In marketing, you’ve got to be able to segment and pull a list appropriately. A bad list is a lot like bad hygiene- they don’t have email addresses, phone numbers, or job titles. There’s a lot of missing/wrong data, buying history and everything else. When you look at any campaign, you can’t say it’s just one element, because really marketing is a matrix of things that have to be correct in order for it to work, right?
So, for example, you come to me and you say, “Robin, give me the email that I can just shoot out there and get referrals.” I give that to one client. Fantastic. You’re like, “Holy shit. I got 20, 30 referrals. I could barely keep up.”
Then another client sends it out, she gets nothing. Why is that? It’s the exact same email. Well, it has to do with timing. Maybe she sent it out like the day before Thanksgiving. Maybe it depends on who else is talking to them. Of course, it depends on your relationship with the list. It also depends on maybe how you phrased it. So, there’s a matrix of things. Who else is talking to them? How satisfied, how close is the relationship, how connected they are? You know, he might have clients that are in medical and they’re very referral based.
She might have clients that are mostly, I don’t know, manufacturing. And they’re not as connected as medical because medical doctors are used to referring to each other. So that’s more in their nature, right? You see what I mean?
So it’s a matrix of things to get to get a campaign to work.
And that’s why some of you may send out a campaign and it flops. And it’s the exact same campaign. You’ve heard three or four or five others use it. And it works beautifully, right?
But one of the things that is consistent is your list.
And you really have to be militant about list hygiene and more importantly, the relationship with your list. Because when you have a really good list, if you need money, you need referrals, you can send an email to the list. You can do that very quickly, especially if you’ve done the hard work of building a relationship with a qualified list.
I’m an amateur gardener. We moved into a bigger house, and I started gardening, which is the first time I’ve ever done this. I put a garden in the back. I’m learning, right? And I’m reading a book on gardening. And it said something that was really interesting. It said, “A bad gardener grows weeds. A good gardener grows vegetables. But a great gardener grows soil because the soil is what makes everything else flourish.”
A seed will flourish if it’s in really good soil. And so really, if you want to be a great marketer, a great marketer builds the list because the list is like the soil. Now we’ve got to have the right offer and we’ve got to have the right timing and we’ve got to use the right media and all those things, too, right? So, it’s not only the list, but the list is the soil.
The list is the most — I wouldn’t say most important, catch myself — but it’s an extremely important part of this. And if most of you are doing prospecting, you’re going to have to start out cold, you know, so that you can build your list.
And if you stay in and maintain that list over a year, five years, ten years, you’re going to have a killer list.
I’ll tell you right now, I have the best list in the in the whole channel. You put me against any vendor out there. Anybody is selling to this channel. I got the best list. I got the most accurate, up-to-date complete list than anybody out there. Because I’ve got someone full time. That’s all they do is clean the list. I’ve got about five or six list cleaners. That’s all they do is update, maintain and clean my list.
Now, that’s just one piece to have accurate data and completeness. But the other part of it is you’ve got to market to it in a way and communicate to your list in a way where they stay engaged.
So, what is an asset? An asset is anything you own, a value that can be turned into cash. That’s Investopedia’s definition.
What in your business is more valuable than your list?
When you go to sell your business — and someday you guys are going to want to sell it. So when someone comes and buys your business, what are they buying? Are they buying your ConnectWise licenses? Are they buying your standard operating procedure manual?
No. Because when somebody buys your company, they throw out the operations manual because they bring the clients onto their platform. They’re right. Yes. What are they buying then? The list.
Not your furniture. Like what else do you have? Right. It’s your list. So that’s the single biggest asset and it’s the most neglected part of your business. Think about it. What are you doing today? To grow your list and and tighten and keep that relationship with it? What are you doing every single day to the most valuable asset in your company? Probably nothing. Wake up. So today’s the day. We’re going to change that.
