P.T. Barnum once said “Without promotion, something terrible happens … nothing!”

I was reminded of this quote today and it got me thinking. Yes, of course, P.T. Barnum was right, no business will EVER succeed without “promotion”. If somebody drives up to your house in a huge truck and drops off thousands of dollars worth of the world’s best ever product onto your driveway … and you just look at it … does it sell itself? Of course not. If you just look at it, then it will just sit there. Even the best product or the best service in the world will NOT PROMOTE ITSELF!

And, I’m sure that you can think of many examples where less than perfect products have become hugely successful. They have achieved that through being promoted … through marketing.

So, I accept wholeheartedly that P.T. Barnum was right about promotion.

But, there’s a problem …

We do NOT like being promoted to!

If a stranger comes up to you in the street and says “Hey, I’ve got a great deal, just for you!” or is wearing a t-shirt that says in big letters “Make your fortune in the next six month? Ask me how?”, or if we come across yet one more website that says something like “I made $100,000 in 3 months, enter your email address and I’ll show you how you can too”, we run … fast … in the opposite direction.

We’ve had enough of the “get rich quick” stories. We’ve learned not to believe them anymore. Sure, I am NOT suggesting for a second that anybody out there is lying. Far from it. I’m certain that the story would stand up to careful cross-examination in Court! BUT, I don’t believe they are telling us the WHOLE story. Sure, it probably is a “great deal” … but only for somebody that has a certain set of specific skills and has the time, money and passion to see it through. And, yes, I’m sure that guy did earn $100,000 in 3 months. It probably cost him $85,000 though and he was only able to make any money at all because he had spent the previous 5 years building up a huge email list. So, yes, it is possible …. but only when you have all your ducks lined up! (Actually, I want to come back to that another time, because ducks don’t fully line up … that’s for another day!).

So, we don’t want to be promoted to.

But, despite that, we are looking for solutions to our problems. And maybe, just maybe, you might possibly be able to follow what the guy who made the $100,000 did. And, just maybe this is exactly what you need for your current circumstances and your beliefs and desires and skills and knowledge. Maybe it is a perfect fit! And, even though only $15,000 of that was profit … maybe that matches your income goal … maybe this really is the perfect opportunity for you?

But maybe you already rejected it because you don’t like being promoted to?

And that’s our challenge these days. And, just to be clear, by “our”, I mean business-people. Because we know that we have a product or a service that can genuinely help people. For the right people, in the right circumstances, at the right time, it really is … the RIGHT solution. (By the way, if your product or service does NOT genuinely help people, then change something … now!)

So, on the one hand, we HAVE to promote our product/service but we know that nobody wants to be promoted to. Is there a solution to this dilemma?

Absolutely!

Just enter your email address ….  ha ha! No! Just joking … you probably don’t like being promoted to either!

Think about this for a second …

Imagine you had a problem. Let’s pick a simple one. Let’s say that you have a problem because your camera has just packed up, just before you head off on vacation. It was old anyway, and it had given you good service. But you want a camera for your vacation. So, what do you do?

Well, I was in this situation a while back. I went to my local camera shop. Things had changed enormously since I had last bought a camera. So, I asked the guy behind the counter for some help. Do you know what he said? He said “I’m sorry, I don’t know much about cameras, why don’t you surf the Web and then come back and we can get the camera that you want?” I vowed never to return to that shop. I was looking for advice and information relevant to my problem and he couldn’t give it to me. I was looking for somebody who would be genuinely interested in steering me towards buying the right camera. I did surf the web and I did the research myself and identified the camera that seemed the best for me and bought it over the Internet.

I may be unique (and in some respects I like to think that I am! ) But in many respects I believe I am just another human being. If I have a problem then I will search out possible solutions. If I have to spend money to solve the problem then that is fine, as long as I believe that I am getting value for my money.

So, back to promotion and marketing … how does this all fit together?

Well, these days, to be successful, business-people have to focus their promotions on helping people. Because they realise that people like being helped and they also realise that people accept that there may be a financial exchange involved. They just want to make sure that they are getting fair value for their money.

And, one of the really great things about doing business these days is that getting information out there for people to find has never been easier. We “Google” our problem and up come heaps of useful (and sometimes not so useful) responses.

So, if you are in business today then promote, promote, promote … but remember to do it in a way that genuinely helps people … not rams your sales message down their throat!