How to get prospects to say, "That's interesting, tell me more." / Build your brand by becoming a trusted resource / Interns want to learn / Starbucks' competitors boost amenities and expand menus

HOW TO GET PROSPECTS TO SAY, "THAT'S INTERESTING, TELL ME MORE."
Go get Beyond Buzz: The Next Generation of Word of Mouth Marketing, by Lois Kelly. Study it, highlight it, underline it, tag the pages, and implement the practices. As with many great marketing concepts, the idea behind conversational marketing is so simple it’s brilliant. The author quotes John Battelle, founder of Wired and The Industry Standard, who says this about conversational marketing: “it sounds so obvious, but in fact it requires an entirely new approach to marketing.”

What’s different about it?
Traditional marketing and communications don’t really help people talk. They inform, promote, direct, and describe, but they don’t help jump-start conversations that get people to say (and I love this phrase Lois uses to test if a subject is conversational),

“Gee, that’s interesting, tell me more.”

How many times has a prospective customer said that to you when you’ve given them your opening line about your company or product? Not very many, huh? Do their eyes glaze over instead? How much would it be worth to you to actually have people say, “That’s interesting. Tell me more,” regularly, not just when you’re talking to people, but also when anyone in your company is talking to people? And how great would it be to have a meaningful, effortless conversation follow this, where you’re able to keep their interest with relevant ideas that help them to better understand your value?

Having interesting things to talk about is valuable
If you’ve ever tried to get your sales reps to hone an elevator speech, or tried to arm non-sales people with a description they can use when asked about the company, you know what I’m talking about. It can come off as stilted, prepared, salesy, and not at all interesting. And if the listener’s eyes go into a far-off stare, most likely you and your people just talk faster about your products and services, as if talking faster will make them suddenly wake up and listen. At least it’ll get the ordeal over with sooner.

We always knew that marketing was about having a conversation, a relationship with customers, right? Some of us have just had difficulty keeping the conversation interesting for our customers. Kelly contends that

“Studies have found that the more customers participate in meaningful conversations and interactions with companies, the more likely they are to purchase a product or service and recommend it to others. For marketers, this suggests that we need to find ways to involve customers in more conversations that are meaningful to them.”

Make meaning
Surveys say that people don’t trust companies, and that the only way to gain back trust is to communicate in new ways, according to Kelly. In addition to traditional marketing and communications, create conversational marketing approaches, and have something interesting to talk about. One way to do this is with meaning making — meaning making helps make sense of an idea, an option, or concept, and shows people how it relates to what they already know. When they don’t see meaning, customers tend to become skeptical and indifferent.

The author jam packs her book with tips for making meaning, using emotion — the most powerful ingredient for understanding — and uncovering talk-worthy ideas, including the three steps for real, relevant, and repeatable conversations.

The three steps for real, relevant, and repeatable conversations
1. Research in new ways, listening more closely and seeing new patterns
2. Create conversation themes based on points of view.
3. Make it someone’s job and hold them accountable.

Have a point of view
The point of view section alone is well worth the price of admission and could be your big “aha!” Having a point of view and talking about it can add real legs to conversations about your company, and has the added benefit of revealing something about the company’s authenticity. The better your customers know your company’s personality, they better they can connect for the long term — without being able to “know” the company, they’ll consider your product to be a commodity.

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BUILD YOUR BRAND BY BECOMING A TRUSTED RESOURCE
Well-crafted blogs, podcasts, webinars, email newsletters, and similar online endeavors differ in delivery but share one important trait: rather than focusing on the promotion of a product or service, these undertakings are a chance for an organization to exhibit thought leadership and to brand itself as an industry expert. A good blog or other online project builds a company's reputation as a knowledgeable, trustworthy source of information. As a by-product, leads will follow without any real selling.

To build your reputation as a thought leader, inform your customers -- don't advertise to them. Consider the problems or questions that customer is likely to have, and provide the best information to help them solve it. Don't mention your company. Don't describe a service you offer that might fit this customer's needs. The better and less biased your information, the more likely it is that customers will come back when they need or want to know more.

It's also a good idea to be entertaining and creative. Perhaps you host a sales blog, written by a top salesperson who chronicles her best tips as she travels the country, always including photos of interesting restaurants or coffee shops in which she's met prospects. To get the most bang for your buck, cross-promote your informative and interesting online endeavors. Mention your e-newsletter on your blog and vice-versa. Outside of the Internet, market all of these projects whenever and wherever possible.

Always think in terms of providing the best information and proving yourself to be an expert source instead of selling. Brand yourself as a thought leader in your industry, and customers will return to you as a trusted resource -- and leads will naturally follow.

Source: MarketingProfs.com

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INTERNS WANT TO LEARN
Wet Feet, a San Francisco-based recruitment and research company, recently surveyed college students who had completed internships and found that their prime objective in the internship was gaining experience and knowledge. "Receiving a job" was further down the list. Interestingly, the two objectives appear tied together. Less than half of the students overall accepted end-of-internship job offers, but internship programs that were designed around student objectives had a higher-than-average conversion rate.

The message seems to be that if you want to hire your interns, you should mold internships to reflect what they would like to learn to do. In the Wet Feet survey, students reported that the best learning experiences were those that provided real tasks and exposed them to a genuine work environment.

Kaiser Permanente's interns are treated very much like salaried employees. Managers are required to increase the complexity of an intern's projects each summer that the intern returns for a new internship. Interns go through performance reviews twice per summer, and graduating interns must present a summary of their projects to a panel of KP executives. Employees of Deutsche Bank require licenses to perform some work such as trading, but the company mirrors "real work" for interns by including simulated trading competitions and scoring them as if they were using real money and real accounts.

True to what has been widely written about Generation Y, college interns are unwilling to chug through a day with only the promise of a paycheck to lure them. According to Wet Feet, interns wanted their internships to mimic the experience of working for the company as a true employee -- but also wanted a clear line of sight between the work they were doing and the company's overall success. In other words, they wanted to feel that their work mattered.

Source: Workforce.com

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STARBUCKS' COMPETITORS BOOST AMENITIES AND EXPAND MENUS
Starbucks, which operates almost 14,000 locations worldwide, has a substantial lead on competitors like Caribou Coffee, which has 450 locations. Still, smaller coffee chains are following Starbucks' lead by enhancing store atmosphere and adding new menu items in an attempt to woo customers away from the market leader.

Caribou, for instance, recently said that it will be able to provide the best experience in the coffee shop market by training employees to memorize the names and drink preferences of regular customers. Starbucks has excelled in atmosphere so well that customers often use laptops to work in their stores, all the while ordering more beverages and more food. In an attempt to get more of its own customers to "linger," Caribou is outfitting stores with amenities such as free wireless Internet connections and fireplaces.

Only 10 of Coffee Beanery's 147 outlets currently have drive-thrus, but the chain plans to build them on most future suburban stores. Caribou is doing the same, as are smaller chains Tully's and Dunn Bros. Peet's has deliberately not built drive-thrus, opting instead to focus on a brand image of serving hand-crafted beverages face-to-face.

Starbucks' most serious rival, however, appears to be Dunkin' Donuts, which leads the quickserve market in sales of non-flavored brewed coffee. Dunkin' Donuts has rolled out a new line of espresso-based drinks that the chain claims can be served faster than Starbucks' concoctions and which cost less -- 99 cents for a Dunkin' Donuts espresso versus $1.45 at Starbucks. Only time will tell if the chain will seriously infringe on Starbucks territory.

Source: Nation's Restaurant News