No WIIFM is not the newest video game/car stereo combo from Nintendo, it's actually one of the most important marketing considerations there is.
What's in it for me?
This is the question all of your clients and potential customers ask themselves. If it’s not an actual thought in their minds, it’s the subconscious mantra by which they judge all of your marketing, messages, and offerings.
Think about it: If a commercial or piece of mail doesn’t immediately show itself to be relevant to your circumstances you disregard it, right? There are dozens of commercials for mattresses, but only when you need a new bed do they exist in your world.
That’s why it’s so important to put some useful content in every sales and marketing effort you make. Whether it’s a joke, a link to a website, or starting your ad with some useful statistics, there better be something other than “Look at what I’ve got!” in your messaging or it’s in one ear, out the other.
For example, last week I got three e-mails in three days from a networking contact who was hawking her latest venture. I did not opt-in to this list, which is its own marketing infraction, so I was a bit peeved at getting three e-mails in four days for items I don’t want or need.
But it would’ve been so much easier to take if there had been any tiny element of content in the e-mails other than, “Buy my stuff!” Maybe some introductory text on how people are using the items to generate business, a product-related joke, a coupon – anything! But as it stands all I got was a bunch of spam, essentially.
There was nothing in it for me. So being the self-concerned human I am, I hit delete.
Maybe if there was something in there that I could relate to I would’ve read the entire message and realized that someone I know could use the product, or I would’ve made a mental note to remember the product and refer it to my clients.
It’s basically the Golden Rule, rearing its golden head again. Would you want to get a message that says only “Buy my stuff!”? No. Well, neither does anyone else. |