If you’re not sure how to market your business, give this book a read…
TL;DR:
- Marketing Made Simple is a book that gives you both the high level marketing strategy that Donald Miller used for his own business along with the step by step process of how to implement it in your business.
- Miller argues that the reason why most businesses are not growing at the level they could be is because they don’t have sales funnels in place.
- A sales funnel is a systematic approach to taking prospects from unaware of who you are/what your offer is to paying customer.
- I’ve used Miller’s five step sales funnel in my own projects to varying levels of success based on how well I actually implemented the system.
I first learned about Donald Miller and his business books by reading Business Made Simple. After that, I was hooked. Miller has the unique ability to explain the theory and then give practical steps that you can take immediately. His books give you exactly what you need to go out and execute.
After Business Made Simple, I read Building a Story Brand. Shortly after I had gotten through that, Donald Miller and Dr. J.J. Peterson released Marketing Made Simple. Out of all his books that I’ve read, I’d say this book has helped me the most as a marketing consultant for my clients. I’ve taken this book and applied it directly to my own projects and projects for my clients.
In this article, I’ll share some of the things I find insightful about the book. I’m not going to go into details because you should read the book if you want all the goods, but I’ll give you a sneak peak.
Why Your Business Isn’t Growing
Donald Miller’s main argument in the book is that the reason your business is not where it could be is because you’re not using sales funnels. He spends the introductory chapters explaining what a funnel is and why you need it, then the rest of the book is a step by step guide on how to implement the Marketing Made Simple sales funnel.
What is a Sales Funnel?
Sales funnel isn’t just a logo, or facebook ads, or a clear message. A sales funnel is a step by step approach for developing a relationship with a customer - taking them from unaware of who you are to paying customer.
Miller argues that “people fall in love with brands for the same reason they fall in love with each other. The brand helped them survive and got them a great return on their social, emotional, or financial investment.”
Miller mentions that he knew he wanted to marry his wife the day he met her, and he eventually did end up marrying her. However, he couldn’t have asked her to marry him on that first day. He had to take her through the phases of the relationship before he could as for commitment. Miller argues that many businesses make the mistake is they ask their customers to marry them the first time they meet them. Of course customers would be turned off by your brand!
The Three Stages of a Relationship
Continuing the relationship analogy, Miller argues there are three phases to all relationships - both for people and for brands. They are:
- Curiosity - when the customer is asking can this person, product, or service help me survive? This is usually a quick phase where the customer decides whether or not they want to learn more about your offer.
- Enlightenment - The customer wants to learn more about your offer and how your offer can solve their problem. In this phase, you’re answering the question “but how?” For the customers.
- Commitment - This is where you ask for the sale. Timing is key here, if they haven’t gone through the curiosity and enlightenment phase before you ask them for the sale, you may turn them away.
The Five Elements of the Marketing Made Simple Sales Funnel
Miller lays out a five step process for creating a funnel that guides customers through the curiosity phase to the enlightenment phase to the commitment phase.
- A one-liner
- A website or landing page
- A lead-generating PDF
- An email nurture campaign
- An email sales campaign
I won’t go into details here as is this is the main meat of the book, but if you want a free resource to walk you through this, check out the Marketing Made Simple Sales Funnel Plan.
Worth The Read?
I’ve actually applied this book on various projects I’ve worked on and now every time a client comes to me looking for some marketing help I just use this sales funnel checklist to see where I need to focus on to get them more customers. If you don’t know anything about marketing or getting customers online, this book is a must read.
If you read the explanation above and feel like you’ve already got that down and you don’t need a system to get more customers because you already have one in place, then this book may not be of value to you.