Jun

How to Make Web Marketing Stone Soup

By Sid

Here’s the scenario:

Marketing guru “A” has a “proven” approach to growing a business that includes an intense article distribution strategy.

Internet guru “B” shows you how to generate massive amounts of income through a comprehensive “up-sell” strategy that leads people from a $19 purchase to a $997 purchase.

Social Networking guru “C” explains that the best way to grow your business is by spending gobs of time on Twitter and Facebook.

SEO guru “D” wants you to create pages upon pages of content on your blog, with each page being highly optimized for the search engines.

And marketing guru “E” brings to the pot his formula for writing web copy that worked like gangbusters four or five years ago.

Put all of this together and you’ve got a filling pot of Stone Soup. Mmmmm…. it’s quite filling and emotionally satisfying, but there’s something missing:

It probably won’t work.

The Problem With Listening to Too Many Gurus

I run across this all the time. My clients hear a talk, go to a conference, or find a web site that does a fantastic job of selling them on a methodology or approach.

It’s not that the methodology or approach is bad in and of itself. It’s that when you throw it in the pot with a hodge-podge of other approaches, you get a quite filling bowl of stone soup that ultimately isn’t satisfying. Emotionally, it feels like you’re doing a lot for your business, but you’re not.

The idea is to examine what’s working TODAY with an eye towards the future. While it’s impossible to predict the future, it’s fairly obvious that things are getting more social and interconnected.

For example, if you listened to or read about President Obama’s address in Egypt on June 4th, it’s clear that he’s pointing to a vision in which we focus on our commonalities and not our differences. You see this happening online as well. “Uniters” are applauded and supported, while “dividers” are ignored or shunned.

What this means for you as a marketer is that whatever tools or approach you choose to use, your attention should be placed on supporting and uniting a community.

Putting Some Flavor Into Your Marketing Stone Soup

The keyword is “value.” Does your brochure-type web site offer any real value to your community of colleagues, prospects and customers? Are your special reports, articles, videos, and webinars filled with substance that unites people through a shared experience and belief?

Remember that your prospects and customers are human. We live in a world that is becoming simultaneously more connected and more isolated. We work in cubicles, communicate electronically, and cherish our often brief interactions with others.

Twitter’s rapid rise to the top of the social networking shows how clearly that this is true.

So, to put some real flavor in your Marketing Stone Soup, stop focusing on the marketing methodologies. Focus instead on the experience you want to create for your community. Measure the appropriateness of a marketing approach against the yardstick of experience, and forget about what it’s done for others.

Your business depends on your ability to create a deeper, broader, and value-added connection with your community that’s based on shared valued and shared ideals. If a marketing approach does this, use it. If not, toss it aside and maybe use it later.

Let me know what you’d throw into the pot to make a tasty and fulfilling web marketing stone soup…

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