11 Steps to maven marketing

11 Steps

Step 1. Rethink trust.

Start by caring more about the client and everyone else you encounter. Show clients that things are done differently with your company, and you do it the right way. Fill their needs and help them achieve their goal above your own personal profits.

Step 2. Create your maven persona.

The character you create represents your company’s core values and combines elements of your personality because you’ll have to turn and project it to the public. If it is a pure fabrication, then you will not be able to pull it off, if it does not resonate on a real level, clients will sense it. This character should be made up of the best parts of your company and your personal strengths.

Step 3. Develop a market vision.

State a clear message that relays your core values to the market. You are positioning your company in the market as one that is here to serve clients with respect, value, and honesty. This vision you are crafting is one that is here to enrich the lives of your clients.  

Step 4. Tell your origin story.

You need to tell people why you are in this industry, and how your presence goes beyond profits. Show you have a vested interest in the health of the industry as a whole and express your frustrations with certain parts of the industry that are done poorly. Take them back in time and explain where you come from, what motivates you, and where you learned the industry yourself. By communicating your hopes and dreams to people, and even how you failed in the past, makes you more relatable. People want to work with someone they know, someone who thinks like themselves. You are not the silent business owner that moves the pieces on the chessboard, but instead, you are the loud voice that speaks the truth about your industry. People are interested in people!

Step 5. Develop predictable behaviors.

Create an experience for the client when they use your company. Whether it’s calling in, working with sales, or using your products/services it should feel special. Also, be consistent with this crafted experience so every time any client does business with you, the same thing happens. This predictable behavior will create a shared experience between all customers and become a marker of quality unique to your company alone. That way if the client ever goes somewhere else, they will not get the experience you have created. Finally, look beyond the company and see what behaviors your clients have and especially notice any odd or unique traits. These often can signal new ideas you can act on and give insight into who your customers are.

Step 6. Become an honest voice.

It is better to be seen as overly passionate than plain and boring. Every other company is plain and boring; you have the opportunity to be different than your competitors. Let the people know about the poor-quality products and lack of standards in your industry and that you are doing things differently. Shake the boat and disrupt the natural order of the market and explain how your competitors are not serving the market. You do not need to name them directly, but merely talk about what they are doing wrong. Warn your clients of pitfalls, give free advice, and recommend how they should be spending their hard-earned money in your industry.

Step 7. Develop your own phraseology.

Create a certain set of words to describe the industry and the way you see it. Call the shots when it comes to picking and choosing how things should be framed. As a leader and an authoritative source of information in your industry, you are responsible for breaking ground on new solutions, and creating standards when they are missing. Each time, make sure that you are using phrases and language that reflect your company, and are replicable. This helps to cement the messages of wisdom and truth in your client’s minds and create positive associations. You may wish to revisit the “Choice of Language” lesson in the Mindset Pillar to refresh how the words and language we use have an immense influence in our minds and in business.

Step 8. Use a signature communication channel.

This supports how you can create predictable habits and behaviors for your clients to see and build up a reliable track-record. Create a place where people can access your information or pick a method of how it will be delivered. This can be a weekly blog, newsletter, podcast, or even a vlog.  Clients want to access your knowledge and learn from you, so give them what they want. Ongoing communication further solidifies your position as the top choice and gives you a platform to spread educational information.

Step 9. Create an exclusive community.

Treat your clients as VIPs…however, before you can even do that, you need to decide what it means to give special treatment to a client. How will you show that you appreciate them with attention, perks, and benefits just for being your client? One possible VIP treatment is to allow your customers to meet for exclusive events and provide them with one-of-a-kind offers that no one else in your industry has. Another goal is to create a dialogue between the company’s advertising and the clients. Most advertising is a one-way street and seldom do you see companies give their clients a say in the direction of the business by having them reflected in the messaging.

Step 10. Create client referrals.

A maven creates a wow factor in their services/products, so when the client uses them, they become addicted to that feeling of pure satisfaction. This wow factor is the key to converting your clients into free advertising via word-of-mouth referrals. Referrals are making a comeback because we are bombarded by advertising 24/7. It is hard to now trust companies as more and more of them deploy psychological tricks that get you to buy their often-low-quality products. Your clients are actually helping their friends by referring your company to them since you provided so much value. Be sure to leverage this and make the referrals process easier for your clients. Show your appreciation by offering something to your existing client and their new referral.

Step 11. Seek a mentor.

The Service Strategist highly recommends that you seek out a mentor for personal and professional guidance with business growth. Choose a mentor that can help you work through the higher-level concepts and guide you through the planning stages of your processes. Remember it takes years to experiment, fail, learn, and then finally produce a working system. You can shortcut the experimentation phase if you find a mentor that has been there and done that. A mentor who has tried and failed and helps you avoid a pitfall, so you succeed faster. It might seem like something that you don’t see the value in or have time for but we know from years of experience that over time mentors can save you a great deal of time, money, and additional stress.