Jim Connolly Marketing

Your opinions, voice, uniqueness and AI

By |

human opinion, ai, chatbots, marketing

Opportunity is knocking. It’s knocking loud and it’s knocking clear.

The best part? To benefit from this spectacular opportunity you just need to be yourself.

Allow me to explain.

It starts with a statement of fact: Your opinions are exactly that. They’re yours. They’re as specific to you as your unique blend of life experiences and lessons.

Conversely, artificial intelligence doesn’t have an opinion. Everything about its knowledge base is artificial.

Instead, AI is fed with masses of data. And it’s trained by groups of AI experts. One of the primary tasks of AI trainers, is to keep their AI as neutral to everyone as possible. And in seeking not to offend anyone, AI lacks even an artificial opinion.

In stark contrast

No person who has ever lived is neutral. Unlike AI, we not only have an opinion, we have countless opinions. This includes the opinions and feelings we have regarding the way we do business. And it impacts everything, including:

  • The business tactics we rule in or rule out.
  • The atmosphere we create for our clients or customers.
  • The way we sell or negotiate.
  • The value we place on our products or services.
  • The baseline quality of service or products we provide.
  • The type of staff we hire and the way we look after them.
  • The suppliers we choose.
  • The profile of customers we want to attract (and those we want to avoid).
  • The type of promises and guarantees we provide, etc., etc.

Your business, opinions, voice and uniqueness

Your opinions matter. They always have. They’re what give you your unique voice in the marketplace.

I firmly believe that today, and for the forseeable future, that uniqueness is a powerrful way, maybe the most powerful way, for your business to gain your biggest ever slice of the marketplace.

How?

A growing number of your competitors are switching to AI for their voice. For example, AI tools are creating and guiding their business plans; what to do and what to avoid. Chatbot apps are handling their frontline customer service. Chatbots are also guiding or shaping (and in many cases providing) their; newsletter content, blog posts, video / podcast scripts, advertising copy and social media interactions, etc. In short, everything that prospective clients or customers use in order to judge these businesses, is bland and lifeless.

I’m suggesting that you adopt a very different aproach to AI.

The most savvy business owners I know are also using AI. But the way they use it, excludes every area of their business that carries their DNA. Their opinions and their voice remain 100% human. It’s what guides their messaging, their priorities, their values, their commitment, their customer service and their willingness to go the extra mile. Their businesses have a pulse and personality. They are extremely easy to connect with. They are easy to relate to. And on a very human level, they’re easy to trust. Because they are human. And so is their brand. Not dull and lifeless like the previous example.

Very soon, you’ll be able to stand out and get noticed, in a way that wasn’t possible before. The opportunity is knocking. But only for those who choose to take notice of it.

Married bachelors and 3-sided squares

By |

marketing, prospecting

You’ll never meet a married bachelor. You’ll never find a 3-sided square. And you’ll never build the right kind of business, with the wrong kind of people.

  • If the wrong kind of people work for you, they’ll ruin your business.
  • If the wrong kind of people hire you, they’ll ruin your business.

The solution seems simple. Decide exactly who the right kind of people are for your business. And then intentionally hire, and market to, the right people.

The tricky part? Saying no to the wrong kind of people!

That’s why the best time to hire someone is before you desperately need a position filled. And the best time to choose a new client, is before you desperately need a new client.

It’s that easy.

It’s also that difficult.

Either way, it’s absolutely essential.

Get connected and prosper

By |

customer experience, marketing, word of mouth

As you start the second quarter of 2023, I have a suggestion you might find really useful. Why not connect with some people?

For example.

  • The people you know, who could help you to reach someone you’d like to meet with.
  • The people you know, who will give you their honest opinion on that idea you have.
  • The people you know, who always leave you feeling energized after you speak with them.
  • The people you know, who need your help or support right now.
  • The people you know, who have successfully duplicated their business model in a new location, and opened up a whole new marketplace.
  • The people you know, who you haven’t connected with in a while and you should catch-up with.
  • The people you know, who would make great Joint Venture partners.
  • The people you know, who are experienced at dealing with a challenge you have.

Your list

Your list of people will be different from the one above. And your list will change, as your situation changes.

For example, my wife is an author. Her list changes radically, when she gets the publication date of her next book. It changes again, when the publicity for that book starts. And again, when she starts research on a new book.

The key thing is to set time aside when required, to focus on the people who could help you, and those who you might be able to help.

Their list

As you know, there are people out there who rely on you for various things; both in business and life in general. You’re on their lists, even if they don’t have written lists. The myth of the self-made success is exactly that… a myth. None of us can do it all by ourselves.

So get connected. And prosper.

What really matters

By |

Stalling tactics, marketing tip

It doesn’t matter what brand of laptop or phone you work with. Leonardo da Vinci used a quill and parchment. Einstein used a pen and paper, plus a chalkboard.

It doesn’t matter how motivated you feel. You don’t wait for inspiration to appear. You command it to appear.

It doesn’t matter what negative or peevish people tell you. Great ideas are not anointed!

It doesn’t matter if others can’t see your vision. Steve Ballmer famously laughed on camera, when interviewed about Apple’s first iPhone. He said no businessperson would use a phone that didn’t have a hardware keyboard.

What does matter

What matters, really matters, is that you get started.

This means taking the first step, despite being fearful, tired or nervous… rather than waiting for that mythical perfect time to arrive.

Sometimes we are our own worst enemy.

Unconsciously, we develop stalling tactics and end up standing in our own way. We need to identify the things that cause us to stall, and call them out for what they are (excuses). When we do, we’re free to get started.

Free to unleash our full potential.

Suddenly it smashes you in the face!

By |

Jim Connolly marketing, fix your marketing

Marketing tactics and strategies seldom fail overnight.

Instead, they become a little less effective over time. The decrease in effectiveness is usually so gradual that for weeks, often longer, you hardly even notice it. Then you look at your sales leads, your upcoming sales meetings and your sales figures and the reality of the situation kicks in.

Your marketing is no longer effective and you’re about to feel some real pain, unless you resolve things.

One guy went 5 months without a sales lead, before he contacted me. He said, and I believe him, that he hoped it was just a long blip, and that things would pick up ‘next week’. It was only after his bank refused to increase his lending that he reached out for help.

That months-long period is how marketing problems usually manifest themselves. There’s a slow, very gradual decline in results. Then suddenly the numbers punch you in the face. It’s at this point, where most business owners will take action.

Other business owners do things differently.

Here’s what I see regularly, with new clients. They have been keeping an eye on their marketing and the results generated. They then paid extra attention as soon as they saw a negative pattern emerging. The moment they believed there was a bigger problem ahead, they contacted me.

So, why do most small business owners hesitate?

There are a number of reasons behind the decision of some business owners, to wait longer than others, before proactively taking control of their problem.

Here are the reasons I hear most commonly from new clients.

  • Some are sat on a fat bank account, which decreases their hunger to fix things. They’ll try to ride it out.
  • Some hate the idea of change, so leave it as late as possible.
  • Some have far less motivation or need to make money, as the vast majority of their family income is from their life-partner, wife, husband or parents.
  • Some have a well-paid job and their business is really just a hobby or pastime.

It boils down to different circumstances and different attitudes.

Whatever your current situation or mindset, marketing problems are easier and faster to resolve, the sooner you get started. Because the moment you start doing the right things correctly, you change the direction of your business.

How to get your prices right: High, medium or low?

By |

how to set prices, get your prices right

One of the best things about owning a business or directing the path of a company, is that you have the freedom to adapt and improve as things change. With this in mind, I’d like to share an idea, more of an opportunity really, with you. Something you may not have considered before.

It’s all about which segment of the market you should serve and how to get your prices or fees right.

High priced, medium priced or low priced?

Long before the current economic turmoil. Before the pandemic. In fact, for decades now, here’s what we have seen.

High priced, quality brands are doing really well.

Low priced, budget brands are doing really well, too.

The average priced, average brands are struggling.

Yes, those are general observations. But the core message is loud and clear. It’s a lot harder to sell an average priced, average positioned product or service. Average prices (or fees) are too expensive for those with limited budgets. Average prices are of no interest whatsoever to those who demand the best possible products or an exclusive, premium service.

Why then, is the middle ground where the great majority of businesses land?

Obviously, most new businesses set their prices where they feel they have the best chance of making sales or attracting clients. In my experience, they’ll start off a little higher or a little lower than whatever the average is. By default, this means most businesses begin life within the average price range. And that’s where most of them will remain, adjusting prices roughly in keeping with their similarly priced competitors.

Are your prices or fees pitched correctly?

If you’re currently serving that highly competitive middle ground, and you’re finding it hard to thrive, I’d like you to consider leaving it. (I wrote this helpful piece about how to leave the middle ground that you may find useful).

I’d like you to think about one of the following alternatives.

  • Embracing the opportunities that come from serving the high price, high end of your industry or profession.
  • Or embracing the opportunities that come from being a successful, budget provider.

By the way, there are huge opportunities at the budget end of things, if you get the balance right.

Poundland, a budget retailer in the UK, generated revenues of over $1.5Billion when its most recent figures were announced. Similarly, service providers who are able to put robust, highly optimized systems in place, can make a fortune whilst charging significantly lower fees for their services. I’ve seen this low-fee model work extremely effectively, many, many times.

So, should everyone reading this reposition away from the middle ground?

No. It totally depends on your answer to the following question.

Did you intentionally chose the middle ground?

Over the past 25 years, I’ve found that business owners tend to naturally gravitate toward the middle ground and average pricing. Very few of them intentionally set out to be there. It just happens. The reasons are many and varied.

My suggestion is that it’s a good idea to consider your options. All of them. Is the segment of the market you find yourself serving today, taking you where you want to be in the next 5 or 10 years?

  • If it is, then you’ve landed in the right place.
  • If not, then examine the opportunities open to you, serving one of the other segments.

In short, make sure you intentionally choose where you set your prices or fees. Determine what part of the market you are most likely to succeed in. Many business owners ‘happen upon’ the right segment, others happen to get it wrong. We need to be smarter than that and deliberately decide for ourselves.