Marketing Ideas: When it Comes to Marketing, Looks Matter

Learning to turn your customers on can make a world of difference in sales

Countless dollars are wasted on marketing ideas, messages, and executions that don’t connect with their intended audience. That audience being “potential customers”. The lack of focus on delivering what the audience wants or expects, or more simply put: words or images that don’t connect with them, turn into a lack of response.

If sales are down, it doesn’t necessarily mean your product is bad, it may mean your marketing is bad.

There was a great story on the CBS Sunday Morning last week that illustrates this. Visit many animal shelter websites and you’ll find the typical “I have a digital camera, I’ll take the picture” images on the site. Dogs and cats not looking their best, hidden behind the metal bars of their crate, illuminated with the harsh automatic flash from the camera. Even the best looking ones can be scrolled right past because the photo was just wrong.

Marketing Ideas: Adopt Shelter Dogs CBS Sunday Morning News
Before and after photos. Which dog would you bring home? (Teresa Berg, CBS Sunday Morning news show)

Certainly, a shelter operates on a low budget so hiring a photographer isn’t really at the top of their priority list. Lucky for this shelter, photographer Teresa Berg appeared, with her talent and skills – plus a heart of gold – and donated her time to give the pups’ photos the showcase appearance and quality they should have. From mangy and blurry to elegant and appealing, the new photos increased adoptions (i.e., in marketing speak: conversions) 100%.

While I’d love to carry on about her ambitious effort to train others to volunteer their time to do the same, there’s another message to be shared here: the presentation of your message is key to driving sales.

When trying to reach your audience, consider this:

  • Say something too softly – it won’t be heard.
  • Use the wrong language – they won’t understand.
  • Present an image that’s unprofessional – it will be ignored or misinterpreted.

Plan C for Marketing to CustomersIf I have one marketing tip to share, it’s this: Your audience wants to be sold to. Let me repeat that: your audience – that is, potential customers – WANTS to be sold to. No one wants to buy something ugly. No one wants a service that doesn’t seem to meet their needs. They want to be made to feel good about their purchase. That’s the job of marketing.

Remember that your potential customers visit your website or read your ads and direct mail pieces with some level of need or desire. Don’t turn them off. Push those buttons that turn need and desire into sales. Turn your customers on!

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