Let’s do this the “EASY” way, that always works!

Digital Marketing
​How To Fix "The Easy Way", Once and For All

via MEME

"The Easy Way", Rarely Works 

I always remember telling my kids if they had a problem not to take the "easy" way out. Deal with the real problem by being honest and working it out the right way. Of course, they usually didn't listen and it got worse from there. We all know this instinctively as we have all made the same mistakes.

So many examples come to mind such as asking our friends or co-workers to do something we don't want too, only to learn later it was either not done at all or worse created a mess we now had to clean up.

That's not to say that delegation is not an important aspect of what we all do but rather to say that in many cases it's just laziness on our part.

This is all leading to what is happening today in sales and marketing and with many large and small organizations looking for the "easy" fix. The easy fix is to spend more money on a what seems like a new technology that really only automates a process that did not work in the first place.

Marketing Automation

Automation is great and can be a real time and money saver when based on a complete understanding of the process. However, when it is simply used to make a broken system operate faster, well you just get more volume of the same poor results.

Case in point, automated emails, InMail’s, ad’s and messaging programs. Emails, up and till recently were an effective way to reach both existing and new contacts with information we wanted them to see.
Over the years people began abusing emails and began sending more and more advertising we now call SPAM into our "In" boxes. So, in response we go through the arduous process of making sure these all go into our junk folders, but alas those brilliant marketing minds have figured that out and they get through anyway. 
Recently I noticed the spam emails in my trash folder were now over 200 / day!
It's gotten to the point now where there are literally so many coming in that the anti spam programs and blockers can't keep up.

So, here's the point.

Recognizing That There Is A problem

Recognizing that there's a problem that needs to be fixed and knowing how we all want the "easy" fix, there are now companies who have an easy solution for us!! Instead of recognizing that our customers don't want to be continually bombarded with spam through emails or InMail’s or online ads (that simply won't go away not matter how many times you push that little X...) they have created another easy fix for us!

Just buy their program and it can push out so many automated emails, InMail’s, ads and junk that your customers can't avoid them!! Sure the percentages are now so low that doing it manually simply can't be done, but that's why we've automated it! Forget trying to message a few people with your corporate propaganda, we can hit ten's of thousands! Heck you don't even have to follow them up because we have automated that too!

You just sit back and wait while our automation figures out and directs those that respond into your sales funnel for your hungry sales people to call. All for an exceptionally low price of...

You get the picture.
​
There is no free lunch.

​Why would your customers be any different than you?

• You don't answer cold calls or numbers you don't recognize, in fact you block them.
• You don't answer spam emails in fact you hate going into your email because you have to dig through all that junk to find your customers email
  
• You don't answer those cheesy InMail’s that pop into your social profile out of nowhere and you certainly don't watch those ads that pop up on your phone or screen when your searching for something!
  

So why oh why do you think your customers are any different than you??

​Their not!

So, let's now realize and learn that we need to do this the right way and yes, the hard way. The good news is that you don't have to pay for some fancy new technological solution that won't work anyway.

So what to do. Well it's not really so hard as you think, in fact it's simply about what you do everyday with your friends and associates. It's about sharing information (not selling) with people in a way that they want to read and see it. It's about being there when they google their question about how to solve a problem your product solves. It's not about jumping their bones just because they connect with you!

People want to buy from people and feel like they now have someone they can trust and ask questions as they need to. I've never seen a corporate advertisement or spam accomplish that.

Don't keep doing what you've always done only in an automated way! Think about what's really wrong and it's "YOU" because you're considering the "easy" way ...again!

So, when that new shiny automation tool gets shown to you and promises to provide all the golden eggs you could ever want, what do you say?
Try this,
​Thanks but we are going to solve this the right way, not the easy way.

Written by:

Thomas Ross