The biggest mistake made in marketing — and a reason that success can be so elusive— is to not clearly explain who you are and what you offer.

At a business function, when someone asks what you do, how do you answer? Many advisors simply say, “I’m a financial advisor.” Oftentimes, however, when that question is asked, because of misconceived perceptions about the industry, your black and white answer actually causes people to want to talk with you less! And we know this! For the past 12 months I have asked groups of financial advisors how they answer this question and if their answer would have people wanting to talk with them more or less. 95% of the advisors answer with a response of “less!” The perplexing question I then have to ask: If you know what you say will have a negative response, why don’t you say something different?

Every firm needs to have a refined firm story to assist in marketing and client acquisition. But, there is a serious need to have a compelling opening line for your firm story. Without this, you may never get the chance to share your story. Even the classic elevator pitch, typically one to two minutes in length, is too long-winded for an informal initial introduction. In a world of ever-decreasing attention spans, less is definitely more.

A solution for compelling others to want to listen to you is to develop a 15-20 second Simple, Repeatable, Statement of Value (SRSV). An SRSV is a statement that is easy to remember and shares some value directly for the person you are speaking with. Below is the 4-step formula for building your own SRSV. Your SRSV may not include the answer to every question, and it doesn’t have to be compiled in this order.

SRSV Builder Questions:
1. Who are you?
2. What do you do?
3. Who do you work with (niche)?
4. What is unique/memorable about what you do or have done?

If you ever try to attract someone and feel you’re falling short of making your case, here are a few solutions. If you try to sell someone something, a typical reaction you may receive is that person becomes immediately not that into you. As the nation’s #1 sales expert Jeffrey Gitomer says, “People Don’t Like to Be Sold, But They Love To BUY!™”

In businesses where the seller and the buyer’s relationship matters, instead of focusing on the product, it is smarter to focus more on the relationship and making a connection. Here are 3 ways I’ve observed from some of the nation’s top salespeople that have been proven to take you from repelling prospects to attracting them to want to buy.

1. Research diligently before meeting a prospect. Research potential prospects even if you don’t know when you’ll meet them. The more you know, the better the conversation will go. Today, no matter who your prospect is, it is easy to research online. If the person has put information online it is there for you to find. It is not violating any personal space when you research about people online – it is smart.

2. Ask big questions. Building on #1, if you have researched, you will be prepared to ask good, insightful questions that will engage the prospect. The key with engagement is interaction and that happens most succinctly when THEY are talking, not you. Most (and I really mean most) people are focused on themselves and are more than ready to talk about themselves and their products. The reaction can be surprising when you ask big questions like, “I know your business has received a lot of awards – what was the most meaningful one to you?” Or, “What’s your biggest challenge?” Or, “What is the one thing you wished your current provider/firm/advisor would do?”  The key is to ask a question that requires an answer, not a closed-ended one.

3. Listen curiously for more than 50% of every conversation. If the interaction is focused on asking big questions and listening, you will immediately stand out. If you can get the prospect talking you actually become unique –someone who is uniquely interested in them. The attention span is 17 seconds today. Listening to another person intently is rarely done and may show more about who you are than if you had talked about yourself or your company.

The good news is you can transform someone from not being interested to wanting what you have.  I believe you can get others to pay attention to you through the way you pay attention to them.

Sitting outside in the typically cold temperatures of Green Bay last Sunday watching the Packers run through their pre-game warm up, I wondered what I would do if the Packers actually lost to the New York Giants. Would it be heartbreaking? Would it be maddening? How important was this game to me? It’s just a game, right?!

I guess it’s just a game unless you’re emotionally committed. Then it becomes more than a simple win or loss. It’s similar to putting your heart and soul into the acquisition of a new client or preparing for a big presentation that you want/need to go well. If you’re emotionally committed, it is different.

Sometimes in business we try to not get emotionally committed to opportunities, prospects, and sometimes even clients. It’s just business after all. But anything worth having is probably worth putting our heart and soul into. The problem with being a sports spectator, however, is that the only thing we can do is cheer and hope and cheer, but there is little we can do to change the outcome. I think that may feel even worse.

So, back to Sunday afternoon at Lambeau Field. The unthinkable happens. The Packers played terrible on both sides of the ball. Dropped passes, fumbles, poor coverage, penalties – overall a disappointing performance – or as my dad said, they “laid an egg” (I’m not even sure what that means, but I know it is bad). Most fans, including me, were in shock as we left the stadium. How could they have actually lost after such an unbelievable season???

By late Sunday evening, my pre-game questions about how it would feel if they lost were answered. Sunday and all day Monday I suffered through a sad, sick feeling like my beloved dog ran away and will not be coming back. All over a football team! (You should see what I feel like when Red Zone Marketing doesn’t land a big new client!)

Winning is an incredible high. But the tradeoff is that we also inevitably get the agony of defeat. I guess if something is meaningful, we care. My Grandma taught me everything about football and the Packers and because of her I do care – about a lot of things – sometimes more than seems sane.

What do you do for your business when faced with the agony of defeat?

Video is an incredibly powerful marketing tool… but in order for it to work you have to get people to watch.

You may have video that you have shared on YouTube, on your website, in a blog or on social media sites. Here are 8 quick tips for engaging people so they will want to watch your video and connect further with you.

1.    Create good, interesting content. This is easier said than done. What would people in your target market actually want to learn or find out about you? Ask clients and centers of influence for their feedback on what content would be valuable.

2.    Title the video so people know what content they will be watching. Give them a good reason for viewing. Also give your video a full description that answers clearly why someone would want to watch.

3.    Make sure the thumbnail picture associated with your video looks like you are someone they’d want to watch. The thumbnail can sometimes be a not-so-attractive, in motion, eyes closed type of screen grab of your video. Don’t be afraid to choose different thumbnails.

4.    List the running time of the video when possible. YouTube will automatically do this for you. Under 3 minutes is a palatable amount for a prospect trying to find out about you or learn something. It seems awfully short, but more than 2-3 minutes and the potential viewer has to REALLY want the information you are sharing.

5.    Tag your video with as many key words in YouTube as possible. People will find your videos with these tags.

6.    After uploading your video to YouTube or your website, share a link on Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, etc. Let people you are connected with know it is there!

7.    Send out an email newsletter with embedded video or a link to your video. Sharing your new videos with your connections is a great way to directly give people the valuable content you have created for them.

8.    Use your video as a referral tool by telling advocates and referral sources that they can direct people to a new video you’ve posted or share a link. Give them a reason to introduce you to someone else!

The key with video ultimately is to have valuable content, share the content with potentially interested people and engage them to view and share. Video is definitely a great way to get “face-to-face” with clients and prospects and share just how great you really are!

Add a Variety of Short, Compelling and Personal Touches to Stand Out From Your Competitors

Is video a part of your marketing for your business in 2012? There are some staggering statistics that may convince you to consider adding video to your marketing mix. Online video is the fastest-growing media platform in history, according to a report from social media research consultancy Trendstream and the research firm Lightspeed. And, web video is in front of both blogging and social networking as the leading social-media platform. 80% of C-Suite executives watch work-related video on business-related websites weekly. It’s no surprise that Google bought YouTube!

You probably won’t be shocked to know that even when someone is referred to you, the first thing that person does is Google you and then check out your website. That’s what smart people do, right?  So when a prospect gets to your website, what do they see? The same pile of words that they see on any site? Ultimately, people do business with people! Video allows you to present the real you to them. Video is like a mini seminar online – you are giving your prospects a chance to see you, hear you and build confidence in you.

Now you might think it’s difficult to record video, get it up on your site and have it all working. And how about compliance? The good news is that video today can be truly simple and inexpensive to create.

Here are 5 quick steps to create video for your business…

1. Purpose: Determine your purpose for creating video (for prospects, for referred prospects, for clients, etc). Then make sure that each video you are working on meets the assigned purpose.

2. Video Scripting: Write your video scripts. Remember to keep it short as the videos should be under 2-3 minutes for maximum viewing. Consider scripting out a video for each main navigation page on your website. Develop your scripts by first practicing what you would say to someone if they asked you about your firm. For instance, describe what makes you unique. Have it written out and then edit from there. You want it to be authentic and this will give you a chance to really work on creating that authentic and powerful messaging. If you don’t feel comfortable writing great video scripts consider asking a professional firm like Red Zone Marketing or other marketing and messaging professionals for assistance.

3. Pre-Approval: Get your video scripts approved by compliance before recording.

4. Recording: Go into a video studio with a teleprompter, lighting, and a green screen (so backgrounds can be added later or revised). Or, have the video professional come to you with this equipment. Yes, you can record your video yourself with your own video camera, but more professional is always better than a do-it-yourself look. I do both for different purposes.

5.  Go Live: After getting the actual video approved through compliance (even though the script was approved they will still need to see the final product), have your video professional work with your website provider to get the video placed on your site.

It’s really not difficult and payoff is that you will have a truly authentic presentation of you and your firm for those who are interested to see. Next up… driving people to your video and your website. Happy New Year!

There is one thing in business that is not worth anything. It is priceless.

Whether you have actively developed an online presence or not, one of the most important tasks in 2012 is protecting your reputation! Yes, managing your reputation today must include your online reputation. Much as you would protect your credit, it is crucial to regularly check for activity connected to your name and your business. Anyone can post information about you whether you have a strong web and social media presence or not. Ultimately, it’s better to develop your own online reputation so you are in control of generating positive search results through your online posts and profiles.

One of the easiest ways to monitor your reputation is by setting up a Google Alert which will inform you of anything that has appeared about you online. Google Alerts are email updates of the latest relevant Google results (web, news, etc.) based on your choice of query or topic. Go to www.Google.com/Alerts and set up a free alert on your name and your firm’s name. Whenever anything appears online that you or someone else has posted about you, an email will be sent to you with a link to the online occurrence.

If you are not sure what exists about you in the public space, you may want to start. Your online reputation is a fast way to attract a lot of positive – and negative – attention to you and your firm. Control the message and you will control your reputation.

My contention is that relationship skills are as important to ones future as math, science, and reading. But relationship skills are often overlooked because they are not graded in school like other important skillsets.

During the holidays, kids, just like adults, are required to navigate a variety of social settings and utilize their relationship skills. And when we hear “…click…click…click…” (the sound of a teenager texting instead of answering Aunt Debbie’s question) it may be when we know that things could be improved upon. As a parent, the holiday season is when we tend to notice most acutely which of our kids’ habits could use improvement … right in front of friends and family.

The holiday season provides a wealth of opportunities to demonstrate and practice relationship skills. Here are 3 holiday opportunities for instilling these skills (I’m working on them right now with my kids):

Teach them that sometimes it’s cool to unplug. One of the biggest complaints that adults have with “young people today” is that they’re always “plugged in.” To some extent, that’s true—email, social networking, text messaging, mp3 players, and more have radically changed the way this generation communicates and spends its free time. Now, technology isn’t bad in and of itself, but we all know that it can lead to disengaged behavior—especially at holiday gatherings.

Arm them with ice breakers. For kids who spend most of their days “LOLing,” “BRBing,” and “TTYLing,” having a good old-fashioned verbal conversation might be unfamiliar, if not downright intimidating. Especially if your child isn’t a natural chatterbox, discuss what some good topics of discussion might be and help them to make a list of strategies for drumming up conversation.

Empower them while you’re traveling. Try letting your daughter interact with the hotel receptionist and take care of all check-in aspects at a hotel, except the payment. If you need extra towels in your room, let your child call down to the front desk to request them. It won’t be easy, but it will be a valuable exercise in navigating conversation.

All parents will hit some rough patches navigating the holiday season. With 2 teenagers I know that everything will not be rosy. But I will try to help them continue growing into “connectors” – I believe it is a truly invaluable gift this holiday season.

About Maribeth’s New Book, The Engaging Child: Raising Children to Speak, Write, and Have Relationship Skills Beyond Technology. The book is packed full of strategies and techniques to help kids engage others meaningfully and productively, a skill that—according to research—plays a huge role in driving personal and professional success. The last two chapters of the book are written by Lizzie Kuzmeski, Maribeth’s seventeen-year-old daughter, to provide a peer’s perspective on the elements of building and maintaining real relationships in a wired and fast-paced world.

If we really like something we don’t want it to change. Like a holiday tradition, the way a soft drink tastes, or the format of your favorite TV show. For the things that we like, change can be very negative.

Every Sunday during football season, I spend time in the kitchen making chili. It is the most time I spend in the kitchen all year, and surprisingly one of the only dishes I make that my family really likes. (Not really surprisingly). As I was making chili last Sunday I was questioning whether I really need to include tomato paste. I always include it but does it really make a difference? And then I remembered the time I used one very large onion instead of a usual smaller one and my daughter balked at all of the vegetables in the chili! I quickly decided that taking out the tomato paste could cause unwanted change, and it was not worth the risk.

The problem in business is that oftentimes we want and desperately need change! If a business isn’t satisfied with the way things are, change needs to happen even considering the potential risks. But, what can be changed? What should be changed?

I believe that the best way to minimize risk while implementing necessary change is to create a system for evaluating and implementing one change at a time.

1. Write down the purpose of your business.

2. Determine one element that is not helping the business reach its purpose that should be changed.

3. Determine the one change to make and lay out the positive and possible negative consequences of that one change.

4. Implement the one change.

By working change one at a time, it becomes more manageable and allows you to move forward. I know this because we do this in our firm and with our clients. I won’t do it with my chili though…yet!

Which is more important? Choosing the location, food, presentation, and other meeting prep OR getting the right people to your event? Well of course it is the latter. But it seems that many spend much more time on the upfront prep work and much less on driving people to the event. The good news is that there are new strategies beyond sending out invitations and hoping for the best. In addition to your invitations, here are 3 ways to build attendance and keep the value buzzing.

1. Build Buzz For Your Event (ie. Give them something to talk about!)
Develop content beyond the invitation to build value in the event. Write a blog entry, include information on your website on featured speaker(s), include a video on your YouTube channel discussing the value of the event, etc. Post on your Facebook fan page. Include a Twitter hashtag like #RetirementSeminarDallas and encourage people to use it when tweeting about your upcoming event.

2.  Change Your Registration Process
Give people easy ways to share your event with others. Services such as Eventbrite let your attendees share the event with their networks as they register. You can also make available to those who have registered an article download that they can share with others who have yet to register on a topic that will be covered at your event.

3. Post Your Event Promotion
Consider videotaping your event and posting highlights on your YouTube channel or your website. Another idea is to record the presentation delivered at the event to SlideShare. Then promote the video clips and presentation to attendees to share with others and to those who could not attend. This also builds momentum for your next event.

It doesn’t matter that you’re holding an event, it matters if people attend.

The biggest mistake in business is often made by not doing anything at all.

It is not about making good or bad decisions, the problem many businesses have is the fact that they’ve made the decision to do nothing. I see it in my own business too. We think, perhaps, that if we just wait long enough the problem will go away or the solution will appear, or we are just far too overwhelmed by the number of options we have that we just take too much time trying to decide. But good things rarely happen without impetus on the part of the company. Just thinking about it doesn’t make it happen (sorry to the followers of the book, The Secret).

Many of us, time and again, will tell ourselves:

•    I’ll consider some new prospecting ideas later next year.
•    I’ll plan my 2012 marketing later.
•    I’ll hire a new staff member later when things are much better.
•    I’ll redo my website to make it more attractive to prospects later.
•    I’ll figure out how to get known in that niche later.
•    I’ll let others get going in social media before I jump in.
•    I’ll replace my under-performing staff member later – maybe he’ll get better…

Decision making, as we all know, is often thwarted by the uncertainty and fear that if a decision is made, it could be the wrong one, thus causing wasteful spending and wasted time that we don’t have. True, but this happens to everyone. The truth is that winning companies take calculated risks and make more decisions to move than tentative, risk-adverse companies. Look at Yellow Book, Borders and other slow to act companies that have suffered the fate caused by a lack of decision-making. Companies that try to stay the same sometimes don’t even succeed at that. The key is to make decisions to move forward. It is a tell-tale sign of future success.