Pushing Content

I left Chicago’s cold yesterday for the warmer climes of Virginia.  I am at the Virginia Military Institute doing an entrepreneurship thing Friday and Saturday.  I spit shined my loafers and I am looking forward to hosting a table with cadets tomorrow.

Lexington is a nice college town.  Washington and Lee is right next to VMI.  Sweet Briar isn’t far.

Thursday evening, I met some alums.  One runs a marketing agency and has a podcast he has been running for quite some time.  We started talking about that.  He really enjoys doing the podcast.  One thing about a blog, or a media outlet like a podcast is that you have to constantly “feed the beast”.  I don’t know if I could sustain a podcast.  Blogging everyday is natural but podcasts are tougher.  Since he really enjoys it, no problem for him. His face lights up when he talks about it.

We started talking about different approaches to marketing.   He said something interesting that makes a lot of sense but that I had never really thought a lot about before.  In the last three years no matter what kind of sales you are engaged in, B2B or B2C, the customer has educated themself a lot on the internet prior to meeting with you.  Most customers are 75% there.

That really changes the dynamic of the sales call.

In the old days, the sales person was the information provider.  Selling was easier, because you had more information than your customer.  You could create some doubt and some FOMO in customers to get them to bite.

Today, the customer is as up to date as the sales person.

One of the things a company can do is push content.  Create content, but it out on the internet.  It should be informational in nature that keeps the customer coming back.  It cannot be standing on a soapbox and yelling.

Content should be provocative without being over the top.  It should ask questions and allow the audience to interact somehow.

I will post a link to his podcast when I receive it.