Many small business owners have a great aversion to marketing. They confuse marketing with the stereotype of a pushy salesperson and with the thought of “selling” themselves.
But the reality is, if you want to succeed in business, you won’t get far without marketing. Fortunately, the Internet has opened up a whole new world of marketing opportunities, where integrity combined with your own unique personality can really set you apart from the crowd.
It really is a massive opportunity but very few businesses are using even a fraction of the Internet’s marketing potential. Of course there are professional Internet marketers with slick sales pages leading to an ‘Order Now’ button and all sorts of persuasion techniques to get you to buy.
But these kind of websites only work in a limited number of markets. There’s a far, far bigger untapped opportunity in most markets to win customers through a softer style of marketing, which allows your integrity and personality to shine through.
This kind of marketing is based on truly believing in your product or service and wanting to share it with your potential customers.
Above all, on the Internet, you need to build trust. And the truth is, people will trust a website that looks like it has a real, genuine person behind it, rather than a slick salesy type of site.
So, here is a fundamental secret to marketing yourself online.
It is based on “attraction rather than promotion”. It means you want to attract customers or clients by marketing yourself and your business authentically and from a place of genuinely wanting to offer them something of value through your product or service.
Consider these two types of business owner. The first is motivated by making money. He (or she) sees his customers simply as a source of income and he wants to use every possible trick in the book to get people to buy. The second business owner is different. He truly believes in his product or service and wants to share it with the world.
Now, which of these two business owners is going to come across as more trustworthy on their website? Well, if the second business owner can grasp just afew basic principles of selling online, they will run rings around their money-driven counterpart.
Here is the secret. Tell your story with honesty and integrity, and inject as much as possible of your own personality. Love yourself, believe in yourself, and put yourself out there on your website. Use photographs of yourself, your staff, your premises, and use audio and video too, if possible.
Because you and your business are unique, your website will be unique. It will stand out from the bland and boring crowd. You’ll be run off your feet with business!
Don’t believe me? Try it and see for yourself. I’ve proved this to be true time and again with my own websites and those of my clients who have followed this approach.
It’s a guaranteed winner.