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Definition of Boomers according to Wikipedia: A baby boomer is a person who was born during the demographic Post-World War II baby boom and who grew up during the period between 1946 and 1964.
In general, baby boomers are associated with a rejection or redefinition of traditional values; however, many commentators have disputed the extent of that rejection, noting the widespread continuity of values with older and younger generations. In Europe and North America boomers are widely associated with privilege, as many grew up in a time of affluence.[3] As a group, they were the healthiest, and wealthiest generation to that time, and amongst the first to grow up genuinely expecting the world to improve with time.

One feature of Boomers was that they tended to think of themselves as a special generation, very different from those that had come before. In the 1960s, as the relatively large numbers of young people became teenagers and young adults, they, and those around them, created a very specific rhetoric around their cohort, and the change they were bringing about.[5] This rhetoric had an important impact in the self perceptions of the boomers, as well as their tendency to define the world in terms of generations, which was a relatively new phenomenon.

Do you know your ideal client from an emotional level? What he/she cares about, what she/he values?
If you are marketing to boomers, you should.

There is extreme importance in revisiting your sales strategies and align them with this new consumer. As a small business owner you need to understand that creating a structured sales process and improving your negotiation skills is crucial in your small business marketing strategy.

Most of the time you are more resistant to sell than the client to buy.
It is a lot about psychology and not about sales tricks.
There needs to be a design of the sale you can apply anywhere and become a master negotiator.

I want to share with you a system I’ve created to increase conversion in any type of selling. It is based on psychology and consumer behavior and I’ve tested several times in one on one negotiations, over teleseminars and on stage.

It goes through 5 steps where you can choreograph your negotiation:

1.Find the broken windows: This principle comes from the New York police where they look for homes with broken window because they show there is a problem there. We need to allow prospects to unveil their problems. This step decreases anxiety, shows where the problems are so we can pin point the core points.

2. Join and conduct the Tango: Prospects already have a conversation going inside their minds. This conversation tends to carry a lot of drama and fear. It is up to the negotiator to join this conversation, create rapport and conduct the dance.

3. Incorporate mystery and rituals: (we need some level of tension around their needs). Remember that the brain cannot cope with an unanswered question, this creates traction. Rituals like simple things as having them fill a questionnaire before talking to you not only inverts the relationship, where you are not the sales person anymore, it also shows there is structure.

4. Extract the Wow: show the possibilities. If you have ever watched a n infomercial; you know what I’m talking about. Any sales negotiation needs to have its wow moment where the prospect thinks “I need this guy” “How did I survived without this product?”

5 Tie the knot: Don’t forget to propose. close. partnership from the beginning regardless the amount. They ask you to marry: Now it is the time to ask: how do we work together?

Having a structured sales and negotiation process is part of a smart small business marketing strategies. No one wants a person that talks non stop and pushes a product or service.
It is up to you to have these steps in mind, get a pen and paper and outline in your case how you would incorporate them when you are negotiating.

Think that you are building a graph in the process where the WOW factor is on top and from there you just keep the dialogue going and conduct them to ask to buy.

Check the page on Facebook and click to watch the videos

Here is his post:

Special alert for Domino readers…

My new book, We Are All Weird goes on sale today. We only have 11,000 hardcover copies on sale at Amazon, with no plans to print more. I wanted you to have first dibs. (PS, Outside the USA? click here).

Why limit the number printed?

Conventional publishing wisdom says that the first 10,000 copies are the hardest. In fact, you don’t make money until after that. The goal is to prime the pump and then, if you get lucky, sell millions and millions of hardcovers, day after day, year after year. That’s what pays the bills at all the large publishing houses.

The thing is, digital is better at infinity than paper ever will be. Digital is easy to keep in stock, easy to replenish, easy to connect with. Paper, on the other hand, benefits from scarcity. If you know that there are only a few books and then they’re gone, you’re more likely to hurry up, more likely to grab yours now, more likely to treasure it once you get it. And in a digital world, a book that’s not worth treasuring is not worth owning, is it?

So the bet I’m making is that the scarcity of the hardcover will help you decide to read it right now. And I hope you will, because this is one of the most important books I’ve ever written. And then, after you read it, I hope you’ll share the ideas, perhaps loan your copy or encourage a friend to get the free Kindle reader and get the Kindle edition for herself.

If the hardcover is gone by the time you read this, I apologize, we did our best to guess how many would satisfy the first wave of interest. I think it’s inevitable that publishing is going to move in this direction–hardcover collectibles for those that want them, digital for those in search of the ideas.

Thanks as always for helping with these experiments in the form and content of publishing.

And tweet away at #weirddomino. Summary of a lot of this right here.

[Interesting aside: the scarcity of the book is changing the way I'm interacting with it. Usually, I hand out books like candy, because I can always get more. I'm feeling mysteriously scrooge-like now, though, wondering if someone is hardcover-worthy. Just like concert tickets to a sold out show, things feel different when there's a limit.]

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1. Seeding- you need to be prospecting regularly without being too much in your face. On this stage is where you can benefit a lot from social media. Beware not to make the number one mistake: water too much and ruin the seeds- or spend the whole day on Facebook, give too many tips or provide too much access to you.

2. Picking. There is a right moment to pick the flowers before they loose their momentum. Same thing here, there is a right moment to close the sale. Flowers won’t pick themselves and put themselves in a vase, clients won’t take action either without your help.

3. Keep them blooming. You want your plants to bloom again just like you want existing clients to keep buying. Long lasting prosperity is achieved by selling over and over again to existing clients. Too many times we invest to make a prospect become a client, so our first sale does not bring profits. By selling other solutions to them at different price points is where profit is made.

Here are some third party social media marketing applications that can make your life a lot easier.

1. Tweetdeck: Easy to manage YouTube, Facebook and Twitter in one view. You can manage people you follow in lists.

2. Ping.fm and Hellotxt; Update your status in several platforms. About 50 of social networks. Post can be made online or mobile.

3. Seesmic: similar to Tweetdeck but allows you to manage multiple profile accounts

4. SocialOimph: Allows you to postdate posts on Twitter and Facebook fan pages. Has many other cool features too.

5. 8hands: This is an aggregator that streams notifications in real time and where you get summaries and statistics on your social networking activities. It covers content from multiple accounts.

6. Chi.mp centralizes content and contacts. Good for people without a website.

See? Small business marketing online just became a lot easier.

Now you need to check if in your business you have created purchase channels for each of these reasons.
Yes, marketing is about selling too not just promoting.

Here are 2 big business lessons: Create a community around you, let them share experiences and create a bond. This is what builds a tribe. You will also using the same time slot to help a lot of people instead of one at a time.

The owner goes from person to person helping them in their different challenges. She checks what they are doing, what tools they are using and every now an then she introduces them to a new tool that they cannot live without. 9 out of 10 they purchase the tool.
I’m always paying a lot of attention on how she does this because she sells without being pushy and people are always willing to buy. She sells like few people I know.

Business lesson 2- Always be upselling to existing customers

Almost every week she brings pieces that she made during the weekend. This week she brought a gorgeous skirt for little girls. Silver background with black witches and trees. Everybody was amazed by how pretty it was and started asking how they could get one. She announced she would be selling kits. You had to get on a waiting list because however many kits she put together were already gone.

People ran downstairs to put their orders in. Some even bought more than one. The kit was selling for $50. Not a cheap item. Everyone was happy.

Business lesson 3: Innovate every now and them, bring elements of surprise, create some sense of urgency and scarcity.

Every now and then I hear marketers say there is no money in crafts. I say, that every time people have an irrational passion about something they will spend money over and over.

Add the components I mentioned above and you have a perfect storm.

I suggest some marketers go take a knitting class with my teacher.
She makes money like a ballerina would dance.

This is one you cannot skip: Listen to Adela Rubio right now!

Click Here: How to Become Your Market’ Superstar

It is incredible how many people stop right at this step. Excuses, lack of time, postponing,  are just a few reasons why they don’t do it.

But it comes down to taking action and making it happen.  Especially when it comes to small business marketing. Nothing else.  Just do it.

We watched this video during the meeting and I thought you might enjoy it as well.

The sure-fire recipe for business success

Wait, I was confused. There’s a sure-fire recipe for delicious chocolate chip cookies. There is in fact a magic formula.

For businesses, not so much. There isn’t one secret, one process, one solution. Instead, there are a thousand or maybe a million.

It’s not a jigsaw puzzle, it’s a strand of DNA, easily rearranged and sometimes it even works. For a while.

Member based programs allow you to:

First and foremost passive steady income

Work less and make more money

Stop trading time for dollars

Not have to work with problem clients

Run as a separate, automated business or

Plug into any existing business

Have a business running on auto-pilot

Have a sustainable, recession proof business model

Create as many streams of income as you want.

Stop worrying about bills every month

Save money to do things you love.

You have a business that does not run your life.

With a member based program, your clients are more loyal.

You can outsource, duplicate and repeat the member based system as many times as you want.

You multiply the value you deliver without you having to do anything

Member based programs allow you to leverage your most powerful of influences – social proof.

You can quite your 9 to 5

It is a platform to generate sales for other services and products.

We’ll have a webcast next week covering continuity programs and showing you how to start your own.
Register now for the Continuity programs webcast.

Here are a list of things you need to put in place in order to have your enwsletter.

1. A overall template- You can find them online.
2. Use graphics to support the text and don’t over use them.
3. The first page must be compelling enough to make people open and read the rest.
4. Add boxes like ” What’s inside”. They work as teasers.
5. Big headlines to capture the eye
6. Do a newsletter every month
7. Each one must have an overall goal.
8. Include a coupon or gift certificate.
9. Add a tracking code to the coupon or gift certificate.
10. Print your newsletter with 4 pages- one page od 11×17″
11. Do it in black and white on white paper
12. Add standard information- name of newsletter, contact info, website, edition number.
13. Master powerful headlines
14. Mix short and long articles.
15. Make headlines and sub-headlines one font bigger and bolder.
16. Open sentence and paragraph must be kept short and very intriguing to pull them into the copy

All this becomes just noise.

So, when it is your turn, how do you get attention?

The answer is to simplify your message.

Look at the example of some big companies that have figured that out:

Avis- We try harder
Nike- Just do it
Coke- Just for the taste of it
Mc Donald’s- I’m loving it.

For you to reach the same level of communication you need first to be able to answer there 4 questions in just one sentence:

1. What the problem is
2. Who you are solving it for
3. Why you
4 How do you do it

Ask yourself what is the one thing you do that they would pay for. Something they want really bad.

I know it is not easy to get to one sentence only and it may take you a while but this is how it is done.
We need to know what is the one benefit I do in my work that solves on single problem that my entire market can understand and want to pay for.

For that you need to get inside the mind of your customer and be able to persuade, motivate and sell to them.
If you know who your customer is you can analyze , understand and connect with him/her.

Here are some questions you need to answer in order to profile your ideal client:

1. What brings pain to your customer?
2. What keeps them awake at night?
3. What do they fear the most?
4. Are there any new trends happening in their industry right now?
5. What do they desire?
6. What makes them angry?
7. What things cause them frustration?
8. Is there something specific about their personality?
9. Who else is selling a similar service?
10. How are they selling it?
11. What types of magazines, trade jounals, e-zines they subsctibe to?
12 What’s the average age?
13. What is the average sex, marital status?
14. what is their income level?

By answering these questions you just found a very valuable tool.

You heard this one before: People are overwhelmed with information. Not only that, due to the recession, people are more anxious and more resistant to buy. They know we all have too much stuff and we don’t need more “stuff”.

If your services or products are seeing as “stuff” you are in trouble.

Add to this mix the fact that we are all ADD and just don’t pay attention anymore. In fact the average American adult has an attention span of 9 seconds. This is the same as a goldfish.

Yes, we are all selling to gold fish and they swim away really fast.

Combine the fact that people are not paying attention to the fact that they don’t want anything that is ordinary, that looks like more stuff and you find the reason why so many businesses are suffering.

The gold rush today is to get attention and to be found. Getting attention is difficult if you position yourself as a commodity. In fact, you need to work on your business and turn it into an irresistible business. A business that people notice, talk about and want to be a part of.

I know it looks like a complicated and expensive task but I can assure you this is not the case.

There are 7 components you need to make sure you have in your business and you will see how together they make your business irresistible to people, therefore attracting more and more clients with less effort on your part.

The components are:

1. Create an irresistible promise. A promise is not about how great you are but what do they get when buying from you. It needs to talk to an emotional level.
Ex: Disney promise is: The happiest place on Earth.

2. Unveil your core story. We as business owners need to master storytelling and need to have a story that will resonate with people. We need to be about something. People connect with companies that are about something they can relate to. Ex Thom shoes.

3. Find your unique voice. You need to find your voice in the crowd, need to show personality. Businesses that don’t have personality don’t do well in the new economy. you don’t need to please everyone, just the ones that would buy from you.
When marketing online choose a way to express your voice and become really good with the format. It can be audio, video or text. Ex: Innocent Drinks from the UK

4. Incorporate Mystique. Bring some suspense, tease with your audience. Leave some questions unanswered. The mind cannot live with unanswered questions, so they glue to you. Ex: The Coke formula

5. Become Uberpresent. Businesses today need to be everywhere. They need to be where their audience is. This is where you can use social media marketing and automation to do the work for you. Don’t forget to create a strategy that will not only create awareness but also conversion. Most businesses fail here. They assume that because social media marketing is free and seens easy to use all they need to do is set up accounts and give some tips. There is a lot more here and you need to design a path for people to buy or for you to build a list.

6. Incorporate business rituals. People stick to businesses that have rituals. Just take a look at multilevel companies and churches. Decide how you too can incorporate some rituals. Can be as simple as having an assessment before talking to a prospect.

7. Increase trust. You need to do everything you can to increase the level of trust with clients and prospects. People don’t buy if they don’t believe. Using testimonials is a good start.

These 7 components can change the face of your business and will create loyal customers and advocates that will spread the word about your business. To implement this system takes some brain power and testing but doesn’t cost money and will make all your marketing and advertising efforts more effective. Attracting clients is not about the tools you use but about the message you send.

Now why is this important to your business? Because here lies a huge opportunity to market to all Kindle owners for free.

See the paragraph above where I mentioned I can carry in my Kindle books, magazines and blogs? Yes, blogs.

If you have one, you can submit to Amazon and have it available for Kindle owners.

People will be able to subscribe to your blog, free for 14 days and after that pay a monthly subscription to read your content. Amazon will share this subscription with you. Here is a revenue opportunity for your blog, but I think the best part is the possibility to reach an audience you couldn’t reach before.

In order to have your blog available for Kindle owners you need to go to Amazon, Kindle Store and then click on Blogs and set up a publishing account. After that you will need to provide some basic information about your blog like the RSS feed, how often you publish, what is the blog about etc.

Submit and after a couple of days Amazon will review and approve your blog.

You will be able to check later how many people subscribe to your blog. Note that the real reason you are doing this is because your blog will be on the search engine in the Kindle store and on Amazon. This is great in itself because is giving you visibility.

Don’t forget that your blog needs to be updated consistently.

In my mail last week, I received an interesting letter from my Acura dealer. I purchased my TL 4 years ago and am proud to say it’s paid off! Yay!

Having purchased cars for over 20 years (yeah, don’t try to do the math…smile) I’ve never had this experience before. And I thought, if we as business owners used this level of marketing transparency with our clients, wow…what that could mean!

Let me share a bit of the letter so that you see what I mean. It begins:

“Dear Ms. Makell,

Acura realizes the more transparent the auto buying experience, the more enjoyable it is for our customers.” Ok, so you’re probably saying, “duh.”

But it goes on… “As a loyal customer of Acura (I do let them change my oil, only) you can expect to receive updated quotes periodically, to keep you informed of your options. When the time is right to upgrade to a new vehicle you’ll have all the information you need.”

Ok, again, you’re probably saying, Chris, makes sense…you may be ready to “think” about a new car since your car is now in it’s 5th year and they want to be sure you think of them! Obvious, right?

Do you do this with YOUR clients? I don’t…

This is an excellent example of follow up AND ensuring client loyalty. By connecting with me to let me know that THEY know I may be ready to purchase another Acura and providing me with great pricing options, I am more likely to return to an Acura model. I can tell you Toyota didn’t do that…

So, how can you make this “marketing transparency” work for you and your business?

Consider this… After you’ve concluded a program with your clients, or they’ve purchased a product from you, create a system to follow up or check in with them. Let them know what new programs your have or new products you’re offering. This could be as simple as sending a postcard, regular card, short note to see how your client (never a “former”, once a client — always a client) is doing or how they are still getting results from their time with you. Or you can simply give them a call to say hi, I was thinking of you!

How about letting them invest in a new program or product by giving them an “incentive” price based on their past spending with you? You can also give them one month free in a new program, or buy one get one free!

It’s simply letting them know that they are still top of mind for you. Clients really appreciate that!

Listen, what Acura doesn’t know is that I tend to keep my cars for an average of 9 years, but I am so impressed with this approach, that I immediately saw it’s value for my customers. I like my TL a lot — for me and I like this approach a lot — for my clients! Maybe you will too…

With the amount of noise you face every time you try to promote your business, it takes a lot more to get attention.

It does not matter the midia you are using to promote your business, they are all crowded and offer so many distractions. Especially if you are using social media as the only marketing approach. Social media offers so many distractions that the attention span of the average person is only 9 seconds. That is the same attention your gold fish will give you. So, if you want people to pay attention to you, come to you asking for your products or services and advocate for you, you need more. You need to become an irresistible business.

In order to become irresistible you need to make sure the following steps are in place:

1. Have an irresistible offer

2. Unveil your core story

3. Create your unique voice in the market

4. Incorporate Mystique in your busienss

5. Be Uber-present always

6. Define rituals for your business

7. Increase trust

By making sure you have all these steps in place you create what people will find an irresistible business.

I want to show you some examples of companies that do this well and show you how to apply these concepts in your business.

The Be Irresistible! The art of attracting and keeping clients webcast will be the way we will show you how to be perceive as the only desirable business in your industry.

Join us by registering here: Client Attaction Webcast

Client attraction seminar

• Yellow Pages are difficult to track and have limited tracking options. Online marketing offers extensive tracking options.
• Yellow Pages reach can only go so far and if you advertise in more than one directory it can get very expensive. Online marketing has an unlimited reach and is very cost effective.
• You can only change your advertising message on a yearly basis with Yellow Pages. You can change your message online at any time.
• There are over 13 billion searches on the web/month and growing. Yellow Pages receive an approximate 1 billion references/month and is losing more and more customers that advertise in the Yellow Pages every year.

Don’t forget we can help you with local marketing.

Outsourcing allows a company to put more focus on product development and overall operations. Many marketing agencies can often provide the same service as an in-house marketing department, but at half the cost.

By outsourcing you gain the following:

• Specialized skills and expertise
• More time- your most valuable asset
• More implementation
• Fast results

Every time you hear outsourcing marketing you think about how expensive marketing agencies are. Don’t forget that there are some Marketing companies that specialize in small businesses, just like BuzzBooster.  They are not in the business of selling you on expensive advertising, they focus on other strategies like internet marketing, direct response marketing and social media marketing to bring you more exposure and more results.

Here are a few  questions that should assist you in finding a marketing agency that is right for you.

• Area of ExpertiseFind out what their expertise is in.  What do they focus on? Here are common areas of expertise:
  • Search Engine Marketing and Optimization
  • Branding
  • Positioning
  • Affiliate Marketing Development and Management
  • Marketing Strategy and Plan Development
  • Internet Marketing Strategy and Plan Development
  • Lead Generation
  • Sales and Marketing Campaign Development
  • Marketing Classes, Seminars, and Workshops

  Figure out what areas you need help in and look for consultants with expertise in those areas.

There is one social tool that I think is one of the best things out there for savvy business owners.

It is the QR code. This simple code does something that every small business owner should dream about every night. It creates a bridge between the printed or offline world to the online world.

How powerful is that?

I don’t know about you but when I started my business money was not easily available and every penny spent counted. One thing that annoyed me a lot was going to networking meetings and passing some flyers knowing most of them would end up in the trash really soon. If at that time QR codes were around things would be different.

QR codes stand for quick response codes. They store a lot of data- around 250 characters. Not enough? Well, it is a lot more than a tweet and people are doing just fine marketing themselves with tweets.

The QR codes can be scanned with any smart phone and will take the person to a web page, a coupon, a contest, whatever you can imagine. Just think of the possibilities. They are simple to create and very inexpensive. People can check right away and get the offer right away too.

Authors for example can have QR codes at the end of their book with an offer. Yes, I know you can add a web address to a page but let’s face it, how many times have you gotten a book or a flyer with a web adreesand took to your computer to check the URL? For me, most of the times I make a mental note to check the URL and then just forget.

I think QR codes can become huge allies for small business owners. Maybe what is missing is just some ideas on how to use the codes, so here is a list I compiled:

1. linking to full text journals from print journals; making mobile friendly videos available at the point of need; embedding videos & links to extra help online in printed guides.

2. QR Code on bus stations to allow you to purchase ticket without typing the message.

1. At bus stations with the schedule

2. Geo caching adventures

3. Share presentations

4. Music Downloads

5. Apps downloads

6. Self-branding

7. Geo-based reviews

8. Geo-based tours

9. Green tickets

10. Fashion

11. Product details

12. Offers

13. Event details

14. Contests

15. Competition details

16. Contact details- we use them in our business cards

17. Coupons

18. Random coupons- Starbucks does this very well, each time you scan you get a different offer.

19. Social media Ids

20. Links to your videos

21. how to information in products

22. How to information in printed materials

23. Book offers

24. Authors bio

25. Use in Billboards

26. Use in your shop window to entice reviews

27. Maps

28. Invitations

29. Link to your blog

30. Special offer on flayers

31. On trade shows

32. On trade shows where when you scan tells you to go to a specific booth for a freebie. (saw this one done by a company called Print concierge. Very clever!

Probably there are many more ways to use QR codes, just takes a little imagination and as usual, action.

Want to master marketing for small businesses? Try Small business marketing mastery program