The Sky is Falling ...
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The Sky Is Falling ...
The following article is written by Michael Traveler,
author of Super Size Your Sales through Word-of-Mouse
That’s what the news is reporting, not to mention your neighbors and quite a few other well-meaning folk. It’s spreading like wildfire … through word of mouth ...
Back in the 1930s, many well-meaning individuals spoke those same words, screamed them, when the stock market crashed and the banks closed and unemployment rose and the soup kitchen lines grew. All the advertising in the world couldn’t stop it.
During uncertain times, unstable times, fear runs rampant through the streets and through the hearts and minds of almost everyone, all of us and almost certainly your customers. During these times, it’s quite common to want to play it safe, to protect what we have, to stay close to those we love and wait for the storm to pass.
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Money Changes Hands In Good Times or Bad
Question is: Will consumers be spending it with you or your competitor?
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But not everybody is waiting out the storm. Some shrewd business owners are recognizing the opportunity at hand and acting upon it. They realize that while their competitors are playing it safe, there is a massive opening in the market for them to gain control of their competitor’s neglected customers and increase their own profits through word of mouth.
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Build Your Fortune Now!
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The reality is, whether the sky is falling or not, life still goes on. Bills still have to be paid. Children still have to be fed. Money still changes hands. The question is: will consumers be spending it with you or your competitor?
During the Great Depression, a lot of fortunes were built. We often have the mistaken impression that business came to a grinding halt, but that’s just not the case. My grandfather went from having 25 cents to his name and sleeping on a loading dock with his wife to owning a fleet of trucks. He took the last 25 cents he had in his pocket and turned it into $20 million during his lifetime. The principles that made that fortune are written about in my free e-Book, Michael Traveler's Supersize Your Sales through Word-of-Mouse.
The history books have countless reports of shrewd businessmen who cleverly reframed their customer’s perception of their business and made money during the worst of times, while their competitors were complaining about a sluggish economy and business being slow. This can be your story, too. It’s all a matter of reframing your customer’s perspective …
It’s all about changing how they see you and getting ‘em talking!
Research shows that during bad times, people want to surround themselves with things that comfort them. They want their children to feel safe and loved. They want their family close to them during times of uncertainty.
Sales of comfort items skyrocketed after 9/11.
People find reassurance in items that remind them of their childhood or better times or a place where they felt safe like their grandmother’s house. You’ll notice that publications like My Guide to the Backroads of America have a very comfy, homey look … designed to help make readers feel relaxed and warm and safe, designed to call up or produce good memories and warm feelings, to make a person feel welcome and at home ...
... designed to help spark word of mouth!
During bad times, it’s wise to align your business with warm and safe and comforting things, to do everything you can to make your potential customers feel secure. I call this evocative reframing.
By helping your customers remember that life does go on, that this too shall pass and that at least we have each other and that’s what is really most important, you are helping put their fears to rest and ignite the spirit of hope and determination, the American Spirit, the same spirit that carved a nation out of the wild frontier.
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How Do Your Customers See You?
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It really is all a matter of perspective, all about how you look at things, how you reframe your image in your customer's mind’s eye. Take the Cracker Barrel restaurants, for example. They serve basic home-cookin’, chicken and potatoes, meat loaf and green beans, pork chops and corn. Now, their food is good. But there’s a whole lot more to Cracker Barrel than just their food …
The Cracker Barrel experience begins as you walk onto a wooden porch with rocking chairs, an apple barrel and a checker board game. It continues as you walk inside to a general store, rich with nostalgic appeal from yesteryear.
You are greeted by folks dressed in clothing that fits the nostalgic atmosphere and led to wooden tables and seated in wooden chairs. The walls are adorned with more items from yesteryear and your drinks are brought to you in mason jars. Cracker Barrel is not just selling food. They’re selling a dining experience and evoking memories of yesteryear and all the good feelings that come with it, feelings of an old-time general store, grandma’s house, a taste of small town country livin’ and connecting all those feelings with the dining experience.
This is the secret to succeeding in a bad economy (or a good one), the formula for competing against larger chain stories outselling you on price. By adding value to what you sell, whether through superior customer service, atmosphere or simply by caring more …
… you win, your customers win, everybody wins.
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You Are More Than What You Sell
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After all, you are more than just a bunch of products on a shelf. You are more than just an employee, punching the clock at some big chain store, being paid minimum wage. Your current customers buy from you, because of your vast knowledge and experience. They buy from you, because of the great service you give them. They buy from you, because they have grown to trust and depend on you as a valuable resource.
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All of this is what you are actually selling. Your knowledge. Your service. Trust. This is what adds value to the experience. This is what makes you a valuable resource and why they would entrust you with their hard-earned money. This is why your customers buy from you, rather than the big chain store. And it is this experience as a whole that you must find a way to show to potential new customers, if you want them to buy from you.
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They don’t know about your vast knowledge and experience, unless you show them. They don’t know about your outstanding customer service, unless you show them. And they may never know about either of these things, if you wait til after the sale to show them.
To learn affordable and effective ways that you can tap into the power of Word-of-Mouth (and online, Word-of-Mouse) to show potential customers up-front (before they've even spent a penny with you) about your extraordinary customer service, vast knowledge, superior service and amazing product(s), download my free e-Book, Michael Traveler's Super Size Your Sales through Word-of-Mouse and discover how you too can .
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Reserve Your Free Copy Now!
Yes, I'd like to Reserve My Absolutely 100% Free Copy
of SuperSize Your Sales through Word-of-Mouse ...
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Note: by requesting a free copy of Super Size Your Sales through Word of Mouse, you are giving us permission to contact you, in order to provide you with the ebook. However, this does not obligate you to buy anything and your personal information (such as, your email address) will not be shared with anyone nor will you be bombarded with unsolicited emails from us. We respect your privacy and take every measure humanly possible to respect and protect it.
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- Truly awesome tools that you provide and I am very excited to put these truths into practice. I believe you hit this one out of the park!
- That's our goal ... to teach site owners how to knock it out of the park ... word-of-mouse can do that ... it has the power (when used with the principles we teach) to transform perception, to excite people and help them rave about your site and your products and services to virtually everyone they know ... why? because you're doing more than is expected of you, you've created a compelling product and an extraordinary experience, and most importantly, you're doing the Right Thing simply because it's the Right Thing to do ... and people can tell when that's your philosophy ... it comes through in everything you do,
- Every little detail and it captures the imagination and gets people talking. What's cool about the Roadside Cafe is that it provides all the tools needed to produce word-of-mouse marketing at absolutely no charge. So, a small web site owner with a limited budget can tap into these resources by simply signing up for a Basic Membership (for free) and get started right away marketing their site using this powerful person-to-person technique.
And for those who want to put jet fuel in these tools (and potentially produce results faster and in greater quantity) and really make consumers rave, they can do so by shining the spotlight on their blog (and whatever else they've created in the Cafe) for under $20 by purchasing a special low-cost marketing package through our Paid Marketing Program.
Another way to get more people talking is to tap into our educational marketing materials located in the My Traffic Builder library and learn simple, easy-to-do tips and tricks that will take these same free tools and really put them to work for you. Think of it this way ... someone can hand you an artist's paint brush and you can smear paint on canvas or with a little help (perhaps, a paint-by-the-number template), you can create something that is even more appealing.
That's the advantage of our Roadside Cafe community. A site owner can tap into attention-getting tips, tricks and ideas that are as easy to use as 1,2,3 and amazingly effective without breaking the bank. Why go to great effort and invest loads of time to reach a few dozen people, when you can type a few lines of text, create a few links, press a button or two and reach thousands? It just makes sense to tap into the power of word of mouse.
- This is so true. I've been through good times and bad, and regardless of whether we like it or not, life goes on. Bills still have to be paid. Kids still have to be fed. We still buy things. But from whom? When I think back to who I chose to spend my money with, it boiled down to who offered me the most help and whether I trusted them or not. It really does boil down to knowledge, customer service and perception. I'm doing business with the company that actually puts my family first.
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Join Traveler as he explores the Backroads of America, veering off the main highway onto some roads where angels fear to tread. Discover small forgotten towns, talented artists and crafts people, breathtaking places and amazing discoveries.
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