Cultivate Your Customers

A great way to create word of mouth is to help your customer grow. A better way to create word of mouth is to help them grow for free.

To cultivate your customer look for some of your most valuable information, and then give it away free. Why would you want to do that?

Because:
People like to feel important
People like to help other people
People like businesses that help them without obligation.

When you give information that makes your potential customer more knowledgeable, more informed, or teaches them something that makes them better, they will take that information and talk about it to other potential customers.

How do you do that?
First, ask yourself the question: What is the most valuable thing I could teach someone to make them better (related to your industry)?

Then, ask yourself: How can I best give this information to potential customers for free?

Let's say you are a health and fitness trainer. You can get your clients to attend the workout, you just can't get them to eat properly. The problem, you find, begins in the grocery store. People just don't know what to buy.

To cultivate your customer, you produce a grocery shopping list and guidelines that people can take with them to the grocery store. Then you have it printed and laminated (with your web address and contact information) to give out, plus you convert it to a pdf document and load it on to your website as a free download.

You have now made your customers better for knowing you. You have cultivated them.

How do you cultivate your customer? Give them free information or tools that will make them better.


For more small business marketing advice and lessons, see our other blog: The Marketing Spot
For more about our company, see our website: http://www.themarketingspot.com/

Word of Mouth for a Realtor

Case Study: Sandra Daniels, realtor for John L. Scott Real Estate in Beaverton, Oregon.

Challenge: Increase referral business in a very competitive and close-knit market. She currently gets a large portion of her business through referrals, but says that there's always room for more.

Idea Wanted: A new strategy to create referral buzz.

Background: Sandra has been doing real estate in the Beaverton/Portland area for ten years, eight of those years as a realtor. She wants to create some buzz and get more referral business. Her advertising has been minimally effective and she gets virtually no qualified leads from the yard signs in front of her listings. Her current slogan is "The first step to your next home."

Sandra is originally from Hawaii and actually knows how to hula. She also active in the community doing volunteer work for her church, a women's and children's shelter, and the Red Cross. She prides herself on no BS, straight talk. Current marketing efforts are an email newsletter and inclusion in her Broker's ad in the Oregonian. Sandra has been thinking about starting a blog.

Advice: To get some buzz, people have to have a topic worth talking about. You need to stick out, or say something out of the ordinary.

Our Ideas:

1. Develop an image that is out of the ordinary that gets attention. Our suggestion is to drop the current slogan and become The Straight-Talking Hawaiian. Sandra should embrace her heritage and use it as a differentiator in most of her marketing efforts.


2. Get some attention by being a little controversial. Start a blog called "Straight-Up Real Estate" or "No BS Real Estate." Reveal some realtor secrets. Post case studies (where did we get that idea?) of actual sales of anonymous people and a major lesson learned from that sale. Then promote your blog to local TV & radio stations and volunteer to do a Straight Up segment for them.


3. Create a talking point with every sale. Each homebuyer receives a Hawaiian themed welcome gift when they arrive at their new home. Remember the scene from It's a Wonderful Life where George and Mary welcome a family to their new home with salt, wine & bread? Do something similar with Hawaiian gifts such as as a ukelele, hibiscus flowers, and traditional Hawaiian food. The homebuyers will be sure to tell that story when they tell their friends about their new home.


4. Throw an annual luau customer appreciation party for your past and current clients. Ask the broker to share the cost with you. It keeps customers involved and gives you a chance to visit with them in person. The event will remind them about you and spur them to give referrals.


5. Get customers involved with a cause. Conduct an annual fundraiser with former customers for the women & children's shelter where Sandra volunteers. Send out a fundraising letter with a donation envelope and invite customers to work with you to raise money for this worthy cause. People like to do business with businesses that share common values.


6. Give away some valuable information. People love lists. Create a Top 10 list such as Top 10 Mistakes Homebuyers Make That Cost Them Money. Then print it on a flyer with your picture and information on it. Hand it out to all customers and mail it to phone inquiries. Then write a press release from the Straight Talking Hawaiian and send it to the local television, radio, and print outlets. As well as creating some buzz, you may also get some media coverage.

The Lesson: Don't be afraid to step out with a bold image. If you want to create buzz, you have to be different and you have to get noticed. Don't fall into the trap of thinking that because you work hard and do a good job, that you will get noticed. People need an image to convey and something unique to say about you.

Say or do something out of the ordinary, in a positive way. People rarely talk about the ordinary. Combine your bold image with memorable actions. Then remind them to talk about you by staying in communication with them.

Word of Mouth referrals are powerful, but they don't just happen. They are created not just by hard work, but also with a carefully crafted plan.

See our company website at http://www.themarketingspot.com/
For more small business marketing lessons and advice, please see our other blog: The Marketing Spot.

Magic Spot Ideas

In Tuesday's post, Make the First Visit Count, I suggested creating a magic spot in the customer experience as a way to create a memory and encourage word of mouth.

I found an article on national customer service week that gives some excellent examples of magic spots in action. My favorite is the free ice cream from a pizza place.

Get an idea starter in this article from the Minneapolis St. Paul Star Tribune here: Celebrating Customer Service Week.

Make the First Visit Count

Many a small business is frustrated by the lack of word of mouth they receive from their customers. Even their loyal customers won't talk about them. But that's not a surprise.

Often, it's not your long-time customers that spread the news about you; it's the customer who visits your business for the very first time.

Excitement is the key.
Customers are more likely to talk about something that's fresh and new. They are excited that they made a discovery and they want to share that experience with others.

To get instant word of mouth, make a customer's first visit to your business memorable. To immediately grab a new customer you need a magic spot: a memory anchor that your new customer can refer to when they start talking about you. It's a memorable moment that's outside a normal customer experience.

Here are some ideas:

1. Give customers a surprise bonus. On a recent visit to a restaurant, the server found out it was my first visit and brought me a free surprise appetizer. I didn't know it was coming before I received it.
2. Ask for their input. People like to feel important. When you get a first-time customer, take them aside and tell them you would like a fresh perspective and some honest feedback on the business. Ask them what they really liked about their experience, then ask them what they would like to see changed, added or improved. When they tell you, write it down in front of them and genuinely thank them. Ask them for their email address or phone number in case you have some questions later.
3. Make them feel like they are part of a new group. "Your a first time customer? We like to think of our customers as extended family." Then give them a t-shirt with your logo and tag line and say "Welcome to our family." It sounds silly, but the power of a t-shirt is amazing. If you have an salon or an upscale shop, be creative and make it a tie-die or t-shirt with a unique design.
4. Give them inside information. Nothing sensitive of course. Tell them you get new merchandise shipments on Tuesday and all the new models so come on Wednesdays to get the first shot at all the cool stuff. Got a sale that starts next week but hasn't been advertised yet? Let the customer know. You should never pay retail prices for clothing at Jos. A Bank because they always have a sale. But my salesmen tells me when the corporate club sales are around the corner with even bigger discounts.
   

So make the first visit count. Create a magic spot for first time visitors. That's when their most excited...and most likely to spread the word about you.

For small business lessons and marketing advice, see our other blog: The Marketing Spot
Our company website: www.themarketingspot.com/

Conduct a Survey

There are so many positives that come from surveying your customers. Every business should do it at least once per year. It may be the most inexpensive marketing tool for small businesses.

The Benefits
First, it creates a dialog with your customers. Your customers have a chance to say something to you other than "fine" when you ask them how things are going.
Second, surveys give you great feedback and let's you know how you are doing (yes, you really want to know).
Third, it creates word of mouth because customers talk and they will ask others.
Fourth, it tells customers you care.
Fifth, you will get some great ideas!

What Should I ask?
Sometimes businesses struggle with the right questions to ask. There is no need to get clever or creative, simply ask these questions in this manner:

1. What is the most positive aspect of your experience with our business?
2. What is the most negative aspect of your experience with our business?
3. What would you improve about your experience with us?
4. Please share any thoughts you have about how we can improve our services to you?
5. Is their a product or service you would like to see us add?
6. Would you like for us to contact you to follow up?

That's it.

You will be pleasantly surprised with your responses. Most of your feedback will be positive. You will receive compliments in areas that you didn't expect. These compliments will provide ammunition for future marketing programs.

One of your intelligent customers will make a money making suggestion to you. When they do, use it! Then reward them with a gift and let everyone know you are making a change/addition because of a customer suggestion.

How to Implement
Don't just put a stack of surveys on a table and a suggestion box next to them. Use your customer data base and mail the survey with a return envelope. If you have a large customer base, mail one-fourth of your customers each quarter.

Salon Experience

Case Study: Pepper's Salon, Puyallup, Washington
Challenge: Improve website and increase traffic flow of new clients to the salon by October 2008.
Idea Wanted: Get more out business from the website, and create a customer experience that draws more new clients.

The Background: Owner Sally Flink has a reasonably successful salon, which has been operating for 20 years. They have a small advertising budget and a website that is doing okay, but not great. The website is two years old.

Pepper's has already added several magic spots to their customer experience, but these need to be tied together in a cohesive theme.

Advice: First develop your theme. Then design your customer experience around that theme.

In Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die, brothers Chip and Dan Heath tell us that if you want to make your experience sticky, step outside of standard operating procedure:

"The most basic way to get someone's attention is this: break a pattern."

Themes allow you to break the normal business pattern for a customer and create stickiness. Themes give you permission to create a different world within your business, surprising your customers with something sticky and out of the ordinary.

Pepper's has chosen Style as their theme.

Our Ideas:

1. Extend the Style theme to the website: Add pictures of famous hairstyles from which your clients can choose, for example Victoria Beckham's, and then add a link to "send to a friend."


2. On the website, post comparison pictures of styles that you've done for clients next to the model style or famous person's style. Again, add a "send to a friend" link.


3. When customers enter the waiting area, rather than offering coffee, tea or a water, offer an upscale stylish beverage; such as Brazilian Blend Coffee, Chai, or Voss bottled water.


4. Team up with a local, upscale fashion retailer and have live models showing the latest fashions during your busiest hours.


5. At the time of checkout, take a digital photo of the client's perfect style, load it into a database, then include it in a follow-up email to the client.


6. Advertise your hours. Pepper's is open at 7:30 in the morning until 9:30 in the evening on some days. Use the advertising budget that you do have to run a television or radio spot at 7:30am to say that Pepper's, The Salon With Style, is open right now.

The Lesson:
The Customer Experience is so vital to a business' success for two reasons:

The first reason is that it creates customer loyalty. Shaun Smith, co-author of See, Feel, Think, Do: The Power of Instinct in Business, says that merely satisfied customers are not loyal customers. Customers who are satisfied at level four on a scale of five have only a 25% intent of loyalty, but customers satisfied at a level of 5 out of 5 have a 90% or greater intent of loyalty.

The second reason is that when you establish loyalty, the customer experience then serves as the launching pad for word of mouth marketing. Once you have earned their loyalty, they give you their advocacy. You must design the customer experience with magic spots to give your customers talking points when they give you referrals.

For more small business marketing lessons and advice, see our other blog: The Marketing Spot
Our company website is: http://www.themarketingspot.com/

Change Your Name

Marketing Idea Category: Word of Mouth

Want to create some talk about your business? Change your name. Seriously.

Read this example of how Rouge, a Seattle women’s clothing boutique , changed their name and leveraged some great publicity, including this additional article (and our blog).

People love new things and new places to shop and this idea can gain you new attention. Obviously, this is not the tactic for every business but here are the standards under which you might consider changing your business name:

1. You have very little brand equity: Your name recognition in the community is low and people generally don't know who you are or what you do.


2. Your name has no personality or is generic: "The Clothing Corner" "The Coffee House"


3. Your market has shifted: As in the Rouge example above, they began appealing to a younger demographic and carrying different brands.


4. Your business name has a bad connotation in the community: You received some bad publicity from the misdeeds of an employee or previous owner.

Changing your name may not be cheap to do, so consider the costs involved in changing your name. After you do change your name, make sure you leverage your new name to get some well-deserved publicity.

1. Send out press releases and contact your local media personally.


2. Have a ribbon cutting with your local chamber of commerce.


3. Have a "Grand Unveiling" event. Use your mailing list and email list send an invitation to all your previous customers.


4. Invite a local celebrity to cut the ribbon on your store and be the very first customer of your newly named business.

We followed up with Stephanie Duryea, who says the change was worth it, but it was a lot of hard work. She offers this advice if you decide to take the big leap:

"Make sure it's what you want to do and be committed. Make sure it fits."

Word of warning: Good marketing cannot save a bad business. If you have internal problems and operational deficiencies, a name change will not be of help. But, if your business simply has the blues, this may be a way to get the music playing again.

Coming tomorrow: Case study in The Customer Experience
For more marketing advice and lessons: The Marketing Spot
Our company website: http://www.themarketingspot.com/

Word of Mouth for a Winery

Case Study: Tehuacana Creek Vineyards, Waco, Texas
Challenge: Create greater awareness in the surrounding communities, generating increased traffic to the tasting room.
Idea Wanted: New ways to generate word-of-mouth about the winery.
The Background: Tehuacana (Tuh-waw'-cun-uh) Creek Vineyards is a small, family-owned boutique winery located a couple of miles outside of Waco, Texas. The owners are a Doctor and his wife; she is the vineyard manager, he is the winemaker. They planted their first vines in 1997 and built a winery and tasting room this year so that they could begin selling their wines. Their biggest frustration is hearing: "I had no idea there was a winery in Waco."

Attempts to market the business led to a wasted effort in the local Travel Host magazine, investing $1500 for a $35 return. The winery has built an email list with 1000 names, which they use to announce new products and promote events. The owners also have some association with the local chapter of the Wine Society of Texas. There is also a large, local wine festival in October, which attracts close to 1200 people.

The TCV tasting room is open from 1-5pm on Fridays and 11am-6pm on Saturdays. Because of the owners' religious convictions, the winery is closed on Sundays. The goal is double the traffic to the winery on Saturdays.

Advice: TCV has some solid assets in place: 1000 name email list, relationship with local Wine Society, and a Local Wine Festival. The key is to leverage those assets into a word of mouth campaign that will cause some conversation within the local community.

The owners also need to leverage the uniqueness of their business into more conversation through local media outlets and civic organizations. TCV is the only winery in Waco, and it can make for a fun and unique afternoon, even for locals.

Our Ideas:
1. Launch a referral campaign using the email list already in place. Email a coupon to the email list worth a certain percentage off the first purchase from the TCV tasting room, then ask everyone on the email list to forward the coupon on to 10 friends. The friends receive the discount too when they use the coupon in the tasting room.
But add another twist: The coupon is also a registration slip for the original forwarder. When the friend brings the coupon into the tasting room, the original forwarder's name is signed to the coupon. Everyone who refers X number friends to the tasting room automatically receives a gift (case of wine, logo shirt, etc.)

2. Email the current list with a graphic of a "Charter Member" membership card and hold a special Charter Members Party in the Fall, featuring wine and entertainment. Include a guest pass to bring another couple.

3. Contact the Wine Society and offer to host an event at the winery at cost.

4. Offer to do a wine column in one of the local community publications. There are two in Waco, The Wacoan and Waco Today.

5. Host a Business After Hours event for the Waco Chamber of Commerce. Or just join the chamber and conduct a ribbon cutting. The Chamber will publicize the event for you and do a write up in the quarterly chamber publication.

6. Contact the local morning talk radio host and invite him out to the winery. Offer to do a weekly wine tip for him.

7. Secure a spot at the Wine Festival and offer sample shots of your wine, pass out flyers with tasting room hours and a map to the tasting room.

The Lesson:
Many times businesses have several assets with easy access that are just not being fully utilized. Look at new ways of utilizing assets like an email list.

Local clubs and civic organizations are always looking for speakers and things to talk about. If you have a unique product or service, or you are making a visible impact on the growth of the community, make connections through social groups and organizations like your local chamber.

If you have more advice, please comment below.
Want your free marketing idea? Fill out this form and submit.For more small business marketing advice, see our other blog: The Marketing Spot. Our website is: http://www.themarketingspot.com/

Note: Our next post on The Idea Spot will be Thursday, September 6th. (Vacation)