This post is updated from one year ago and it is more relevant today than ever.

I will need several business services and products to continue growing my business and many of them I don’t need now, or can’t afford yet. That’s why I want you to keep in touch so I won’t forget you.

One of the most common mantras you will hear in business is “Timing is everything.”  I agree. Trying to persuade a prospective customer that he needs your product before he needs your product will annoy him. Just as bothersome is attempting to “educate” your prospect about his “pain” when he doesn’t feel any. If, however, there is a pain point in his business and your product or service will solve it, then by all means take some time to discuss your solution. If you get a “think it over” response, you probably won’t make a sale… until maybe year or two from now. I’m sure you plan on still being around then.

A careful sense of timing – to each individual customer – is critical when planning a direct marketing message or making a sales call.

You may say, “yeah, but how can you possibly live inside every potential customer’s world and know when the time is right?” In traditional business development, a good CRM (customer relationship management) program like Salesforce or ACT works well. So, that’s one way to use good timing but there’s a better way:  It’s all the time!

Junk goes in the trash but the good stuff is opened.

First, identify your target audience by vertical industry lists or by networking and prospecting so you know they have a need for your service or product. Develop your database of names, addresses, phone numbers and EMAIL ADDRESSES. Furthermore, connect with as many as possible on LinkedIn and Facebook. Follow them on Twitter. Then get to work being a sought-after specialist to each one of your prospects.

Why are Google and Apple the most successful companies in the world right now? Because they are genius at what they do and how they communicate it. They remainrelevant and communicate value all the time. There are much smaller examples including local restaurants, law firms, IT companies, you name it.

You need to get busy demonstrating your genius to all of the prospects in your database.  Be a collector and generator of valuable content – expertise and ideas that make people say “Hmm… or WOW!  Yes, it’s hard but you can do it. If I can do it, you can do it too, maybe better!

This isn’t about about you but rather the people in your target audience. My closest concrete example of how this works is what you’re reading right now. Every week different people tell me the same thing: “I get so much junk email and delete it but I always save and read your newsletter.” The Chuck Sink Link generates more quality leads – soon to be clients – than any other sales or marketing activity I’ve ever practiced in 25 years. To all of you: Many thanks!

The examples of how this works are sprinkled throughout your life.

Think about the emails you opt-in to and the supplier companies you follow. What about the exceptional sales reps that stand out from the crowd and whom you like hearing from?

There are plenty of great marketers who know how to put value in front of their audience on a regular, appropriately frequent basis so they are top-of-mind at all times for their products & services. So, when the time is right for their prospect to buy, guess who gets the call?

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There is a lot of volunteerism and philanthropy going on all the time. Most businesses I know devote time, energy and money to showing up at fundraisers, volunteer events and simply giving for the sake of helping the less fortunate among us. Thank God for the generosity of so many in the business world. Giving back is a wonderful thing and many companies make it part of their business plans.

When we see and hear the authentic gratitude of individuals who are helped immeasurably by the generosity of corporate and personal giving, we get emotional because that’s where our selfless love is manifest – one child, man or woman at a time. It is in that one home (hopefully with more added and multiplied) where we witness the evidence of the goodness of our charity.

There are other, more profound works of charity being performed by a small portion of our society. They happen on the street, in the office, the classroom and even the boardroom. They are performed by people who have something in common. What that “something” is, I leave you to ponder.

Doubtless, you have been surprised at some point by extremely valuable help coming from others at great expense to them. Perhaps you felt obliged to pay them back, tried to and they forthrightly refused.

Who’s calling?

The simplest things like answering a stranger’s phone call, returning the calls and emails from salespeople you’ve engaged or from job hunters are acts that one can avoid without a business penalty (usually). He might even think it’s best not to waste the time because his time is far more valuable remaining focused on paying customers and weighing important business decisions. Maybe that salesperson or job hunter would be helped or encouraged by a brief and cheerful dialog.

Spending half a day of prime business hours, filling a gas tank and burning through tires costs real money. Doing things like that for non customers who need your professional expertise is a very kind thing to do. Such is an act of charity; selfless giving that fewer and fewer people seem willing to do. But these kinds of things create ripples in the world, noticed or not.

The latest example of business related kindness in my circle came from a man who wouldn’t expect an article to be written about him, nor would he consider whether or not the favor would be returned. So, to honor his genuine humility I’ll just offer a hyperlink to his website and let you know that my students really needed to hear from him yesterday and they did. Thank you, Steve!

The post Showing up is fine. Helping unexpectedly is priceless! appeared first on Chuck Sink Link.

It occurs to me that marketing and sales have more parallels to teaching than people may realize. As an adjunct professor I’m learning a lot about audience engagement.

Students sit though class because they have to, not because they want to. Their parents are paying good money for them to be there. Most students understand and respect that. They also realize that success or failure in a required class can have a real impact on their futures. There’s incentive pushing them forward and making them pay attention – as far as their attention spans allow.

Naturally there are a few students in just about every classroom who are internally motivated and inspired to learn everything they can. Predictably they excel in learning the material and participating in class discussion. What about the majority of the students who appear indifferent and uninterested? Their academic success is just as important to them as it is to the self motivated students, whether they know it or not.

I’m attempting to paint a metaphor concerning your business audience. Your loyal customers are a pleasure to work with. They look forward to hearing from you and often take initiative themselves to keep improving the business relationship. In reality, they make up a very small portion of your target market and total audience. By the numbers, the mass market of the indifferent could be the source of your future fortunes if only you could engage a significant percentage of them like you do your good customers.

What I find raises more heads and focuses more eyes on the professor is when he introduces emotion and human drama into the material being presented. When I stray off textbook rote and bullet points, I notice that most of my class is focused and listening. It’s the stuff they’re not expecting that has them thinking and becoming curious. So long as I stay within the core of the curriculum, I have a tool at my disposal to wake up my audience and get them refocused on why they are there; on the importance of paying attention. I get them to buy into my message (which is to teach them business communication skills).

Today’s lesson for you is to tap into what really matters to the majority of your audience. Once you understand the emotional hot buttons that can be assigned to your product and service benefits, you’ve stuck through the common bedrock of commodity messages to the real marketing pay dirt. Your otherwise bored students (prospects) will start paying attention and want to learn more from you.

The post Make them want to be there. appeared first on Chuck Sink Link.

There’s a topic one of my business consulting clients brings up in his talks. He does so tactfully and with quiet conviction. It’s a soft topic, ignored with hard consequences.

For me and I suspect most people, there are certain individuals we look up to and genuinely admire. Sometimes I marvel at the discipline and focus some high achievers have. In the past I was envious of their apparent ease at setting goals and accomplishing them. Now as I witness their achievements I feel good for them, happy that I know them and am able to learn from them. Those amazing people can teach us average people (speaking only for myself) a lot.  There is so much I need to learn. And you know what? Those same high achievers may someday be in dire need of my help or your help. Great leaders possess enough humility to know this. Perhaps they already hit that dire situation, found the help they needed, accepted it, recovered and grew to where they are today.

There are times when all of us; I don’t care who you think you are or what of life’s challenges you think you’ve mastered, we all crash or get badly hurt at some point in our journey. We can work for and achieve mastery over bad habits. We can reach and surpass every life and business goal we set for ourselves. And then one day a pointed rebuke or sharp disapproval from a cherished person reveals a truth; a higher ideal that can seem to render our lives as having failed. Nothing affects a human being’s countenance more than the quality of his or her relationships. No amount of wealth or power is worth more than the approval and love of others. A wise leader will use this fact to lead his team more effectively.

Intellectual and physical prowess are worthless without love genuinely practiced. The unaided will of a strong person can run a business or family like a juggernaut, rolling roughshod or even very lightly over the feelings of others.  This can go on for years without obvious consequences. Eventually, valuable employees or partners look for an out. They take their talents elsewhere because they are receiving no social and emotional compensation for their hard work, loyalty and love.

Love exists wherever people congregate, whether it’s a family, church, fellowship, community organization or business.  A well educated leader knows this in his mind. The truly fortuitous leader feels this in his heart. He doesn’t really manage people, but manages well his relationships with people. As such, the great leader is one for whom people want to give their bests efforts. They do so because they are recognized, praised and genuinely appreciated. They feel like family. They know they are loved.

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