Eat, Be Eaten Or Become An Expert in 14 Days

Help!If you’re not marketing, you may soon find yourself out of this business!  That’s not me trying to scare you; it's just the sign of the times.  Wall Street would love to see you gone. Brokers have been allowed to run wild on Wall Street for years and they have no motivation to change.

Wall Street firms are counting on you doing nothing. They understand the independent advisors mindset; wait for passive referrals to rebuild revenues, and stay out of the marketing loop.  Nothing makes them smile more than hearing you say, “I don’t need to market.  My clients send me all the prospects I need; besides, they depend on me for good advice.  I’m like the shepherd guarding over the flock.” 

After they get up off the ground from laughter, they’ll go back to work building the next series of products and services that will be too mouthwatering for your wealthy clients to resist. 

They have hidden, disguised, and tweaked their fees so that what they offer appears to be practically free.  On top of all that, they are spending billions advertising and building emotional brand awareness and proclaiming that they are “there” for their clients.  Their ad men are the tops; they could write promo ads that would make Fallujah sound charming.  

I know you think you’re better than Wall Street, that being independent is your competitive advantage.  But independence isn’t going to put money in your bank account.  Not today, not ever. 
Huge Wall Street firms are staffed with highly trained serfs and well-funded marketing departments that study the buying habits and motivations of your target market.  They don’t have to develop relationships, build a superior product, or provide personal service.  Their strategy is to blitz the market with such overwhelming marketing power that most wealthy prospects never consider any alternatives. 

Wall Street firms also have different business objectives from an independent advisor.  Their goals are to build brand and increase their market share during all types of market conditions.   Their favorite tactic: promote the advantages of size and visibility and rely on the psychological comfort level that consumers associate with familiarity.  People are afraid. They crave security more than anything else.

Wall Street knows this and knows that people feel more confident with a known commodity.

What can you do? You can’t fight them head on. They will easily win those battles. The way to defeat Goliath is by sticking him where he is most vulnerable.  Become known as an Expert!  See Goliath will never allow his serfs the freedom to build individual brand or overshadow their in-house experts.

The following is Eat, Or Be Eaten 14-day action plan (The Expert Builder) designed to help build expert status. These are the fourteen highest value action steps that can create credibility, visibility and expert status recognition.

For more information on other tools, or to share your thoughts, ideas, go to www.AttractionBuilder.com . 

Day One – Raise Your Hand
Becoming a recognized expert isn’t difficult, so I want to remove that barrier now.  I’m not recommending pretending to be something you’re not.  But want constitutes becoming an expert?  

Expert as defined by The American Heritage Dictionary is a person with a high degree of skill or knowledge of a certain subject.  Hey, we can all qualify for that one.  I read that as an expert is a problem solver with a high degree of skill or knowledge of a certain subject that is recognized in the world.

“Expert” is nebulous media-speak and so overused as to be indefinable. The problem is even if you have an MD after your name, that still does not means that you’re recognized as an expert in your field.  The difference is appearing in the media. 

The first step in being recognized as an expert in any field is to raise your hand. Become a leader. Write articles and books, and give talks on a topic that helps your clients.

My experience is that most people are too busy trying to deliver current business by sending out marketing materials, servicing key clients, networking with colleagues, and attending seminars; rarely affording themselves the luxury of thinking about the real meaning and the repercussions of being an expert.  I can sum it up in three little words: status, prestige, and money.

Even if this fourteen-day plan seems a bit contrived, it’s really the beginning of a long-term strategic approach that ensures you will reach expert status. Your plan should address three critical areas.

1. Mind-set. Experts use a belief system and strategy that prevent mere jobs from getting in the way of important careers.
2. Focused self-discipline. This long-term and strategic approach ensures that the light at the end of the tunnel is new territory.
3. Focused Intention.  I’ve seen too many people with the potential to attain expert status who instead remain advisors or facilitators—or something else they had no intention of becoming—merely because they followed the path of easiest money and/or least resistance.  Follow the expert’s path, no matter what.

Day Two - Craft Unique Value Statement
Write a clear statement that tells us who you are, what you provide, and why what you provide is of value. 

My unique value statement, for example, reads:  I’ve spent twenty years building client marketing monopolies.   My Attraction Marketing System helps people write and speak and engage their target audience in a way that creates a relationship with prospects before they meet. 

Like the one above, your statement must be strong, something your competitors don’t offer, and must focus on what’s in it for the customer.  It shouldn’t be focused on you or your company.  Hone your message down to a statement that clearly and concisely captures the essence of what differentiates you from the competition.  Your message should indicate your ability to solve real problems.  Once you have your statement down, you’re 1,000 miles ahead of your competition. 

Day Three – Order the Top Five Books on Your Topic
Search historical New York Times bestseller lists (online); read and summarize each on one page.  Every expert has a library.  Begin yours!

Day Four – Review Your Marketing Material
Take a day away from your routine and review everything about your product or service.  Take apart all your current marketing materials and study each piece.  Lay them out on long tables for physical review. 

do your materials look like everyone else’s in your industry? (You’ve seen the same look-a-like pieces, the ones proclaiming a commitment to integrity, honesty, and trust, featuring a photo of a sincere-looking advisor in front of a polished conference table, and an impressive list of industry designations alongside the photo.)  

I found this ad in a regional newspaper conflicts with my idea of what it means to be an expert.  The advisor pictured must be worried that he might miss some piece of the financial pie.  His ad screams, “I’m not an Expert!”

Replace all marketing materials.  Find informational articles that are of interest or value to your clients. They should address their specific concerns, not yours.

Your expertise should resonate throughout all your marketing materials.   Everything you present should look as if it were put together for one purpose.  If something doesn’t fit, discard it.  Make your materials practical, not theoretical.  Accumulate newspaper or magazine articles and testimonials.  Become a clearing house of financial information.  Jettison anything that does not reflect how your specialty solves your clients' problems.

Day Five –Write a Query Letter
Offer to write one or two articles for trade magazines related to your topics, citing what you have accomplished in steps 1 and 3 for credibility.  If they decline, offer to interview a known expert and write the article—it still gets your name listed as a contributor.

When you do write the article, write like an expert solving a problem, eliminating a danger, or uncovering an opportunity specific to your clients. 

Seek out trade publications that are relevant to your niche and do your best to get published in them.  Find out what magazines your market reads, visit these magazines’ Web sites, and obtain a copy of their writer’s guidelines.  

Your goal should be to write and publish at least three articles a year of 750 to 1,200 words.  Have reprints of your published articles available for your clients and visible on your Web site. 

Day Six – Join a Trade Association
Find a trade organization or association that represents your specialty field. 
I belong to author and journalist associations in my industry.  I also belong to a financial planning organization where I am seen as a writing expert.  These organizations also have trade journals that keep the professionals up to date on developments, conferences, trends, and practices in their field.  You can join these organizations or associations online in a few minutes, using a credit card.

Day Seven – Rest

Day Eight –Plan a Seminar
Begin plans for a free one- to two-hour seminar at your nearest college or university.  Then do the same at branches of two well-known big companies located in your area.  Tell the companies that you have given seminars at the University or College and are a member of the groups you selected on Day Six.  Emphasize that you are offering your expertise to them for free to get additional speaking experience outside of academics and will not be selling products or services. Record the seminars for later potential as a digital product.

Day Nine – Write an Article
In our culture, writing is the number one indicator of our mastery of knowledge.  When your ideas appear in print, you create credible visibility. 

Your words give readers something tangible they can hold onto and examine, and often educate them in new or alternative opinions.  Your printed thoughts become an indelible opening directly into the minds of clients and future customers. 

The Fast Article Outline:
Step 1: Name the issue, problem, or concern 
Step 2: Identify why the problem is important
Step 3: Address the Obstacles
Step 4: Identify the Solution to the problem
Step 5: Illustrate the Issue with a super graphic
Step 6: Quick-Read Summary

Get help in the seven-minute author at www.AttractionBuilder.com.

Your written materials, articles, or white papers will become a part of your attraction marketing materials used as:

• Hand-outs in seminars,
• Stay-behind pieces for meetings,
• Additions to other articles,
• Supplement to Web sites,
• Proof statements for presentations, seminars,
• Replacement pieces for industry look-a-like brochures.

There is an aspect of writing that is almost supernatural, on the borderline of magic.  Writing transcends the boundaries of time and space and even the limits of death.  Think about the fact that making marks on a piece of paper in a certain order can permit someone a world away or a hundred years from now to know your deepest thoughts.  That is a powerful skill, one that can’t be taken lightly.  When you’re spelling words, you are, in effect, casting a spell, charging abstract symbols with meaning and power.

Day Ten – Find a Super Graphic
Find a visual graphic that demonstrates your expertise; people remember what they see.  Your graphic should assist in thinking and minimize the figuring out time.  Give this out before your meets or seminars.  Let them use their own cognitive style.   Talent imitates; genius steals.  You don’t have to be original, just get it right.  You want your graphic to be used in the article you just wrote.

In 1990, the Institute for Investment Management Consultants (IIMC) had fewer than 100 members.  My firm, Chambers & Associates, was hired to initiate my attraction marketing program.  
The organization’s membership swelled to over 2,000, with a prospect list of 10,000.  The graphic below represents prospect call-in matches to the originating marketing activity. Out of a total of 4,735 responses, attraction marketing accounted for 3,919 inquires, beating all six of the in-house marketing activities by almost a 5 to 1 margin. hat you’re looking at: is my super graphic showing monthly and cumulative results comparing my article writing program (Attraction Marketing) with traditional marketing strategies over a three-year time period.  The large red band represents the cumulative result of attraction marketing. The thinner green band represents the cumulative results from traditional marketing activities including: advertising, PR, direct mail, convention promotions, and membership referrals.  The six conventional marketing tactics totaled 816 inquires.

When you present tangible proof, you shift from the perception of value to evidence of value, from mystery to evidence.

The organization’s membership swelled to over 2,000, with a prospect list of 10,000.  The graphic below represents prospect call-in matches to the originating marketing activity. Out of a total of 4,735 responses, attraction marketing accounted for 3,919 inquires, beating all six of the in-house marketing activities by almost a 5 to 1 margin. hat you’re looking at: is my super graphic showing monthly and cumulative results comparing my article writing program (Attraction Marketing) with traditional marketing strategies over a three-year time period.  The large red band represents the cumulative result of attraction marketing. The thinner green band represents the cumulative results from traditional marketing activities including: advertising, PR, direct mail, convention promotions, and membership referrals.  The six conventional marketing tactics totaled 816 inquires.

When you present tangible proof, you shift from the perception of value to evidence of value, from mystery to evidence.
For creative ideas, read books.  Recommended: Beautiful Evidence, by Edward Tufte, Professor Emeritus at Yale University (www.edwardtufte.com).

Day Eleven - Call On a Journalist
Find a journalist who wrote about your subject.  Talk about the subject and offer your insights.  Be genuine.  Most journalists have never been in your shoes and don’t understand your industry the way you do.  This sets up future relationships, and the journalist can call you back when he or she needs a financial source. 

Even magazine editors love genuine recognition.  Troy Kestner, a CFP with Arvest Private Banking located in MI, sent an email complimenting the editor on an article she’d written.  The next day, Troy had a phone call from the editor.  They discussed the article and what the editor was trying to accomplish.  Troy offered himself as a resource and told her he would help network with people in his part of the state—she was thrilled.  He also offered (if she ever needed) to help her interview successful business leaders.  She asked Troy if he knew anyone with his background who might be able to write a financial article each month.  The result of this 30-minute conversation is that Troy may be writing a monthly column for this new local business magazine. 

A phone call or meeting with a reporter could result in your next client.  A casual chance discussion at a cocktail party might lead to something unexpected.  Be on the lookout for chance encounters and follow up on any opportunity that appears to have a possible open-ended payoff.  Explore anything that looks like an opportunity.  Many people do not recognize a lucky break in life when they get one.  If a wealthy business leader, overachiever, film producer, or publisher suggests an appointment, cancel anything you have planned; you may never see such a window of opportunity open up again.

Day Twelve - Up Grade Your Web Content 
Most Web sites are little more than online business cards.  Internet Marketingopens a huge opportunity to outpace your local competition.

Google has changed the rules of the marketing game, and now anyone can find out everything about everyone.  When someone wants an expert they search.  Prospects can find out almost anything and everything about you, your firm, your products, and your services. 

Good Web content drives higher rankings; but did you know that only one percent creates the Web content, 10% enriches it, and 90% consumes it?  That equals a lot of influence, but it’s also a huge opportunity for anyone who adds expert content!  The vast majority of Web sites are not content-oriented, not audience-oriented, but entirely presenter-oriented .  Use all this new research to build content.  

Rule of thumb: Consumers aren’t attracted to products or services or marketing techniques; they’re attracted to someone who can solve their problems, eliminate their dangers, and enhance their opportunities.  Those should be your marketing objectives concerning what you offer.

Good content means your audience goes from uninformed to informed!   Let your prospects draw their own conclusions about the value of your product or service. 

Follow the fundamental principles of design when building good content. 

1. Show comparisons & causality.
2. Integrate your evidence.
3. Documentation — Show the source of your data.
4. Your graphs & charts should amplify your content.
5. Give readers solid proof that your system works. 

Day Thirteen – Begin a Booklet Like This One!
Write a 10-15 page booklet.  Make it free.  Free follows the rule of reciprocity . 

Booklet Instructions
Open with a story. Use examples and stories throughout.

1. Find a great title that grabs the reader’s attention.
2. Use a subtitle to describe what the e-book will deliver.
3. Hire a professional editor to help you through multiple drafts and a proofreader to finalize the copy.
4. Have the e-book professionally designed.
5. Put a creative commons license on the content so people know they can freely share your copyrighted material.
6. Create a landing page from which people can download your e-book.
7. Use easy-to-find links.

Make your message repeatable and memorable.  Success is achieved when prospects can easily find you.  Make sure everyone who comes to your Web site leaves with clarity about who you are via a tight, memorable message or image.  Only then can they spread your word.
Day Fourteen –The Valuable Surprise!
Now for the big surprise finish!  Your fourteen-day Expert Builder Plan is also the first fourteen days of the attraction marketing plan.  Congratulations on jump starting your marketing while building expert status. 

Day One – Put Your Focus on a Specialty
Day Two - Craft Your New Positioning Statement
Day Three – Order the Top Five Books on Your Topic
Day Four – Review Your Marketing Material
Day Five –Write a Query Letter
Day Six – Join a Trade Organization
Day Seven – Rest
Day Eight –Plan a Seminar
Day Nine – Write an Article
Day Ten- Find a Super Graphic
Day Eleven - Call a Local Reporter 
Day Twelve - Upgrade Your Web Content 
Day Thirteen – Begin a Booklet Like This One!
Day Fourteen –Congratulations.

Go to www.AttractionBuilder.com 

Attraction Marketing engages your audience in a way that creates a relationship before you meet. 

Author: Larry Chambers has written and placed thousands of trade magazine articles throughout the country.  He has written 50 books published by some of the largest publishers in the world, including Random House, Ivy Books, McGraw-Hill, Times Mirror, and John Wiley and Sons.

He has taught his techniques and tactics across the United States and provided coach-writing and his Attract-Back Marketing System™ to some of the industry's biggest players. 

Interestingly, Chambers’ degrees were not in English; his Masters was not in business, marketing, or advertising.  How is he able to beat out experienced writers, journalists, university professors, and New York publicity specialists?                    

He does this by capitalizing on "real world" experience, instinct, and his passion for learning. 

Add Attraction To Your
Marketing
Arsenal

Take advantage of 30 years of experience; then, combine it with your own knowledge, and you will be on the road to a successful marketing campaign.

The Attraction Marketing course is an innovative program of study that is easy to follow and helps individuals raise their visibility, credibility, and reach.  The idea is to draw customers to you by delivering information people need, value, or desire.  Attraction is the ultimate marketing weapon.  

The secret is to align your marketing with the way prospects want to be sold. 

www.AttractionBuilder.com