UnMarketing summary

Any good marketer will ask herself the question, “How do people make purchasing decisions?”

This seemingly complicated question becomes pretty simple if you use the hierarchy of buying – a chart that details the purchaser’s decision-making process. The authors formulated this chart based on interviews with over 1,000 business owners centered around a crucial question: “Why do you buy?”

For most businesses, bringing in new customers is goal number one. However, once a business establishes a stable customer base, it often thinks it can sit back and watch the money roll in. This is a big mistake based on an erroneous assumption: that current customers are always satisfied customers.

Marketing approaches tend to center on acquiring new customers and ignoring existing ones. As a result, potential customers often receive much better treatment than current ones. For instance, companies spend huge amounts of money on ads and deals for new purchasers, yet existing customers have to wait in long lines to reach a customer-service representative.

In an era of ad overload, every consumer likes to have a little help when making a purchasing decision. And when faced with such a quandary, who better to advise you than an expert?

After all, experts are reliable, can offer an overview of the total market and aren’t just trying to sell stuff. If a customer is trying to decide between two similar products, an expert opinion may be what tilts the scales. And this is why you should become an expert.

So it’s important to build a reputation for yourself as an expert in your field. But you can’t just go around calling yourself an authority and expect people to listen.

Rather, people need to see you as an expert. Here's how to make that happen:

Do you remember that commercial where Jean-Claude Van Damme landed the “epic splits” between two Volvo trucks? In 2013, the internet exploded over the video and, to this day, more than 80 million people have viewed it on YouTube. So how can you reproduce Volvo’s success?

Well, the first step is to find the right kind of message for your video. Videos only go viral if they communicate in a particular way.

Imagine that your favorite Italian restaurant has a Facebook page. You like the page so that you can stay abreast of any exciting updates, but, after a few weeks, you’re disappointed with the results; the restaurant only posts a single photo every week and doesn’t reply with so much as an emoji to your thoughtful dessert suggestion.

Rather than making you a bigger fan of the restaurant, your engagement with its social media presence is making you think that it doesn’t care about its customers. Clearly a failure on their part.

From showing off your awesome camping trip to making new friends with shared interests, social media can be an incredible, exciting space. And putting together a profile for your business can be even more exciting. To do this successfully, make sure you follow three general stages.

At first, your primary goal should be getting attention for your profile. Do this by posting things that potential customers will find engaging while being both present and consistent. To accomplish this, it’s a good idea to spend a few hours a day on your platform.

Back in the day, it was hard to voice your complaints about a poor customer service experience. If you as a consumer wanted to get your point across you had to write a letter or call up a hotline, which most people weren’t willing to do.

But these days just about anyone can complain, a development that’s transformed the terrain for businesses. In today’s world, you better have a good strategy for responding to disgruntled customers.