benefits

Is the Funnel Consideration Phase Quantitative or Qualitative?

From Venn Marketing, “Awareness, Consideration, Conversion: A 4 Minute Intro To Marketing 101.” (Link)

The picture above shows a simple sales funnel example. The second of the three items in the funnel is the “consideration” phase.

In that phase, those people who are aware of you can then consider your products and services.
If they like what they see, they move on to conversion and hopefully buy your products and services.

But how do prospects in the funnel consideration phase evaluate your offering as opposed to competitor offerings? Is it truly a quantitative and logical process, or is it in reality qualitative and emotional?

Quantitative consideration

For purposes of this post, let’s assume that there are two competing companies, Bredemarket and Debamarket, who are fighting each other for business.

OK, maybe not literally. I have never boxed in my life. By Royal Navy official photographer – http://media.iwm.org.uk/iwm/mediaLib//31/media-31189/large.jpg This photograph A 29806 comes from the collections of the Imperial War Museums., Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=25124750

Second, let’s assume that Bredemarket and Debamarket offer similar services to their prospects and customers:

Blog posts
Case studies
White papers

Finally, let’s assume that a big government agency (the BGA) has issued a Request for Proposal (RFP) for blog/case study/white paper services, and Bredemarket and Debamarket are the two companies competing for the award.

Source selection

Now I’m not a big-time pre-acquisition consultant like Applied Forensic Services, but I’ve been around long enough to know how pre-acquisition consultants work—especially when working with big government agencies like BGA.

A pre-acquisition consultant will develop a Source Selection Plan (SSP). In competitive procurements such as the one in this example, the SSP will state exactly how proposals will be evaluated, and how the best proposal will be selected.

Here is the U.S. Government’s guidance on Source Selection Plans. (link)

SSPs can be very complex for certain opportunities, and not so complex for others. In all cases, the SSP dictates the evaluation criteria used to select the best vendor.

Michael Ropp of RFP360 has published a very simple example of how a particular group of proposal responses may be evaluated.

The weighted scoring approach breaks down your RFP evaluation criteria and assigns a value to each question or section. For example, your RFP criteria may consider questions of technical expertise, capabilities, data security, HR policies and diversity and sustainability. Weighted scoring prioritizes the criteria that are most important to your business by assigning them a point or percentage value. So your weighted scoring criteria may look like this:

Technical expertise – 25%

Capabilities – 40%

Data security – 10%

HR policies – 10%

Diversity and sustainability – 15%

RFP360, “A guide to RFP evaluation criteria: Basics, tips and examples.” (Link)

Individual question evaluation

In most cases the evaluator doesn’t look at the entire technical expertise section and give it a single score. In large RFPs, the technical expertise section may consist of 96 questions (or even 960 questions), each of which is evaluated and fed into the total technical expertise score.

For example, the RFP may include a question such as this one, and the responses from the bidders (Bredemarket and Debamarket) are evaluated.

Question	Bredemarket	Debamarket
96. The completed blog post shall include no references to 1960s songs.	0.8 points awarded. While many Bredemarket blog posts comply, “How Remote Work Preserves Your Brain” does not.	1.0 points awarded. Debamarket fully complies.

Example evaluation of a proposal response to an individual RFP question.

Final quantitative recommendation for award

Now repeat this evaluation method for every RFP question in every RFP category and you end up with a report in which one of the vendors receives more points than the other and is clearly the preferred bidder. Here’s an example from a U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission proposal source selection process. (And you can bet that a nuclear agency doesn’t use an evaluation method that is, um, haphazard.)

From U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, “FINAL EVALUATION RECOMMENDATION REPORT FOR
PROPOSALS SUBMITTED UNDER RFP NO. RQ-CIO-01-0290
ENTITLED, “INFRASTRUCTURE SERVICES AND SUPPORT
CONTRACT (ISSC).”” (link)

So what does this example show us? It shows that L-3 Communications/EER received a total score of 83.8, while its closest competitor Logicon only received a score of 80. So EER is the preferred bidder.

So in our example, BGA would evaluate Bredemarket and Debamarket, come up with a number for each bidder, and award the contract to the bidder with the highest evaluation score.

Quantitative recommendation for the little guys

Perhaps people who aren’t big government agencies don’t go to this level of detail, but many prospects who reach the consideration phase use some type of quantitative method.

For example, if the (non-weighted) pros for an item under consideration outnumber the cons, go for it.

Five pros and only three cons. Do it!

All quantative, objective, and straightforward.

If people really evaluate that way.

But is consideration quantitative?

Now of course the discussion above assumes that everyone is a logical being who solely evaluates based on objective criteria.

But even Sages such as myself may deviate from the objective norm. Here’s a story of one time when I did just that.

As I previously mentioned, I had never written a proposal response before I started consulting for Printrak. But I had written a Request for Proposal before I joined Printrak. For a prior employer (located in Monterey Park), I worked with an outside consultant to develop an RFP to help my employer select a vendor for a computer system. The questions posed to the bidders were not complex. Frankly, it was a simple checklist. Does your computer system perform function A? Does it perform function B?

The outside consultant and I sent the final RFP to several computer system providers, and received several proposals in response.

A few of the proposals checked every box, saying that they could do anything and everything. We threw those proposals out, because we knew that no one could meet every one of our demanding requirements. (“I can’t trust that response.”)
We focused on the proposals that included more realistic responses. (“That respondent really thought about the questions.”)

As you can see, we introduced a qualitative, emotional element into our consideration phase.

According to Kaye Putnam, this is not uncommon.

Qualitative consideration

Humans think that we are very logical when we consider alternatives, and that our consideration processes are logical and quantitative. Putnam has looked into this assertion and says that it’s hogwash. Take a look at this excerpt from Putnam’s first brand psychology secret:

Your brand has to meet people at that emotional level – if you want them to buy. (And I know you do!)

Findings from several studies support this, but one of the most seminal was outlined in Harvard professor Gerald Zellman’s 2003 book, The Subconscious Mind of the Consumer. Zellman’s research and learnings prompted him to come to the industry-rocking conclusion that, “95 percent of our purchase decision making takes place in the subconscious mind.”
From Kaye Putnam, “7 Brand Psychology Secrets – Revealed!” (link)

But how can the subconscious mind affect quantitative evaluations?

While logic still has to play SOME role in a purchase decision (as Putnam further explains in her first and second brand psychology secrets), a positive or negative predisposition toward a bidder can influence the quantitative scores.

Imagine if the evaluators got together and discussed the Bredmarket and Debamarket responses to question 96, above. The back and forth between the evaluators may sound like this:

“OK, we’re up to question 96. That’s a no brainer, because no one would ever put song references in a BGA blog post.”
“Yeah, but did you see Bredemarket’s own post that has multiple references to the song ‘Dead Man’s Curve’?”
“So what? Bredemarket would never do that when writing for a government agency. That piece was solely for Bredemarket.”
“How do you KNOW that Bredemarket would never slip a song reference into a BGA post? You know, I really don’t trust that guy. He wore two different colored shoes to the orals presentation, a brown one and a black one. Someone as slopy as that could do anything, with huge consequences for BGA communications. I’m deducting points from Bredemarket for question 96.”
“OK. I think you’re being ridiculous, but if you say so.”

And just like that, your quantitative logical consideration process is exposed as a bunch of subconscious emotional feelings.

How does qualitative consideration affect you?

As you develop your collateral for the consideration phase, you need to go beyond logic (even if you have a Sage predisposition) and speak to the needs and pain points of your prospects.

Yes, pain.

Spock is behaving illogically. Jayenkai, “Pain – Star Trek Remix.” (link)

Here’s a example from my law enforcement automated fingerprint identificaiton system (AFIS) days.

If your prospect is a police chief who is sick and tired of burglars ransacking homes and causing problems for the police department, don’t tell your prospect about your AFIS image detail or independent accuracy testing results. After all, 1000 ppi and 99.967 accuracy are only numbers.
Provide the police chief with customer-focused benefit statements about how quickly your AFIS will clean up the burglary problem in the town, giving residents peace of mind and the police department less stress.

If you can appeal to those emotions, that police chief will consider you more highly and move on to conversion (purchase).

Can I help?

If your messaging concentrates on things your prospects don’t care about, most of them will ignore you and not shower you with money. Using the wrong words with your customers impacts your livelihood, and may leave you poor and destitute with few possessions.

Remember what I said about pain points? By Unknown author – Library of Congress[1], Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=6237178

If you need a writer to work with you to ensure that your written content includes the right words that speak directly to your prospects, hire…Debamarket!

Oh wait. Debamarket is fictional.

OK, talk to Bredemarket then.

Email me at john.bredehoft@bredemarket.com.
Book a meeting with me at calendly.com/bredemarket.
Contact me at bredemarket.com/contact/.

How Non-Commodity Content Creators Collaborate with Clients

On Friday, I shared a Kaye Putnam video on my Bredemarket LinkedIn page.

From https://www.linkedin.com/posts/bredemarket_be-irreplaceable-differentiate-your-brand-activity-7085682536026165249-tq01/

While I won’t go into all of the video details here (you should spend a few minutes and watch Putnam’s video yourself), one of the points that Putnam made was that the best content creators need to differentiate themselves from commodity content providers—in other words, to “be irreplaceable.”

If it’s not obvious how your product or service is wildly different, not just better, your ideal clients will resort to looking at you like a commodity.
Kaye Putnam, from the transcript to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jNGos1kVIdM

One of the ways in which content creators can differentiate themselves from their competition is to have a unique process.

In addition to having the emotional appeal and positioning that we already talked about, you can employ tools like having a proprietary process. A unique way of achieving a desired result.
Kaye Putnam, from the transcript to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jNGos1kVIdM

I’d like to look at one such process, the process in which a content creator collaborates with a client, but I’d like to take a look at how two very different content creators achieve the same outcome.

How Bredemarket collaborates with clients

One of the many differentiators between Bredemarket and its marketing and writing competitors is the way that Bredemarket kicks off projects.

Before I work with you, I ask a series of questions to better understand what you need.

(UPDATE OCTOBER 23, 2023: “SIX QUESTIONS YOUR CONTENT CREATOR SHOULD ASK YOU IS SO 2022. DOWNLOAD THE NEWER “SEVEN QUESTIONS YOUR CONTENT CREATOR SHOULD ASK YOU” HERE.)

Now these are not all of the questions that I ask. After all, my process is, um, “Bredemarket-developed.” (I avoid the word “proprietary” because of its negative connotations.) But the limited number of questions that I did share suggests how I try to understand you. Why you do what you do. How you do it. And so forth.

(If you are interested in this topic, I have written an entire e-book focused on the first six questions that I ask you. To download the e-book, visit my blog post “Six Questions Your Content Creator Should Ask You: the e-book version.”)

In true Putnam manner, I approach this entire process as a Sage, or someone who imparts wisdom which, when combined with your wisdom, results in an effective piece of content.

Yes, this is a Rembrandt painting, anticipating the next section of the blog post. By Rembrandt – The Yorck Project (2002) 10.000 Meisterwerke der Malerei (DVD-ROM), distributed by DIRECTMEDIA Publishing GmbH. ISBN: 3936122202., Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=157824

But not everyone is a Sage, and other content creators approach collaboration differently.

How Paso Artis collaborates with clients

As I’ve frequently said, my primary emphasis is words. My graphic execution capabilities are somewhat limited.

I did not draw this myself. Originally created by Jleedev using Inkscape and GIMP. Redrawn as SVG by Ben Liblit using Inkscape. – Own work, Public Domain, link.

But there are many, many people who have better graphic execution capabilities than I do.

One such person is the artist behind Paso Artis.

From https://www.facebook.com/paso.artis

Now I don’t know Paso Artis’ personal archetypes, but I’d be willing to bet that her primary archetype isn’t Sage. The obvious guess for her primary archetype is “Creator.”

Get ready to celebrate the power of your creative brand archetype! Whether you resonate with being an Artist, musician, writer, dreamer, builder, or designer, your brand has the incredible ability to amaze and inspire others.

When customers encounter your creative brand, they can’t help but feel captivated. They look at your work and think, “I want to be able to do what they can.” Your brand ignites a spark of inspiration and ignites the imagination within those who connect with it.

One of your innate advantages as a creative brand is your boundless creativity and imagination. You possess the unique ability to see the world in a different light, to think outside the box, and to breathe life into your visions.
Kaye Putnam, from https://www.kayeputnam.com/brand-archetype-creator/

A few of you may recall that I initially thought that I was a “Creator,” until I realized that this archetype applies more to imagery rather than words. And not stick figures.

Despite our vast differences, Paso Artis and Bredemarket have one similarity.

We both work together with our clients to create a piece of content that satisfies the clients’ needs.
With Bredemarket, it’s a written piece of content.
With Paso Artis, it’s a custom painting.

But because Paso Artis is…well, an artist, she doesn’t use Sage-like words and tables and bullet points to describe her client collaboration process. The Paso Artis-developed (again, I don’t like the word “proprietary”) collaboration process is described much more…artistically.

As an artist, I do feel the responsibility and privilege of taking a vision and turning it into a painting that will hang on the wall for years and be seen every day and regarded with affection.

Don’t be scared of handing over your dream to me.

In order to achieve a happy outcome, you and I will work together.
From https://www.facebook.com/paso.artis/about_details

Note that Paso Artis uses some words that Bredemarket never uses, such as “affection” and “dream.” Now I might use “vision” and “scared” in the proper context, but most of my clients and prospects do not dream of having their customers regard their products and services, or their blog posts or white papers, with affection. Even the Bredemarket client who chose to “truly say thank you for putting these (proposal) templates together” didn’t get affectionate about them. I mean, I love Microsoft Word, but I don’t LOVE Microsoft Word.

So Bredemarket and Paso Artis use a different vocabulary. This happens to come back to another point that Putnam made, to speak the language of your clients.

If you only know Italian and your ideal clients are speaking French, you might get a few people that understand what you mean, but it’s not going to have the transformative effect that we’re looking for. You want to learn to be fluent. In the decision making language of your ideal clients.
Kaye Putnam, from the transcript to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jNGos1kVIdM

Marketers, imagine if you will a possible persona for a Paso Artis prospect.

By David Teniers the Younger – 1. Kunsthistorisches Museum Wien, Bilddatenbank.2. khm.at, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=659517

“Jay” is a homeowner who loves art and desires a particular type of painting for his home, but does not have the artistic talent to paint it himself. Ideally, the completed painting will be one that brings Jay delight when he sees it in his home, and will also delight his guests. But can he trust anyone to realize his dream?

So Paso Artis (who has years of marketing experience in her day job work) knows that she has to address Jay’s pain points. She first does this by addressing them in her “About” text (“Don’t be scared of handing over your dream to me”), but then addresses them more deeply during her consultation with Jay.

I have never performed a competitive analysis of artists who respond to commission requests, but I’d guess that some are better at collaborating with clients than others.

And the ones that collaborate well earn a positive reputation, which translates to increased revenue over those who don’t collaborate well.

How should YOU collaborate?

But of course Bredemarket doesn’t matter, and Paso Artis doesn’t matter. You matter.

When you collaborate with a partner, either one in which the partner provides a product or service to you, or you provide a product or service to the partner, make sure that both of you are on the same page (or easel) before launching into the work project.

And if you have a dream for a painting, contact Paso Artis via her Facebook page.

And if you want your blog posts, white papers, case studies, and other content to be regarded with affection (or something like that), contact Bredemarket.

Email me at john.bredehoft@bredemarket.com.
Book a meeting with me at calendly.com/bredemarket.
Contact me at bredemarket.com/contact/.

On Benefits, Features…and Advantages

I’m trying to flesh out the usefulness of the Bredemarket website.

Initially, much of the content was benefit-focused.
As the website matured, I began to include and flag more information on features—not only as features relate to benefits, but also discussing features independent of benefits (example: my discussion of the Touch ID feature).

It’s time to throw one other term into the mix.

Using bad statistics, addition of a third term to the two existing terms improves bredemarket.com by a whopping 50%.

Not bad for (more than) 5 minutes of work.

Review of features and benefits

The home page for the product management platform provider Airfocus, https://airfocus.com/

Airfocus has published an article about…well, I’m not going to reveal the title yet, because that gives away the massive surprise ending.

(Whoops; I already revealed it. Pay no attention to the title behind the blog post.)

For now, I’ll just say that the article discusses features and benefits.

Here’s how Airfocus defines features (which coincides with my own definition of features):

(Features) are characteristics that a product or service has. It is a simple statement about attributes.

For example: ‘An automated photo storage app that edits, selects and stores photos’
From Airfocus

Contrast this definition of features with Airfocus’ definition of benefits (which again coincides with my own definition of benefits):

A benefit…is why a prospect would ultimately use a product.

This key benefit provides an emotional hook point that you can leverage in helping the user imagine the positive experiences felt by using your product.

For example: ‘If you don’t waste your time editing and can store more of your best photos, you’ll keep happier memories for longer’.
From Airfocus

So again, the feature is a characteristic of a product (or what the product does), while a benefit explains why that characteristic is important to a prospect.

This is good in and of itself, and has served me well for years. I could stop right here, but I’ve just passed 400 Bredemarket blog posts and am on a roll to get up to 500.

So I’m going to tell you that Airfocus expands the feature-benefit model by defining an middle category between features and benefits.

The stage between a feature and a benefit

Airfocus defines the intermediate step between a feature and benefit as follows:

An advantage is what that feature does, and how it helps. These are factual and descriptive but do not yet make a connection as to how it will make users’ life better.

For example: ‘It automatically keeps only the clearest picture of a similar set, and deletes the rest. Your photo storage is reduced on average by 80%.
From Airfocus, https://airfocus.com/glossary/what-is-a-features-advantages-and-benefits-analysis/

So now it’s time for the big surprise. The third word is advantage.

No, not tennis. By kance – https://www.flickr.com/photos/kentmercurio/59629166/, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=507392

Perhaps I’m oversimplifying the analysis, but the three terms (features, advantages, and benefits) can be related as follows, using my three favorite question adverbs and incorporating Airfocus’ examples:

Feature	What	Automated photo storage app
Advantage	How	Reduce photo storage 80%
Benefit	Why	Keep happier memories for longer

I’ll use this caption to plug my first e-book, which you can get here.

Since I talk about benefits ad nauseum, you may get the mistaken view that features and advantages don’t matter. They do matter—in the proper context. For example, if you’re working on a data sheet or a user manual (if they still exist), you definitely need a feature list and could probably use an advantage list also.

Now do you have to use a feature-advantage-benefit model, instead of the simpler feature-benefit model?

Not at all.

But if you find it helpful, use it.

Qualitative Benefits and Inland Empire Marketing

Are you an Inland Empire business who wants to promote the benefits of your products and services to your clients? If so, don’t assume that these benefits must be quantitative. You can use qualitative benefits also.

Before we talk about quantative vs. qualitative benefits, let’s talk about benefits themselves, and how they differ from features.

As Kayla Carmichael has noted, features answer the “what” question, while benefits answer the “why” question.

From https://blog.hubspot.com/customers/3-takeaways-from-start-with-why

She explains that your clients don’t care if your meal kit arrives ready to heat (a feature). Your clients care about saving time preparing meals (a benefit).

Quantitative benefits

In certain cases, the client may be even more impressed if the benefits can be expressed in a quantitative way. For example, if you know that your meal kit saves people an average of 37 minutes and 42.634 seconds preparing meals, let your client know this.

Am I the only one mouthing the words “these are the days of our lives” to myself? CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=2949924

But maybe you don’t know this.

You haven’t paid for a survey of your existing customers to see how much time they’ve saved preparing meals.
Or maybe the data just isn’t available at all.

The power of qualitative benefits

A lack of quantifiable data won’t stop your marketing efforts, though, since qualitative benefits can be just as powerful as quantative ones.

I’m going to take the marketer’s easy way out and just cite something that Apple did.

I’ll admit that Apple sometimes has some pretty stupid marketing statements (“It’s black!“). But sometimes the company grabs people’s attention with its messaging.

Take this July 2022 article, “How Apple is empowering people with their health information.”

You probably already saw the words “empowering people” in the title. Sure, people like health information…but they really like power.

By Andreas Bohnenstengel, CC BY-SA 3.0 de, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=61536009

Later in the article, Apple’s chief operating officer (Jeff Williams) emphasizes the power theme: “…they’re no longer passengers on their own health journey. Instead, we want people to be firmly in the driver’s seat.”

Of course, this isn’t the first time that Apple has referred to empowering the individual. The company has done this for decades. Remember (then) Apple Computer’s slogan, “The Power to Be Your Best”? If you missed that particular slogan, here’s a commercial.

From https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s5S9VvMMxhU

There are zero statistics in that commercial. It doesn’t say that the Macintosh computer would equip you to jump 5% higher, or sing on key 99.9% of the time. And Apple Computer didn’t claim that the Macintosh would equip you to draw bridge images 35.2% faster.

But the viewer could see that a Macintosh computer, with its graphical user interface, its support of then-new graphic programs, and (not shown in the ad) the ability to distribute the output of these graphic programs via laser printers, gave Macintosh users the power to…well, the power to be their best.

And some potential computer buyers perceived that this power provided infinite value.

As you work out your benefit statements, don’t give up if the benefits cannot be quantified. As long as the benefits resonate with the customer, qualitative benefits are just fine.

What are your benefits?

Let’s return to you and your Ontario, California area business that needs content marketing promotion. Before you draft your compay’s marketing material, or ask someone to draft it for you, you need to decide what your benefits are.

I’ve written a book about identifying benefits, and five other questions that you need to answer before creating marketing content.

Click on the image below, find the e-book at the bottom of the page, and skip to page 11 to read about benefits.

Feel free to read the rest of the book also.

My…Umm..Opportunity is YOUR Opportunity

A little over a year ago, Bredemarket announced two changes in my business scope and business hours. I stopped accepting work from clients who marketed systems to identify individuals, and I reduced my business hours to Saturday mornings only.

I had to change my business scope and business hours. On May 9, 2022, I started a full-time position with a company in the identity industry, which meant that I couldn’t consult on weekdays and couldn’t consult on identity projects.

But things change.

As of May 31, 2023, I will no longer be employed at my day job.

Which is my misfortune…um…opportunity.

Has Bredemarket changed its business scope and business hours a second time?

Yes.

As of June 1, 2023:

If you need a consultant for marketing or proposal work, and your company is involved in the identification of individuals, Bredemarket can accept the work.
If you need a consultant who can meet with you during normal business hours, Bredemarket can accept the work.

So what?

My…um…opportunity is your opportunity.

Now that I can expand my business scope and business hours again, you can take advantage of my extensive marketing expertise, including deep experience in the identity industry.

This means you can obtain quickly-generated and expert content with an agreed-upon focus.

This means you can get content that increases your revenue.

What kind of content?

Blog posts, case studies and testimonials, proposals and proposal text, white papers, and many other types of content.

How about e-books?

Yes I also write e-books.

These two e-books explain (a) how Bredemarket starts a project with you, and (b) how Bredemarket has helped other businesses over the years.

(UPDATE OCTOBER 22, 2023: “SIX QUESTIONS YOUR CONTENT CREATOR SHOULD ASK YOU IS SO 2022. DOWNLOAD THE NEWER “SEVEN QUESTIONS YOUR CONTENT CREATOR SHOULD ASK YOU” HERE.)

How Bredemarket Can Help You Win Business (April 16, 2023)Download

How can I find out more information about Bredemarket?

Contact me.

Send me an email at john.bredehoft@bredemarket.com.
Or go to calendly.com/bredemarket to book a ~~Saturday morning~~ meeting with me at any time.
Or go to bredemarket.com/contact/ to use my contact form.

But wait…what if Bredemarket changes its business hours and business scope a THIRD time?

I very well could change Bredemarket’s business hours/scope again.

Maybe I’ll find a new full-time position in a couple of weeks, and I’ll again have to reduce hours and scope.

Which basically means that you have to ACT QUICKLY to ensure you can reserve my services.

(See “how to create a sense of urgency.”)

Benefits of win-win business relationships

There must be a winner and a loser in every business relationship. The Internet said so, and everything on the Internet is true.

When a contract is negotiated the legal teams start posturing and you’ll find one party wins and the other loses.
Derek Bain, quoted in ““Contracts have a winner and loser – so if they don’t work for me, I’m out”

By Brandonseigler – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=77578854

Poppycock.

While I agree with the second part of Bain’s assessment where he won’t enter into a contract that works for him, remember that the other party won’t want to enter into a contract in which Bain gets all the winnings. Or if they do, they’ll mutter about Bain under his breath and find a new contractual partner when the opportunity presents itself.

Hard sell (win-lose) is of limited value. Win-win is better. If you can establish it.

Why should I listen to your pitch? (Or why should you listen to mine?)

A business relationship starts with one party approaching the other. Perhaps it may be a question, or perhaps it may be a pitch. We all get pitches. Some of us (including Bredemarket) give pitches.

What determines whether you respond to a Bredemarket pitch?

You’re not going to book a 30 minute Saturday morning meeting with me if it doesn’t benefit you.

If you know that you don’t need marketing content at all, you won’t need Bredemarket. (I can perhaps dispute your assessment, but if you’re not ready to create targeted marketing content, you’re not ready.)
If you already have access to great content creators, you won’t need Bredemarket. Just treat your content creators well so they continue to advance your business.
If your company is outside the United States, you can’t use Bredemarket. My company isn’t mature enough to handle the complexities of international business.
If your company offers finger/face identification services, you can’t use Bredemarket because of that pesky day job.
If you need me to be available Monday-Friday 8-5 Pacific time, you can’t use Bredemarket, again because of that pesky day job.

What determines whether Bredemarket responds to a company’s pitch?

Again, your product or service has to benefit me, Bredemarket, and my current status as a small part-time business.

I don’t need payroll software. I’m a sole proprietor.
I don’t need your phone answering service. I already have a free one, and most of the voicemails I get are spam. I’m not going to pay to get spam.
I’m not interested in your list of leads. The fact that you have me on your own list of leads shows how poor your lists are.

By From The New York Public Library – https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/510d47de-036a-a3d9-e040-e00a18064a99, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=77318025

And no, I don’t need your (INSERT SPECULATIVE INVESTMENT SERVICE HERE) offering. If your (INSERT SPECULATIVE INVESTMENT SERVICE HERE) is going to take off like gangbusters in the next 6 months, why are you so stupid as to sell it to me, rather than keeping it for yourself?

Beyond the pitch

So we don’t respond to pitches if they don’t benefit us.

In the same way, we don’t sign contracts if they don’t benefit us. And we certainly don’t remain in long-term business relationships if they don’t benefit us.

Yet people still pursue the win-lose model. If you want to score a single sale and move on from a disappointed customer and find your next target, win-win isn’t for you.

I don’t work that way, in Bredemarket or anywhere else.

Three benefits of win-win relationships

Since I’m writing this to potential Bredemarket clients, let me share three benefits of our working together in a win-win model.

Improved collaboration

From the first six questions onward, you and I will collaborate on the deliverable Bredemarket prepares for you, ensuring that you get precisely what you need.

As we continue to work with each other, I will have an understanding of what you need, and you will have an understanding of what I can deliver. This speeds up the deliverables, an added bonus.

Mutual growth

My hope is that my Bredemarket work will benefit your business.

One of my six questions involves the goal that my deliverable is supposed to satisfy, and after the content is available we can see if the goal was met.
While we both need to realize that inbound marketing is a long-term approach, hopefully the content will start to move the needle forward.
Example: I’m writing this post in April 2023. Will it work as a “secret salesperson” to attract someone to Bredemarket in April 2024?

At the same time, what I learn about your business will benefit me.

For example, I’ve already described (on page 6 of the e-book I talked about here) how the practices of one of my customers influenced Bredemarket’s own practices.

Increased profitability for both of us

By https://images.recordsale.de, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=15377915

After all, incoming money is a necessary component of business. I get paid for my Bredemarket work, and my work helps you increase your revenue and profit, based on what we decided during our collaboration.

Of course, this assumes that you want to make money. If your goal is to bankrupt your business, Bredemarket could theoretically help you with that also. But I won’t, because that increases the chances that you won’t pay me.

Go out and win-win

So whether you select Bredemarket for your writing needs or not, take care to pursue win-win relationships with your partners. You’ll establish long-term relationships, and (in most cases) you’ll feel better about yourself.

Well, in most cases.

Technology firms and qualitative benefits

If you are a technology business who is communicating the benefits of your products or services, don’t assume that these benefits have to be quantified. Qualitative benefits can work just as well.

CC BY-SA 2.5, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=308760

But what are benefits?

As Kayla Carmichael has noted, features answer the “what” question, while benefits answer the “why” question.

She notes that a company’s clients don’t care if your vacuum cleaner has a washable lifetime filter. That’s just a feature, or what the product does.

Your clients care about eliminating extra costs, which is the benefit that the washable lifetime filter provides, and why the client should care.

How do you discover benefits?

Let’s say your boss tells you to write about the washable lifetime filter. Imagine that you’re conversing with one of your clients, and you tell them that your vacuum cleaner has a washable lifetime filter.

Now imagine that your client responds…

…”So what?“

You respond that the client only has to buy one filter, rather than buying a new one every few months.

“So what?”

(Yes, your client may ask the “so what” question several times, like a small child. And you should do the same, to dive down into the true benefits of a particular feature.)

By Mindaugas Danys from Vilnius, Lithuania, Lithuania – scream and shout, CC BY 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=44907034

To the client’s last “so what” question, you respond that the client will save money!

Now the client is impressed and knows why they should care about your washable lifetime filter.

Quantitative benefits are great

In certain cases, the client may be even more impressed if the benefits can be expressed in numeric form.

For example, let’s say that a disposable vacuum cleaner filter costs $35 and lasts for 6 months. I have no idea whether these numbers are accurate; my last name isn’t Hoover, after all.

By Marion S. Trikosko – This image is available from the United States Library of Congress’s Prints and Photographs divisionunder the digital ID ppmsc.03262.This tag does not indicate the copyright status of the attached work. A normal copyright tag is still required. See Commons:Licensing for more information., Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=64381

Whoops, not those Hoovers. I couldn’t find a picture of William Henry “Boss” Hoover or son Herbert William Hoover Sr.

Back to my guesses about disposable vacuum cleaner filters. If my numbers are correct, you can tell your client that your washable lifetime filter can save the client $700 over a ten-year period. Depending on your price points, the savings may be more than the cost of the vacuum cleaner itself. (Again, I’m not Hoover, so don’t quote me.)

With a couple of fancy leaps of logic, you could then say to the client:

“Would you like to MAKE money by buying this vacuum cleaner?”

Hey, whatever works. I’m a marketer, not a salesperson.

But qualitative benefits can be just as great

You can’t always quantify benefits, because to quantify benefits you need data, and you may not have the data close at hand. The data may not even exist.

This won’t stop your marketing efforts, though, since qualitative benefits can be just as powerful as quantative ones.

I’m going to take the marketer’s easy way out and just cite something that Apple did. I’ll admit that Apple sometimes has some pretty stupid statements (“It’s black!“).

But sometimes the company grabs people’s attention with its messaging.

Take this July 2022 article, “How Apple is empowering people with their health information.”

You probably already saw the words “empowering people” in the title. Sure, people like health information…but they really like power.

There are more examples within the article:

Referring to an underlying report, the article states that “The first section describes Apple’s focus on personal health and fitness features on Apple Watch and iPhone that offer actionable, science-based insights.” So what? It turns out these actionable, science-based insights “help protect users’ health and safety.”
Apple’s chief operating officer, Jeff Williams, is quoted as saying “We believe passionately that technology can play a role in improving health outcomes.” Nice, but Williams subsequently returns to the power theme: “…they’re no longer passengers on their own health journey. Instead, we want people to be firmly in the driver’s seat.”

From https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s5S9VvMMxhU

There’s not one statistic in that commercial. It doesn’t say that the Macintosh computer would equip you to jump 5% higher, or sing on key 99.9% of the time. And Apple Computer didn’t claim that the Macintosh would equip you to draw bridge images 35.2% faster.

And some potential computer buyers perceived that this power provided infinite value.

As you work out your benefit statements, don’t give up if the benefits cannot be quantified. As long as the benefits resonate with the customer, qualitative benefits are just fine.

What are your benefits?

Before you draft your marketing material, or ask someone to draft it for you, you need to decide what your benefits are.

I’ve written a book about benefits, and five other things that you need to settle before creating marketing content.

Click on the image below, find the e-book at the bottom of the page, and skip to page 11 to read about benefits.

Feel free to read the rest of the book also.

How Bredemarket’s Six Questions Support Strategic Content Marketing

(UPDATE OCTOBER 23, 2023: “SIX QUESTIONS YOUR CONTENT CREATOR SHOULD ASK YOU IS SO 2022. DOWNLOAD THE NEWER “SEVEN QUESTIONS YOUR CONTENT CREATOR SHOULD ASK YOU” HERE.)

Just for fun, I’m going to challenge my assertion that there are six questions that your content creator must ask you before creating content.

I ought to know about these six questions. As a content marketing expert, I wrote the book on the topic.

To download this e-book, go to https://bredemarket.com/2022/12/18/six-questions-your-content-creator-should-ask-you-the-e-book-version/.

If you haven’t read the e-book, the six questions are:

Why?
How?
What?
Goal?
Benefits?
Target Audience?

The idea is that your content creator hosts a kickoff session, asks you the six questions, and only then starts to create the content in question—the blog post, case study, or whatever.

Are the six questions overkill?

But simplicity advocates may argue that those six questions are five questions too many.

Analysis paralysis may prevent you from moving forward at all, much less realizing your content creation goal. Perhaps you should be more efficient and just put pen to paper and, as the shoe people say, just do it.

By http://www.seeklogo.com/nike-classic-logo-99493.html, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=48024270

I found a content marketing expert who agreed with this assertion, and wrote a post entitled “In marketing, move quickly.”

That content marketing expert was…well, it was me.

I ran across a local company (which I will not name) that issued a press release in December 2021. In part, the press release mentioned the local company’s new dedication to the marketing function.
From https://bredemarket.com/2022/03/23/in-marketing-move-quickly/

The company had hired an international marketing firm “to develop comprehensive marketing strategies….We expect their work to incorporate a website redesign, brand refresh, new strategic messaging and content, as well as focused video and digital campaigns.”

So, when I wrote the “In marketing, move quickly” post three months later, what had this international marketing firm accomplished in the interim?

The website has a full slew of data sheets on the company’s products, and I found a 2017 brochure that effectively served as a white paper. But that’s it; no other white papers, and no case studies describing happy customers’ experiences.

The company’s YouTube channel has two videos from 2021.

The company’s Facebook page hasn’t posted anything since 2017.

Neither of the company’s LinkedIn pages (yes, the company has two LinkedIn pages) has any posts.
From https://bredemarket.com/2022/03/23/in-marketing-move-quickly/

Now I have no visibility into this particular company, but I’ve been around the block to guess that the international marketing firm was probably still in the analysis stage, optimizing synergies according to “out of the box” criteria, to ensure bleeding-edge revenue maximization.

No, the six questions aren’t overkill

After reviewing what I wrote before in that blog post, I realize that my e-book lacks a very important point.

Don’t spend three months answering the six questions.

I shouldn’t HAVE to say this, but perhaps it’s safer to explicitly say it.

Now practices can very from consultation to consultation, but it’s very likely that a content creator and their client can breeze through those six questions in half an hour or less.

Or maybe the client can answer the questions on their own before the meeting.

If your content marketing expert schedules six one-hour meetings (or worse still, workshops) to address the six questions, run away!

(Is the content marketing expert billing by the hour?)

And the six questions create a content strategy

There’s something else that I failed to explicitly say in my e-book.

Not only do the answers to the six questions benefit that one piece of content, but they benefit everything else that your company does.

For example, let’s say that a content marketing expert is working with a gourmet ice cream shoppe (not a shop, but a shoppe), and the proprietor (Jane Cold) answers the “how” question as follows:

At Jane’s Gourmet Ice Cream Shoppe, we keep the internal dining temperature below 50 degrees Fahrenheit to ensure that our guests enjoy ice cream as it was meant to be enjoyed. We inform our guests of our temperature policy beforehand to ensure they bring proper attire.

By Edward S. Curtis – This file was derived from: Inupiat Family from Noatak, Alaska, 1929, Edward S. Curtis.jpg, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=24953870

Now let’s say that the piece of content in question is a social media post describing a new farkleberry ice cream flavor. (Thanks, Live Eat Learn.)

By Eric Hunt – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=85068643

While the content marketing expert will use the answer to the “how” question to create the content, the ramifications go far beyond the social media post itself.

Perhaps the new flavor could be branded “Frigid Farkleberry” to suggest how the ice cream should best be enjoyed.
Maybe in addition to branding, the “how” answer may even influence pricing. Perhaps prices incorporate the number “32,” as in a single-scoop price of $4.32. (Yes that price is high, but after all this is an ice cream shoppe.)

And what of future social media posts?

Let me clue you in on a little secret: once your content marketing expert has asked the six questions for the first piece of content, the kickoff is much quicker for subsequent pieces of content.

Chances are the basic “why” and “how” won’t change, although some of the later questions such as the target audience could change for each individual piece of content.

So without explicitly trying to do so, the six questions have created a de facto content marketing strategy. After creating five pieces of content, you’ve essentially defined your company’s mission, purpose, and differentiators, and may have defined as many as five separate vertical markets along the way.

Not a bad investment of thirty minutes of time.

(But a terrible investment of three months of time.)

An exercise for you

Normally this is the point where I’d tell you to contact me if you want to use Bredemarket’s content marketing expertise. But this time I’m going to do something different.

Why don’t you think of a piece of content you want to create?
Once you’ve decided on that, why don’t you ask yourself the six questions?
Once you have the answers, why don’t you see what type of overall content marketing strategy you can shape, solely based on those six responses?

Lockheed Martin’s Anti-biofouling Customer Focus

Businesses exist to serve their customers, something Lockheed Martin says when talking about itself.

Lockheed Martin’s customer-first mentality is a big way the company stands out from its competitors.
From https://www.lockheedmartin.com/en-us/news/features/2020/how-lockheed-martin-anticipates-customer-needs.html

It’s nice to claim a “customer-first mentality,” but Lockheed Martin has provided an example of how it demonstrates customer focus.

The problem

Here’s how Lockheed Martin defined the problem that one of its customers was facing.

Barnacle on a boat propeller. By Foto: Jonn Leffmann, CC BY 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=23069484

Biofouling is the buildup of barnacles and microorganisms on ocean-going vessels such as ships and unmanned underwater vehicles (UUVs). This buildup is a naturally occurring process which can increase drag and decrease ship fuel economy, ultimately costing customers hundreds of millions of dollars. The United States Navy needs to eliminate biofouling growth along the underside of its ships, which involves a cleaning process that requires a ship to be out of commission for up to 18 months and hundreds of hours of manual labor.
From https://www.lockheedmartin.com/en-us/news/features/2020/how-lockheed-martin-anticipates-customer-needs.html

Maybe your customers aren’t quite as big as the United States Navy, but your customers have problems also, and they’re relying on you to solve them.

A solution from nature

For aeronautical engineer Joseph Keegan, the solution to the Navy’s problem lay in the sea snake.

Banded Sea Snake. By jon hanson on flickr. – https://www.flickr.com/photos/jonhanson/90795890/, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=665674

Because defense contractors think about sea snakes all the time. Or at least Keegan did.

Keegan decided to apply for funding for a project that mimicked how a sea snake mitigates biofouling growth. The sea snake has a clever way to mitigate growth by organically shedding its skin to rid itself of biofouling growth and disease when the growth begins to affect its movement.
From https://www.lockheedmartin.com/en-us/news/features/2020/how-lockheed-martin-anticipates-customer-needs.html

OK, an ocean vessel isn’t going to literally shed its hull. But that’s why Keegan needed research funding. And the researchers came up with a solution, and started to test it.

Ventura Harbor in the sunshine. By Platinummedia – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=110032114

A Lockheed Martin team took the idea from paper to prototype and went to Ventura Harbor, California to conduct static testing of a multilayer mylar skin on various surfaces including fiberglass, steel and aluminum. After leaving the prototype in the harbor for a little over a month, results confirmed that the films were effective in demonstrating that biofouling growth could be easily removed by peeling a layer of the film. The test was also successful in proving that the films did not allow for biofouling growth to occur between the multiple layers of film or underneath the four-layer prototype. No degradation to the films has been observed in the five months of testing.
From https://www.lockheedmartin.com/en-us/news/features/2020/how-lockheed-martin-anticipates-customer-needs.html

Anticipated benefits

While Lockheed Martin’s write-up includes the common researcher statement “further efforts are needed to successfully implement this biofouling film technology,” it looks like the project is moving forward.

And Lockheed Martin has already identified the benefits of the completed project. Not the benefits to Lockheed Martin, but the benefits to its customer, the U.S. Navy.

With the potential to reduce the time a Navy ship remains out of commission for cleaning, this nature-inspired design idea could…save money and enable greater mission readiness…
From https://www.lockheedmartin.com/en-us/news/features/2020/how-lockheed-martin-anticipates-customer-needs.html

Saving money and getting ships out to battle more quickly. Stuff that the Navy likes.

Of course this benefits Lockheed Martin also, but the company kept the focus on the Navy.

How does this apply to my company?

Even if your customers don’t battle biofouling barnacles, and even if your customers don’t face problems that put their equipment out of commission for 18 months or cost hundreds of hours in labor, there’s a lesson to be learned from Lockheed Martin’s customer focus.

Keep your focus on your customer, not you.
Describe the problem your customer faces.
Define your solution to the problem.
List the benefits your customer receives from your solution.

If your solutions benefit your customers, then you’ll receive benefits also.

What I Missed About QR Codes in 2021

A lot has happened with QR codes since I last wrote about them in October 2021. (For example, the Coinbase Super Bowl ad in 2022, and its demonstration of security risks.)

Now that I’m revisiting my October 2021 post on QR codes, I wish I could change one word to make myself look smarter.

See if you can guess which word I want to change.

I have since chosen to adopt QR codes for some of my Bredemarket work, especially in cases where an online reader may need additional information.
From https://bredemarket.com/2021/10/15/a-qr-code-is-not-a-way-of-life/

Did you find it?

Instead of writing “online,” I should have written “offline.”

I don’t know whether I just made a typo, or if I intentionally wrote “online,” but I shouldn’t have.

Why QR codes rarely make sense online

Because if you’re online, you don’t need a QR code, since you presumably have access to a clickable URL.

But if you’re offline—for example, if you’re watching a commercial on an old-fashioned TV screen—a QR code makes perfect sense. Well, as long as you explicitly identify where the QR code will lead you, something Coinbase failed to do in 2022. “Just click on the bouncing QR code and don’t worry where you’ll go!”

But there’s one more place where QR codes make sense. I didn’t explicitly refer to it in my 2021 post, but QR codes make sense when you’re looking at printed material, such as printed restaurant menus.

Or COVID questionnaires.

Which reminds me…

What I didn’t tell you about the Ontario Art Walk

…there’s one story about the Ontario Art Walk that I didn’t share in yesterday’s post.

After leaving Dragon Fruit Skincare, but before visiting the Chaffey Community Museum of Art, I visited one other location that I won’t identify. This location wanted you to answer a COVID questionnaire, which you accessed via a QR code.

I figured I’d do the right thing and answer the questionnaire, since I had nothing to worry about.

I was vaccinated.
I was boosted.
I hadn’t been around anyone with COVID.
I didn’t have a fever.

I entered the “right” response to every single question, except for the one that asked if I had a runny or stuffy nose. Since I had a stuffy nose, I indicated this.

But hey, it’s just a stuffy nose. What could go wrong?

When I finished the questionnaire, I was told that based on my answers, I was not allowed in the premises, and if I was already in the premises I should leave immediately.

Which I did.

And which is why I didn’t write about that particular location in yesterday’s post.

Bredemarket, pressing the flesh (sometimes six feet away)

But back to non-health related aspects of QR codes.

The Ontario Art Walk was actually the second in-person event that I had attended that week. As I noted on Instagram, I also went to a City of Ontario information session about a proposed bike lane.

Now that COVID has (mostly) receded, more of us are going to these in-person events. My target market (businesspeople in the United States) is mostly familiar with the century-old term “press the flesh.” While it usually applies to politicians attending in-person events, it can equally apply to non-political events.

Whenever I go out to these local events, I like to have some printed Bredemarket collateral handy in case I find a local businessperson looking for marketing services. After all, since I am the Ontario, California content marketing expert, I should let relevant people in Ontario know this.

In those cases, a QR code makes sense, since I can hand it to the person, the person can scan the QR code on their phone, and the person can immediately access whatever web page or other content I want to share with them.

On Saturday, it occurred to me that if I ran across a possible customer during the Ontario Art Walk, I could use a QR code to share my e-book “Six Questions Your Content Creator Should Ask You.”

Unfortunately, this bright idea came to my mind at 5:30 pm for an event that started at 6. I dummied up a quick and dirty page with the cover and a QR code, but it was…dirty. Just as well I didn’t share that on Saturday.

But now that I have more time, I’ve created a better-looking printed handout so that I’m ready at the next in-person event I attend.

If we meet, ask me for it.

Making myself look less smart

Well, now that I’ve gone through all of this trouble explaining how QR codes are great for offline purposes, I’m going to share the aforementioned handout…online.

(UPDATE OCTOBER 22, 2023: “SIX QUESTIONS YOUR CONTENT CREATOR SHOULD ASK YOU IS SO 2022. DOWNLOAD THE NEWER “SEVEN QUESTIONS YOUR CONTENT CREATOR SHOULD ASK YOU” HERE.)

Which has probably prompted the following question from you.

“Why?”

Four reasons:

It gave me the excuse to post the question “Why?” above, thus reiterating one of the major points of the e-book.
Because I felt like sharing it.
Just in case you don’t make “Event X” that I attend in the future, you can experience the joy of printing the flyer and scanning the QR code yourself. Just like you were there!
To demonstrate that even when you provide a piece of content with a QR code, it’s also helpful to explicitly reveal the URL where you’ll head if you scan the code. (Look just below the QR code in the flyer above.) And if you receive the flyer in online form rather than printed form, that URL is clickable.