04:07] guide to how to manage marketers that you do hire if you're working with professional marketers

[00:04:14] to get good results out of them, to really guide them in the right way and to contribute the things

[00:04:21] that only the business owner can do the marketing process.

[00:04:25] The information that they need because sometimes they don't ask for it in a way that's meaningful

[00:04:31] to us as an owner. Yeah, exactly. I mean so many, if you read any of the popular marketing books,

[00:04:38] they're primarily written from the perspective of someone who's actually doing marketing,

[00:04:43] who's creating the marketing assets. And I've become convinced in what 23, 24 years I've

[00:04:50] been a marketer now over the course of my career, I've become convinced that there are some insights

[00:04:55] that only the business owner can furnish that really make or break your ability to be successful

[00:05:01] in your marketing campaigns. And so this is really the guide to helping business owners,

[00:05:06] or whoever is managing the marketing a not make the mistakes that sabotage marketing inadvertently

[00:05:12] and b contribute the key things and insights that only you have to make those decisions so that

[00:05:18] you set up your marketing success. And it's going to give them the perspective to be able to

[00:05:26] put it in the right context for the marketing, marketing people whether they be internal extra.

[00:05:32] Right, I basically when I sat down I wanted to write the book that I wish all my clients would have

[00:05:37] read before they hired me and you know I hope I've done that. I think you have, you know there are

[00:05:44] different formulas if you will or different ways to create that message in ways that will captivate

[00:05:52] the attention of the people that you want to reach, your ideal customers. And there are

[00:05:59] you know ways that you can craft a story that will get them engaged and persuade them to want what you're

[00:06:08] what what you do or to change the perspective on the world that they have that is preventing them from

[00:06:15] buying your product or service. And there are ways that you can tell that story that will build

[00:06:20] a much deeper relationship with that customer so they don't just buy the first time but they keep

[00:06:24] coming back. You know that's the discipline of marketing and sales. But you know I think where people

[00:06:30] often get themselves in trouble is that they haven't really fought through those aspects of their

[00:06:36] business before they get underway. You know Peter Drucker said you know the number one job of a

[00:06:44] business is to create a customer and he followed up by saying that you know as a because of that

[00:06:51] you know there is really you know marketing and sales is what drives revenue and everything else

[00:06:57] is in expense. You know that innovation and marketing is really the two things that drive the

[00:07:04] business. You know and you know I asked the question a moment ago you know why is it that

[00:07:11] you know so often people forget to you know really think hard or work on that part of the business

[00:07:19] and you know solid bit is because it's foreign to them. You know you know and I think you made

[00:07:25] the point when we had a conversation a little bit ago that you know the Michael Gerber book,

[00:07:33] the E-Mith really explains why that's true so so neatly. That you know the vast majority of

[00:07:39] businesses are started either you know people like to think that they're started by visionaries

[00:07:44] you know and that's a small percentage of the business but the vast majority of businesses are

[00:07:48] started either by technicians you know who are really good at doing something you know they're

[00:07:53] the baker who knows how to make a great cake or they're the car mechanic who knows how to fix

[00:07:57] their car or they're started by people who are managers. They know how they know how to orchestrate

[00:08:02] the work and they've been in the industry they kind of know how businesses like that operate

[00:08:08] but they haven't really figured out the you know going out and getting customers part the

[00:08:14] you know convincing us for the buy part and they never really think through that part of their business.

[00:08:19] And they struggle with the vision part of it too right so there's

[00:08:24] that entrepreneur doesn't I mean that's why Gerber called the E-Miths because it's an entrepreneurial

[00:08:30] myth so rarely is that one person all things. So I mean I love that I mean it's a great book I think

[00:08:41] anybody that starts a business should read the book before they pull the trigger

[00:08:45] right because it's going to help them see things from a different perspective and then go read

[00:08:52] your book because it's going to help them tell a story in a meaningful way and help them fill

[00:08:57] in the caps. Yeah I mean the big idea in E-Mith is one that everyone who starts a business or

[00:09:04] who owns a business I think needs to really take on board and you know I mean it's such a

[00:09:09] famous book and probably most of the people listening to this podcast it have read it that what he

[00:09:13] says is you need to work on the business first you need to think about the business itself

[00:09:18] as a product as something that you're designing and you have to fit you know you have to work

[00:09:23] on how the business operates you need to systematize the way you take care of customers but you also

[00:09:29] need to have a plan for how you actually create that customer in the first place. How do you go out

[00:09:34] grab their attention? How do you you know persuade them to buy and then how do you build a relationship

[00:09:39] with them so that they keep buying again and again and that's really you know the book that I try

[00:09:45] to write is you know the owner's manual for how to do that but yeah you know. So let's go back to

[00:09:55] the I mean I think everybody that listens to this is Brett E-Mith at least once like you said

[00:10:03] they think everybody's struggled with getting marketing right. So let's tap into those three

[00:10:10] mistakes and these aren't these come from your book they come from yours but they come from

[00:10:19] years of experience of watching and they're simple enough I think we can get people to understand

[00:10:24] here in the next 15-20 minutes what those three mistakes are and how they might go about change

[00:10:31] enough so I'll reiterate the first one is that they start off I'll build it and they will come

[00:10:40] if you build they will come is one of the mistakes I see really often often especially with

[00:10:51] classically with startups. I've worked with a number of venture-back startups through the years

[00:10:57] what often happens is you know they might raise you know three or five million dollars

[00:11:02] in order to build a software product for example you know maybe they're going to revolutionize

[00:11:06] a particular part of you know business-to-business software and what they do is they spend a year

[00:11:17] and a half building product they do it often with the customer discovery methods so they've got

[00:11:22] you know maybe three to five initial customers and they build a product that solves a business

[00:11:28] process problem for those customers and then they invest a little money in marketing which really

[00:11:36] means that they build a website that looks like every other software is a service website

[00:11:41] that's selling to other businesses that highlights the features of their product all the cool things

[00:11:46] that the product does they hire an outbound calling firm to develop leads for them and then

[00:11:53] they hire a sales manager and a couple of salespeople who are whose job then is to convert those leads

[00:12:00] and what they have you know and they think that because they have this amazing product

[00:12:07] that the how amazing the product is is going to be obvious and it's going to be able to

[00:12:14] immediately persuade people that you know they have the solution that they're looking for

[00:12:20] I was working with a client in the last few years who did you know a little bit more than this

[00:12:27] but you know kind of follow that plan they've developed legitimately a groundbreaking product

[00:12:32] that for a particular kind of business and there were thousands of them in the country

[00:12:37] would legitimately save them at least a million dollars a year

[00:12:41] and it wouldn't be very hard to adopt it made things super simple it wasn't very expensive

[00:12:48] and the amount of headcount that they could save would pay for the product many times over almost

[00:12:53] immediately it was such you know apparently slammed on sale that the board of directors and the owner

[00:13:01] the founder and the the managing team all thought that the sales process would be super short

[00:13:06] they just need to have a quick conversation and they'd be able to sell a product pretty quickly

[00:13:11] well I'm sure you know how that story you know I lived with a startup that had

[00:13:22] in that situation it was arrogant yeah they just thought they had the greatest thing but I remember

[00:13:28] I went on a road to go share this product with people and I went to New York

[00:13:35] met with the leading consultant in their space it was like a luminary and I'm like look we've got

[00:13:43] adoption from these big companies right and I'll just say like might have been Google

[00:13:51] and I might have been Facebook right yeah and she's like she's she just sat there and shook her

[00:13:56] head she's like I hate those I hate those organizations yes they give you guys hope yeah

[00:14:02] and I remember I sat back in my chair and I like what do you mean tell me tell me what you're really

[00:14:09] saying she's like you have a product that's interesting but it's not prepared you

[00:14:16] you're they think it's cool but that's what they bought it because it's cool and they don't

[00:14:22] really understand it and they they're not going to buy filled their whole space with it right

[00:14:27] they gave you hope that was not legitimate yeah and they have it will they just go out and spend

[00:14:31] money on that so I mean it it really speaks to the problem that they get very excited but nobody's

[00:14:38] really able to tell the story in a meaningful way of people like oh shit that's great we need that

[00:14:42] that's going to solve that problem right they need to discover that so just because you've got

[00:14:48] the cool thing the best mouse trap if you can't talk about it in a right way and explain it

[00:14:55] to that to that consumer that buyer doesn't matter how cool it is yet there's virtually no product

[00:15:03] that will sell itself without some work having been done to prepare the market and some work having

[00:15:10] been done to persuade the customer to actually buy especially when the status quo is so different right

[00:15:15] and what jumped in my head was Henry Ford trying to sell this horse was carriage just in the idea

[00:15:23] that they referred to it as a horseless carriage just tells you that there were so many people like

[00:15:30] I don't trust that car right I know what the word is going to do I know how they operate I know

[00:15:34] what I got to do to make sure that horse does its thing and all fast I'm going to go I can get

[00:15:38] down the road and that thing breaks did right so yes you have to be able to get past that and then

[00:15:47] everything else that comes up in the consumers mind yeah I mean you know the example of Henry Ford

[00:15:54] is instructive right even just calling it a horseless carriage started to build a bridge to the

[00:16:00] customer's perspective right and find a way to communicate what the product did it did the things

[00:16:07] that the carriage does and how does it do well it does it some way other than a horse um but you know

[00:16:13] already Henry Ford was doing a good bit of sales and marketing work just to get your attention

[00:16:20] and communicate what he did and you know there's lots of other you know the classic startup product

[00:16:26] is something that's truly disruptive that is unique novel that doesn't really have an exact

[00:16:32] parallel it's it's pioneering to do market but you know so much of the entrepreneurship that

[00:16:39] you know we see out there uh the businesses that are formed the clients that you work with

[00:16:44] that I work with um they're really you know innovating and improving or sustaining ways right they're

[00:16:50] working within a new market but they have a slightly better way to do something or they're doing

[00:16:56] it roughly something else but it you know it's a little bit different sometimes they have to niche

[00:17:02] inside of a space right and they they have to have a different perspective on like oh yeah that's

[00:17:10] different than what everybody else does so you can differentiate in a bigger space and niche it down

[00:17:18] to somebody that really cares about certain things you're not going to get the whole thing

[00:17:23] right but nobody ever gets the whole thing right no exactly um and and I think there's this concept

[00:17:30] in startup investing uh it's really useful to entrepreneurship in general um they call it product

[00:17:36] market fit and that's what you're really looking for uh or what you're really looking to create when

[00:17:43] you start a company you know the startup advisors are good to say you know you you really want to put

[00:17:49] 100% of your energy in building a business to build a product that uh you know they'll often say

[00:17:55] scratches your own niche and keep working at it keep uh designing it keep refining it keep

[00:18:03] building it you know keep testing this minimum viable product until it achieves product market fit

[00:18:08] until the product uh fits a particular customer so well that they want to buy it um but what

[00:18:15] they often forget uh and this is where that first mistake if you build it they will come comes in

[00:18:20] is that product market fit doesn't exist in a vacuum product market that is created by the

[00:18:26] combination of sales and marketing and the decisions you make that bake that sales and marketing

[00:18:33] into what you do so it's who you decide to serve and it's the features that you build into your service

[00:18:40] that do a very particular job for that customer that solves the specific problem or helps them

[00:18:46] satisfy a specific desire and the job of marketing and sales is to ensure that your business has

[00:18:53] a system that will put that product in front of the customer frame it in the correct way so that

[00:18:59] they're interested and then follow up in ways that persuade them to buy it ultimately you don't

[00:19:05] have product market fit until you have marketing and sales that will attract those customers

[00:19:13] and persuade them to buy because you know in the essence of that if you think i'll just build this

[00:19:19] product that fits this customer and you don't have a system for connecting the product and building

[00:19:24] a bridge between that product to that customer you're never going to have product market fit because

[00:19:29] you're never going to have the customer who purchases that product so i mean there's a

[00:19:33] that's the gap and you're you're talking about is fixing that gap um exactly it's heartbreaking

[00:19:40] so i i i can count probably several dozen times in the last 20 years where i've had clients come to

[00:19:47] me they've spent hundreds of thousands of dollars in some cases millions of dollars uh building a

[00:19:53] product designing a business they've often sunk 18 months uh two years three years into making this

[00:20:00] business go and then they come to me and they say i have 15 thousand dollars left i've developed a

[00:20:05] great product uh i'm about to go bankrupt safely and you have to kind of deliver the news you know

[00:20:12] given the customer you're trying to find the odds that you're going to be able to attract them with

[00:20:19] what you can spend on advertising right now or or slanted on i you know hey thanks for being part

[00:20:25] of the sales and cigar community i wanted to share that i wrote a book the seven critical mistakes

[00:20:30] CEOs make with their sales organization the CEOs you've read it tell me i cut to the chase quickly

[00:20:37] get to the point explain exactly what they're experiencing why they're experiencing and how to fix it

[00:20:43] so if you want a free copy go check out the link in the show notes now let's get back to the interview

[00:20:48] so the message is really there's a parallel tractor but but it's the parallel isn't really

[00:20:56] isn't truly parallel you have to be ahead think about Steve Jobs and Apple right he he wanted to change

[00:21:05] how people viewed and the their access and their uh the ease of use right and he knew who he

[00:21:12] wanted to help and he knew what he wanted to do and they sort of they i mean they had an idea

[00:21:18] right with the computers and then the iPhone thing and all of that but it was the clarity it was

[00:21:25] like i want to do this big thing and then let's go build some shit that's going to make that happen

[00:21:32] the vision was there yeah right well yeah i mean it's it's really interesting it would be

[00:21:38] instructive for the listeners to go back and you can find on youtube uh old videos of Steve Jobs

[00:21:46] his keynotes or when he was pitching products i saw one just a couple days ago uh he was at MIT

[00:21:53] and he was talking about Nats computer uh the the computer startup that he it's he had created after Apple

[00:22:01] uh and it's it's really interesting he he was uh talking about object oriented programming

[00:22:09] and in five minutes he took this really arcane technical subject and he described what next was

[00:22:16] dealing to innovate on that concept and why it was going to change the future of computing but

[00:22:21] what was amazing about that is you could tell from that description exactly who he was trying to

[00:22:26] serve the market seems going after the problems his customers had uh what they desired and what

[00:22:34] they believed about the world that he was going to change uh and then in changing how they saw

[00:22:39] the world he was going to change their ability to uh create software and run their businesses

[00:22:44] and uh you know it's it's really a masterclass in how uh the right marketing message

[00:22:52] um can really change the reality of the audience and create a new market out of the air

[00:22:59] uh you know people talk about Steve Jobs having this reality distortion field

[00:23:03] uh and it's true but the way he did it uh was through the stories he told and the way his message

[00:23:12] uh connected with what his audience already thought and felt and then helped them see a new reality

[00:23:18] uh and you know that's something you don't have to be super charismatic or persuasive like he was

[00:23:23] to do you just you know need to follow certain steps uh in uh how you communicate uh what your vision is

[00:23:31] and uh how you're bringing it to market that's really the thing you have to tell the story

[00:23:37] to the right people and get them to lean into it and recognize he's talking about me

[00:23:43] he's talking about my problem yeah you did that it didn't matter if he was uh an animated movie

[00:23:50] he did later in his career uh software computers yeah uh gadgets of any type

[00:23:57] he it was all tied together like who's who are we trying to serve here don't forget

[00:24:02] that our customers are you know with with i'm thinking about the fix our right it's yeah the consumer

[00:24:12] was the little the little kid but it wasn't it was the parent that was going to be spending the dough

[00:24:18] right keep it engaged right but he was able to to tell that story in the same way um and peel off

[00:24:24] enough i mean they did okay yep stunner right oh yeah yeah they i i think you'd say that they're you

[00:24:31] know apples uh not such a company anymore few years later they they change the world and Tim

[00:24:40] Cook hasn't been able to screw it up badly enough yet so let's talk a little bit about the

[00:24:46] other idea of the marketing and we've talked about it and i think i think we've added covered it but

[00:24:53] that you you have to be able to address this marketing component in this story when you're developing

[00:25:00] your product and and before you develop the product you got to really know what am i trying to do with

[00:25:06] this what do they care about so that's gotta lead it right it's gotta lead what they care about

[00:25:15] you gotta go figure that out and make sure you're delivering it and then phrase it in the way

[00:25:20] marketing magic is about that putting the words that gonna resonate with your consumer whoever that

[00:25:26] i yeah that that's not a mistake we were talking about is the idea that you can just bolt on your

[00:25:32] marketing after you've created your product um and that's still the way that a lot of marketing

[00:25:39] firms think and it's the way that a lot of the mark the books out there are marketing operate right

[00:25:44] that you know it's the job of the business owner the operations and the entrepreneur to create

[00:25:49] the product and then it's the job and then they throw it over the fence and it's the job of the

[00:25:53] marketers and salespeople to go you know sell the hack out of it um and you know the reason

[00:26:01] that that's such a common perspective is that that's how the world used to work and used to be okay

[00:26:08] um you know if you think about most of the 20th century you had very limited advertising channels

[00:26:13] you had three TVs you know three networks that were broadcasting TV you had a you know

[00:26:19] handful of radio stations that mattered and you had you know some magazines and newspapers

[00:26:24] and each of them were very bandwidth limited right you only had maybe six commercials per commercial

[00:26:32] break uh five commercial breaks per hour um and you know that was it they're just weren't that many

[00:26:38] ads to buy and they reached 30 seconds long you couldn't really say that much uh and it was

[00:26:43] expensive distribution was hard you know if you were distributing products through retail stores

[00:26:49] you had limited else space it's like what Dan Kennedy said in that space and that world for a long

[00:26:54] time whoever can spend the most money wins and to a certain extent that's still true yeah but

[00:27:01] the context is changed about where you spend and how you spend well yeah the way advertising

[00:27:08] distribution was set up in the 20th century uh it really favored large companies so if you were

[00:27:13] first a market and you could develop profits first then you could uh for now spend your competitors

[00:27:19] you know ad rates would go up shell space got more expensive but you'd still stay there

[00:27:24] and because there were mass audiences uh you're it really prioritized products that kind of served

[00:27:31] the 20 you know the 20 percent I'm sorry that you know provided the 20 percent of features

[00:27:37] that were good enough for 80 percent of the market right that will leave you 20.

[00:27:42] But we now have been a world of abundance uh you know for five bucks you can target an ad

[00:27:48] to people just like me on Facebook and Instagram or I can target ads to people just like you

[00:27:55] and uh you know I can publish a message that is thousands of words long or 30 seconds long

[00:28:03] or a video that is you know a 10-minute webinar or any of that I can I if you know for five bucks

[00:28:10] I can get that in front of virtually anyone and it's really easy to distribute products now

[00:28:15] I can send them through the mail and you know a whole bunch of drop shipping services and uh

[00:28:22] online stores had made it you know really cost effective and easy to uh set up um you know

[00:28:28] ways to to sell your product once you get your ads in front of people um so those barriers have

[00:28:35] been lowered and as a result there's so many more viable competitors uh you can create a product

[00:28:40] profitably that serves virtually any any and so as a result there's uh much more you know

[00:28:48] many more people vying for the attention of your ideal customer um and you know what that means

[00:28:55] is that if you're going to succeed you really need to design a product that has dev right a product

[00:29:01] in a message that has dev they can attract the attention of that ideal customer that's particularly

[00:29:08] tailored to what they're interested in uh and isn't uh you know the the generic messages that

[00:29:14] succeeded years ago um just for most companies and most of the time won't cut through the noise today

[00:29:21] uh and you know the other problem is that today with social media and blogs and and email and

[00:29:29] what you can do on the internet your customer has many more ways to talk back to you

[00:29:34] and to share their experience with other people than they ever had before you know in 1950

[00:29:40] if you sold a product that was maybe a little over-promised and you know not that compelling

[00:29:45] and and tricked people with ads and divine it uh they might be able to tell their neighbor

[00:29:51] today they tell the world and that post can go viral uh you know as the airlines have found out

[00:29:56] you know if you have a flight this stays on the tarmac a little too long millions of people might be

[00:30:01] aware of it and you could lose 10% of your you know stock value overnight well you could

[00:30:06] sitting in the in the airport lounge twitter and if you have the right following

[00:30:11] in the airport engages the airline engages with you to like say cut it out right like what can

[00:30:16] we do to get because they because of of the impact it can have to or or another example from last

[00:30:24] year you know bud light spends five hundred thousand dollars on a promotion that only a few of their

[00:30:29] customers you know a few a new target market a few people were we're supposed to see but uh

[00:30:35] you know if you if you have the regular customer see it get offended and all of a sudden they lose

[00:30:42] 20% of their market share overnight well they they lose the number one spot that they felt for decades

[00:30:49] yeah yeah and you know now uh they've been put on uh warning at Costco they're about to lose a lot

[00:30:56] more of the distribution it you know it's probably all told uh you know five or ten billion

[00:31:02] dollar hit overall you know if you add up their stock value brand value and uh wassales

[00:31:11] so i mean having that thinking through that piece of it before you jump into building it

[00:31:20] and before you you can't just bolt it on to what you've done because of the way

[00:31:26] marketing is told and the stories are available and how we can target

[00:31:30] is change so much yeah actually you actually need to build your product be consistent with the

[00:31:37] message that we want to go to market with right you need to be truthful in what you're selling

[00:31:43] and the days that you can con people into buying your product you know you might get buy on that for

[00:31:48] a week or a month or a quarter but uh it'll come back to buy you and buy you and and uh

[00:31:54] damage you quickly uh but it also extends to you know how you take care of customers after the sale

[00:32:00] you know how do you deliver customer service it needs to be in keeping with the brand that you're

[00:32:05] trying to create uh you're asking your person rather than a robot right there's a piece of that

[00:32:10] yeah exactly you can't just paper over uh your flaws with marketing anymore you need to build

[00:32:16] that back all the things that your marketing and sales represents need to be built back into

[00:32:22] everything that you are as a company how you treat your employees how you operate how you care

[00:32:26] for your customers uh the culture that you create you actually need to live those values

[00:32:31] you can't just give lips or service to them anyway it's gotta it's gotta be authentic

[00:32:36] go back to morty for a second because one of the one of the things that

[00:32:40] that he's struggling with is framing his story the words he uses his his message

[00:32:52] um from the customer's perspective rather than his perspective and yeah and I mean I've had

[00:32:59] conversations with him consistently about you know you're talking about what you do and how you do it

[00:33:09] you're not talking about what it means to the other to your customer why why do they give a

[00:33:14] shit about what you're what you're doing what are the outcomes you're gonna get why did it help

[00:33:20] them get to where they want to go or does it help them alleviate the fear that you know that

[00:33:26] they're afraid of and I think that's a big huge stumbling block for most entrepreneur

[00:33:36] because they're just so wrapped up in the thing that they do yeah and um I think that there are

[00:33:45] you know a couple of really common reasons that prevent entrepreneurs especially from

[00:33:52] being able to talk from their customer's perspective uh you know the kind of the the big reasons

[00:34:00] I see that uh people's message gets lost in translation if you will uh is first the curse of techno

[00:34:08] battle uh that they use uh you know technical language that compresses a lot of meaning for them

[00:34:17] right because they're an expert in their industry uh but they do that in it in ways that uh

[00:34:23] really don't connect with the customer uh you know you you might talk about to an accountant who's

[00:34:29] using a bunch of uh you know terms that are used in tax law and really what the customer cares about is

[00:34:38] not dealing with the IRS exactly like the way I frame that we had a contractor at our house last night

[00:34:47] and like dude I don't care how you make the sausage yeah I care about I don't even care what's

[00:34:54] in the sausage to a large extent I do care about what the sausage tastes like and how long it's

[00:35:01] going to take to be prepared what the what that what that does to me like I don't care like and he

[00:35:08] want he was very excited about sharing me the the the new on service product and like I get it

[00:35:16] it's got the thing that nobody else has okay but what is it what does it do for me yeah totally

[00:35:22] what's it is when you have to say that to somebody like his his his sales pitch didn't jive with the

[00:35:31] marketing that you see from this product on television right and right like that night we saw

[00:35:38] West Television for an hour and we saw six commercials for the product we we bought

[00:35:45] yeah right and but they weren't congruent there's another whole problem which we can get into

[00:35:51] it a later date totally but the the idea is that if if you're talking about technical stuff if

[00:35:57] you're talking about how the the the microns of the of the product it doesn't get through the thing

[00:36:06] out here yeah patterns on that great that's terrific right and in Tektor Babel is really a subset

[00:36:14] of a bigger problem which you might call the curse of knowledge right so many business owners are

[00:36:21] our experts in their field and they forget what it's like not to know what they already know

[00:36:28] and they don't really realize what the customer already understands and more importantly

[00:36:33] what they don't already understand so what they often do is they'll skip over explaining the reason

[00:36:40] the customer has the problem they do and they'll just dive right into the solution and all the

[00:36:45] cool features of their product but you know as you say they haven't explained why those features

[00:36:52] matter to the problem that the customer actually cares about we haven't explained why I should care

[00:36:58] right right uh the and you know another way that they'll not explain why you should care is they'll

[00:37:05] just talk about the feature and not the benefit that it supplies them right it's the the old adage

[00:37:11] right you're not buying the drill bit you're buying the hole you can create with the drill bit

[00:37:16] right and you know in sales and marketing you need to sell the hole not the bit

[00:37:22] which there again is uh you know another way that the curse of knowledge can rear its ugly head

[00:37:30] and it's really not to me it's as simple these three mistakes um are important to understand

[00:37:40] they're important to be able to change your perspective as an entrepreneur and talk about

[00:37:46] what really matters um to to your customer and positioning your product in a way

[00:37:53] not just in its design and function but everything about it right like how we talk about it

[00:38:01] how we how we service it how we deliver it um it's uh it's it's it's getting them

[00:38:11] there's a certain amount of education if somebody doesn't understand the the product or the space

[00:38:19] and you have to be able to talk about that and bring them to where you want to go

[00:38:25] right in a way that's entertaining in a way that's interesting a way that keeps their attention

[00:38:30] and and sometimes it's talking about your competitors in a in a way that's not negative in a way that's

[00:38:38] not um you know uh you're speaking down to it but it's it's informative and I have a client who

[00:38:46] they have a superior product if you want to do this thing but this thing nobody knows about

[00:38:52] so we have to educate them that you can preserve your roads in such a way that you don't have to

[00:38:59] keep fixing them and replacing them right so you talk about the preservation idea to make them aware

[00:39:05] of it and then you have to say okay there's multiple ways to do that and you've been doing it this way

[00:39:11] and then there's another way to do it and then our competitors do it this way

[00:39:16] and then you help them see that the competitor does it in a way that creates a bigger problem

[00:39:21] and then so your solution is uh is the customer realizes for themselves like well why would I want

[00:39:28] that when i could have this i don't know and it's fun to be able to tell that story

[00:39:35] and watch the audience go like yeah why would we want to have brittle roads we want something that's

[00:39:40] flexible it can but it's a lot longer and you know once you build a bridge

[00:39:51] but you have to be able to be willing to go outside of that normal way to talk about it there's

[00:39:58] that education and be willing to talk about your competitors embracing some of these things

[00:40:05] to get the customer to say well that's that's not really what we want we want to go over here

[00:40:11] yeah right and it's it's it's it's persuasion but it's not directly persuading there

[00:40:17] they're on discovering for themselves to me that's what sales is it's helping somebody see if

[00:40:23] you've got a fit or not and if you don't you're done but if we are let's dive in and see if we can

[00:40:29] really but this really is a good fit and it's that we're willing to be vulnerable i think in that

[00:40:35] space yeah most people think of persuasion as something that you do to someone else right that

[00:40:41] you you come in and almost by force argue them out of their point of view uh and really it's a lot

[00:40:47] more persuasive it's a lot more effective and you persuade a lot more people uh if you

[00:40:53] craft your message in such a way that they persuade themselves that they come to the realization

[00:40:59] of oh hey i didn't even know that was available but you tell me i can make my roads flexible and they're

[00:41:04] gonna last 20 percent longer and i don't have to spend that much to do it well who wouldn't want

[00:41:09] that right it's uh you know it's it's kind of verbal jujitsu uh if you will great knows my second

[00:41:15] favorite answer yeah and it all this all kind of ties together where we get them to uncover this

[00:41:21] but it starts with developing a product and the message like what are we trying to do we want to be

[00:41:29] more like Henry Ford or Steve Jobs in that we're we're trying to change something and it doesn't have

[00:41:36] to be the world view we don't have to create this mega company we can do it on our own little niche

[00:41:46] we can we can help people see their own things if we're using the right i mean it's almost like a

[00:41:52] philosophy here we're talking about marketing in a completely different perspective yeah

[00:42:00] i want to highlight something in your story that i really love um because it gets to what that

[00:42:05] philosophy is um you know your your mentor was saying well he really in using that method you were

[00:42:11] trying to help your wife uh you know because you were you wanted her to be able to go to the restaurant

[00:42:17] she wanted to to go to right and so uh you were just using this technique to figure out what she

[00:42:23] really wanted so that you could deliver um you know i think that's really the key to successful

[00:42:31] entrepreneurship in general it begins with having a servant's heart at the end of the day

[00:42:37] you need to create a business design a product and craft a message that serves your ideal customer

[00:42:46] if you don't know who that is if you don't have a vision of what they uh want what they need

[00:42:52] and what how they currently see the world so that you can build that bridge between what you're

[00:42:58] creating for them and uh the you know experience that you want them to have

[00:43:04] you're not going to be successful uh but that that really crystallizes it if we're not trying to

[00:43:12] help somebody if we're not trying to figure out and discern whether they're a good fit and help

[00:43:17] them figured out for themselves by telling the right message and being clear about what it is

[00:43:22] that we can do you either are going to put them in the wrong spot for the short term and create a

[00:43:29] bigger problem right and if it's not a good fit like that's fine right we'll find the right person

[00:43:36] and maybe you know in a in a in a in a regular world we can help them be can be a resource to help

[00:43:42] them go to the right spot but we've taken something away and we've helped them this isn't a good fit

[00:43:48] and it you know you you called it you know a servier ideal customer

[00:43:53] and i just look at it as helping somebody yeah totally now the one thing i do want to say is and

[00:44:00] is that i i see people who begin with the servants heart uh consistently make one mistake and so

[00:44:10] i just want to flag this so that as you uh think about your message and think about your products

[00:44:15] from what the perspective will we've been just been talking about that you can keep this in mind too

[00:44:21] and that is you want to make sure that the message you use to build a bridge between your product

[00:44:26] and your customer uh is in terms of what your customer wants not necessarily what they need

[00:44:35] the trick it is sort of so the mistake that i see uh some clients make uh and it's a really

[00:44:42] for anyone because it comes from the best place they really want to help their customer

[00:44:46] but what they do is they because they're an expert on their subject and because they have a very

[00:44:52] particular view of what the customer needs they don't need this solution they're shopping for

[00:44:57] they need this better solution um they spend so much of their time uh just trying to sell the

[00:45:04] customer what they need assuming that the customer will realize it's what they need

[00:45:09] rather than communicating the virtues of the product that they built the that does what the customer needs

[00:45:16] in terms that the customer already desires um so you know for example uh i can think of a

[00:45:25] the uh a SaaS startup uh the design of this product that they were convinced would revolutionize

[00:45:32] this business process so all their messaging was it was telling the customer about how revolutionizing

[00:45:39] it it was and how it would completely transform the way they did this important business process

[00:45:44] well it turns out when you talked to potential customers they didn't want their business

[00:45:49] process completely transformed that sounded scary it sounded risky it sounded expensive

[00:45:55] what they really wanted was it to be less painful to do and as soon as they switched their

[00:46:01] messaging to talk about how they removed the hassle and made it a lot easier and saved them

[00:46:05] at time and time uh and you know provided them documentation and helped them comply with all

[00:46:11] these regulations that were coming that were super scary uh you know they were able to almost

[00:46:16] overnight triple the number of leads they were generating it's because they're finally talking

[00:46:21] in terms of what the customer actually cared about uh and the fact that it also would save

[00:46:26] the millions of dollars and completely revolutionize this business process uh they didn't have to

[00:46:30] mention that the customers discovered that after the facts were thrilled to know it.

[00:46:35] It's being bold enough to really be honest and be authentic about what you're really

[00:46:43] what you're really doing and allowing your consumers and your customers to uncover for themselves

[00:46:51] right and this is the really a parallel between marketing and sales yes is that we want them to

[00:46:56] uncover for themselves like this is what I want because if they say it's the freaking gospel

[00:47:02] and if we say it's a marketing guy or sales guy saying it and it's we have some

[00:47:07] prepudations but if they uncovered for themselves no maybe you're right yeah and if your customer

[00:47:15] doesn't understand yet you have to have the humility to admit that's your fault not theirs

[00:47:20] I don't know if you've got clients like I have who invest a lot of time and energy into

[00:47:27] all the reasons their customers too dumb to realize how brilliant their product is

[00:47:32] uh you know that might be really satisfying in the moment but it rarely is the path to achieve

[00:47:39] your marketing sales goals. I've been in a room where the CEO said like you know you just don't

[00:47:45] get it. Your product is better than everybody else and you know the truth is they don't get it

[00:47:54] it's their job message that explains it that makes it obvious that people come to that conclusion

[00:48:00] themselves yeah and it's hard to uncover it's hard to recover from that once you've laid out

[00:48:07] that you've just called your customer your buyer an idiot yeah it's hard to come back

[00:48:13] yeah that buyer is rarely going to have the wherewithal to admit they were wrong and take your views

[00:48:23] and still buy a product especially in corporate america will they'll spend more money to save face

[00:48:28] than they will to fix the problem. Exactly all right well let's land it there mr. Matt I appreciate

[00:48:35] your uh here's always Walter it was fun don't forget uh folks we'll have this in the

[00:48:42] in the go by the book the manual right I'm gonna call it a manual not a book yeah there

[00:48:47] are people fix the maybe that's a marketing thing you the marketing man so thank you man appreciate

[00:48:56] it and we'll we'll talk again next month sounds good I'll talk to you next month Walter looking forward

[00:49:01] to it thank you bye