Unmarketing: Stop Marketing. Start Engaging

“You have to be an expert to run your own business.”

Marketing is not a task, department, or job. It is an engagement with your past, present, and potential customers. Word-of-mouth marketing is absolutely essential for an organization’s success. UnMarketing is the ability to engage with your market in a natural way that is authentic and personal. This results in lifelong fans, strong relationships, and loyal customers.

Customers first buy from people they know, trust, and like. The higher on the pyramid of buying you are with your market, the less competition you have. To move from cold calls to satisfied customers, you’ll need to search through ads and other sources, recognize experts in the field, build relationships prior to purchase, and get referred by trusted sources. 

To successfully UnMarket your business, your goal should be to get to the point where you are a recognized expert in your field. The first thing to do is to realize your interest and the needs of your customers. When you position yourself as an expert with useful information for people, you will naturally attract customers - there will always be someone who needs your expertise. 

Once you have successfully pulled people into your funnel and you have their attention, you need to do something great for them.

“The problem with the term “social media” is that whenever people see the word “media” they automatically think “push.”

Fast-forward to the present day. The encyclopedia has been replaced by Wikipedia, the big book is now called the Internet, and the Yellow Pages are called Google. Google offers a tool “AdWords” for advertising from click-through tracking to conversion rates. If you are aiming for the bottom of the hierarchy of buying, then Google AdWords is a great tool. 

The better way from “push and pray” marketing is “pull-and-stay”. You pull customer’s information and stay in front of them. Remember, marketing is not one department of your business, it is every point of engagement, including sales. If shoppers do not want to buy immediately, then just let them walk away after engaging with them and building a relationship. 

Companies that don’t use social media say they have no time, they have no control, and so on. If you say you have no time to listen and to talk with people in your marketplace, then you are saying that you have no time for your customers. You need to make time to be in that conversation.

“The biggest regret of people who have gained traction is that they wish they had jumped in sooner.”

There are three steps to successfully building your platform: 

1. Traction, which refers to the initial step of getting a hold on social media through engagement,

2. Momentum, which is the point where you are getting something out of the network,

3. Expansion, when your platform starts to grow rapidly due to regular engagement.

Immediacy and relevancy are crucial steps to stay on top of social media. If people are talking about your brand, you should be a part of the conversation. Publicize your customer services; it allows people to see that you are listening and engaging and that you care about customer service. 

In general, people are forgiving when companies simply acknowledge them and take responsibility for their mistakes. Although a few may be angry, many more of your customers will likely be mildly dissatisfied. Social media allows these more moderate praises to reach your business regularly, along with suggestions on ways you could improve.

Your website is the place where people will go to learn about you. A blog is the best way to share knowledge unconditionally. You can also use a newsletter to provide the user with the knowledge and up-to-date content about your business in an authentic and unique way. 

Your site should not be like a jungle but a map. When people land on your website, they should feel like they have arrived at the right place and begin clicking away. Set a low barrier to engagement by avoiding pop-ups and excessive advertisements. 

Your goal should be simple. Give people enough value on your site so they want to stay in touch. As a business owner, your goal should be to have no gap at all with your customers by optimizing every point of contact. As the gap grows, so will your customer’s dissatisfaction.

There are some core values from which you can develop your culture, brand, and business strategies. These are: 

• Delivering “wow” through your service
• Embracing and driving change
• Creating fun
• Being adventurous, creative, and open-minded
• Pursuing growth and learning
• Building open and honest relationships with communication
• Building a positive team and family spirit
• Doing more with less
• Being passionate, determined, and humble.

“Content is king.”

Every human has his own history, so don’t try to be anyone except yourself. Of course, you can seek out opinions, learn tips and draw inspiration. You can also find large groups of experts through social media to give you feedback when you need it the most. 

Being authentic and transparent with your business is essential. When you don’t provide the customer experience that your brand is supposed to represent, you begin to experience a gap between you and your customers. They will soon begin to doubt your values or policies. As your customers become less happy with your service, competitors can move in.

Your online content and how you deliver it matters a lot for success in any business. Being able to be critical about your own work and being able to accept honest feedback from others is absolutely necessary. After all, that’s how you can learn more about what the market wants, and understand where you need to improve.

“The gold is in the engagement of your lists and the relationship you have with the list members.”

Viral marketing refers to marketing efforts that reach an ever-increasing amount of people. To go viral you can use flash video, live video, streaming video, and social media.

For something to go viral, it has to be funny, it has to have the WOW factor, it should evoke emotion, or it should give people an incentive to look at it. However, note that using incentives, such as commissions or prize giveaways, is the least natural method and the viral marketing campaign will likely be short-lived.

When you are designing your landing page, remember to keep it simple. Viral marketing is the best thing you can do to position yourself, your business, or your product in front of your market, but you’ve got to say what you want.