Sales pitch and marketing style for IM to IM

by rooze
12 replies
Disclaimer - It's early and I'm nursing a hangover so I probably won't verbalize this very well.

I know this is kinda like stating the obvious but I wonder how many people are cognizant of this: have you noticed how the IM community is an industry in of itself and plays by different rules and scripts to most other online businesses?

Let me explain - if you go to most B2C and even B2B sales websites, which are not connected in any way with IM, you'll see a completely different style of sales presentation than with an IM site.

IM is its own cottage industry that's grown to the size of a castle. It generates and circulates revenue within the industry and only rarely connects with the 'real' world. If you go to some of the big companies who are outside of our community, sites like L.L Bean, Gander Mountain, any major vitamin store, or just about any other non IM website, you'll see that they all have a very different style of sales presentation than any site selling to the IM crowd.

To help visualize the contrast, think about 'big' vitamin stores whose primary focus is to attract IM marketing affiliates, then compare their style with any of the non-affiliate focused sites....and it's completely different.

I think IM has never really grown up. Its roots and methodology are still set in the mid 90's, it has never moved on.

If you're wondering what I'm talking about, think of the style of presentation of a WSO, or go to one of the male enhancement supplement sites, or some site selling affiliate software or a backlink builder or whatever. If it's a site servicing the IM community the pitch is big and bold and brash, full of hyperbole, crazy statistics and size 30 fonts. If it's a site selling to the average Joe it's more laid back, more friendly and less in your face.

Get Your Big Penis Now!!!! ONLY 50 LEFT!!!

So we sell among ourselves using one style and we hope to eventually get to sell to the outside world where we'll need to use a completely different style. Does that strike you as a little inconsistent, or odd?

Now I'm not saying every site fits into this mold, there are obviously many examples of sites that approach marketing in a more 'grown up' way.

Is it time for the IM community to grow up and stop being so......90's?

Even when we sell products/services/affiliate offers within our community, would it be so much less effective to adopt a more professional style of presentation? Maybe we're all still copying stuff from the 90's and don't have the wherewithal to implement an update?

This might be a long shot, but when I look at some of the companies who've transitioned from the IM community and become more mainstream, they seem to adopt a more mainstream style of selling. When I look at some of the home pages of the IM sites, I can pretty much guarantee they'll never sell outside of their own little incestuous circle of colleagues, unless they change their style radically.

Just a thought, I may be wrong.
#marketing #pitch #sales #style
  • Profile picture of the author viffer211
    It happens mainly because it still works. The overhyped sales copy and in your face graphics is what appeals to the gullible newbies who continually buy worthless junk that they then complain about one week, but then continue to buy for potentially months or years to come.

    The standard $47 - $197 'make money online' offer isn't geared towards business people or people with any sort of common sense. It's aimed towards the dreamers and fantasists who ultimately want to buy a nice cosy dream that tells them everything they want to hear. And of course, that's exactly what they get sold.
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  • Profile picture of the author Warrior X
    True enough-- I know I have to grind my mental gears when I switch from writing for an IM client over to a b2b client.
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  • Profile picture of the author damasgate
    nice post It's definitely tempting sometimes when you're a newbie and the sales copy says 5 gazillion visitors to your site in 1 day or something lol
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  • Profile picture of the author Raydal
    This opinion is the very oppostive of what Dan Kennedy teaches.
    Those big companies if they changed their style would make more
    sales. A ton of them are not doing as well as internet marketers
    and could take some help.

    Direct marketing style selling may not make it to the opera but
    it works. Of course anything can be overdone, but the soft
    sell used by most large companies could take some hardening.

    -Ray Edwards
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    • Profile picture of the author absolutelee
      Originally Posted by Raydal View Post

      This opinion is the very oppostive of what Dan Kennedy teaches.
      Those big companies if they changed their style would make more
      sales. A ton of them are not doing as well as internet marketers
      and could take some help.

      Direct marketing style selling may not make it to the opera but
      it works. Of course anything can be overdone, but the soft
      sell used by most large companies could take some hardening.

      -Ray Edwards
      I'm with you on this. Sales in general has gotten too soft. The old stuff really works! Pitches, objection handling, closes...that stuff works like gang busters. I learned to sell from my Dad who sold aluminum siding. Later when I "modernized" my approach I really believe I became less effective. When I realized this I dressed up what my Dad taught me in politically correct clothing and that works just fine.
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  • Profile picture of the author David Keith
    direct selling techniques work best for products that sell an intangible benefit. think about the industries that do use it. the Make money industry or the weight loss industry.

    these people are often times selling the dream of more money (with ease) or of losing weight in 15 minutes a day.

    the same sales pitch just doesn't work for selling much more comparable goods like electronics. people could easily compare the laptop you are selling on your long sales letter with that of several others and realize that they all do pretty much the same thing.

    but when you get into stuff like weight loss, millions of people are still holding out hope that there is an easy solution, so when someone uses emotional triggers in a long sales letter to reaffirm their belief, it works and they buy the product.

    the more tangible and comparable a product is the less the emotion trigger work because the logical aspects of the purchase are so much more known.

    most big companies are in fact selling more tangible products that are very comparable, so over promising on what the product will do for you in your life via a long hyped sales letter is just not a very good long term strategy for them.

    many in the IM industry are learning the hard way what over promising and over hyping your products will do to your long term business.
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    • Profile picture of the author rooze
      Great comments, thanks.

      I agree that it works, but it's also restricting the market to a specific group or type of person, and it's that factor which irritates me a little.

      Originally Posted by David Keith View Post

      direct selling techniques work best for products that sell an intangible benefit. think about the industries that do use it. the Make money industry or the weight loss industry.

      these people are often times selling the dream of more money (with ease) or of losing weight in 15 minutes a day.

      the same sales pitch just doesn't work for selling much more comparable goods like electronics. people could easily compare the laptop you are selling on your long sales letter with that of several others and realize that they all do pretty much the same thing.

      but when you get into stuff like weight loss, millions of people are still holding out hope that there is an easy solution, so when someone uses emotional triggers in a long sales letter to reaffirm their belief, it works and they buy the product.

      the more tangible and comparable a product is the less the emotion trigger work because the logical aspects of the purchase are so much more known.

      most big companies are in fact selling more tangible products that are very comparable, so over promising on what the product will do for you in your life via a long hyped sales letter is just not a very good long term strategy for them.

      many in the IM industry are learning the hard way what over promising and over hyping your products will do to your long term business.
      That's a great point about selling intangibles. It begs the question though, if the same pitch/style is used to sell an IM product like a backlink blaster, or an autoresponder, or a cookie-cut mini site, or whatever.....shouldn't it raise a red flag in the mind of the buyer? If I need to use emotional hooks to get you to believe in my product, and I slap you in the face with bold texts and bright font colors, isn't it like saying 'hey, buy this but it probably won't work!'.

      And that's really the crux of my point, the technique, though clearly effective with certain groups, could never be used outside of those groups and is therefore restricting the more mainstream appeal for the product/service.
      As someone alluded to, 'if it ain't broke don't fix it'. But maybe it's a V8 running on 6 cylinders, but because it gets us to the office every morning we don't care to mess with it?
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  • Profile picture of the author robnoble
    OK you got me at "big penis"

    My wife wants to know is it too late or do you still have some left?
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    • Profile picture of the author rooze
      Originally Posted by robnoble View Post

      OK you got me at "big penis"

      My wife wants to know is it too late or do you still have some left?
      LOL...I'll see what I can do..... though I'm not supposed to post an affiliate link so your wife may be out of luck!
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  • Profile picture of the author David Keith
    you are totally correct these sales tactics should in fact raise many red flags to buyers, but they are blinded by their underlying desire to have a quick and easy fix for their problem.

    only once they realize that there is no easy button to problems like money or weight loss do they embrace true time tested methods of solving those problems.

    as for the industries limiting themselves. thats a bit different. in the weight loss industry, i dont think these tactics limit people much because of the size and demand for the quick fix product. the belief that science can progress to the point where an easy pill will exist also help them.

    for the Make money niches, these tactics do limit them a little, but not as much as using those tactics add to their bottom line.

    can you actually imagine HG promoting an offer for 5,000 backlinks for $40... Do you realize how fast the authorities would be on their a$$es for a move like that.

    but yes, these scammy tactics are keeping the IM industry down. ever wonder why some big companies like a awber or hostgator who have tons of customers that could use some IM training dont promote IM offers even from the so called gurus.

    i know the owner of HG pretty well, i was one of their first 100 customers, and we have had this discussion a few times. HG just cant risk their reputation promoting products and people that are selling dreams and not offering much real value to their customers.

    thats why they partner with big well established SEO companies that don't use the scammy tactics.
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  • Profile picture of the author Daniel Wilson
    What is frightening to me is that this is not successful only in self-help niche or some other where people are really desperate and buy anything that would help them. But here people who are falling for it are IM'ers, intellectual "businessmen" who surf WF and similar forums and blog for years now.

    If they fall for such marketing tricks how a normal non-web-educated (yes it is a word ) visitors react to it.
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    • Profile picture of the author rooze
      Originally Posted by Daniel Wilson View Post

      What is frightening to me is that this is not successful only in self-help niche or some other where people are really desperate and buy anything that would help them. But here people who are falling for it are IM'ers, intellectual "businessmen" who surf WF and similar forums and blog for years now.

      If they fall for such marketing tricks how a normal non-web-educated (yes it is a word ) visitors react to it.
      See now that's the complete irony of it

      <cynical attitude>We spend our days trying to devise ways of detaching people from their money, then we use the same methods on each other......and we fall for it!!</cynical attitude>
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