Educating and Informing Your Prospects

Educational based marketing is an important marketing strategy that every businessperson needs to familiarize himself with as much as possible. I find, however, that many salespeople tend to try educational based marketing and then stray back towards traditional sales tactics shortly thereafter. Some have admitted that this happens out of habit, while others admit to not being comfortable with this method of marketing.

I truly believe there is one main problem when it comes to educational based marketing. You, as a salesperson, are afraid of sharing the knowledge you have. You are either afraid of overexposing yourself and making a mistake or you are afraid that your competitors will steal your ideas and become more successful than you are.

Both of these are incredibly poor reasons to give up on educational marketing. First of all, if you are confident in your knowledge it will show in all that you do. You’ll never make a mistake if you create well-planned, carefully researched, and thoroughly checked educational materials. It simply isn’t possible to put together a genuine piece of marketing material in a few hours or even a day. Taking the time to do things right will result in a properly formatted document that will leave your prospects clamoring for more!

As for fear – well, someone once told me that “fear is life’s greatest motivator.” She was right. You can not let your fears stop you from doing what you love. You obviously love your profession or you wouldn’t be looking for ways to improve yourself. You should not fear your competitors stealing your information. Most of them won’t, and those that do will not have the slightest clue what to do with it. You can’t avoid the competition – you just have to outsmart and outthink them.

Your clients and products need to be informed and you are the only one who can help. If you are, for example, a real estate agent, your clients are likely dying to know the top 5 red flags to watch out for during any home tour. They’ll love you for sharing some incredible tips, and they’ll trust you because you were honest enough to give them information that might stop a sale even though you’re in the business.

People want to deal with those they can identify with. They want to form solid business relationships. Believe it or not, client loyalty does still exist. Sometimes your clients will even be willing to pay a few extra pounds for services if it means they can be secure in the knowledge that they are dealing with someone who knows what he is talking about.

Are you that person? They won’t know if you don’t tell them.

Happy Marketing!

Sean

Sean McPheat

Marketing Consultant – Internet Marketing Consultant - Sales Expert