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This is the question I posed to my contacts in LinkedIn.  The question was as follows:

"Should we 'make love' to our customers?"

"Do you think marketers should stop treating their customers like wallets and instead treat them more like the people they would like to be their dearest friends, or even a desired lover?"

I received a few interesting responses, and have decided to post them here:

Lucas Allmon wrote:

While I agree with Benny to a certain extent, business IS relationships. You are more likely to do business with someone that you like than someone you can't stand.

Companies need to start treating people more like humans than just policy numbers or walking products.

While you may get a sale by being a hardass, you aren't going to retain those clients as lifers.

Hamish Taylor wrote:

Only if you're married to them as otherwise invoicing becomes really difficult!!!

Ray Miller wrote:

There is the old expression……….you catch more flies with honey than…..

Benny Greenberg wrote:

Actually befriending your customer is a poor approach to closing a sale. I have given a few e-courses on the proper methodology involved in this strategy. You need to be the expert, the person your customer looks to as the one-and-only person to buy from. Not the person to go bar hopping with. Think people - it is much easier to say NO to a friend than to a stranger. The same way you would not present in jeans and a t-shirt, or show up with your cell phone in hand, a bic pen and torn post it notes, you do not turn your customer into your friend. If you want to know more - drop me a note

Eugene Rembor, MBA wrote:

OK, had some time to look at the viedo, but honestly - I don't understand a thing. What's your point??

Eve Morris BSc(hons), Cert DigM wrote:

I think the FSA stance on treating customer fairly gives some valuable guidance on how UK financial services businesses should treat their customers. This guidance can also apply to non-financial services businesses. We should all treat our customers fairly & with respect - not with a veneer of false friendship which could potentially be perceived as shallow & insincere.

Outcome 1: Consumers can be confident that they are dealing with firms where the fair treatment of customers is central to the corporate culture;

Outcome 2: Products and services marketed and sold in the retail market are designed to meet the needs of identified consumer groups and are targeted accordingly;

Outcome 3: Consumers are provided with clear information and are kept appropriately informed before, during and after the point of sale;

Outcome 4: Where consumers receive advice, the advice is suitable and takes account of their circumstances;

Outcome 5: Consumers are provided with products that perform as firms have led them to expect, and the associated service is both of an acceptable standard and as they have been led to expect;

Outcome 6: consumers do not face unreasonable post-sale barriers imposed by firms to change product, switch provider, submit a claim or make a complaint.

These 6 outcomes should be the foundations upon which all products are marketed & sold to customers.

As regards your love metaphor.. to take it literally - to smile at a customer can be to engage initial interest in your product, to cuddle them can be to comfort & reassure with credibility & brand reinforcement, to make them feel special is to target & personalize the relevance of your communications to them individually, and to love is to value them as an individual who interacts with your brand time & again.

I hope this is helpful - I am open to connect
Kind regards
Eve

Pieter Dorsman wrote:

No that would be too much…

I do hope some of my suppliers say "yes" but preferably just the female representatives…

Hjörtur Smárason wrote:

Depends on what you are selling, Angela

But in general, the answer is no. You should not.

I like it when brands approach me personally and appear relaxed, secure and sincere, (the same goes for people). But if you start stroking my thigh, I'm off. So don't over do it.

Cheers
Hjörtur

Geri Rockstein wrote:

Hi Angela,

I believe that a business relationship should be a professional one where each party meets or exceeds the expectations of the other. I don't believe that is treating someone like a wallet. Being treated or treating a business relationship like a potential friend or lover does not enter into the equation for me.

Best regards,

Geri

Teemu Korpi wrote:

If there can be a person more reserved than a brit then he/she must come from Finland like myself. Like John W. I would find it very troublesome if someone in the position of a salesperson came too "close".

I would rather have that relationship in the right framework that being a customer one. Then again there are certain facts that make a good customer relationship.

One vital part of marketing communication mix is personal selling. That's the contact point where the promises are kept or not. That's the critical point where the basis of returning customer relationship are laid.

So, I would keep my pants on and hands in my pockets.

Tim Chattaway [LION] wrote:

In the industry I work In It pays to be nice, even through gritted teeth sometimes.

However I work with clients/people I get along with, I know this is not always possible, but if you find clients you enjoy talking to the desire to go that extra mile for them is there. Willing to take phone calls from Clients in various time zones at 3am in the morning for example.

We all work to get paid, thats life, but whats to say we can't be nice and treat people with a bit of respect whilst they are also lining are pockets?

John Welford wrote:

I'm not so sure! If a marketer treats me in this way, I will immediately know that they are only pretending to be my dearest friend. If someone said that they wanted to be my lover, I'd get really worried!

The point is that when the marketer is clearly acting out a falsehood, how can I trust anything they say about what they are trying to sell?

This may have something to do with cultural differences. I understand that Americans have a different attitude in these respects from Europeans. As a "reserved" Brit I do not want to be grabbed by the elbow when I meet someone for the first time, and I want people to earn the right to use my first name, not to assume it. In marketing terms, I am deeply suspicious of advertisements voiced in American accents, simply because they sound, to my British ears, less sincere than those that use British accents.

(What I find even odder is the public prudery in America that goes alongside the personal chumminess. Look at the absurd shock and horror generated by Janet Jackson's costume malfunction!)

No - in the same way that I will not jump into bed with you after only one date, don't expect me to buy your product simply because you "come on strong" with your first marketing contact!

Eugene Rembor, MBA wrote:

I don't need to watch the video to yell from the bottom of my heart "YES, they should!".

Thanks so much for all of your responses.  I will be contacting you all tomorrow with your downloads.

The question will be live for 7 days, but from the looks of things, very few people are watching the video.  The question in itself is enough to evoke a passionate answer.  And viewing my video without first reading the Attention Age paper is confusing, as one reader, Eugene mentioned in his second post above after watching the video.  However, when I took a look at my YouTube statistics before writing the post, there were 72 views of the video, so SOMEONE is watching out there!!! Yeah!!!

Apparently, a lot of people do not like the idea of becoming your customer's best friend.  Opinions are also divided.  Many of the interpretations are far from what my intention was.  Eve hit the nail on the head with her analysis and explanation, and I think we can all learn a thing or two from her answer.

For those of you who have not yet seen the video, here it is again:

http://www.strategicprofits.com/66-seconds-compelling/angela-wickenberg/

Talk soon,

Angela Wickenberg

 

 

 

As marketers, in 2006 and 2007 we saw several "Death of" reports;

First out was Scott Boulch in November 2006 with "The Death Of Adsense."

Scott wrote that within a few days, he had built a list of over 38,000 subscribers.

I don't  know how many subscriptions to his software "thelistvirus" he was able to

get - probably a lot of them.  It was a smart tactic that worked  like money in the bank,

Just a short week or so after, we heard from Mike Filsaime with his

"The Death of Internet Marketing".  He gave away his list building software

and built a list of over 50,000 people. He wrote that in just over 24 hours,

they had over 34,346 people create an account to get the report.

(and he thanked Keith Baxter and Scott Boulch in the email he sent

out to his list for their marketing campaign for Their Death of AdSense

report, inspired him on how to market his own report.  The marketing

method was to pay for the referrals - so as a marketer using this traffic tactic

- it required money to make the money).

Next in line were a series of separate articles and pre-sales pages:

"The Death of Email Marketing", "The Death of Adwords for Affiliates",

"The Death of the Search Engine Spammer", and many spin offs of that theme.

 

Rich Schrefren also came out with a very popular series of reports last year

along the same lines.

Then Simon Leung came out with his "The Death Of Google Adwords" report as a

pre-launch to his adwords products.  I never heard how the campaign went.

 

Just the other day or so ago, I received another "Death of" report. 

The first thought in my mind was "Oh No!  Not another 'Death of' report!".

I had to find out if it was the same kind of information in the report.

The title is "The Death of Information Marketing As We Know It"

Dan Lok writes that he spent close to three months working on his

"Death of" report, which is slightly over 40 pages.

http://www.deathofinformationmarketing.com

Angela Wickenberg

http://e-bizsecretsexposed.com/blog

It’s what you want. The very popular StumbleUpon concept is simple: when you sign up, you provide the service with some of your interests, and you install the neat little toolbar. Once you’ve got the application installed, you can simply begin stumbling and you can tell the system how you feel about the page that was served to you. By clicking on the thumbs up “I like it” button or by clicking on the thumbs-down button, you teach the SU system what content you truly enjoy. By stumbling and sharing your finds to other users, you’re personalizing your own experience and the experience of your peers as well.

The personalization concept — where content is being provided based on your own desires — has proven to be quite successful. Since it was introduced two years ago, StumbleUpon now boasts over 1.8 million users, and is continually expanding. Version 2.90 of the toolbar, which came out earlier this week, is incorporating the relatively new video social search engine that it unveiled in December. StumbleUpon is truly growing…

And so is Digg.

At half the amount of subscribers that StumbleUpon has, Digg is aiming to emulate the SU concept, a recent BusinessWeek article has reported. Hot on the heels of StumbleUpon, Digg (which launched its own video extension five days after StumbleUpon did) is aiming even higher to SU’s core success model: a recommendation tool.

According to Kevin Rose, Digg’s founder who is quoted in the article, “Digg will be smart enough to know what interests you” and it will serve content that fits within the tastes of its users. For current subscribers, this means that Digg will serve content based on the stories users have dugg or buried. If you used the service to promote pages that you truly liked, the Digg system appears to not be much different from StumbleUpon.

More and more companies are involving themselves in what can be an imminent threat (well, perhaps not just yet — and it still depends on who you ask): personalization. Google’s personalized search is being promoted more heavily. As more and more people realize that there are only a few items that may be of interest to them when they search, systems are learning to adapt to user preferences through their own algorithms. As Google explains it, if you’re searching for “dolphin” because you want to learn more about the football team from Miami, you’re not overly concerned with results pertaining to marine life. Depending on the types of pages you visit and the domains upon which these sites are located, Google’s personalized search will rank these pages higher than the undesirable results, thus providing you with a searching experience that like that of no other user. To Google, this is a move provide quality results and reduce the unnecessary clutter.

 

To make our websites shine through these results and be obvious to the viewer, there will likely be obstacles that we’ll need to overcome. Good content is a necessity. Telling your friends is a good way to get the word out. Promoting these pertinent sites through social search is still going to be very useful.

We’re bordering on a new era, one with incredible challenge and obstacles, but one that does have the end user — you — in mind, and hopefully everyone in all communities will be happy with the results.

The 4 ESSENTIAL Keys to Building an Internet Business:

1. You need to build a list

2. You need to have a backend and multiple front-ends

3. You need to be working with at least one other individual (partner), or in a team

4. You need to build a business with continuity income.


You need to begin with the end in mind and build your business based on the basic principles of marketing that have been around for hundreds of years.

So, how are the gurus making big, big money online. How are they constantly entering new markets and extracting huge profits from them?

They're using a very consistent, tried and true model.

It's actually a very simple model that they use over and over again, and it's easy to copy.

There are no secrets when you know the model. You only think there are secrets now because you haven't been able to piece the model together yet.

So, here it is:

This model (the KEY to online wealth), consists of multiple front-ends leading to a backend, which is either a high-ticket item or a continuity program (something where someone is billed automatically each month).

This is the foundation.  Every major online success has been a result of implementing this model properly.

Look at the most successful companies in the world, and you'll see the continuity model in action:

- Credit card companies

- The phone companies (cell phone and regular)

- Gas

- The grocery store (you HAVE to eat!!!)

- Cable TV

Even certain retail stores, like Costco are member-based. Costco charges an annual memembership fee to even allow you to shop at their store!

Of course, they can do this because of the way they've presented their product offering: buy in bulk and save.

It's no accident that these companies lock you into a subscription, and sometimes even a contract where you HAVE to pay them for a certain length of time.

Successful marketers often use a technique called forced continuity. This is where in order to buy something, someone absolutely MUST join the continuity program. The brilliant part is that the continuity program is positioned as a bonus, and on top of that the first month is free.

So, conversions on this are very, very high. And, once you have someone in your continuity program, there is a good chance they'll stay for awhile — possibly for years.

Watch the progression:

1. Customer comes in though a $30 front-end (ebook, cd, etc)

2. Customer is funneled into an email list where they are hit multiple times over the next few weeks (or even months) with autoresponders.

3. Customer is upsold into a $49/month continuity program.

4. From within the continuity program, customer is upsold to a $1000 home-training course.

5. From there, customers are upsold into a $7000 mentoring program including personal coach and teleseminars, plus other tools and bonuses.

If you didn't catch what I just wrote, read it again.

This is how the big names are making BIG BUCKS online. There are also many, many people who you've never heard of who are making insane amounts of money using this model.

Ever heard of Agora Publishing? Their model is based on continuity - they are one of the largest newsletter publishers in the world. At this point, they're bringing in $1,000,000+ per day using the model I described to you above.

With that said, let's take each of the bullet points I listed further up the page and break them down.

I want to tell you exactly what you need to do starting today.

- List Building

Building a list (with either email addresses and/or snail mail), is CRUCIAL if you want to succeed online.

If you don't do it, you will probably never reach your income goals, much less your income potential.

Start building a list now, in whatever niche is most appealing to you.

Now, once you have that list, keep in touch with your subscribers. Send them free content — build a relationship.

- You need to have a backend and multiple front-ends

This is one of the golden rules of Internet marketing.

Do you think guys are Armand Morin are making their money selling their little software scripts and eBooks? Heck no! These products are front-ends.

Armand's big backend is his BIG SEMINAR, which he holds annually. He not only charges people to be there, but he also takes a cut of whatever commerce takes place between people there. It's his seminar, so he can do it!

Remember, a backend can be a high-ticket item or a continuity program.

In this case, Armand's seminar is a high-ticket backend.

If you don't have a backend, you are seriously limiting your income. You're not following the model I've laid out for you!

Just remember, a backend is useless if you don't build your customer relationships. So, I urge you to go back again and read the 4 bullet points I've listed above.

You need to have ALL of them to make this work.

Here's a suggestion. In your everyday life — shopping at the store, taking the kids to school, etc — just pay attention to the businesses around you and ask yourself how they are utilizing the continuity model.

You're going to start seeing examples EVERYWHERE because this is a model that the rich have been using for many years. It's so freaking obvious, yet so many people miss it.

As you're observing the businesses around you, you're also going to see examples of businesses that have no backend whatsoever and you're going to wonder what the heck they are thinking.

As a final note, I want to stress that you don't need your own product to do what is described here.  Some people make it online with one affiliate site.

The model is dead simple — it's the model described above. The only difference is to use other people's products as front-ends. A successful marketer gathers email addresses, and upsells his customers to teleseminars, personal coaching, and his community subscription site.

- You need to be working with at least one other individual (partner), or in a team

I'm not going to devote too much time to this bullet point.

I just want to stress that if you're working alone right now, you're going to move much more slowly than if you find a partner who understands this model.

As entrepreneurs, we have a psychological condition where we think we know everything and can do everything better than anyone else.

This is perhaps our greatest downfall, because it is serious self-delusion.

You are going to be severely limited until you find a partner. This is a universal rule.

- You need to build a business with continuity income.

I think we've pretty much drilled this point into the ground, so I won't talk about it anymore here.

I hope that at the very least this letter has made you think.

I hope it's jolted you and caused to take a step back and really think about how you're spending your time online.

For some of you, what you're reading here will seem like nothing new.

In fact, a lot of people will say: " I already knew all that stuff…"

But the astute marketer, Frank Kern, does not seem

to think that everybody knows this.  Frank Kern wrote in his email to his list

"Listen - some idiots out there will say you don't

need a list …and if you're like me you're sick of their

B.S.  HERE'S PROOF THEY ARE LYING.

Think about this.

How many gurus do you know who don't have a list? None!!

How many big launches have you ever seen where email

marketing wasn't the NUMBER ONE method of promotion?

How many super affiliates do you know without lists?"

Please leave your comments and questions below.

Thanks, 

Angela Wickenberg

"Walk Into Any Niche You Choose
And Dominate Instantly Because
You'll Already Know Where The
Money Is At Every Single Turn…
Before You Ever Even Spend A
Dime Of Your Own" ???

These are the types of claims we have been reading in the recent months from several software, promising that you can literally begin to investigate
a number of keywords and track the advertisers whose advertisements are constantly showing up. This type of monitoring is hugely powerful, especially if it's
able to be done in an automated fashion.

Well — if you've seen any of the recent launches for Google Cash Detective, X-Ray Domination, Uncover Profits or Adwords Tycoons, then you already know that most of those programs are out of reach even for some people that are making good money.

X-Ray Domination = $1500
Undercover Profits = $291 per month
Google Cash Detective = $495 plus $97 per month
Adwords Tycoons = $1500

If you've ever wondered how some of the guys in the past year have been turning up some incredibly enormous checks by using the Pay-Per-Clicks, wouldn't you want to know HOW they are doing it?  I know I do! 

What gets more powerful than letting a little robot loose on the Internet to monitor particular keywords and report back ONLY the campaigns that were shown the most every time they were monitored?  This literally gives you a license to piggyback on other people's success that already have a proven selling process for their affiliate website landing page or just their affiliate link.

I have been testing GCD for a couple of months now and can verify this.

I recently received a great offer from JP Schoeffel at www.adspypro.com/ . This software is the was created in the "Better'n'Cheaper" series, where a number of people pay in advance nominal membership fees to create cheaper and better alternatives to software that has been released and which are only available at much higher prices.  He writes that he has received a lot of criticism for this.  JP Schoeffel has long experience in Internet Marketing and has produced some very good marketing materials and tools, such as Niches-In-A-Box and many social bookmarking books and tools. He has also had  a lot of success as an affiliate marketer.  Now I know why!!!

When I finally got around to reading the sales page on www.adspypro.com/ I was happy to see that it works with several other programs - not just Adwords. The price on the page says $67 for the time being, and will continue to rise after the pre-launch period is over.  Rush to get this software, if you have missed out on the others. Receive $20 back from me after the guarantee period has ended, provided you purchase through my link, of course.  The $20 rebate is valid only until June 30th, 2007 and for 500 licenses.

I received my copy today and I am pleased to say that it looks very good.  More to come in the near future on a review of this software and some effective strategies to use with them.

I received Google Cash Detective, GCD, as a surprise bonus last year when I subscribed to a new Adwords management service, which took me months to learn - not because it  was so hard, but because I am so non-technical. The link to GCD arrived about a couple of months ago.  Being the non-techie person that I am, t took me quite some time to learn to install - but once I finally got over my fear and "got it", I realized it wasn't that  difficult, after all to install software and things like a "cron manager" and to create databases. I've been testing it without any detailed instructions on how to find the profitable campaigns.  I have found campaigns and tested new ones but haven't had the instant success that so many people are claiming would be the results of having this. I suppose if someone were to peek over my shoulder and tell me exactly what, when and how to do things, I would learn much faster and be earning much more money with it. 

I also recently received a copy of Adwords Tycoon, which went on sale yesterday and sold out within a few hours of its launch, even after hours of problems with their servers, and learned just very quickly through their tutorials how they find the profitable campaigns, but the price of that software was very high.  These software are very similar to one another, but to be fair, the Adwords Tycoon software gives more info and is more flexible than GCD, but lacks the extended service of transferring your keywords to your Adwords campaigns, a monthly service priced at $97 per month, as mentioned before.

More to come on a comparison of the functionality of these software and the results I am getting.

Google Cash Detective, Adwords Tycoons, XRayDomination, and UnderCover Profits are ALL SOLD OUT.  But you can get www.adspypro.com/ for a limited time at the pre-lauch price of $67 and $20 back from me after the guarantee period has ended, provided you purchase through my link, of course.  The $20 rebate is valid only until June 30th, 2007 and for 500 licenses.

Stay tuned to this blog for an upcoming video on the results I am getting with these software.
 
Angela Wickenberg

Three Internet marketers I know have struck gold and I can't keep it quiet any longer.

They stumbled on a formula that uses Intenet video to generate UNBELIEVABLE TRAFFIC AND SEARCH ENGINE RANKINGS–in as little as 24 to 48 hours!

I know it's hard to believe but they have the proof.

In fact, one top Internet marketer just used their little known but highly effective techniques to capture the ENTIRE FIRST PAGE OF GOOGLE RESULTS for his targeted keyword phrase.

How did he do it? I want to let you in on it, too. More