Category: Weekly Story

Baseball great Albert Pujols got his 3,000th hit earlier this month. 

I’ve rooted all my life for the St. Louis Cardinals. So it broke my heart when Pujols broke up with the Cardinals in 2012 to join the Anaheim Angels.

The heartache reminded me of my ninth-grade girlfriend, Susie Wallace. Susie and I had just finished a slow dance at the mixer when she broke the news: She was dumping me for Stevie O’Shea.

“Why?” I asked.

“Because he appreciates me,” she said. And then she strolled across the dance floor, grabbed Stevie’s hand and left the gym without looking back.

“But I DO appreciate you,” I mumbled. Too late.

After signing a $254 million contract with the Angels, Albert said he might have taken less money if the Cardinals had appreciated him more.

“But we DO appreciate you, Albert,” Cardinals’ management said. Too late.

Albert and Susie have me wondering:

Do you appreciate your customers? Do you show it?

If not, brace yourself. They might bolt to Anaheim or run to Lover’s Lane with Stevie O’Shea.

Customers break up with businesses for various reasons. A vast majority of them will bolt when they feel unappreciated, perceive indifference or simply forget about the previous business.

In fact, many will forgive a service slight or tolerate a slightly inferior product – as long as they feel appreciated.

That’s why you need a customer appreciation communication plan – before it’s too late.

Whether you communicate by email, snail mail, social media or some other medium, here are four tips to guide your customer appreciation plan:

1. Stay in touch – at least monthly. If you don’t have an email or print newsletter, you need to launch one.

2. Educate and entertain. If all you do is pitch products, your customers will tune out.

3. Be interactive. Let customers post on social media, in online surveys, in comments on your blog. Thank them for praise. Thank them for constructive criticism. Show them you’re listening. Appreciate their feedback, and they’ll appreciate you.

4. Get personal. Use personalized salutations in your emails. Tailor your content and special offers to specific audiences. Don’t send everything to everybody. The more you tailor content to customers’ interests, the more you say, “I know you and appreciate you.” They’ll feel the same.

Want to learn more about how to appreciate your customers so they’ll appreciate you? See the p.s. below…

Thanks for reading.

Tom
MarketVolt

p.s. Our on-demand webinars reveal great ways to build connections with prospects and customers. We’re currently running two webinars. We’ll be adding other topics soon. 

• 5 Ways B2B Businesses Use Email Marketing To Simplify & Accelerate Connection-Building & Sales
    
  
• 5 Ways B2C Businesses Use Email Marketing to Increase Profits

WARNING: You may never microwave a convenience store burrito again after reading this kinda-gross, but kinda-funny(?) story!!!

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A job-seeker in Aurora, CO prepped for an interview and drug test by taking a cup of urine to a 7-11 near her prospective employer’s office.

She popped the urine in the oven, set it to “High,” pressed start and waited.

Just guessing, but I think the urine wasn’t hers. And I bet it was drug-free.

For those wondering “WTF?”: To fool the drug-testers with someone else’s clean urine, you gotta make it warm — as if it just streamed from YOUR bladder.

Anyhow, back to the microwave: It didn’t take long for the cup-o’-pee to reach that point that all us microwavers dread — the explosion threshold.

We’ve all heard the sound – a pop or dull thud, nothing like TNT, but messy all the same.

The clerk heard it and then watched as the drug-test-faker opened the oven door.

Yellow liquid dripped onto the counter and the store filled with that unmistakable aroma…

…of straight-from-the-oven pee-pee.

“Clean it up!” the clerk demanded.

The faker wiped a pool from the oven onto the floor and then bolted.

She didn’t get far.

The cops found her (and issued a citation) at the prospective employer’s. She was waiting for her interview (most likely wondering how the heck she was going to pass the drug test).

One more thing: She didn’t get the job.

My kindergarten teacher, Opel Bossey (yep, I had a kindergarten teacher named Mrs. Bossey), used to say, “Cheaters never prosper!”

With all due respect, Mrs. B.,  that’s a nice idea. But it’s not true. 

Cheaters do prosper occasionally (perhaps often).

But that doesn’t mean you oughta cheat.

And there’s nothing like a good cheater-DIDN’T-prosper story to remind you…

You can prosper in marketing and communications without tricks. Without misleading subject lines. Without fudging the facts. Without misrepresentations. Without cheating.

Next week I’m going to share a story about the on-demand webinars we now offer (see the p.s. below for details). Some so-called “marketing experts” encouraged us to mislead and fudge and misrepresent to increase webinar response rates. We chose a different path.

Thanks for reading, and remember… If you’re going to microwave a cup-o’-pee, use the medium power setting. 

Tom
MarketVolt

p.s. On-demand webinars are here. We’re offering 5-in-25 Webinars (five great marketing ideas in less than 25 minutes) 24/7. Show up any day, at any time, and the webinar will be starting within 15 minutes. We’re currently running two webinars, both of which dive into how you can segment your list to deliver the right information to the right people at the right time. 

• 5 Ways B2B Businesses Use Email Marketing To Simplify & Accelerate Connection-Building & Sales
    
  
• 5 Ways B2C Businesses Use Email Marketing to Increase Profits

This is a tale about how to annoy email subscribers and encourage them to opt-out.

I signed up for Nordstrom Rack’s email list last year after I bought a couple of shirts from them.

Men’s shirts (I’m a man).

Since then, I’ve received almost-daily emails from Nordstrom’s. Eighty percent of the emails peddle women’s products.

Intimate apparel: “Enhance your favorite assets.”

Dresses: “Breezy silhouettes that are always in bloom.”

And handbags. So many friggin’ handbags!

Dooney & Bourke handbags two weeks ago. Rebecca Minkoff handbags last week. And Kate Spade handbags yesterday — TWICE.

10 a.m.: The “Online Flash Event” for Kate Spade handbags (“Bring A Little Fun With You Wherever You Go.”).

5 p.m.: “The kate spade new york Event ends soon.”

I’m finished with the breezy, bloomy, asset-enhancing emails. I’ve opted-out.

So what’s this mean for you?

Don’t make the same mistake Nordstrom’s made. Don’t send everything to everybody every time.

If you’re going to send an email that resonates with only a segment of your audience, send it only to that segment.

Nordstrom, should know I’m a man. They can check their sales logs. I buy only men’s products. They can mine third-party data. They’ll see that the guy named “Thomas Ruwitch” with the credit card they have on file, with the address they have on file is, in fact, a man.

So they can put me in the “interested in men’s stuff” bucket. And, please(!), take me out of the “interested in women’s stuff” bucket.

Clients tell me all the time that they’re afraid of sending too many emails.

Too many emails is not the reason people opt-out.

Frequency is not the issue. Irrelevance is the issue.

If you pound the inbox with emails that are not relevant to your subscribers, they’ll stop opening your emails.

Or they’ll opt-out.

Or, worse yet, they’ll click the “this is spam” button even if they originally opted in.

It’s easier than you many think to segment your list and send the right information to the right people at the right time.

Check out the p.s. below and sign up for one of our webinars if you’d like to learn how…

Tom
MarketVolt

p.s. On-demand webinars are here. We’re offering 5-in-25 Webinars (five great marketing ideas in less than 25 minutes) 24/7. Show up any day, at any time, and the webinar will be starting within 15 minutes. We’re currently running two webinars, both of which dive into how you can segment your list to deliver the right information to the right people at the right time. 

• 5 Ways B2B Businesses Use Email Marketing To Simplify & Accelerate Connection-Building & Sales
    
  
• 5 Ways B2C Businesses Use Email Marketing to Increase Profits

I watched a rerun of Curb Your Enthusiasm yesterday in which Larry David gets into it with a guy who asks him to lunch. Larry and this guy are both from LA, but they run into each other in New York.

The guy suggests that he and Larry grab lunch the next day.

Larry refuses.

“So let me get this straight,” the guy says. “I’m going to eat alone tomorrow!?”

Larry: “Why do you want to eat with ME?”

The guy: “Because we never get a chance to eat in LA.”

Larry: “Because we’re not friends.”

The guy: “We’re not friends because we never spend time together.”

Larry: “We don’t spend time together because I don’t want to spend time together.”

It’s the typical Curb Your Enthusiasm gag:

Larry says out loud the things that many of us think but are afraid to spit out. He is so blunt and so emotionally clumsy that he usually comes off as the fool. We laugh at Larry — the manner-less clown.

But how foolish is he, really?

Forget Larry’s sloppy delivery and focus only on the core message.

He says, in effect: I see no value interacting with you so I’m not going to waste my time doing it.

In life and in business, that’s a wise approach.

Business people spend so much time on worthless interactions. Meanwhile, they complain that they don’t have enough to get everything done.

I’ve been to countless breakfasts, lunches, dinners, coffees, live meetings, virtual meetings and other get-togethers with people who bring little value to me and, most importantly, to whom I offer little value.

Why was I there?

Sure, in some cases, I discovered this only after meeting.

But too often, I should have known before I met.

I should have asked (at least to myself, if not out loud), “Why do you want to meet with me?”

If you don’t anticipate mutual benefit from the relationship, don’t take the meeting.

Better yet, turn the tables when you’re chasing a meeting and ask, “Why do they want to meet with me?”

If you don’t have a clear answer that has something to do with mutual benefit, don’t chase the meeting.

Sometimes, as difficult and awkward as it may be, you have to say “No.”

Thanks for reading!

Tom
MarketVolt

p.s. I got some great feedback from some subscribers who said they want to attend some our webinars, but they can’t make it at the times we’ve offered. We’re fixing that. Beginning in the next few days, we’re going to offer on-demand webinars. Rather than joining us live, at pre-set times, we’ll pre-record the webinars, and you’ll be able to attend whenever you wish. Stay tuned for details. 

When I was a dumb kid, I feared my IQ would drop if I had my wisdom teeth pulled.

I was over that by the time I was 19 and dating Kathy.

She had her wisdom teeth pulled the summer we dated. She couldn’t stand the pain.

I suggested she rinse with warm salt water. I had a tooth pulled, and warm salt water helped.

Her reply: “We don’t have any salt water around the house.”

Hmmmmmm.

“Do you have any SALT around the house?” I asked.

“Yes,” she said.

“How about WATER?” I asked.

Long pause. And then she said, “Ohhhhhhhhhhhhh. Yeaaaaah. Thanks. I’ll make some salt water.”

Maybe she once knew you don’t have to buy salt water at the Salt Water Store — but she forgot when her dentist yanked that wisdom from her.

Maybe she never knew…

We often have the ingredients. The recipe is easy. But we don’t realize how simple it is to put it all together.

So it goes with marketing and content creation.

I hear it all the time:

“I understand the benefits of email marketing, blogging and other content strategies. But I don’t have any content around the house. And it’s such a pain to create it.”

I used to think the same…

…Until I found the ingredients in my Gmail “Sent” folder.

Before I ever launched a blog or sent an email newsletter, I covered key topics — in individual emails to prospects and clients.

Here’s an example…

Over the years, multiple clients have asked me whether it’s OK to purchase an email list for their marketing. That’s a great topic for a blog post or an email newsletter.

If I search my “Sent” folder for “purchased list,” I find multiple emails in which I answered the question.

Cut the answer from my “Sent” folder. Paste it in a word processor. And I have a rough draft for a post or newsletter.

Sure, it needs some tweaking. But that’s a lot easier than starting from scratch.

What’s in your “Sent” folder? You may have the ingredients to make some great content.

That’s just one simple recipe for overcoming the pain of content creation. If you want some other recipes or generally need some tips or help with content creation, click here and see the “p.s.” below.

Thanks for reading!

Tom
MarketVolt

p.s.  MarketVolt helps businesses overcome the pain of content development so you can garner the benefits of email marketing, blogging (etc.) without the headache and hassle.

Shoot me an email (tom@MarketVolt.com) if you’d like to:

• Figure out what topics will resonate with your audience and help your business. 
• Discover simple recipes for creating effective content. 
• Have someone create and deliver/post content for you — quickly and affordably (we have a team of marketing experts who can do it for you). 
• Get some free advice on how to make your existing content marketing be more effective. 

The meeting went off the rails when I asked, “How are you going to build your email list?”

The nonprofit executive director replied, “We’re going to borrow lists from some other nonprofits we partner with.”

“I recommend against that,” I said.

“But we do that all the time with direct (postal) mail,” she said.

I tried to explain the difference between direct mail and email. I tried to explain the difference between SPAM and opt-in email.

But she wasn’t listening. I lost her at “I recommend against that.” She didn’t invite me to meet again.

I was thinking about that meeting yesterday when the news broke about Missouri Governor Eric Greitens. Before running for Governor, he founded and ran a nonprofit called The Mission Continues.

Greitens allegedly “borrowed” the nonprofit’s enormous email list — without permission — and used the list for his political campaign.

I’ll presume the Governor is innocent until proven guilty.

But for the sake of a marketing lesson, let’s imagine that thousands of people who opted-in for email from The Mission Continues received unsolicited emails from the Greitens Campaign.

I don’t know whether the nonprofit with which I met borrowed those lists from partner agencies. But for the sake of a marketing lesson, let’s imagine that the nonprofit sent unsolicited emails to thousands of people who didn’t ask for them.

Most people don’t like to receive unsolicited email. It frustrates and angers them, and it reflects badly on the sender.

Like it or not, that’s more the case with email than with postal mail. Sure, people don’t love getting piles of junk postal mail. But they tend not to hold it against the companies that send it.

More importantly, the United States Postal Service doesn’t have filters to block future deliveries from those who send junk mail.

SPAM filters will flag you and block future deliveries if you send emails to borrowed or purchased lists.

List-building is a quality-over-quantity game. Communicate with people who know you — existing clients, prospects with whom you’re already conversing via email, subscribers who give you permission to contact them.

Your list may be smaller than the one you borrow or buy, but your results will be better.

Here’s a free resource from our site that will help: Nine Proven List-Building Techniques.

Thanks for reading!

Tom
MarketVolt

The last time I ate a Red Delicious apple, I thought, “Hmmm. ‘Red Delicious?’ That’s half-true. Red? Yes. Delicious? Not so much’?”

Bad texture. Bland taste. All beauty. No substance.

How can something so pretty and shiny be so terrible?

I discovered the nasty secret in this great article in The Atlantic.

Reds used to be delicious. But a chance genetic mutation “made the apples redden earlier (and) also given them a deeper, more uniform color,” according to the article.

“The cosmetic changes were a boon for industrial agriculturalists: Apples that turned rosy before they were fully ripe could be picked earlier and stored longer, and skins with more red pigment tended to be thicker, which extended shelf life and hid bruises. But as genes for beauty were favored over those for taste, the skins grew tough and bitter around mushy, sugar-soaked flesh.”

Apple growers opted for beauty over substance.

So it goes with too many marketers, too.

I’ve seen so many marketing pieces that are prettier than a Grand Canyon sunset but otherwise bland and ineffective. Red Delicious marketing.

Business people spend big bucks and countless hours making their stuff bright and shiny while often neglecting the more important stuff:

Are you targeting the right audience?

Is the copy concise, compelling and persuasive.

Are there good calls-to-action?

In general, is their good marketing strategy in place or is it just a bunch of mush behind a shiny red facade?

I’m not suggesting you have to deliver ugly emails or launch dull-looking websites. I’m saying focus first on the substance: Great marketing strategy, strong copy, calls-to-action, etc.

Then add the sparkle and the shine if you wish.

Want some tips on how to add the substance? See below…
April

Tom
MarketVolt

p.s. Want to add substance to your marketing? Check out MarketVolt.com/Resources. Tons of free downloads, including tips to:

• Improve your website.
   
• Make your marketing messages more persuasive.
   
• Get more referrals.
   
• Increase email open-rates with better subject lines.
   
• Build your email list more quickly.

On April Fool’s Day 1998, Burger King ran a full-page advertisement in USA Today to introduce the new “Left-Handed Whopper”

The ad proclaimed: “Finally, after years of neglect, left-handed eaters will no longer need to conform to traditional right-handed eating methods when enjoying America’s favorite burger.”

Highlights:

• “Whopper rotated a full 180-degrees to ensure better grip on bun…” 
• “Rearranged orientation of condiments, allowing left-handers to have it their way.”
• “Sesame seeds meticulously placed to ensure least amount of loss during consumption.”

Good joke.

Here’s the funniest thing: Thousands of lefties visited Burger Kings that day and asked for the new sandwich.

“Many others requested their own right-handed version,” according to Burger King’s next-day news release. 

Some hear that story and think, “stupid people.” I hear that story and think “smart company.”

Sure, the left-handed Whopper was a joke, but it still promoted the idea that you, the customer, should “have it your way.”

That’s a good idea. That’s the essence of hospitality.

And it’s a good model for all businesses…

Know your audiences and cater to them. Your customers value you more if they think you’re on their side. That should happen in your business transactions. That should happen in your marketing.

When marketing, that means we deliver the right messages to the right people at the right time.

That means messages that are pertinent and valuable.

That means messages that are customized for different audiences — kind of like a left-handed email for lefties. 

I know this may sound a little pie-in-the-sky or difficult to master, but it’s easier than you may think.

If you want to discover how, attend one of my upcoming webinars (details in the p.s. below…)

Thanks for reading (reply with feedback if you want to share some thoughts) and see you next time…

Tom
MarketVolt

p.s. They’re back: 5in25 Webinars — Five Powerful Marketing Lessons Delivered in Less than 25 Minutes. 

We’re offering left-handed and right-handed webinars (just kidding).

We ARE offering separate webinars for B2B and B2C businesses (also webinars for nonprofits coming soon).

Discover how to put the right messages in front of the right people at the right time so you can build connections with your subscribers and grow your business. Webinar times and registration here…

Back in high school, I had a crush on Amanda, but she had a boyfriend named Cam.

A few days before her 16th birthday, she was flirting with me, bad-mouthing Cam, hinting that he was toast.

So I made my move. 

During the birthday party at her house, I snuck up to her room with a dozen long-stem roses and placed them on her bed — without a card.

A few hours after the party, I called her and said, “Do you like the roses?”

“I love them,” she said. “I knew they were from you.”

Then she told me she and Cam were finished. She wanted to “go with” me.

Alright!!!!

But wait…

There was a catch.

The Rolling Stones concert was in eight days, and Cam had two tickets.

“I don’t want to miss The Stones,” she said. “I’ll break up with him AFTER the concert.”

She was going to spend the next eight days pretending she still liked Cam, go to the concert on his dime, break his heart after the concert, and become my sweetie the next day!?

“Sounds good to me,” I said.

In retrospect, I wish I could have rewritten the script.

I wish that voice inside my head told me: “Hmmm… I don’t think this is going to turn out well.”

I wish I had mustered the courage to tell Amanda, “Thanks, but no thanks.”

I wish I had anticipated the inevitable: A month after The Rolling Stones concert, I was toast.

Fast forward a few decades to this morning.

Minutes before I drafted and sent this email (really), I called a prospect who wanted to hire my firm or a big project.

“Thanks, but no thanks,” I told him.

This prospect is a great guy with a great business. The opportunity was lucrative. But it wasn’t the right fit.

That voice inside my head told me: “I don’t think this is going to turn out well.” And I listened.

I had struggled with the decision. Marketers and salespeople are taught to “get to ‘Yes.’”

But sometimes the best thing we can do for ourselves and our business is know when to say “no.”

That voice that says, “This might not go well…” It doesn’t just magically appear. You have to summon it.

You have to take the first step and think, “How will this turn out?” And you have to respond honestly.

You have to have the courage to say, “Thanks, but no thanks.”

Impossible for a 16-year-old boy wooing his crush.

Still not easy for a (relatively) mature businessman with decades of experience.

We work so hard attracting leads, wooing prospects, trying to close the sale.

We cherish the sale. We want the thrill of victory.

In this case, though, it was more thrilling to choose a different path: 

I referred my prospect to another company I trust. The folks at that company are grateful. The prospect is grateful. And I’m relieved and grateful to bypass a project that would not have turned out well for the prospect or me. 

Thanks for reading (reply with feedback if you want to share some thoughts) and see you next time…

Tom
MarketVolt