We were asked a very insightful question by a prospective customer – what do the most successful aviation marketing clients for our practice have in common?

.

Transcript – Our Most Successful Aviation Marketing Clients

[MUSIC] Announcer: You’re listening to aviation marketing Hangar Flying, the community for the best sales and marketing professionals in the aviation industry. You can’t learn to fly just from a book. You learn from other pilots who know the tools, the skills, and the territory. Your hosts, John and Paula Williams, are your sales and marketing test pilots.

They take the risks for you, and share strategies, relevant examples, hacks, and how-tos. Be sure to subscribe on iTunes so you won’t miss a thing.

Paula Williams: Welcome to aviation marketing hangar flying episode number 61, the most successful aviation marketing clients. So I’m Paula Williams.

John Williams: I’m John Williams.

Paula Williams: And we are ABCI and ABCI’s mission is,

John Williams: To help all you ladies and gentleman out there sell more products and services in aviation world.

Paula Williams: Absolutely. We actually had somebody who was a new client ask us recently what are some of the most common traits of your most successful aviation marketing clients.

And I thought you know what, that is important. [LAUGH] And that is something worth talking about. So, that became it’s own topic. So that’s what we’re gonna be talking about today. Who are the people that we get the best results for, and who succeed at marketing and sales with our help and who are our favorite ones to work for, right?

John Williams: Mm-hm.

Paula Williams: Okay, so in response to this, you may have questions, comments, whatever you like. And if you use #avgeekmarketing or if you comment on our blog or anywhere else, I will find your comments and do my best to give you a good reply, right?

John Williams: Well a reply, whether it’s good or not.

Paula Williams: [LAUGH] Exactly. All right. So, three big ideas in terms of what make our best aviation marketing clients and I would say three things. One, they’re constant learners, two, they are rock stars and three they really like the product and their people.

John Williams: Number four, from previous podcast would be, they are really good and enjoy sales.

Paula Williams: Absolutely, and well nothing goes without saying so that’s absolutely right.

John Williams: [LAUGH]

Paula Williams: We’ll add that in as number four. Okay so to start with as constant learners, these are people who consume a lot of information and they adapt based on what they learned. And I can give you some examples like Gene Clow was quoting us some information from the 8020 sales and marketing book that I had to go back and reread because I’d missed some pieces that he found, and was using in his marketing.

And the folks that really sink their teeth into the materials, this is kind of part of the reason that we have what we call our insiders circle where we have a book club, and we have other functions where we share information and learn from each other. So yeah, Gene’s one of our favorites because he is always learning and adapting based on information that he gets from us and elsewhere, as well.

David Santo who’s been a client in various capacities for a number of years and he absolutely insisted that we read the Blue Ocean Strategy and also read Neuromarketing, both of those books we really enjoyed. But it gave us a really good starting place to work on some projects together because it gave us a common vocabulary and some different ideas that we could talk about in context of what we wanted to do.

Jeff Stodola, the connection there is he’s the brother of Mike Stodola, who was part of our GKIC Peak Performers Group. Which is a mastermind group with the GKIC, Glazer-Kennedy Insider’s Circle. Which is a group that we’ve participated with. So, once again, different ideas from different industries and other kinds of things that come together that people are adapting to.

And Shane Ballman with Snapse MX he’s been a part of a lot of different incubator groups and learned a lot from the Silicon Valley kids that he’s hanging out with. And the other really smart folks that are involved with these incubator groups. So there’s lots of ways that people incorporate these new ideas into their business and I think that’s one of the big factors in being successful.

What do you think John?

John Williams: Absolutely.

Paula Williams: Right, okay so they’re constant learners. Second thing is that they are rock stars, right?

John Williams: Yep.

Paula Williams: And what I mean by that is that they’re willing to get out there and stand behind their products and stand behind their ideas.

And they’re willing to be the public face of their company. And what this does is, if nobody is willing to get out there and put their name and their face behind a product, it makes you wonder what’s wrong with it, right?

John Williams: Yeah.

Paula Williams: Exactly. So, people don’t trust companies as much as they used to but, they do trust people.

And so being willing to be involved with the NBAA and Aviation Week, and the EAA, and the AOPA Education sessions, being willing to either have your own podcast or be a guest on different podcasts and things like that. Being a guest speaker, a guest writer at different events and other things.

Those things are really important. So a couple of things that come to mind of course Shane Ballman, doing a lot of pitching as part of his investor group and things. He’s kind of the master of the two-minute pitch and has become really, really good at that. David Santo, frequent guest on a lot of different podcasts and things, very good speaker with FSANA and some other aviation groups.

And Larry Hinebaugh has done some promotional videos and other things is willing to be the, the public face of his company which is great. Matt Steward with ACE, it’s applied composite engineering. He was willing and able to jump into a social media panel discussion that we had last year at NBAA and really kind of put a face to the name, and also be the public face of this company which was wonderful.

Pat Lemieux, very active with podcasts with his company C&L Aviation and

Paula Williams: Seven Jet!

John Williams: Yeah.

Paula Williams: And also with some local podcasts in his area. So, kind of a social media and podcasting pioneer in that area. So, being willing to and able to be a rock star just makes it some much easier for us to do marketing for and with you because it gives us somebody to collaborate with, somebody to be the public face of your company and once again to stand behind that and to build credibility for those ideas.

And the third thing, of course, is people who really like their product and their people. One example of this is Special Services Corporation. Their pilots stay with the company for an average of ten plus years. And how unusual is that in the charter industry, John?

John Williams: It’s exceptional.

Paula Williams: [LAUGH] Most of them don’t, right?

John Williams: No, they don’t.

Paula Williams: Right, they have a pretty high turnover because, pilots go from company to company. Special Services, I think part of the way that they do that is by really trying very hard, and I know the gold stream who does a lot of their work puts a lot of effort into scheduling their pilots so that everybody gets time off.

Everybody gets what’s important to them, as far as their family events and other things, and really bends over backwards for his own people, which in turn, makes it so that their customers have the same pilot every time or one of several pilots. But still, people that are known and trusted to the company and to the clients.

And that network is just about unheard of in the revolving door of charter pilots, right?

John Williams: Mm-hm.

Paula Williams: Okay. Another one is Flight Schedule Pro. When we talk about their blog, we talked about ways that they could write about their products and services and other kinds of things.

Jason Barnes was not really interested in that. He was most interested in articles that would serve his customers and helped them sell their services. His customers are flight schools and flying clubs and universities and other kinds of folks. So he put the emphasis on his customers in terms of the way that he wants his blog to be run.

So a lot of the materials that we’re putting out, a lot of the effort that he expends is not in selling products. It’s taking care of his folks, right?

John Williams: And what a deal.

Paula Williams: What a deal, absolutely. Last one, Centrex Construction. They help their customers publicize their buildings and get tenants.

They did some joint press releases. They did a lot of meetings at the last convention. They were attending with their customers to introduce them around to people in the aviation industry that they may not know already and really make those connections that are good for everyone. So once again it shows that they really, really like their product, they really, really like their people and they’re really willing to go the extra mile for them, right?

John Williams: You bet.

Paula Williams: All right, so big ideas?

John Williams: There they are.

Paula Williams: [LAUGH] This is a podcast John.

John Williams: Yeah, well I don’t like reading slides.

Paula Williams: Fine, the three big ideas. One, people who are constant learners. Two, people who are rock stars. And three, people who really like their product and their people, right?

John Williams: Yup. So go sell more stuff.

Paula Williams: America needs the business.

John Williams: That’s [INAUDIBLE] one of the best sales guys ever.

Paula Williams: Exactly. So subscribe to our podcast on iTunes, [INAUDIBLE], or Google Play. Do leave us a rating. Let us know what you’d like to see more or less of.

We look forward to seeing you next week.

John Williams: See you next time, ciao.

[MUSIC]

Announcer: Thanks for joining us for aviation marketing Hangar Flying. The best place to learn what really works in sales and marketing in the aviation industry. Remember to subscribe on iTunes and leave a rating.

[MUSIC]

..