Position yourself – or die!

There is not much time left to change your marketing. Because customer change much faster than you. Especially in the MICE business. Sellers die – long live the buyers. Customers want to find and not to be chased. The better your positioning, the more orders you get and the less pitches you do. The transformation into buyer markets is a massive challenge for agencies, venues, destinations and other MICE and BT providers. Think about this:

 

Almost every decision in buying is influenced by experiences in the internet. People communicate online, they recommend, they shit storm, they search, perceive ads – more than 70 % of the population between 15 and 55 years old make their buying decisions based on online experiences. And mostly they make this decision before they directly contact any provider. On the other side it has never been easier for companies to influence this decision by professional positioning so that they buy from you. Major steps are:

 

If I meet MICE agencies and ask them what they do, most answers are like: “We do events from A to Z. Everything. Full service. Except weddings.“. It’s okay of you to offer everything, but please only behind the stage for hot leads or existing clients. Your communication should be about your core competencies and about why you operate your company the way you do it every single day. The Why is always related to your products and services. So there are some agencies I know who focus on sustainability concepts out of conviction. They will be loved by clients who are convinced of the same values. Others focus on outdoor and interactive formats. experts4events, my company, focusses on measurable events with speakers and experts because we strongly believe that these events enables easy access to participants of their target groups and provide countless concept opportunities for verifiable results. What do you stand for? How do you differentiate effectively to your competition? And is the world able to be aware of it easily?

 

If you write and publish, you are somebody. The term “author” is related to authority. Entrepreneurs often tell me that they are experts in doing but they are not a writer. My answer is: If you are an expert in doing and know a lot how to do something professionally then let others write for you: Let them ask you questions your clients ask themselves all the time and record your answers. Copy writers are experts transferring these audios into great copy with the key words people should find you with and search engines love. And if you don’t want to distribute your “7 tips-“ or “Golden rules-“-text online then let marketing agencies do that for you so that your target groups find it, are excited about it and call you. In this context writing is almost as strong as speaking. So please go out and speak to the world. Use the stages of fairs and target group market places. The limiting problem with speaking is that every speech takes preparation time and time is limited. So with speaking it is very important to record it as often as possible and post it on all platforms and lead traffic to it by campaigns and ads. 

 

Most websites of our businesses I know inform. Full stop. Some provide newsletter and a blog I can subscribe. But almost none offer value to read and watch or provide community opportunities. So I’d like to ask you to transform your website into a treasure chest – step by step with the content you generate. Because prospects don’t search for texts of self-congratulations but for proof of expertise. So please provide your expertise on the most important touchpoint you have: Your website. And ask for emailadresses with contact permission in order to build a list of prospects turning them into customers and fans later on.

 

The most harmful attitude of entrepreneurs is to be satisfied with the current status. In order to surprise and bind customers to you you need to constantly deliver new ideas, service attractions and offerings. The best way doing it is to regularly turn yourself into an “Undercover Boss” and check your processes. And to regularly turn yourself into a mystery shopping client or ask others to check the customer journey from outside. Protocol everything which is not satisfying, complicated, missing etc. – and innovate. By the way: Most innovation happens in production and gets lost later. I have experienced so many great ideas in MICE projects they have never been repeated later. So please store every idea and concept you have produced and open this magic box regularly to all (new) employees. They will develop it to the next level.

 

You  can win alone but why? Winning together by creating Win-Wins is  easier and more fun. So if you produce content offer it to others who address your target groups as well (with their newsletters, blogs,…). And ask for content/tips from them to publish it in your communication channels. Interview other, more successful experts and make them shine in your audio and video. Most of them will let you shine later. We are in the event industry – so organize live marketing events for your business together with others and gather much more prospects than you could achieve alone. 

 

There is no one recipe to be successful. But I have learnt three major lessons: 1. Make it easy for customers to deal with you. 2. Excite and deliver high quality products with high prices but don’t be too expensive. 3. If you care more who your customers are, where they are, what they really want and how they change then you cannot avoid being a successful entrepreneur having an easy life with lots of fun doing your job. 

 

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Siegfried Haider is one of the most 

well known brand positioning experts

and speakers in Germany and help 

companies around the world to attract

clients automatically. His agency 

experts4events organizes live marketing

and meeting concepts with experts 

globally.

 

experts4events - meet your clients -

Siegfried Haider

Tel. +49 (0) 8141 227993-0

info@experts4events.com

www.experts4events.com