Category: a slice of STRATEGY

Pure, unadulterated strategy: marketing, brand positioning, & entrepreneurial wisdom. New trends with staying power. Old standbys with inarguable value.
What to embrace, what to avoid, and what to attempt — with steady discernment.

Cash flow, creativity, and compassion are not mutually exclusive™

How to Make Facebook + Instagram Ads Work for Your Business: A Chat with Devani Freeman

Posted on by Red Slice

Social media is a big part of promoting your business. Except for a few folks I know who have managed to build empires without it (believe me, they are outliers), social media is one of the best ways to boost your visibility and nurture a warm audience. It’s a fabulous way to share your content, and help people know, like and trust your brand.

Am I preaching to the choir?

But many of us don’t always understand the nuances of the platforms, especially when it comes to advertising. Yes, I’m raising my guilty hand on this one. I know branding, not social media…which is why I turn to experts like social media marketing expert Devani Freeman to guide me and share the latest and greatest. Algorithms and consumption habits change all the time, faster than we can keep up, or so it feels.

Social media platforms are changing all the time. Learn the rules and nuances to make your posts and ads successful and see ROI. (TWEET THIS!)

Devani specializes in helping clients generate leads and build audiences with Facebook and Instagram. Her company has helped me launch programs in the past and I’ve learned a ton from her, as well as built up my list with her strategies.

We sat down for this great video interview to share practical tips and surprising rules you MUST know so that you can spend your money wisely and get results from social media advertising.

YouTube video

Watch the video now and you just may rethink your entire social media advertising strategy – for the better!

? VIDEO HIGHLIGHTS:

* The crucial ingredient to REALLY standing out on social media (and why most people don’t!)
* Why and how to build a marketing funnel and not simply expect people to buy from you with one-click – and an easy one you can create right now.
* Practical action tips for how to build a strong community in Facebook so it works for you.
* How exactly to make your Facebook ads work and drive sales for a new offering or course – and how to nurture those leads.
* The surprising rules you need to know or else Facebook will reject your ads!
* How to make the most of Instagram stories for your business – and why you need to just on this platform NOW.

The tools are out there to boost your visibility. You just have to make sure you’re getting good advice on using them the right way!

Any tips particularly resonate with you? Please Tweet me or stop by the Facebook page and let me know!

Cash flow, creativity, and compassion are not mutually exclusive™

The Myth of Authenticity

Posted on by Maria Ross

The Myth of Authenticity

Be authentic. Have an authentic brand. I want to be seen as authentic.

Everyone’s all about “authenticity” these days. Which really hasn’t changed all that much since I first blogged about this in 2011. And yet, marketers and entrepreneurs are still fretting out about it.

It’s time to bust this myth of authentic branding, once and for all.

Authentic is not something you can BE. It is a way of being that is unique to whatever you already are, what you deliver or how you serve people.

Trying to be “authentic” is like trying to “be original.” An original what? Authentic to what? How does this show up in the world?

When experts advise you to be authentic, all they are really saying is to be who you are.  Play to your true strengths. Don’t try to slap on “coat of brand paint,” as I like to say. This is the very reason why your brand must be lived from the inside out.

Some confuse authenticity with transparency, or homemade, or natural. If that is who your brand and business really are, then, yes. You are being authentic if you convey that vibe. But if you are truly a loud, obnoxious and rabble-rouser, your brand can convey those traits and “authentically” be that, too.

All authentic really means is that you walk your talk and deliver what you promise.(TWEET THIS!)

It’s not an “end state” to aspire to, it’s a way of being what you already are and showing that to your audience. Period.

What I believe entrepreneurs and marketers often mean when they say they desire an “authentic” brand is that they want to be seen as down-to-earth, conversational, approachable, open or direct. If so, then use those attributes. Don’t say authentic. It should be a given that your brand walks its talk.

You can be an elite, exclusive, downright snobby brand and, if that’s truly what your organization delivers and what you convey in all of your messaging and design, then it is an authentic brand as well.

And please don’t take things too far! Being authentic is also not the same as having no filter. It’s not an excuse to forget about your audience’s needs and what would be valuable for them. Personally, I don’t find an Instagram feed full of what a thought leader ate for breakfast “authentic.” To me, that’s just egotistical. If, however, showing me the “behind the scenes” glimpses offers value, then great. Share the story, lesson, or failure so I can learn something. Heck, make me laugh or inspire me. That’s adding value, too. Be real…as long as it’s genuine to who you are AND in service to the promise you made your audience.

Authenticity is not a state to be achieved that means one thing. Authentic is a qualifier: Your brand is authentically….what?

Cash flow, creativity, and compassion are not mutually exclusive™

How to Make Good Habits Stick: A Chat with Sarah Von Bargen

Posted on by Maria Ross

Have you ever committed to a productive or healthy habit only to have it all fall apart and revert back to status quo within a month, a week….or an hour?

Yes, I’m talking about that daily afternoon scone I said I would give up forever, but by 2 pm had already scarfed down. Please don’t judge.

We all have. We’re human.

It’s so easy to talk about productivity habits, or “hacks” (I abhor that word when used for anything other than computer espionage) but it’s an entirely different thing to make them stick.

Which is why I was thrilled to talk with the charming and wise Sarah Von Bargen, lifestyle blogger at YesandYes.org and creator of the Make It Stick Habit School.

Sarah graciously spent some time talking to us about the mental game of why we flake out on good habits, how we can ensure we don’t, and which habits have worked for her in running her business more efficiently and profitably. (Hint: Steal these!)

We talk about everything from procrastination to guilt to time management to, heck, healthy habits for content creation, analyzing your analytics and networking. And how to make them such easy habits, that your day will feel strange if you DON’T do them.

The best habits are things that are incredibly fast and very, very doable. (Tweet this!)

If you feel like your work or time is running YOU more than you are running it, please grab a notepad and click below to enjoy this video:

YouTube video

Highlights include:

How to be successful without getting overwhelmed:

  • People who were simultaneously successful and not overwhelmed are people who put good business habits on auto-pilot…Because they put these good business habits on autopilot, they removed the stress from it. 2:48

What causes us to abandon good habits so quickly:

  • If you are constantly looking outside of yourself for solutions, buying things you don’t use, procrastinating and over researching, you are going to have a hard time moving forward 7:52
  • If you can associate the physical feelings, stress headache or stomach aches, with these bad habits, you will develop a distaste for them. 11:20

Sarah’s success habits that can work for you, too (P.S. Llama farm is optional, but seriously, why would you want it to be?!):

  • In a perfect world, you will know your best work times. So if you know when you’re most strategic, you can block out your calendar for these habits. 15:45
  • I swear up and down by writing retreats. Once a month, I go to the same Airbnb, and I do 90% of my writing in 2 nights…I still write every day, but the bulk of my writing is done in two nights at this llama farm in Wisconsin. 17:49
  • Being a happy and successful business person is knowing your strengths, knowing your weaknesses, outsource properly and knowing what success looks like for you. 21:27

Powerful business success habits that you can start TODAY:

  • [Networking emails] You have to do it so often and so much that a) your day feels weirdly incomplete if you don’t do it and b) you send so many emails that you loose track of who does and doesn’t respond. 24:53
  • Once or twice a month, look at your website analytics to determine where your traffic is coming from and what things you are publishing are the most popular. 28:12
  • Updating old blog posts and re-promoting them. 29:40 

What good habits are you committing to? Drop me a line over on Twitter or the Facebook page and let me know!

ABOUT SARAH:

Sarah is a writer, blogger, lover of cats and cheese… and creator of online courses that make your life and work happier and more productive. Read her incredible lifestyle blog, which attracts more than 14,000 visitors daily, and find out more about her courses, including the Make It Stick Habit School at Yes and Yes.

Cash flow, creativity, and compassion are not mutually exclusive™

How to Get Started with Video Marketing: A Chat with Amy Landino

Posted on by Maria Ross

Video is one of the best ways to promote your business, build trust and convey your unique brand personality.  So why is it so terrifying for so many?

If video marketing or vlogging is on your branding to-do list for the year, good for you! Video is a great way to build trust, establish your expertise and allow your audience to get to know you. And when it comes to driving traffic, YouTube is the second most popular search engine in use.

But how does one start? Do you need a lot of gear? What will you talk about?

My wonderful interview with globally-recognized YouTuber, author and business video marketing expert Amy Schmittauer Landino is here to help!

I kind of adore Amy #GirlCrush

Amy and I “met” years ago over social media and started promoting each other’s content and collaborating virtually. I even featured her expertise in the second edition of Branding Basics for Small Business. We got to meet in person when I went back to Columbus, Ohio for a holiday visit and it was like we’d known each other forever (the power of virtual business relationships done right). She’s sassy, straightforward and super smart – all the things we love here at Red Slice, am I right?!

Why do video? Well this quote from Amy in the interview says it all:

“At the end of the day, we’re doing this so someone will buy something. But truthfully we’re trying to get someone to trust us to make a buying decision.”

So, in my attempt to do more video myself, I hope you enjoy and get a ton of value out of this lively video interview:

YouTube video

Some highlights:

  • The benefits and ROI you can get from doing more video marketing (4:00)
  • How video works for both B2C and B2B businesses: “This works no matter who you’re talking to, but if you lose track of you’re talking to, it’s going to be hard to accomplish anything but that’s a B2B or a B2C problem.” (11:15)
  • How you can make your video content stand out in a crowded content landscape We talk about Search, Playlists, tagging and the YouTube algorithms (13:22)
  • The YouTube Gold Rush and why it’s much harder to make money simply from ad dollars (14:27)
  • How to manage your content and production schedule…True Confession time from me! (34:51)
  • How long should your videos be to keep attention and “win” on YouTube (50:32)
  • Tips for being on-camera, including lighting (53:11)
  • How often to post new videos to generate more traffic on YouTube (15:22)
  • And a really interesting conversation about how video impacts society. Are we becoming too concerned with surface appearances or a false reality? And does video play a role in reducing our desires for real-life interaction and experience? Spoiler alert: No, and Amy and I talk about why. (1:00:05)

If you’re still not convinced incorporating more video can help your business and build trust in your expertise and brand, I’ll leave you with this quote from Amy:

“I knew that the best way to get myself out there was not just meeting people , because obviously you can never replace that. But the second thing to that in my opinion is allowing someone to have an experience meeting me in a way that I could get out to more people  and I just don’t think there’s anything like that compared to video that is as effective.

Video is that really, really close second place to being able to shake someone’s hand.” (TWEET THIS!) 

ABOUT AMY:

Amy is a globally-recognized YouTuber, speaker, author, and business owner. She coaches people at her popular YouTube channel, AmyTV, on how to go after what they want in life and leveraging video storytelling to make it happen. Owner of two creative companies—Aftermarq and Vlog Boss Studios—Amy presents to and consults with a global clientele about leveraging online communication and content marketing to increase brand awareness. In her best-selling book Vlog Like a Boss: How to Kill It Online with Video Blogging, she shares her collection of strategies and tactics to help you create video that gets the attention you deserve and builds real relationships with your community. Amy’s an international speaker and has appeared in media outlets such as The Huffington Post, Entrepreneur, Inc and more.

Check out Amy’s wonderful video masterclass, Vlog Like A Boss. I can personally vouch that the content is solid (and her action steps manageable) if you want to create great videos…and content overall.

Cash flow, creativity, and compassion are not mutually exclusive™

The Brunch Crisis

Posted on by Maria Ross

A few years ago, my friend Alex helped her sweetheart Brandon to open a brunch restaurant in Portland.  

At first, they had zero customers. But within a few months—thanks to some glowing reviews in local newspapers, positive Yelp reviews, and a lot of hard work—they found themselves with a “good” type of problem:  

They had too many customers.   

At 9am when they oened their doors, some days, there’d be a line of people creeping around the block. With a tiny dining room—just eight tables—they couldn’t possibly seat everyone at once. The waiting area became cramped and hectic. Often, customers had to wait an hour—or more—before they could sit down and order their meal.  

Alex noticed that most of the people in the waiting area looked extremely “hangry” (hungry and angry). Their eyes were glassy. They looked bored and disgruntled. They wanted waffles and bacon. Like, yesterday.  

One day, a customer—who had been waiting over an hour—exploded at Alex and started yelling about how “ridiculous” everything was. It was completely inappropriate. Basically, a grown woman behaving like a toddler. Alex felt shaken and horrified. Later that night, she said to Brandon, “We need to figure out a way to make people feel happier while they’re waiting for a table. Because things are getting crazy out there. It’s a crisis zone!”  

Alex and Brandon came up with a plan. 

People feel bored? We’ll set up an area with Nintendo, books, coloring supplies, a chess board, and Tarot decks. They can entertain themselves for hours! 

People feel thirsty? We’ll put out pitchers of water, and we’ll sell them coffee that they can sip while they’re waiting for a table. 

People feel hungry? We’ll pass out teeny-tiny mini pancakes as a little snack. For free. Something to nibble on while they wait. 

That week, Alex and Brandon revamped their waiting area and made all kinds of changes. Customers LOVED it. They couldn’t believe how cool it was. “OMG, you guys have 400 Nintendo games? For real?!” The sour faces disappeared. The entire atmosphere in the restaurant shifted. People started playing games, talking, laughing, and enjoying themselves instead of grumbling. Brunch crisis: averted. 

The moral of the story:  

When a frustrated customer lashes out, most entrepreneurs do one of two things: They apologize. Or they ignore the situation. But maybe there’s a third option…  

Empathizing. 

You can choose empathy. You can get inside your customer’s mind. Put yourself in their shoes. You can ask yourself, “What are they feeling? Are they tired? Hungry? Bored? Anxious? Feeling ignored?”  

If you can empathize with your customer—really try to understand their feelings and their point of view—then you can come up with a plan to make them happier. (Just like Alex and Brandon did.)  

The next time you get a fiery email, a mean blog comment, or a nasty Yelp review, instead of panicking… try empathizing. (TWEET THIS!) 

Really try to see—and feel—the situation from that customer’s perspective. Imagine their scenario. Consider what you’d want if you were in the same scenario.  

Then, design your business accordingly. 

Cash flow, creativity, and compassion are not mutually exclusive™

Want to Succeed? Focus.

Posted on by Maria Ross

Focus

Be careful about giving advice. It can come back to haunt you.

My almost 4-year-old burned me pretty badly the other day.

The modern world does not do us any favors when it comes to presence and focus. I work very intentionally with my son to help him avoid overwhelm and concentrate on one task at a time. When he starts flipping through another book while I’m reading one to him, I gently take it from his hands. When he jumps from one game to another, I stop him and we make a game out of putting the first one away. When I’m speaking to him, I encourage him to look me in the eye and put down whatever he’s working on to ensure he’s listening.

“We have to focus on one thing at a time,” is my mantra for him.

The other day, we missed the freeway exit for his swim class. When he asked why we were going on little detour, I said, “Mommy missed our exit, honey. I wasn’t focusing, was I?” He nodded.

A few days later, I was driving him to preschool,  my mind abuzz with the day’s to-do list. Sure enough, we drove straight through the light instead of turning right and had to double-back.

“Why are we turning around?” he asked.

“Because I got distracted and didn’t turn when I was supposed to.”

He gave me a stern look, “You weren’t focusing, Mommy.”

Out of the mouths of babes.

Multitasking is a myth. Science proves that we don’t really do tasks simultaneously: We’re just switching focus.  And it takes longer to complete tasks that way because of stopping and starting. Efficiency goes out the window.

And yet, God love us, we still try.

When it comes to promoting your work, you may be tempted to try a million different tactics to see what sticks. After all, there’s a lot out there, right? We live in an age of marketing overwhelm.

You’re right to test and tweak. But not all at the same time! The truth is that you’ll just do a lot of things really badly – and not see results.

Quality over quantity wins. Every. Single. Time.

It’s better to focus on doing a few things really well, mastering them, if you want to see results for your revenue, visibility and impact. 

Focus on mastering a FEW things really well, not trying to do it all, if you want revenue, clients + visibility! Share on X

To help you tackle your focus challenges and breathe easier while getting more results, please download a FREE taste from my upcoming MOMENTUM Pro self-study program by clicking the button below. This Playbook is titled Simplify Your Marketing Plan and it’s all about how to streamline and focus for results. I promise: You don’t have to do it all!

Get your Playbook Now

If you like this playbook and want a more streamlined, non-overwhelming, completely do-able way to master your marketing, check out MOMENTUM Pro! It’s all about focus, providing a step-by-step system to take one action at a time and gain clients, visibility and revenue.

Photo by Samuel Zeller on Unsplash

Cash flow, creativity, and compassion are not mutually exclusive™

Are you Using the Right Marketing Muscles?

Posted on by Maria Ross

Are you using the right marketing muscles or is your progress stalled?

Being an avid Crossfitter (going on 7 years now), I’ve learned a thing or two about getting my head on straight so my body will follow. And how false assumptions can only hurt your progress. 

My fabulous coach (I use more colorful adjectives when she gives me too many burpees) devotes herself to ensuring we understand the intent behind all of our moves, so that we are not just blindly trying to complete reps, but that we do each rep right. Proper form is everything.  

You can do a million reps of an exercise, but if you do them badly, you won’t see results. Period. 

For years, I held on to false assumptions about which muscles should be activated when doing certain moves.  And because of that, I plateaued. Despite lots of effort, I never got stronger, faster or better. And often, I would just hurt myself! 

For example, when you do a deadlift (lifting a weighted barbell from the floor), most people think you use your back or even your arms to a certain extent. You actually need to activate your hamstrings and booty to lift more weight..  

When you do a push-up, most people position their arms in the wrong spot and believe it’s all about arm strength, which is why they quickly fatigue. It’s not about arms, but about tightening your abs and butt. 

When you squat, especially with weights, it’s not about your quads. It’s about your booty and core. 

When you bench press, it not about using your arms. It’s about activating and pressing from your core.  

The epiphany here is that if each rep is perfectly executed, you can actually do less and make more progress than if you do a thousand reps really, really badly. And side bonus: You don’t hurt yourself! 

You’d be surprised how much more weight you can lift and how many more reps you can do when you activate the right muscles.  

The same holds true for your business and brand success.  

If you’re brutally honest, you may find you, too, hold many false assumptions that are halting your progress and keeping you from reaching your personal best – and potentially hurting yourself! 

Sales is not about being pushy, annoying or slimy, it’s about having a conversation. 

Profitability does not come from just signing new clients. It’s about managing expenses and correctly pricing your offerings or you could actually be losing money on every new deal.   

Marketing success is not more effective just because you spend more money, time or effort. More ads, more content, more, more, MORE. It’s actually about doing less, but making sure you’re doing the right things so you get more bang for your buck.  

It’s not about doing more and doing it all badly. It’s about focusing on fewer tactics and making sure you execute them with perfection.(TWEET THIS!)

Ready to learn proper form and technique so you can do less sales and marketing and yet attract more clients, fans and revenue? If so, please check out MOMENTUM Pro, a self-study digital course you will adore to help you focus, streamline and be more effective in generating sales. Sounds good, right?!

Photo Credit: Tech Girls Movement

Cash flow, creativity, and compassion are not mutually exclusive™

4 Ways to Support Small Businesses, Not Just on #SmallBusinessSaturday

Posted on by Maria Ross

This week is Consumer Crazy Town. You know what I’m talking about: The post-Thanksgiving, shopping-binge, sale-frenzy that is Black Friday.

To be brutally honest with you, it kind of disgusts me. The unabashed display of consumer greed. The crowds lining up at 3 a.m (What the…?1?!) to save $300 on a new TV, trampling all over each other to get in the door. P.S. there is actual data showing that, for all that effort and pain, people don’t save as much as they think they do.

All I can think of is how these people’s children are seeing this behavior…and what they are learning from it. Yeah, they’re REALLY going to believe that you can’t buy love.

I’m ALL FOR a good deal. Believe me. The Nordstrom semi-annual sale. Finding an awesome piece of art at a garage sale. Scoring that cheap boutique sweater that becomes my staple for years. I just prefer sleeping in (or at least as much as my toddler will let me), enjoying time with my family and finding similar deals from the comfort of my own laptop.

With this commercial frenzy, comes the equally ambitious push to ditch megastores and instead shop small on #SmallBusinessSaturday.

Here are four ways you can support small businesses, not just on Small Business Saturday, but EVERY day:

  1. Shop there! While you might adore them from afar, how many small boutiques and cozy local restaurants have you actually given regular business? And then one day–POOF!­–they are closed and you just say, “Oh, that’s so sad!” Businesses can’t stay open without customers, so put your wallet where your mouth is. (TWEET THIS!) And this includes your favorite Etsy boutique or small online specialty retailer.
  2. Share an Online Review: Social proof is a huge marketing boost for any business. If you love your new hoodie or had a fantastic meal, don’t just keep that joy all to yourself. Leave an online review to help that business succeed.
  3. Give the Owner Feedback: I am notorious for falling in love with a local shop and, as an occupational hazard, giving them tips and pointing out issues. That’s how you know I care: when I point out your flaws (…just ask my husband.) You want your favorite haunt to succeed, right? Then let them know their menu is confusing, or the sweater pilled on the first day or that their store hours are not posted online. They may not know…and they need to know. You are not complaining if you do it with love – you are giving them feedback to help them keep more customers and stay alive.
  4. Tell Your Friends: Instagram and Facebook are tailor-made for sharing your next savvy find or amazing local experience. Don’t feel like a cliché in sharing your morning latte or food porn IF you also tag the small business and give them more exposure. Better yet, send an email to 10 friends and tell them about it. If I find out you’re holding out on me by not telling me that shop has fabulous locally-made necklaces, I’ll be very mad at you. This works for B2B businesses, too. If a consultant or coach rocked your world, share the love. Word of mouth is priceless.

Just like you shouldn’t wait until Valentine’s Day to tell your honey, “I love you,” don’t wait until #SmallBusinessSaturday to support your favorite small business.(TWEET!)

Otherwise, they may not be around this time next year!

And if you’re a small business on a budget, here’s how I’d like to support YOU: My popular digital course, Brand Bootcamp, will be going away at year end to make room for some new offerings. You can still access all this juicy value that has helped small business owners attract more customers, clarify their sales messaging, and get more buzz for a Farewell Sale price of just $49. Click here to learn more. The course will have it’s final curtain call on December 31, so if this sounds like just what you need for 2018, please enjoy!

Photo via Unsplash

Cash flow, creativity, and compassion are not mutually exclusive™

3 Tips to Make Facebook Ads Work For You

Posted on by Maria Ross

Social media offers fantastic opportunities to increase your brand visibility, drive sales and build an audience. For those who do it well, you can get away with using the platforms for free and accomplishing all your goals.

There are lots of experts who can help you do this well, such as Lilach Bullock, Jay Baer, and Amy Porterfield. But they will also educate you that investing some money into the process through ads or promotions can exponentially increase your reach and grow your audience.

In the past few years, I’ve experimented with Facebook ads to boost my brand and increase sales. While I would never claim to be a Facebook expert, I’ve learned three incredibly important lessons about how to make Facebook ads work for you.

3 Tips I’ve Learned Firsthand About Making Facebook Ads Work

  1. Use Facebook Ads to Build Your List, Not Just Sell: Nordstrom can get away with simply offering a cute pair of red stilettos in their ad and having people click “Buy!” (ahem…guilty) That’s because it’s a product and I know their brand well. Initially, my old school advertising background kicked in and I mistakenly thought that I, too, could just promote a paid program in my ads and it would work. No. Even if you think your product is competitively priced, people may not know you yet…and you’re invading their personal News Feed with your ads. So, yeah, you’ve got to build trust. Duh. Using Facebook ads to promote a free offering FIRST (a cheat sheet, webinar or the like) works much better to pull people into your orbit and onto your list. You can then nurture them and create warm leads for when you’re ready to make the ask. Drive folks to a specific blog post (and offer a free download they can sign up for when they get there), offer a free guide or access to training videos. Anything they can easily sign up for with no risk.
  2. Create a Marketing Funnel for Your Campaign: Social media does not work, as mentioned, for most unknown brands as AD = SALE. Plan the journey you want prospects to take. Perhaps you build a campaign to launch a new coaching program that includes: A) Free guide, B) Free webinar or Facebook Live event and C) Free consult. Think through the steps and plan ahead.
  3. Leverage Lookalikes and Retargeting: Facebook has such cool features that enable you to laser-focus on your ideal client or customer. Mapping out who they are in crisp detail will make your ad efforts (in any medium, I might add) way more effective, trust me! Facebook allows you to create lookalike audiences of your existing email list and also retarget in many ways, including: website visitors, people who downloaded your previous offer or those who attended your last Facebook Live.

Once I learned these lessons, my Facebook ad results matched up to my expectations and I’ve gotten much savvier about how to effectively use them.

Now, I have no idea how to voodoo behind Facebook ads work–and I’m not the gal who wants to DIY this type of thing as I have no interest in being a Facebook Ads expert. That’s why I turned to experts to help me, including most recently the FABULOUS Devani Freeman and in the past, Tammy Martin and Gavin Bell. Seriously worth the investment.

With these tips, you can hopefully skip some of the learning curve I had to climb and get to success faster!

Cash flow, creativity, and compassion are not mutually exclusive™

Trick or Treat?

Posted on by Maria Ross

Trick or Treat?

Marketing does not have a very good reputation. 

People often perceive marketers as liars or con artists, saying anything and everything to get you to buy their stuff. 

When I see others in my chosen profession deceiving the public, my blood pressure goes up. I want to throttle soda companies that try to pretend their products are “healthy” somehow (this includes so-called “water drinks” that are loaded with sugar). When I get a piece of direct mail that looks like an official legal document, all I can think of that naïve person who might actually think they’ve done something wrong. 

Makes me want to smack somebody. Hard. 

I once got a direct mailer that essentially made it sound like my credit cards would all be shut down unless I responded to their offer. Sickening. 

And don’t get me started on telemarketing companies that prey on the elderly. My dad is 89 years old and we’ve luckily intercepted calls for him where they made him think his computer was hacked, tried to con him into another timeshare condo or assured him they had a “can’t miss” investment opportunity.  

My profession and other honest marketers like myself take a hit every time some jerky jerk decides to engage in false advertising or find the semantic loopholes. (“What did we do wrong? We said it only has 100 calories! We don’t have to mention how much sodium, chemicals or sugar is in it, too. Legally, we can say it’s a ‘healthier alternative!’”) 

Marketing is not about lying to people. It’s about elevating the truth of your story so the right people who need what you’ve got can find. Share on X

It’s about communicating real value. If you are targeting the right people who have a very real need, then it will not be a hard sell, as long as you’re clear and compelling. 

You can choose to play the game in one of two ways. And you must decide now what kind of marketer (and human) you will be: 

  1. Trick people with lies and hyperbole.Trick, scare, or scam them into action and then deal with the aftermath of regret and anger.  
  2. Treat people with the truth. Delight them by making it compelling, valuable and authentic and, if it’s a good fit, they won’t be able to resist. Savor the loyalty and connection. 

Wall Street and our current consumer-driven culture may disagree with me, but I’ll give you one guess as to which approach is more sustainable, scalable and better for humanity.