Studies have shown that superstar salespeople spend 60% of their time focused on building rapport with a prospect, way more than the average sales person. What better way to gain their trust than to release a natural “feel-good” chemical and make them laugh! I happened to be searching LinkedIn last week and I came across a fantastic LinkedIn group called “Brilliant Ads.” I took the most hilarious ones just for you because…

1. Seeing these massively successful campaigns will give you some good creative muse for your next marketing campaign.
2. I’ve been using these pictures as a sales tool to send to my potential clients to break the ice, crack a good joke, and win some rapport through text message, facebook chat, and email. (I even put #8 in a proposal right before the pricing to soften them before the close).
3. Because I find these hilarious and I want you to enjoy them as well

How can you do something like these ads in your next campaign…

The Funniest Insurance Ad Ever. Can you create a picture and caption like this for your company?

A picture is worth a thousand words. Can you capture the perfect picture that puts your buyer in urgency, pain, or laughter? This Diamond company did all three.

Can you use the holidays to post something seasonally funny? Welcome to the scariest day of the year…

Educate your buyer about why you’re better than your competition! Even something as simple as this, highly effective! (Notice how many likes this got on LinkedIn, almost double what all the other posts received).

Can you create something that’s innovative and grabs attention? How many employees do you have in the field? Did you ever consider using their cars as billboards? #guerillamarketing

Can you come up with a creative place to put your ads where people haven’t seen them before and find it clever?

McDonalds took thinking out of the box to a new level. What out of the box thinking can you create in your marketing mediums?

HILARIOUS. This is the one I’ve been using in my emails and proposals to potential clients… “P.S. I saw this ad a couple days ago on LinkedIn and found it amusing. I think it’s a great analogy of what our work will do together… All you need is [insert what you will give them] and it changes everything. ;)”

What clever merch can you place your company information on? I’ve been keeping this stick of chapstick for years because it tastes amazing and the provider that put their information on it has been on the top of my mind years later because of it. Where can you place your information where people will continue to see it for years to come?

Who is your target market? Can you speak in their language? Jacoby&Meyer knew millennials liked emoji’s and this campaign has been a huge hit for them.

Hah. Too funny. Be clever and remember laughter is a great way to gain rapport with clients. The difference between superstar salespeople and mediocre is their ability to build a lasting relationship.

If you’re looking to spice up your marketing material, or find more compelling ways to close more sales download our chapter that changes lives from our New York Times Best Seller The Ultimate Sales Machine. Or if you’d like to speak to someone about growing your company faster, better, smarter, sign up for a 22 minute strategy call with one of our growth specialists.

Love and light,

Amanda Holmes
CEO -Chet Holmes International

P.S. Have YOU ever put together a clever campaign? Tell me about it below in the comments box!

[Case Study] This Boosted Sales 1,100% for Chet Holmes International

A few weeks ago, our friends at LeadPages asked if they could profile our company in a case study. I didn’t just say yes—I told them:

“I’m going to be the best case study you’ve ever had.”

Businesses routinely see impressive conversion results when they start using LeadPages’ landing pages and other tools, but I’m not sure anyone would have predicted we could take our sales conversion rate up by 1,100%.

I want to share with you exactly what I did to grow our business while taking our operations into the digital age. In this post, we cover:

• How Content Can Build Excitement: This sequence of emails and lead magnets kept people highly interested from opt-in to purchase.

• My Exact Campaign Flow: Step by step, you’ll see how I turned tons of people from cold leads into members of Chet Holmes International.

• The Four Templates I Used to Build My Campaign: You’ll even get a direct link to download them yourself when you read the post.

I’m still a little wowed by the results we’ve seen, and I think you will be too! The post is full of strategies you can apply to your own business. You might get some good ideas about what you can do with your LeadPages tool, check it out here.
Enjoy!

Amanda Holmes
Chet Holmes International

Optimizing email marketing can greatly benefit businesses.

Whether your company is involved in selling to consumers or other businesses, email marketing is a powerful tool that offers some unique advantages.

A slight tune-up of marketing strategies or more sweeping changes as part of a plan for how to grow sales will both benefit from paying attention to the latest email marketing advice from Business 2 Community.

Necessary tactics

Some of the updates to messaging have come about because scamming and phishing emails now use strategies that once helped legitimate marketers reach prospective clients. Because the public has adapted to older concepts like personalized greetings, change is required. A study from Temple University’s Fox School of Business found that 95 percent of customers responded poorly when their names appeared as part of an emailed greeting from a business.

The negative reaction to personalized online greetings – one-on-one communication should still involve the use of a client’s name – stems from fears of identity theft and the invasion of privacy. The study specifically suggests not greeting new customers by name for this reason.

Business 2 Community recommends using collected data to point out products that they may be interested in. This strategy shows you know their preferences but avoids the personalized greeting pitfall.

Long subject lines are another area to avoid. While being descriptive is important for email marketing, going above 70 characters is discouraged because it doesn’t produce increased an click-through rate or more responses.

Refresh and refocus

A business growth plan for a company that uses email marketing as a key component should involve a review of these strategies for effectiveness. The Long Island Business News provides a checklist for growing the reach and results of your efforts.

Businesses should be worried about sending too many and too few emails to customers. While complaints and unsubscribe rates should be carefully watched, companies shouldn’t be afraid of sending out more messages, as long as they are engaging and targeted to consumer interests. More messages means an opportunity for more clicks, reads and purchases.

Optimizing email campaigns for mobile viewing should also be of paramount importance. A heavily formatted email can look good on a computer screen but terrible on a smartphone, which more customers are using to view messages. Using a design focused on mobile viewing won’t negatively impact views on standard computers. A large font is also a simple change that will make reading such messages on the smaller screens of smartphones easier.

Let’s take a peek at some of them first.

• There are hundreds of social media channels including the big four, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and YouTube… with Google+ rapidly playing catch-up
• The ever popular but difficult route of traditional search pay per click ads for Google and Bing and the newer pay per call solution platforms that reach local services search networks
• Blogging, micro blogging and guest blogging on another popular blog are powerful ways to grow your influence and reach your audience
• SEO strategies range far and wide but all come back to a solid content marketing strategy which may encompass articles, white papers, etc… education-based marketing at its finest
• Traditional advertising is still an option and includes print advertising, TV, radio, infomercials, news segment bumper ads and more
• YouTube videos are still making a splash and drive great brand awareness and backlink traffic, video content in general is huge but can come with a big price tag to produce original content
• Direct Marketing (email and mail)
• PR is still an important focus which may include press releases/article placements/feature stories/pitching to bloggers, etc.
• Webinars help you provide free education to your engaged audience and these can be executed a variety of ways with an offer at the end or not
• … and the list goes on and on.

Honing in on the right channels for your audience, message and product/service can be very overwhelming. To stay within budget and get it all done in a timely manner—you have to have a plan.

When we crafted our marketing plan for this year there were at least 15 different marketing methods or channels in the strategy. But many of them align together in groupings, for example for us to create, market and complete a webinar we utilize: email marketing, banner ads, a newsletter, social media, a press release, blogs, landing pages (post-event), post-event sales touch strategy workflow, surveys, key metrics, etc. That’s ten different channels all focused on the same effort and the same end goal; get people into an awesome webinar, share our knowledge so they can bring something powerful back to their business. And sometimes webinar attendees realize that from all that was presented they may feel they can’t do it all on their own and CHI is here to help deepen their sales and marketing skills, provide perspective through master coaches and build strategies and tactics that will double their business.

So for your business it may only make sense to set your sights on the initiative level and then drill down into the marketing channels it’s going to take to get the best exposure and cross-promotional mix needed to meet your specific goals. Otherwise you could be swimming in channels, ideas and disparate strategies without a real direction or goal for the end result of all the expense, time and energy these marketing tactics will take to pull off.

“Focusing is about saying No.” ― Steve Jobs

Steve had it 100% correct. You cannot and will not succeed in your marketing efforts if you say yes to every new strategy, tactic or ad channel that comes along. Before taking the leap and saying yes to a new marketing option, evaluate it with this easy checklist.

6 Questions to Ask Before Starting Any New Marketing Strategy

1. What is the goal of doing this marketing strategy?
   1. What metrics will I use to know if I hit that goal?
2. Do we have adequate time/energy/budget to justify the activity and what is the ROI?
3. Will this reach my ideal target audience and engage them to take a specific action?  (At CHI we call your ‘idea’ target your ‘best buyers’, these are the folks with upsell, cross sell and referral potential because you are the perfect fit for them.)
4. How does this fit within my current marketing mix? (Making various channels work together, i.e. creating a marketing mix, is where you will find your greatest success.)
   1. Will it optimize, leverage or cannibalize those other efforts in play?
5. Is this a brand awareness method or an inbound lead-generating method? Or a combo punch?
   1. And which do I really need to focus on at this time to meet my goals?
6. Does my team have the skills, time, and expertise to fully execute on this method?

If you answered NO to two or more questions this probably isn’t the right new tactic or the right timing to take on this particular thing. Deciding on a new tactic is one thing, but executing on it is a whole other issue so makes sure you’ve evaluated from all sides, consulted your team for their knowledge and input and then make a final decision that fits your brand strategy and goals for lead generation, revenue generation or brand awareness. Because keep in mind, not all tactics or channels drive results to all three of those goals. Often a channel will only drive to one or possibly two things and ancillary tactics will help to fill out the third if it’s on your plan.

Your Key Takeaways

• Create your plan and stay focused on its end goals as you roll through new tactics.
• Don’t get overwhelmed, go back to the six questions and stay true to your mission.
• Remember it’s OK to say No.

“A clear vision, backed by definite plans, gives you a tremendous feeling of confidence and personal power.” — Brian Tracy

To your success!

Danielle Lafontaine, Chet Holmes International