Last Friday, I shared my Battle Mastermind interview with Vince Reed…
(If you haven’t watched the video yet, click here to get it.)
I really like the format. Vince goes “toe to toe” with his guest, trading blows… Or, questions… About how to get better business and marketing results.
He gets two questions for every one you get as a guest.
Which is interesting — because unlike the standard podcast, it means guests are also asking the host questions.
So, while Vince asked me questions, I also got to ask him…
And, since he’s a paid traffic expert, and sells his own courses, I figured I’d get him to reveal…
His most valuable tip for selling content through paid traffic!
Anyone who is serious about growing their business obsesses over this stuff.
Figuring out how to reliably spend money on advertising and have it pay off consistently and scalably is the best, fastest way to grow any business.
I’ve had a fair bit of success with this.
And I have a history of helping clients with this, going back to my start in marketing in 2005.
But I always like to get a NEW perspective, and Vince’s stuck with me…
Vince invited me to remember a common childhood experience…
In fact, I didn’t even have to think back to my childhood.
This is something I’ve watched my kids go through a lot in the last few years.
“Show and tell.”
Or, as they call it today…
“Sharing day.”
You know what I’m talking about…
It’s where you get to bring your favorite toy to school. And you get a moment in the spotlight, showing off what you’ve got.
It’s a moment of pride for you. But Vince pointed out something equally interesting…
Almost no matter who you are, if you’ve got something good, you’re the most popular kid in class in that moment…
Your classmates look on as you show off what makes your toy so cool and desirable.
They listen with rapt attention as you explain why it’s your favorite.
Everybody asks you questions. They want to learn more. They’re curious about your toy.
And naturally, they’re interested in YOU, too…
Because you’re the one with the cool toy.
Vince pointed out: you can do this with marketing, too!
First let’s apply this to selling content, as Vince did in the podcast. Then, let’s look at what the implications are for other offers, such as physical products.
Selling content? Your best show-and-tell is… Drum roll… Content!
Here’s an application of Vince’s explanation, in a nutshell…
Let’s say you’re selling a yoga program, helping your students master trickier poses.
You could just make an offer for the yoga program. And if your offer is great and your marketing is compelling, you’ll likely convert some segment of your audience.
But, especially in competitive markets (like yoga), you’ll lose a lot, too.
Now let’s say that out of your bigger curriculum, you pick three of the most popular yoga poses that are tricky, but gratifying to master.
And for each of those poses, let’s say you’ve also identified some critical tips that will help almost anyone master the poses much quicker, that are easy to demonstrate.
Here’s how to do this, “show and tell” style…
First, your ad would likely show you in all three poses, in different pictures.
If they’re popular or particularly interesting, this would be perfect. It’s instantly-recognizable for your target market. And could grab attention long enough for you to make the promise…
“Let me show you how to master these three poses, free…”
Or something like that.
A click through would put them onto your landing page.
And on that landing page would be the first video…
Where… YOU ACTUALLY GIVE AWAY CONTENT — WITHOUT ASKING THEM TO EVEN OPT IN!
I know, blasphemy…
Here’s how you structure this content…
First, you’d start the video by saying, “Hi, my name is [your name], and I’m going to show you some simple secrets that will have you doing [pose 1], [pose 2], and [pose 3] in no time.”
Then, you go right into teaching!
“Let’s start with [pose 1]. The first thing you need to understand about this is…”
And so on…
You actually give away your best information on this.
Then, as you get to the end of your instruction on pose 1, you pivot.
Here’s where you go back into marketer mode…
Here’s where you’re going to ask for the opt in.
Only AFTER you’ve done a little show-and-tell, demonstrating value before you ask them for even a meager email.
“… If you’ve followed these simple tips, you should be experiencing more success with [pose 1] today than ever before. And like I said, I’d also like to share these kinds of tips for you, for [pose 2] and [pose 3]. For me to do that, I need you to enter your email address on this page. And you’ll get instant access to the next lesson, where we’ll go right into how you can master [pose 2] and [pose 3] as quickly and easily as you’ve just seen with [pose 1].”
If the value in the first part of the lesson was high enough, they’re ABSOLUTELY going to want to see what else you have to offer.
And here’s a nice part of this: it’s not about the hard sell, teasing, or anything like that.
All you’re doing is playing “show and tell.”
That is, all you’re doing is showing them what you’ve got, telling them all about it, and then including an offer to ask for more.
This is completely in line with what I teach in The Value-First Funnel Strategy.
Frankly, I wasn’t surprised that Vince has gotten a significant bump in conversions by applying this, in principle.
But I also thought his tactical implementation was both interesting for the analogy he looped it into, and a valuable illustration of the concept.
Finally: how would you do this for other types of products?
First off, remember that education-based and value-first selling is universal.
It doesn’t matter if you’re selling information products, physical products, or services.
Every offer can be overlaid with an informational, educational component that will increase the perceived and actual value enjoyed by the prospect.
And the marketing of any product or service can be made more interesting, more compelling, more unique and distinctive by adding an educational component that adds real value to the lives of your prospects.
But what does a physical product have that’s hard to pull off with many kinds of information or services?
Demonstration.
One great way to play “show and tell” with physical products is to look to the infomercial industry for inspiration.
To show your product in action, with a relevant demonstration, is a fast and easy way to get all the benefits of “show and tell” — and prove the value of the product, too.
Your empowering question: what tests will you run in the coming days to test this principle’s profit-boosting power for yourself?
Yours for bigger breakthroughs,
Roy Furr
