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Sales Psychology That Works (3) |
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Surprise, free and casual works
Most people ignore advertising or direct calls to buy something. They
get defensive initially. They even learn to automatically 'not see' advertising.
I am sure that your brain somehow blocks out all those banner ads and
only very rarely do you even really notice what is really on those banners.
Why? Well, because your brain can see the ad coming! It has all the cues
that make it look like an ad and it is shut out. What if it did not look
like an ad. Perhaps it looked like content that you would be interested
in reading, or a cartoon you like?
You would see it and read it! What this means is that your Web site,
your banners, and everything else should have nothing that smells of advertising.
Eventually you must ask for the sale (yes, you must clearly ask your client
to buy, but only at the right time). But until the point where all your
prospects emotional and logical requirements have been fulfilled, you
must look like a free information service or at least provide useful information
along the way even in your product information sheets.
You must be the opposite of an advertisement. An ad tells you quickly
about the product, its features, and screams at you to buy. The opposite
is a useful information resource. That keeps the prospect calm, gives
them something useful, while subtly leading to the sale. Only at the point
of sale is the sale asked for very clearly and bluntly. With this strategy
you will be ignored far less and the client will read your material much
more. Give people free, instantly useful information and entertainment
and let that lead subtly but persistently to the sale. Keep it casual.
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You should also try to use something that people have never seen before.
Surprise them in this way and they will pay attention. For example, when
making a banner, don't do it like everyone else does. Use a design trick
that people haven't seen before. One trick that used to work very well
and still works quite well is to make the banner look like one of those
Windows 95 OK and Cancel buttons in response to a warning message. Or
you can have a banner that appears to fall and shake (like in an earthquake).
Anything surprising and unexpected works better because it bypasses the
brain's filters. By the way, a good reason to offer something free and
useful is that it allows you to be a part of your prospect's life. Once
you have entered their life, you will be more readily accepted and can
then work up to the sale.
Putting it all together Well
there you have it. Now go back to your Web site and re-examine everything
about it. If you find that it really is very far off from what we have
talked about, then you might want to re-build all of it. Whatever you
do, make sure that you fully grasp what we have talked about here and
apply it in full to your site. You cannot go about applying these selectively.
That will only work half the magic. For example, a lot of Webmasters are
lazy or reluctant to offer free content and tools. Well, you must because
most of these tactics depend on it. If you would like an example of how
to apply this knowledge, have a look at www.positionweaver.com. Without
free and instantly useful free content that induces return visits, it
is going to be very hard to effectively get people to return the required
5 to 7 times, make small yes decisions, and correct their cognitive dissonance.
Like we said in the beginning, people run on a common psychological framework,
rules that you can live and succeed by.
Go back
to part 1
Go back to part
2
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David Gikandi is CEO at SearchPositioning.com.
PositionWeaver.com features
tools and resources that get you top positions for your Web site on AltaVista,
Excite, HotBot, Infoseek, Lycos, Northern Light and other search engines.
It also has forums, articles, links, and other resources useful for the
Website owner and marketer. You can also download free trial copies of
the PositionWeaver Gold and PRO software packages for Windows 95/98/NT
from this site.
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