What Marketing is and What it is Not

Show Notes

• Marketing is not about extracting money out of people. It is about connecting with people.
• If your marketing is focused on getting money out of people, you will lose the game, as potential customers will be able to see your intentions.
• Knowing what marketing really is will change the dynamic of your message, your offers, and your research, so that you know you are really solving a problem people have.
• Evaluate your current marketing. Is your marketing about connecting with people or about getting people to give you their money?
• Long term businesses that last connect with people. It connects with their interests, motivations, alleviates their pains, and helps them pursue their dreams.
• Evaluate your current market strategies by asking yourself:
• How do I create a reputation that will grow and enhance my ability to survive?
• How do I connect with people?
• What is the primal motivation for people spending money with my company?
• What is the reason people buy what I sell?
• We make decisions based on emotion first, and then we back it by logic. With this in mind, understand the core reason why people spend money with you.
• When people know you understand the problem they have, then they will trust that you have the right solution for them, too.
• Text CLAIM to (760) 621-8199 to get more information about the "Claim Your Life Back" event.

Transcription of Episode

[00:00:00] This is Ryan Chapman with Fix Your Funnel and in today's episode we're going to talk about what marketing really is and what it is not. Many times people think marketing is about getting people to give you money. If that's your primary focus, you're going to lose the game of marketing. The reason why is because nobody likes to be used. Marketing is not about extracting money out of people. Gurus or people selling you programs often will couch it that way because they're trying to tap into your base emotion of greed. But the reality is, if your marketing is focused on just getting money out of people, you're going to lose because people are going to see it.

At the end of the day, marketing really is about connecting with people. You want to make sure that whenever you're doing marketing, you're connecting with people. I can see a whole lot more advantage for my company if I can connect with people heart-to-heart then if I just get their money. Money only lasts for so long. But when you connect with people heart to heart or mind to mind, then you have the [00:01:00] ability to really move them to great places for themselves as you also profit as a company.

If you understand what marketing really is, which is about connecting with people, that's going to change the dynamic of what your messages are, what your offers are, and also what your research is into what it is that you're actually solving. What is the problem that you're fixing for people that actually makes it worth their while to spend money with you? Think about that as you go through your marketing.

Evaluate your current marketing. Is my current marketing about connecting with people or about trying to get them to give me money? And if it's just about trying to get them to give you money, you're going to miss the boat. You're going to be in a transactional business, which means you're always going to be fighting for that next transaction and you're never going to be able to create a long-term business that's going to last.

Long-term businesses that last connect with people. They connect with their interest, with their motivations, alleviates their pains, helps them pursue their dreams, and if you're not doing that some level, if you're not connecting with them at some [00:02:00] psychological level, some emotional level, chances are, you're not getting the job done. If you're not getting the job done, that means you're fighting an unnecessary battle.

I just challenge you to look at that. Look at your business. How am I communicating with people? What are my messages all focused on? Am I trying to get a year contract out of somebody because it's going to give me the money before they realize what they're getting from me? Or am I trying to actually connect with people and I'm using a year contract to get people to actually get results? These are totally different approaches and motivations and that motivation is going to come through and it's going to create a reputation for you.

A lot of small businesses are often thinking about, how do I survive, and they forget to think about, how do I create a reputation that will grow and enhance my ability to survive? If you can think about connecting with people, you're going to be overcoming that hurdle. You're going to be creating a situation where you have a good reputation in the marketplace and that good reputation, they call it good will, it actually shows up on the balance sheet. Although it may be hard to put a price [00:03:00] tag on, it's real and it's something that can make a huge difference. So, as you're thinking about your marketing, think about, how do I connect with people?

There's a little exercise in my book, Would You Like to Go Big? Would You Like to Go Big is actually about up-sells and how to make that an actual pleasant experience for customers that will increase short-term initial customer value without compromising lifetime value, but in that I have an exercise where I take people through and have them look at, what is the primal motivation for people spending money with your company? I'd encourage you to go through that.

I'll give you a brief version of it, but if you want to go deeper, you can pick up that book. I think it's like five bucks on Amazon. I have it priced very inexpensively because I want the information to be in people's hands so they can be able to know how to approach their business better.

But in that book, in that chapter, what I say is, think about, what is the reason that people buy what you sell? And when we answer that question, normally that question is on the surface. I think there's a [00:04:00] book called, Why, or something like that, but the the premise of it is if you keep on asking the question, why, you'll eventually get to the core. That's what I want you to do with your business. Why is it the people spending money with you? When you come up with that answer, ask, why do they do that? And then ask, why do they do that? Normally about three or four questions in, you might start getting into some emotional reasons.

As soon as you start getting into some of the emotional reasons, you're in the right territory. As humans, we make decisions based on emotions and then we quickly try and back them with logic. You may disagree with that, but even in the course of disagreeing with that, you're probably proving that to be true.

When you realize that people make decisions based off of emotion first and then back them with logic, then that means you have to get to the base emotion that makes the decision of why they buy your product or service. Once you understand that, then you can know how to really address their need. If you're addressing the need on the surface, whatever you think [00:05:00] that thing is, the first question of why, you're gonna miss the target. You're not going to connect with people. But when you understand, what's the core driving motivation for why people spend money with you, then you're going to be able to hit the core reason.

When you hit the core reason, you're going to be able to connect with people. They're going to understand that you understand the problem that they're trying to alleviate or the dream they're trying to pursue better than they do. And when they know that you really understand the problem because you took the time to figure it out, they're gonna trust that you actually came up with the right solution for them too, and hopefully, you have.

If you haven't, going through this exercise may help you to be able to identify how to enhance your product or service so it actually addresses the core issue of what that person wants when they spend money with you. This is Ryan Chapman with Fix Your Funnel. Keep moving forward.