This blog post is about three things:

1. Smarketing Strategy #4
2. How to SELL WITHOUT DISCOUNTING
3. The Best iPhone App EVER!

In my last blog post I shared Smarketing Strategy #3 : Creating content that jumps out at those who are most likely to become your customer.

If you did not have time to read my last blog post below is a short video (1:39) that explains how to create content that jumps out and here is link to some resources by Doug Kessler and his team over at Velocity Partners that also talk about it.

Smarketing Strategy #4 – using the Situation, Target, Plan (STP) framework – is to take your content where your best prospects go.

One of the major challenges of marketing is to solve the ‘Here vs. There problem’ – Here is where your content is, There is where the prospect is.

So you need to figure out where online your target audience goes, what they read, who they listen to and then find a way to get your content there or get links to your content posted there.

One of my favorite strategies is to comment on blogs and leave behind a cookie crumb – that leads people to a resource on your website.

If you want to use that strategy, here is a web site that ranks all the tops blogs by category.

Using a Here vs. There strategy:

• One comment resulted in over 500 people filling in a form to access my Won Sales Analysis™ template
• My Won Sales Analysis™ landing page has been viewed almost 15,000 times in the last 12 months.

The next stage of this strategy is to make my comments a status update on LinkedIn and let it be automatically tweeted.

Join us on September 13^th as thought leaders Mark Hunter, Craig Elias, and Steve Connolly share 3 Ways to Eliminate the Price Objection. (See the bios below.)

You don’t want to miss this FREE Online Event at 11:00 AM – 12:00 PM PDT | 2:00PM -3 :00PM EDT on Tuesday, September 13, 2011.

Register even if you can’t make the live event because all registrants will receive links to the recording and handout from the event.

Click the button or below to sign up now!

http://bit.ly/NoMoreDiscounting

Learn more about the 3 speakers below!

Mark Hunter, “The Sales Hunter,” helps B2B sales professionals close more high profit sales by identifying better prospects, building profitable long-term customer relationships, and negotiating mutually beneficial strategic partnerships.

Mark has conducted thousands of training programs to organizations like BP, Novartis, Northrop-Grumman, American Express, and Kawasaki. His book High Profit Selling is due out in December of this year

Steven Connolly is a 15 year veteran of B2B product management and is currently the Senior Product Manager responsible for the revolutionary new sales tool iSell.

Steven is a frequent presenter on sales topics such as using social media for increasing sales as well as best practices for prospecting and lead generation.

Craig Elias is the creator of Trigger Event Selling™ and author of the Bronze Medal winner of the Top Sales Books of 2010 “SHiFT!“

His knowledge of Trigger Events has resulted in a 20-year track record as a top sales performer, winning a $1,000,000 prize in a global billion dollar idea competition, having his last company chosen by Dow Jones as one of the 50 most promising companies in North America, and coverage on NBC, The New York Times, and The Wall Street Journal.

I’ve been an iPhone lover ever since I found one on eBay that was hacked so I could insert my SIM card from a Canadian cell phone provider and have the phone work in Canada.

Since then I have played with every sales / marketing / business development app I could find. At last count I have downloaded 217 apps.

My 10 favorites are:

1. CardMunch
2. Gist
3. LinkedIn
4. Salesforce.com
5. Google Apps
6. Twitter
7. SplashID – Keeps track of all my online and offline passwords
8. Skype 
9. GoToMeeting
10. Weather Eye

Nine of them allow me to do on my iPhone what I can also do on my laptop.

CardMunch on the other hand allows me to do what I have always wanted to do on my laptop but have never been able to:

• Enter all the business cards of the people I meet into my address book
• Send these people a LinkedIn connection request
• Send all of them follow-up email with my contact information.

CardMunch on the other had does all the above quickly, easily, AND IT’S FREE!

Here is how it works:

• Open the CardMunch and take a picture of a business card. This picture is then sent to a team of people who manually enter the data – If for some reason the data is not entered correctly simply push a button and it gets sent back to be re-entered.
• Once the data comes back to the application – which typically takes less than 10 minutes – all you have to do is touch a button on the screen to send a LinkedIn request and send a post meeting email
• I have mine configured so it automatically sends a custom LinkedIn message once the date comes back and adds that person to my list of contacts. All I have to do is then touch the button that sends my standard meeting follow-up email that includes my contact (.vcf) file.

This blog post is about three things:

1. Smarketing strategy #3
2. Content that captures the best prospects
3. How to SELL WITHOUT DISCOUNTING

In my last blog post I shared Smarketing Strategy #2 : Using a Won Sales Analysis™ – to identify what made you win your best customers so you can replicate your biggest successes.

If you did not read my last blog post below is a short video (4:49) that explains the Won Sales Analysis™.

Smarketing Strategy #3 – using the Situation, Target, Plan (STP) framework - is to tailor your content so it’s highly likely to be noticed by those who recently experienced the Trigger Events you identified during your Won Sales Analysis™.

Have you ever noticed that as soon as you buy a new car you see it all over the road or that when you or your wife get pregnant, you suddenly start seeing pregnant women everywhere?

This is called selective perception. The Trigger Events we experience change what we see. Every time we experience a Trigger Event a new version of selective perception is created. We begin to notice things that were always there. We just did not ‘see’ them.

Why is this important? By focusing your marketing on getting the attention of those who recently experienced a Trigger Event not only will your marketing be more likely to be ‘seen’, its more likely to resonate with the decision maker and cause them to act.

You get their attention by using words, visuals, or scenarios, that will make your marketing jump off of the page and get noticed by those readers who recently experience a Trigger Event and are most likely to become your customers.

The next time you craft a message, harness the power of Trigger Event Marketing™ to focus on the audience that recently experienced a Trigger Event. Remember to use a call to action so that when they see it, they will take that most important step to becoming your customer – phoning you.

Here are  few examples:

• Getting pregnant
• Getting a raise
• Getting engaged
• Getting a new job

If you are asking yourself why am I not using B2B examples, It’s because I have not been able to find any. If you know of any please comment on this blog post and provide a link to your example.

For me it’s always fun to find people who just ‘get it’.

The Trigger Event of me starting this blog post on using Trigger Events in marketing had me seeing blogs that talked about – you guessed it – using Trigger Events in marketing.

One article by Doug Kessler the Creative Director of a B2B Marketing Agency which says “Trigger Marketing … can be the most powerful Huskie in your B2B marketing dogsled” stood out from the rest.

Doug’s article provides some excellent insights and ideas on how to implement Trigger Event Marketing™.

Here is a link to his article B2B content marketing around Buying Triggers

While on the Velocity Partner’s website be sure to checked out their B2B Marketing Manifesto that talks about:

• 3 new realities of B2B Marketing
• The REAL B2B marketing challenge
• 5 B2B imperatives
• 6 B2B staples

P.S. They also have a B2B Content Marketing Workbook that I like.

Join us on September 13^th as thought leaders Mark Hunter, Craig Elias, and Steve Connolly share 3 Ways to Eliminate the Price Objection. (See the bios below.)

You don’t want to miss this FREE Online Event at 11:00 AM – 12:00 PM PDT | 2:00PM -3 :00PM EDT on Tuesday, September 13, 2011.

Register even if you can’t make the live event because all registrants will receive links to the recording and handout from the event.

Click the button or below to sign up now!

http://bit.ly/NoMoreDiscounting

Learn more about the 3 speakers below!

Mark Hunter, “The Sales Hunter,” helps B2B sales professionals close more high profit sales by identifying better prospects, building profitable long-term customer relationships, and negotiating mutually beneficial strategic partnerships.

Mark has conducted thousands of training programs to organizations like BP, Novartis, Northrop-Grumman, American Express, and Kawasaki. His book High Profit Selling is due out in December of this year

Steven Connolly is a 15 year veteran of B2B product management and is currently the Senior Product Manager responsible for the revolutionary new sales tool iSell.

Steven is a frequent presenter on sales topics such as using social media for increasing sales as well as best practices for prospecting and lead generation.

Craig Elias is the creator of Trigger Event Selling™ and author of the Bronze Medal winner of the Top Sales Books of 2010 “SHiFT!“ 

His knowledge of Trigger Events has resulted in a 20-year track record as a top sales performer, winning a $1,000,000 prize in a global billion dollar idea competition, having his last company chosen by Dow Jones as one of the 50 most promising companies in North America, and coverage on NBC, The New York Times, and The Wall Street Journal.

In my last post, The #2 Way to Sell More by Using Social Media, I shared three ways to sell more by using LinkedIn. Jos Willard added a fourth way and received the most votes for his answer to my question “How else can you use LinkedIn to create or harness relationships to sell more?” For his efforts Jos won $2,000 worth of Trigger Event coaching, training, or advice.

For a while now I have been sharing, with my customers, ways to generate leads by using Trigger Events in their marketing efforts – aka Trigger Event Marketingâ„¢. Doing so allows them to harness the Selective Perception that is created when people experience the Trigger Events that turn them into highly motivated buyers.

Here is an excellent example of Trigger Event Marketingâ„¢, that I recently noticed on the home page for TD Canada Trust. It is based on the knowledge that getting pregnant triggers couples to want a house, which leads to needing a mortgage. The event of getting pregnant typically triggers a number other purchases besides houses and mortgages – Cars, life insurance, and finally getting around to doing a will.

If you want to do the same thing for your own business all you have to do is conduct a Won Sales Analysisâ„¢ the next few times you win a new customer. Doing so will allow you to identify the Trigger Events that motivate buyers to want what you sell. Once you know what the best Trigger Events are for your product or service, all you need to do is apply what you learn to your marketing efforts. When you do, your marketing will jump off the page because it’s resonates with the reader and you are highly likely to generate leads that result in core, loyal, customers, who will represent 80% of your profit and only 20% of your headaches.

If you want to learn more about Trigger Event Marketing I have a Facebook page that shares the resources and examples I come across. I invite you to become a fan of the page and post any examples you come across. I also invite you to call me (+1.403.874.2998) or Skype me (Craig.Elias) if you want to spend 15-20 minutes brainstorming ideas on how to make Trigger Event Marketing work for you.

Next Tuesday I’ll post the #1 way to sell more by using social media. Take a look at numbers 2 through 7 and see if you can guess what it is.

Have an eventful week!

Craig