What Is Authentic Marketing? Are You Using It In Your Business?
July 24th, 2013 by Diane Conklin under Marketing. No Comments.
When did the word marketing become such a bad term? When was it that marketing became associated with manipulation and the idea of making people do something they don’t want to do?
As a business owner, you should be in love with marketing, because it’s a tool – a tool that allows you to get your message out to the world. It allows you to show your clients and prospects exactly what difference you have to offer that will make an improvement in their lives.
Does the thought of marketing scare you? Do you feel like it’s your tool? If you don’t absolutely love marketing, that’s fine, but as a business owner you still need to use it. It’s still a strategy that should be helping your business reach your clients and potential new ones. If it’s not working that way for you, why not?
Are you being authentic in your marketing? Do you understand what authentic marketing is all about? If you feel like marketing means you have to manipulate someone, that’s just not the case, at least, not if you’re using authentic marketing strategies.
Being authentic in your marketing means you talk to your clients how you want to be spoken to. It means showing people the valuable products or services you have for them, and asking them to have a genuine relationship with you as a business person. When you know, with conviction and without a doubt, what you have can be a big benefit to them, then you owe it to them to share what you have with them.
And maybe you have to use a little persuasion. Persuasion, not manipulation. The difference between persuasion and manipulation is when you persuade your client to experience your business, you work hard at getting them to do just that because it’s a benefit to them. There’s no shame in convincing someone to experience something that’s an improvement for them.
Manipulation, on the other hand, is all about you. It’s about selling someone something – you may not even care what it is – but you convince them that they need this thing and it does nothing for them. Instead, the sale is your benefit. That’s manipulative, and you don’t want to use that in your business.
So how can you be more authentic in your business? Think about your products and services, think about your clients, the ones in front of you, the one’s on your website, and the ones thinking about making an investment in your company. Are you providing them something they need, or something they want, or something that can have a great impact on whatever they’re doing? If you are, you should not feel bad about marketing your items to them. It’s building a relationship with those people that can truly get something of value from you.
Think about the way you market to those people. Are you speaking from your heart? Are you touching their heart? Are you tapping into their emotion by showing just how much you care about them as your client?
These are concepts of being authentic in marketing. And these could be the concepts you’ve lost when you think about marketing in general. Put those concepts back into your marketing and see the difference it makes for you and your clients.
