Author: Ryan Dolotallas

A client complained to me that his email campaign wasn’t working.

“The phone’s just not ringing,” he said.

He’s a commercial real estate broker.

He sends notices about properties for sale to prospects. The emails link to a more detailed flier and prospectus.

I checked the stats for the last email he sent before he told me the campaign didn’t work.

Twenty-two people clicked the link to the flier/prospectus.

I suggested he send a follow-up email to those who clicked, inviting them to tour the property. I suggested he should follow that email with a phone call one day later.

He did what I suggested.

Five people scheduled tours.

Two bid on the property.

He sold it for more than he’d hoped.

He now tracks who clicks on his emails and conducts the same follow-up every time.

Digital marketing tools — email, social media and others — haven’t reinvented how business-to-business salespeople close deals. You still need to pick up the phone. You still need to meet in person. You still need to work through the details.

This broker was blasting emails and expected the phone to ring off the hook with buyers asking, “Where do I sign.”

When that didn’t happen, he decided email didn’t work.

But it DID work…

…as a prospecting tool…

…to show him who was interested…

…so he could get to work connecting with real, warm prospects…

…and close sales more quickly.

If you typically close deals with one-on-one, personal interactions on the phone or in person, don’t expect your email campaigns to change that.

Emails won’t close the sales. Those personal interactions will.

But emails will reveal with whom you should interact. You don’t have time to call the 2,200 people in your database. But you can easily call the 22 who clicked on your email. Chances are one of those calls will lead to a sale..

Tom
MarketVolt

p.s. Here’s a fun riddle: Name the two states in the USA that border the most states. Answer: Tennessee (Missouri, Kentucky, Virginia, North Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi and Arkansas) and Missouri (Iowa, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas and Nebraska). 

p.p.s. We help businesses figure out what they sell and how. Then we help them identify and connect with their target markets so people will view you as a welcome guest and listen to what you’re saying. If you want to discuss how to make it happen for your business, email me  at  tom@marketvolt.com. For no charge and no strings attached, we’ll discuss with you how you’re building email lists, generating new leads and generally finding and connecting with prospects.

If you like these emails, please do me this favor: Forward this to someone who might also enjoy it and encourage them to sign up for future emails on our website at MarketVolt.com.

This is the story of a $51 million boondoggle called The Loop Trolley. The Trolley is a 2.2-mile streetcar line in St. Louis that connects the Missouri History Museum in Forest Park with the Delmar Loop entertainment district. Those who pitched the idea said the Trolley would be a major tourist attraction, shuttling visitors from a popular museum to a popular dining and shopping district. It hasn’t turned out that way. The Loop Trolley Company, the nonprofit that manages the line, projected annual ticket revenue of $394,433. After seven months of operation in July 2019, the Trolley Company reported 11,364 tickets sold for $22,283 in revenue. One month later, the Trolley Company announced it would hire comedians to deliver stand-up routines on the streetcar. They dubbed this add-on feature “Laugh Tracks.” “We’re super pumped about it,” Trolley Co. spokesperson Brittany Robbins told a local newspaper. “You know, the Loop Trolley is one of St. Louis’ great attractions, and this just adds to the experience St. Louis and tourists visiting from elsewhere will be able to enjoy when riding.” Ummm… Not so much. Laugh Tracks has derailed. Last week, The Trolley Company asked local governments for a $700,000 bailout to stay afloat. That’s after spending more than $51 million — from a $25 million federal grant, a 1-cent local sales tax and other sources — to build the thing. No one’s laughing now. I’m sad about this. A little mad, too. I’m a taxpayer, and I paid for this. I wonder who conducted the market research. I wonder if there was ANY market research.  Were there really throngs of tourists clamoring for an old-timey way to travel from the museum to the loop? If there were, show me the study. Were they really getting feedback that said, “I’d ride the Trolley more often…if only the ride was more entertaining?” If so, show me the survey results. Don’t get me wrong. I think the Missouri History Museum is a great place. I encourage you to go when you’re in St. Louis. Same goes for the Delmar Loop. I eat there often. I’ve spent countless hours watching movies and gobbling popcorn in the Tivoli movie theater, and I’ve bought countless treasures at Vintage Vinyl — one of the planet’s great used record stores. The Museum and the Loop are two great places in this great city. That doesn’t mean there’s demand to travel between the two on refurbished streetcars. Those who championed the idea are good, honest people who believed this would be a hit. The world is littered with failed business ideas hatched by good, honest people who believed they were on to something big. The common thread in many of those failures: Those good, honest people can’t answer two key questions: What problem will this solve? What desire will this fulfill? If you can answer those questions, you probably have a viable business… … and you have a good story to promote the business. Tom MarketVolt p.s. Here’s a fun riddle: Name the two states in the USA that border the most states. Answer: Tennessee (Missouri, Kentucky, Virginia, North Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi and Arkansas) and Missouri (Iowa, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas and Nebraska).  p.p.s. We help businesses figure out what they sell and how. Then we help them identify and connect with their target markets so people will view you as a welcome guest and listen to what you’re saying. If you want to discuss how to make it happen for your business, email me  at  tom@marketvolt.com. For no charge and no strings attached, we’ll discuss with you how you’re building email lists, generating new leads and generally finding and connecting with prospects. If you like these emails, please do me this favor: Forward this to someone who might also enjoy it and encourage them to sign up for future emails on our website at MarketVolt.com.

I live in Missouri…

…which is adjacent to Nebraska…

…which has a tourism slogan: “Honestly, it’s not for everyone.”

I’m not kidding.

And I love it!

In a press release that unveiled the slogan last year, the Nebraska Tourism Commission declared, “Nebraska may not be on everyone’s bucket list of places to visit, but if you like experiences that are unpretentious and uncomplicated or if you enjoy escaping the big city life for moments of solitude in the open plains, creating your own fun or exploring the quirkiness the state has to offer, chances are, you will like it here.”

Commission Chair Deb Loseke explained the campaign’s rationale. “We discovered that we can’t offer something to everyone – but to those that we can, this campaign speaks to their sense of adventure and discovering what we as Nebraskans are all about.”

That’s strong.

Pull out the virtual highlighter and note: “We discovered that we can’t offer something to everyone…”

That’s the big marketing idea here, ladies and gentlemen.

No business can offer something to everyone.

Good marketers recognize that. Good marketers focus on those who want what they offer. Just like an airplane speeding past “flyover country,” you should pass over those who don’t want or need what you offer and focus your marketing only on those who will care.

Don’t be afraid to focus on fewer. It will save you time and energy and generate better ROI. 

Tom
MarketVolt

p.s. Here’s a fun riddle: Name the two states in the USA that border the most states. Answer: Tennessee (Missouri, Kentucky, Virginia, North Carolina, Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi and Arkansas) and Missouri (Iowa, Illinois, Kentucky, Tennessee, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Kansas and Nebraska). 

p.p.s. We help businesses figure out what they sell and how. Then we help them identify and connect with their target markets so people will view you as a welcome guest and listen to what you’re saying. If you want to discuss how to make it happen for your business, email me  at  tom@marketvolt.com. For no charge and no strings attached, we’ll discuss with you how you’re building email lists, generating new leads and generally finding and connecting with prospects.

If you like these emails, please do me this favor: Forward this to someone who might also enjoy it and encourage them to sign up for future emails on our website at MarketVolt.com.

One day last week, Burger King restaurants in Argentina stopped selling the “Whopper” for one day and encouraged customers, instead, to head over to McDonald’s for a Big Mac. 

It was “McHappy Day” in Argentina, the day McDonald’s donates a portion of sales to a charitable foundation that helps children with cancer. 

In print ads published after “McHappy Day,” Burger King trumpeted “A Day Without Whopper — The Day We Donated Our Guests to McDonald’s Charity.”

Here’s one such ad.

The move generated a ton of free press and social media buzz.

I think that’s a pretty good marketing stunt.

What do you think? I’d love to hear from you.

Tom
MarketVolt

p.s. We help businesses figure out what they sell and how. Then we help them identify and connect with their target markets so people will view you as a welcome guest and listen to what you’re saying. If you want to discuss how to make it happen for your business, email me  at  tom@marketvolt.com. For no charge and no strings attached, we’ll discuss with you how you’re building email lists, generating new leads and generally finding and connecting with prospects.

p.p.s. If you like these emails, please do me this favor: Forward this to someone who might also enjoy it and encourage them to sign up for future emails on our website at MarketVolt.com.

Earlier this month, I shared the news that marketing great Dan Kennedy was in hospice care.

Since then, I’ve been recalling many of the valuable lessons I learned over the years from Dan. 

Here’s one of my favorites: 

Dan often told the story of being disturbed at home by a door-to-door salesman who rang the doorbell while he was watching the ballgame. 

An unwanted pest! 

A few weeks later, again while Dan was watching a ballgame, someone started pounding on his back patio door. This time Dan was really P-O’d and was ready to let this pest have it. 

Turns out, it wasn’t a salesman this time. It was a passerby telling him that some brush in the backyard was ablaze. The good Samaritan diverted Dan’s attention from the ballgame, but he was far from an unwanted pest…

…He helped Dan avert tragedy. 

He was a welcome guest. 

The best marketers devise strategies and tactics to be a welcome guest, not an unwanted pest. 

Tom
MarketVolt

p.s. We help businesses figure out what they sell and how. Then we help them identify and connect with their target markets so people will view you as a welcome guest and listen to what you’re saying. If you want to discuss how to make it happen for your business, email me  at  tom@marketvolt.com. For no charge and no strings attached, we’ll discuss with you how you’re building email lists, generating new leads and generally finding and connecting with prospects.

p.p.s. If you like these emails, please do me this favor: Forward this to someone who might also enjoy it and encourage them to sign up for future emails on our website at MarketVolt.com.