Cathy Stucker - The Idea Lady

Attract Customers and Make Yourself Famous

Selling Dreams

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What are you really selling? When you sell dreams you attract customers who want to share the dream.

Gian Luigi Longinotti-Buitoni was the CEO of Ferrari North America. He wrote a book called Selling Dreams: How to Make Any Product Irresistible wherein he coined the term “dreamketing.” While the word does not trip easily off the tongue, it does create an image of what many successful companies do.

Selling Dreams addresses how sellers of luxury goods (Ferrari, Ferragamo, Sotheby’s, Hermes, et al) attract customers by selling the dream. You can buy a car for less than $20,000. When you spend many times that amount for a Ferrari, you’re buying more than a car; you’re buying a dream.

You’re probably not selling anything in the price range of a Ferrari, so what can you learn from this book? Well, see if you can apply these principles:

Companies should create products and services designed to convey intense emotions. People don’t buy for simply intellectual reasons, they buy when there is an emotional connection. How can you reach your customers’ emotions? Create images for them (in words or pictures) so they can see themselves successfully using your product or service. Go beyond the functionality to how they will FEEL.

Take every opportunity to magnify your customer’s perception of added value. Sell the dream.

The dreamketer should ensure that all forms of customer relations consistently support the mission to build the dream in the customer’s mind. Stage events to build the dream. Advertise and promote in support of the dream image. Use publicity to create the aura you want for your product or service. Keep in touch with your customers in support of the dream. 

The subtitle of “Selling Dreams” is How to Make Any Product Irresistible. So, what about those of you (such as consultants, coaches, writers, etc.) who ARE the product? How do make yourself irresistible? One way is to show how you are living the dream you are selling. Give customers a mind picture of how they can have a life like yours, and what that will be like for them.

Give yourself an aura. Build your image and credibility. Techniques such as publicity, speaking, publishing, etc. will both demonstrate your abilities, and create a celebrity image for you, making you part of the dream.

Value yourself. After all, if you don’t understand what you’re worth, how will you ever communicate your value to anyone else?

Image Products as a Profit Center

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Professional sports teams make big money from licensed products. There are t-shirts, sweatshirts, jerseys and other apparel, along with cups, mugs, pennants, balls, dolls, and just about anything they can slap a label or a decal on.

Image merchandise isn’t just for sports teams, though. Although Pets.com ultimately didn’t survive, one thing that did is their “mascot,” Sock Puppet. The Sock Puppet was the most popular aspect of Pets.com and he recently turned up in television spots for an auto loan company, having survived the dot com bust and the demise of Pets.com.

If you have a character, logo, slogan, color scheme or other image associated with your business, you can create image products. When customers wear a t-shirt with your logo, or take a mug with your web site and slogan on it to a meeting, they help to spread the word about your company. You may give them away, but when you sell them, these items can be a profit center in their own right. Here are some ideas for image products. Which ones are right for your business?

T-shirts. A t-shirt is a basic image product used by many. Make your shirt something cool, something people will want to buy and wear. Put clever slogans, your company logo, or interesting images on the shirts. If you plan to sell them, don’t feature your URL too prominently. People do not want to wear your advertisement across their chest or back.

Mugs and sport bottles. Coffee mugs and water bottles are everywhere. They may carry your company name and logo, or slogan or an image related to your business. The National Museum of Funeral History sells a number of souvenirs (including mugs and sports bottles) with their slogan, “Any day above ground is a good one.” It’s odd and it’s funny, and many people will buy the products and use them because of the slogan.

Posters. An image may be magnificent, inspiring, humorous, or even titillating, but if it grabs attention it could become a poster.

Other products might include calendars, magnets, buttons and badges, mouse pads and more. You can create and sell your own products with no upfront investment at CafePress.

The ultimate image product. As you walk the aisles at your favorite toy store, you see action figures of superheroes, movie characters, comic figures and . . .you? You may not make it to the toy store shelves, but you can be immortalized in your own action figure. At prices starting under $30, MyFaceOnAFigure.com will custom sculpt a head to look like you, your logo character, a mascot or another real or fictional person. Then just attach the head to your favorite off-the-shelf actions figure, or buy one from them.

This idea isn’t for everyone. But if you’re looking for a fun way to stand out from the crowd, this could be it. It’s a great way of getting attention at speeches, booksignings, trade shows and other events.

Hmmmm . . . I wonder how much my action figure would go for on eBay?

Promote and Profit with Tip Sheets

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What’s bigger than a business card, and smaller than a brochure? A tip sheet.

A tip sheet is a list of five to twenty tips telling readers how to solve a problem, do something better, get something they want, or avoid something they don’t want. It starts with a descriptive title that promises a benefit, such as, “8 Ways to Protect Yourself from Identity Theft,” “6 Things You Need to Know about Building a Great Credit Rating,” or “How to Look 10 Years Younger than You Are–Without Surgery.”

Did you notice that two of these titles start with numbers? Numbers are effective in titles. Take a look at women’s magazines, and you will see headlines such as, “17 Ways to Get Organized–Today!” (Hey, that’s not a bad title for a tip sheet.) It is even more important that your title promise a benefit. What will the information do for readers?

Although you will use your tip sheet to promote yourself and your business, the tips should be informative and not promotional. So your topic should not be, “10 Reasons Why Acme Widgets Are Better than Others.”

Introduce the tips with a paragraph or so, followed by the tips in a numbered or bulleted list. You might find it easiest to write the tips first, then write the introductory paragraphs.

Format your tip sheet in two or three columns to fit on one side of an 8-1/2″ x 11″ sheet of paper. End with a short paragraph about you and your business, including contact information. You might want to hire a professional editor to review the content, and a designer to lay out the page attractively. The tip sheet can be printed in black on white paper, on your letterhead, or in color if you want to splurge.

Use your tip sheet as a handout when you speak or present a seminar. Give it out at meetings and conferences. Use it as a “leave-behind” with clients and prospects.

Post the tip sheet at your Web site. Make it available as a PDF to preserve the format, and offer an HTML version for faster download. Visitors will appreciate having a choice. You may want to require that visitors enter their e-mail addresses to register before they download the tip sheet. Although that will reduce the number of downloads, you will build your e-mail list.

Send the tip sheet as a press release. Media may reprint your tips, or use them as the basis for a broadcast story. Or, they may file the information away until they need an expert to comment on a story.

Submit the tip sheet for publication. Offer it at no charge (but require that your contact information is included) and many Web sites, newsletters, trade magazines and other publications will use it.

A tip sheet can be put together in less than a day, but recipients will keep it on hand and refer to it for years to come. Each time they do, your tip sheet is marketing for you.

A Sound of Your Own

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You’ve got a business name and a slogan. Perhaps you have a logo and a color scheme that identifies you. But do you have a sound of your own? 

Your sound may be a jingle or theme. Jingles and themes stick in people’s minds. When you hear “Thanks for the Memories,” you think of Bob Hope. And if I ask, “Remember the Oscar Meyer Weiner jingle?” you won’t be able to get it out of your head all day. (Sorry!)

We retain information better when it’s set to music, too. My mother helped my Girl Scout troop learn the Girl Scout laws (there are ten) by writing a song about them. To this day, I can tell you all ten laws—and it’s been more than a few years since I learned them. Setting your business name, address, phone number or Web site URL to music will make it easy for customers to remember how to reach you. Include your slogan to reinforce your message.

If you want a jingle of your own, you can contract with someone to write one. A quick Google search found several professional jingle writers who will create a sound for you. There is an extensive list of music providers, including jingle writers, at Radio411.com. You should expect to pay anywhere from a few hundred dollars to several thousand for a package that may include several versions of your jingle.

Make sure you know exactly what rights you are buying. In some cases, the writer retains the copyright but allows you to use the jingle in a defined area, such as a state. To own all rights, negotiate a Work Made for Hire agreement. For more information on Work Made for Hire, see http://www.copyright.gov/circs/circ09.pdf [PDF].

A low-budget alternative is to use royalty-free music as your sound. Individual tracks or collections can be purchased at prices starting at just a few dollars. You can use these tracks “as-is” or add spoken word or other vocal elements.

Do not appropriate an existing song or someone else’s jingle. For example, you can not legally write new words for a popular song and use it as your theme, or use a song from one of your favorite CDs. That is a violation of copyright law, and it can get you sued.

Your sound doesn’t have to be a whole song or even a jingle to be memorable and effective. Intel has it’s familiar chords—when you hear them, you think of Intel. NBC used a three-note sound that you immediately recognize. 

Once you have a sound for your business, use it often as part of the branding of your business. Play it in all of your radio and television advertising. Put a WAV file of it on your website. Play it on your phone system, when the voice mail answers or while callers are on hold. Make people aware of it, so they associate the song or sound with your business. 

Every Day’s a Holiday

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You can create your own holiday to promote your business or your cause, or “just because.”

Here in the United States, we celebrate Independence Day every July 4th. But are you also celebrating these other July events: Embrace Your Geekness Day, Nude Recreation Week, National Baked Bean Month, Cow Appreciation Day, and National Ice Cream Day? These are just a few of many observances in July. And of course, July 7th is Bonza Bottler Day. It occurs each month when the number of the month is the same as the number of the day (e.g., January 1st, February 2nd, etc.) and it is heralded as “an excuse to have a party at least once a month.”

Each of these holidays was created to bring attention to a business, a cause or the individual responsible for coming up with the holiday. Creating your own holiday is a great way to get free publicity. You may be interviewed on television or radio, or information about you and your holiday may appear in newspapers and magazines and on Web sites. I have appeared on radio from coast to coast to talk about my holidays, such as Get Paid to Shop Week, Take Charge of Change Week, and Someday.

There is no master authority that has to approve your holiday. Just create it and start promoting it. An easy way to generate awareness of your holiday is with listings in calendars, such as Chase’s Calendar of Events. It is used by the media when they are looking for story ideas, so you may get calls for interviews just from being listed. Most libraries carry Chase’s, so visit your local library to see examples of holiday listings. The book includes information on how to submit your holiday, or you can visit their web site: http://www.chases.com/.

A quick search through Chase’s Calendar of Events reveals Eat What You Want Day, Anonymous Giving Week, National Kite Month, Home-Based Business Week, and many, many more. You may wish to name a holiday after your book, celebrate your industry, or set up an activity that focuses on your product.

Tom and Ruth Roy of Wellcat Herbs http://www.wellcat.com/ devote a section of their Web site to the more than 80 holidays they have created. Their holidays include everything from Happy Mew Year for Cats Day (January 2nd) to Falling Needles Family Fest (December 30th).

The Roys are also behind Make Up Your Own Holiday Day. It was March 26th, but even if you missed it this year it is not too late to make up your own holiday.

You don’t have to be listed anywhere, though, to declare a holiday. Send out media releases announcing your holiday. Write articles about suggested holiday activities. Post the articles at your web site, and offer them to other web sites, e-zines and newsletters. Use your holiday as a way to give your marketing and promotion efforts a timely publicity angle.

Hmmm . . . I wonder where I can get a greeting card for National Underwear Day.