15 years ago, not many people knew how to setup a website. You could charge a lot to do it for someone.
Now, a complete technophobe can create a competent website (plenty competent to get their message out) in about 6 minutes. And they have plenty of choices for how to do it.
4 years ago, not too many people knew how to setup a blog. You could charge a lot to do it for someone.
Now, anyone can do it. My dog could almost do it.
Over time, it seems like the value of certain information is declining at a pretty rapid rate.
So what happens if the very same thing happens to the information marketing business? What if the inherent value of the information starts dropping and becomes more and more difficult to sell outright?
In the past, great marketing is what separated winners from losers. Heck, great marketing could MAKE a business, even if they were selling junk. Marketing did that very thing for many people. I’m talking about the folks who sell high priced information products and then send out photocopied notebooks that look like a 6th grader put them together.
Info Marketing 101: The Value is in the Information
The value is in the information right?
That’s what we’ve all been told in the info marketing business.
But what if the real value was never in the information in the first place?
What if the value was in something else?
What if the real value was simply that most people did not have access to the information. Or because most people didn’t even know that the information existed?
Wouldn’t that make it more valuable all by itself?
So now what happens when so much information is available to so many people from virtually anywhere?
Just how valuable is that information anyway?
Can you sell it? Will anyone buy it?
Sure, marketing can change the perception of your information. It can make it seem more valuable. The packaging alone can make your information more in demand.
But how long will “marketing” produce the sales when the next 10 listings in Google® offer up similar information right NOW, at no cost?
If the main reason information used to be inherently valuable is because it used to be scarce or hard to get, then how can an information business be valuable today - in an age where information is everywhere?
Is there anything left that’s scarce, that could provide value?
Yup.
Real CONNECTIONS With Other Human Beings
Don’t worry. This post is not about to get all mushy and turn into a Web 2.0 love fest. That’s been done already.
But now that the shine and the glitz of the web and of web 2.0 are wearing off, we’re left with all we really have - which is connections with other human beings.
But just because you have to CONNECT and build a relationship, doesn’t mean that relationship has to be between 2 people.
Let’s look at 37signals®.
Those guys have great products. They have products that are SO great (and so simple) that people even make up excuses to use them.
“Well, if we used Basecamp, we could do X, Y and Z… And if we signed up for Backpack, well then we could do X, Y and Z… Dang it, let’s just sign up for all of them. I’m sure we can use them somewhere.”
37signals® is excellent at creating a relationship between their people and their products.
There is a huge amount of value there.
Business on the web is slowly reverting back to be a whole lot like business in the village. The style of business where you went to Bob, the shoe cobbler, because you knew Bob. And you trusted him. And he treated you well.
Except now, Bob could live in India and you could live in Hawaii.
In the village, Bob didn’t try to milk you for every last dime you had. And he didn’t ask you to buy something every day of your life.
Bob knew that’s not how you treat people. And he also knew that if he did that, you wouldn’t come back.
Plus, people would talk about him. About how he doesn’t care about his customers.
Just think of the internet as a connection of thousands of little villages. Villages where people share stories and experiences.
But Does Old School Direct Marketing Work in the Village?
Old school direct marketing is focused on creating leads and/or sales. It hasn’t really been focused on creating relationships and connecting people.
At least I’ve never heard any direct marketing expert or book say, “Let’s just send this out… it’ll help build a strong relationship. Let’s just send this because we care about our people.”
I’m sure it happens, I just haven’t seen it.
After all, how do you measure that?
But can you imagine our friend Bob in the village, walking around thinking about how he can place a killer 2 step ad in the village newspaper and then follow up with a salesletter to close the deal?
That’s just not how selling works when you are in a village. It’s too cold and impersonal. It’s not effective.
And it’s missing the most important ingredient: the relationship.
Instead, Bob does great work.
Instead, Bob gets to know people.
He asks about their kids. About how they’re doing.
The relationships Bob creates do his selling for him. The relationship IS his marketing.
Will Focusing on the Relationship HURT Your Sales?
There’s just one problem. Especially for any entrepreneur that wants to hit it big.
In the village, I’d bet that Bob never became a millionaire. He didn’t really have the tools to do that.
Bob couldn’t really scale his relationship building.
And he couldn’t really scale his caring.
His market was pretty much defined for him, because it stopped at the village wall.
Online, we no longer have those limits.
So how do you scale relationship building?
How do you scale caring?
How much is a relationship or caring worth anyway?
No one has ONE answer for that.
No one has a COURSE for that. A relationship isn’t something that can be “duplicated.”
This is the business frontier we’re on right now. The people that figure that out how to build and scale relationships in their own way for their own business are going to do very, very well.
So isn’t that the hard work we should be doing? Figuring all that out… how to do it for our businesses?
And as quickly as possible?
Isn’t that more important to the long term future of our business than spending so much time searching for the hottest new place to advertise, or the cutting edge technique to get a better click through rate?
After all, no one can copy a relationship.
Because relationships are unique.
And no one can really put a price tag on one either.
Because relationships are valuable.
And unique value is something customers will gladly pay for. They always have.
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