www.sdchamber.org

Membership Update

By Doug Holman, Vice President of Membership

January is a time of new beginnings, transformations and bright things to come. In the spirit of the New Year, I would like to provide you with my once-monthly advice on the topic of personal direct contact (PDC). PDC is the part of your marketing plan wherein you meet face-to-face with potential clients – simply stated, it is prospecting.

With approximately 85,000 businesses in San Diego County, the odds are strong that you have serious competition. What’s worse is that you not only compete against similar products and services, but you also compete for favorable attention from your prospective customers. Anyone who would possibly buy from you also has a job, a social life and any number of people vying for their attention. Therefore, in the world of selling, your greatest limitation is finding someone to listen to your story. 

There are tried and true ways to grow a business that you have either used or investigated: yellow page ads, print media, radio, television and direct mail to name a few.  Advertising is great, and clearly it works, but it’s best employed as part of a comprehensive strategy of gathering prospects. Focusing 100 percent of your marketing on advertising is limiting, because while advertising can reach many people at once, it doesn’t allow you to create the incredibly valuable one-on-one relationship. Therefore, most consumers generated through advertising tend to be very cost conscious, and your business has little control over them. They either find you or they don’t.  

The Chamber has a whole other world of consumers that function quite differently.  These consumers buy based on trust, respect and knowledge.  They believe in the importance of word of mouth and love to demonstrate its power.  Treat them right and they will be customers for life.  There are hundreds of businesses actively generating prospects, customers, revenue and loyalty through relationship selling.

Getting prospects to call you back is the difference between a great offer and a personal introduction.  Let’s face it, great offers are all too common and are rarely what they seem.  Personal introductions are meaningful.  They are a combination of past good experiences and a belief of more to come.  Relationship selling aligns your name, face and reputation with your brand. The more individuals that you get to know, the more significant impact on the brand awareness that you create through advertising.