When I first heard this, it changed the way I thought about internet marketing forever…
I’m sure I heard it from Perry Marshall. It wasn’t even the point of what he was trying to say. It was an offhand remark. One of those throwaway comments that packed a punch, but was really meant for those who’d get it.
What did he say?
I’ll tell you in a minute.
But I have to set the stage…
Before I heard this one thing, I thought about internet marketing the way most business people and marketers do…
That is, I thought the goal and purpose of marketing was to go out and attract the people who were basically ready to buy, who just had to be prodded into action.
And, in fact, this approach was only reinforced by my heroes in the direct mail world.
That is, if you take someone like Gary Bencivenga, who could write a little 50-page “digest” direct mail promotion that could mail profitably to 100 million households…
Whose copy could go out to total strangers, and convince them to become customers…
It’s easy to see why I’d think the goal of any good marketing would be to go out and convince people, right now, to take action and buy.
And in fact, with many of my projects, with many of my clients, that’s still what I do.
One-and-done marketing.
We send you an offer, and you respond, or you don’t.
Does it work? Sometimes. And sometimes it works really well!
Yet, what Perry said totally flew in the face of this “best practice.”
Here’s the secret — and this applies to just about ANY form of marketing, especially online…
Perry said, “I haven’t seen a profitable Facebook marketing campaign yet that doesn’t include an email autoresponder follow-up series.” He went on to say that the same principles pretty much applied for AdWords today, too.
That is to say, that one-and-done is NOT an effective online marketing strategy!
Are there people proving this wrong?
Absolutely. Every day. The world’s best marketers, as well as very targeted marketers in very defined niches are able to, with some effort, get away with selling direct without follow-up.
And yet, for the most part, it’s incredibly difficult to do — and it only becomes more difficult by the day!
If you want to be successful at internet marketing — whether we’re talking building your own business, or helping clients — you MUST get good at email marketing…
Here’s the thing.
You can’t just write any emails.
You can’t just drive traffic to your site, get them to sign up, then pummel them with offers. They’ll opt out of your email list in a New York Second, and probably report you as spam, too.
No, you have to be engaging. Interesting. Compelling.
You have to follow a principle Gary Bencivenga once told me he used in all his advertising to become the best in the world. You have to make your advertising look, feel, and actually be valuable to your target audience.
And email is a perfect medium to do that.
And yet — there’s a right way and a wrong way to do it!
Frankly, there’s no better way to do it than with stories.
Once someone opts into your list, they have a few questions…
— Who is this person?
— Where do they come from?
— What do they have to offer?
— How’s it going to work for me?
— How has it worked for people like me?
— Why is this a great solution to my problem?
… And so on…
A ton of questions you can answer, question-by-question, email-by-email, through stories.
You write your first email, and maybe it really makes it clear how you ran into this problem and decided to solve it.
Your next one goes even deeper into your origin and motivation for being in the business in the first place.
The third reveals stories of people who’ve succeeded.
And on and on. Story after story.
All along the way, compelling them, persuading them, motivating them to do business with you.
Why does this work?
Well, on a very deep level, the more a prospect feels like they know, like, and trust you, the easier it is for them to decide to do business with you.
Going back to Perry’s comment, when someone hits your website for the first time, they don’t know you from Adam.
However, if you develop a relationship with them through stories in an email follow-up campaign, they start to know who you are. And assuming you are doing the right things to show your attractive character and set up the sale, they are also starting to like and trust you more.
And you’re doing it in a way that feels like it’s not pushy or too “salesy” — you’re just telling stories.
These are the exact kinds of campaigns Perry is talking about with Facebook and AdWords.
And no matter what media you’re selling in (or if you’re selling one-to-one), developing that relationship through STORY is the single-most powerful way I know to really make a ton more sales.
I want to hand you a complete blueprint for telling this kind of story…
Registrations for the Story Selling Master Class close on Monday night.
This weekend is really your last good opportunity to make sure it’s the right decision, and hop on board.
Click here to get real-life case studies of story selling at work…
Click here to discover how to crush the biggest road blocks to story selling success…
And click here to discover what all you’ll get when you register for the Story Selling Master Class…
There’s a TON of value there, even if you don’t register for the Story Selling Master Class. And of course, even though it’s a very smart investment, you’re under no obligation to take this step to move your career, business, and persuasion ability forward.
However you should know that after Monday, you will have missed your opportunity for what could be a huge breakthrough in your persuasion abilities.
Yours for bigger breakthroughs,
Roy Furr
