Aviation Sales – 80/20 Sales and Marketing by Perry Marshall –
The January selection for the Aviation Marketing Book Club
In January in our Aviation Marketing Master Class, we enjoyed Perry Marshall’s 80/20 Sales & Marketing book.
Our Silver members and above get books in their packages of course materials.
This month’s book, 80/20 Sales and Marketing by Perry Marshall, is a great resource.
And of course, since we are all focused on aviation, we all evaluating the book through our own lens and thinking –
“How useful is this to me?”
“How will this work with my specific marketing tasks?”
and of course,
“How can I use this in a way that will work best for me?”
I have to say that the one thing I DON’T like about it is that Marshall is a math nerd who assumes that every marketing experiment has enough numbers to run statistically significant A/B tests and so on. This is not always true. One of our clients has a possible universe of prospects of 63. Just 63! That’s it. Which is fine, for a very specialized service. But that makes it just about impossible to split-test!
That said, there’s still FANTASTIC stuff in the book, particularly for aviation sales.
Four Questions about Your USP
The first item I’d like to call your attention to is the four questions on page 66 about your USP (Unique Selling Proposition to those who are not already aviation sales nerds)
1) Why should I listen to you?
2) Why should I do business with you instead of anybody and everybody else?
3) What can your product (or service) do for me that no other alternative can do?
4) What can you guarantee me that nobody else can guarantee?
I think that last question is the doozy. It really separates a strong USP from a weak one.
The box on page 66 gives some great ideas about things you CAN guarantee that no one else has probably thought of . . .
What’s Your $2700 Espresso Machine?
Marshall suggests that many companies could offer an upgrade that some 20% of their clients would purchase if it were available. The example he gives is a $2700 Espresso machine available in Starbucks.
The story and the math behind that number is fascinating – you’ll have to read about it in the book. But the suggestion to create a top-of-the-line product to offer to your existing customers is a fascinating one.
ABCI’s is a revision of our Executive Business Jet Program.
Basically, ABCI hires, trains and supervises a marketing coordinator that works full-time on-site with your company; and then quarterly we have the CEO/founder/executive team come stay with us for two days in Park City with a film crew to record interviews and other material that we use throughout the year.
We haven’t sold one yet, we’re still working out the details and looking for the perfect candidate and client!
Marketing DNA Test
Did you take the Marketing DNA test from the Perry Marshall book? Care to share your results?
Mine were not surprising, but enlightening about some of the decisions I’ve made about our team.
I’m good with words and images, and love for things to be recorded, reused and stories retold. I’m not so great at analytics and empathy.
This is why John and I work together so well. He’s great analytics & statistics, I’m not!
And which is why it’s great to have Bert Botta, Jeff Stodola, and Bryan Pilcher on our Master Class team.
Bert in particular does a great job of facilitating the group, making new members feel comfortable and included, and doing our Member Highlight interviews.
Share your own results in the comments, if you’ve taken the test and are so inclined!
I think these types of tests are usually not a surprise, but what’s valuable is the shared vocabulary when you’re working with a team – you can understand one another better and understand and appreciate one anothers’ strengths in a more empathetic and useful way.
(As you can see, I need all the help with empathy I can get! One assistant used to call me “M.” – referring to Judi Dench’s character in the newer James Bond movies.)
I get it. And if I had any empathy I would care. 🙂
Last point from the book –
Half your battles were won before you were even born.
You’ll understand this one if you’ve done any international travel. Many of the things we take for granted are specific to the United States and the twenty-first century.
We have the ability to use several marketing methods more cheaply and effectively than at any other place and time in history!
For example:
Since Benjamin Franklin was appointed our first Postmaster General in 1775, billions of pieces of mail with an incredibly high reliability.
Most countries don’t have a postal system that will send a letter three thousand miles in three days for less than a dollar.
Cheap direct mail is a marketing method most of us don’t take advantage of.
Our education system, library system, cheap and reliable Internet, patent protections, and other business and marketing innovations are factors we can and should make more use of that we do currently.
With all of the negative news and focus lately, this was a timely wake-up call.
Next Month – Trust Based Marketing by Dan Kennedy and Matt Zagula
Silver members and above – expect your book (with four handy bookmarks about the things I found to talk about) this week.