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Anyone can learn how to market effectively: understand your ideal client, pinpoint their pain point and demonstrate value. However, from a buyers perspective, differentiating the 'solution cowboys' from the true 'value adders' is much more difficult. How can you tell if a potential adviser has something of substance to offer? These the 5 criteria I use for finding help from advisers that deliver
As our businesses grow, we seek answers to an ever-growing list of questions.
Learning from humans should be more effective than learning from books or courses because of the interaction. Advisers should be able to adapt their teaching, so it applies to what we need to learn.
Problem is ‘should be’ can be pretty far away from ‘are’, in my experience.
Answering these questions and not being taken in by clever marketing tricks is where the problem lies.
Being honest about the value I can and can’t provide, I was naïve about the world of advisers. There are some really really bad ones. My financial and energy budgets have paid the penalty for my naivety.
‘Solution cowboys’, as I have named them, are good marketers but their offering is empty, their advice is out of date or doesn't apply.
I know I’m not alone with this problem.
Who can afford to waste budget, time or effort on bad advice?
No one.
Having wasted all three, but also succeeded in finding incredible value for money and time; I decided to think through the characteristics that separate them.
This is what I came up with.
Do they:
To trust someone, I first must like them. I like people with whom I share something. Resonating with me, in some way, goes a long way to me liking you. Somewhat stating the obvious here.
However.
Mixed messages kill resonance.
The advisers that have worked out well for me have showed up demonstrating the same values and the same approach when I’m in direct contact and when they don’t know I’m watching (i.e. on social media or in content).
It's who they are, not who they think I want to see.
It’s a red flag if the way they are with me is inconsistent with how they carry themselves elsewhere. They give me a chance to figure out who they are, I trust a consistent character.
The good ones know this.
They give me the time to decide rather than jumping in with sales pitches. They provide value for a long time first. If fact, I have approached all of my successful advisers. They have never approached me first.
Pick up any marketing book and first it will say: know who your ideal customer is. Then it will say: understand and articulate their pain points.
The problem is all their competitors are talking about my pain points, so articulating them well doesn’t necessarily mean they understand them.
I look for people that introduce me to the questions I should be asking. The questions I hadn’t arrived at on my own. New questions demonstrate they understand my problem better than I do.
What haven't I thought of?
Be more than a text book.
Go back to the marketing textbook somewhere around chapter 4 or 5 will be: include social proof on your website.
I don’t completely disregard testimonials, but do take them with a massive pinch of salt. I often get little cards in with my amazon packages, give us a review and we’ll send you a free gift. People have given me reviews because they want to sell to me (they remain unpublished reviews). I know reviews are not always a fair representation of true value received.
I have also paid for advisers with webpage walls of testimonials who were, well, rubbish.
I look for people that demonstrate they understand the solutions either by showing primary research or by putting their voice on secondary research. They have a grasp of both the tactics that work but also the underlying principals.
For me proving it is not just 'rinsing and repeating' the current thinking. Its telling tangible stories that show how it works, doing your own research, reviewing others' research and having a point of view.
They don’t just say ‘my clients see great results’: they demonstrate application of the solutions.
The world changes and the variables that need to be optimised constantly shift. No one can claim they know everything. No best approach exists forever.
Depending on the subject matter, what worked a year ago might not work today. The pandemic has changed so many perceptions, behaviours and attitudes. They talk about what has changed and how tactics have to adapt too.
The best advisers I have come across are constantly updating their program. They say things like 'I don’t know but I’ll find out'. They ask other people’s opinions. They recommend other people in their same field.
Each person, business, situation is slightly different. I want to ensure they aren’t just replaying what they taught someone else. Experience is very valuable and so is knowledge but it's application that has the biggest impact.
I have had a lot of advice that feels like it would apply if I was running a retail shop or building a business to sell or selling a tangible product but doesn’t apply to my purpose.
My best advisers try and find the differences as much as the similarities. They don’t ever assume I’m the same as everyone else. If they are able to see this, my experience has been they shape their knowledge and insight to fit my specific world.
My system isn’t perfect, no system is but these criteria work for me. They seem to save me from the ‘solution cowboys’ much more often.
Do I like them?
Do they understand my problem?
Can they solve it?
In today’s world?
For me?
I hope this helps you waste less effort and time than I have!
Let me know the criteria you use when finding good advisers, let’s vote with our money and discourage the solution cowboys!
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