It took a couple months, but I’ve been put back on the track of marketing systems gone bad…
Let’s have a look so that you can a) identify it when you receive it, b) enjoy a little bit of humor around the holiday season, and c) avoid setting up this sort of problem for yourself!
People that sell email marketing systems and services will always make claims that email marketing is not dead…
Individual messages
Everybody knows that you can automate email so that it inserts the “name” of the person receiving the message:
“Hey Steve!”
This does help create a sense of intimacy – did Matt Lauer really send me a personal email?!?
But the message to me the other day went astray rather quickly…
“It’s that time of Year again when everyone’s looking for a Personal Trainer.“
And then I realized what was going on – wouldn’t it be great if I used their services to attract clients for my personal training services?
But get this – they do that through social media!
Why yes, they will hook me up with the latest:
“Do you have Your Facebook Business Page, Twitter, Blogs, Landing Pages, Newsletters, and Copy write updated and up to Par with useful content?“
If I don’t, they’ll be happy to help me out – even though their sentence doesn’t really make sense – what’s the purpose of that word “write”, and why have they capitalized “Your” and “Par”?
Detecting crapola
Some of the things I look for:
- Less than perfect copy
- An automated mismatch
- Help with the latest buzzwords
Copy counts
So – message to all marketing firms in existence:
If you can’t send me perfect copy, why would I think that you’ll send my clients perfect copy? Isn’t that your business?
I mean if I make a copy mistake, I can chalk it up to a learning experience because I don’t hang that shingle on my front stoop – but you do…
Trolling
It’s called trolling because it really is like fishing – you hang a lure at the end of a line and drag that line behind your boat, covering a large patch of water. At some point you hope a fish is attracted enough to the lure to swim up and latch on – and bingo – you’ve got some success.
It’s required that the lure be attractive to the fish – or in this case, the “line” to the “prospect”.
If I’m trolling for “Personal Trainers”, I’ll talk to them about their training business…
The ironic thing in this case is that the attempt was made to show a group of people that social media could be used successfully – and social media is a reasonably intimate environment. But the attempt used a rather non-intimate process to attract them.
Buzzword based
If there’s a new, hot process working its way around the internet, you can count on the trolls to come out.
And yes, I see them in the LinkedIn space.
That’s why I lead with solid advice and a real conversation – and avoid the hype of suggesting that all your problems will end if only you bring me in to train you…
Read with your head attached
So – if you’re the recipient of this sort of message – my sympathies go out to you.
Identify it with the advice I have above, and just drop it in the bit-bucket. Life’s too short to go around tilting at mole hills – if you’re going to go around tilting, at least pick a noble target like a windmill;-)
Check your automation!
I was looking back into the articles I wrote in October, and like my words well enough to drop them in there again:
So folks – this should be a clear call that if you’re going to use this thing called “social marketing”, you can’t delegate away the intelligence behind it.
Really – don’t fool yourself into believing that someone else can “be” you. And think about it – if they could, what does that say about you? (and if they did, what does that imply about your future?-)
Enjoy the snow!
We’ve had our first reasonably big snowstorm of the year here in the upstate NY area – and I’m getting excited about pulling out my skis. Hope you can find the right attitude to approach this season!
To your continued success,
steve
—
Steven Tylock
http://www.linkedinpersonaltrainer.com
http://www.linkedin.com/in/stevetylock