It reminds me of the book “The Slight Edge” by Jeff Olson. Where he talks about the small insignificant daily actions that seem irrelevant at the time. But they build one on top of the other over time, till one day you answer your own phone.

And then a whole new concept has been established, and the rest of the world
is racing to catch up. Seems so insignificant at the time, the guy answered his
own phone. But like you Jack, is John Reese just a guy when it comes to the Internet.

Keep up the great work you and your team do for all of us.

Gary McElwain

I was Las Vagas last year at the ASC Summit (great event), where I was privileged to listen to Howie Schwartz. And as chance would have it he walked into the lunch spot after his power packed speech (which had more golden nuggets than McDonald’s serves in a month) So as non-stalker as I could I offered him a seat at my table. Howie and I got to talking and we realized we live 20 minutes from each other. When I returned home I emailed him to follow up, and say that I would join conversation domination but could not afford the private seminar in his home. THATS when Howie opened up his home and invited me as his guest. Now I am a loyal raving fan of Howie and all the products he puts out. I will be in attendance to see him next week in NYC. Join me if you can, you wont be disappointed.

http://www.onlineprofitworkshop.com/

The message on the back might be:

I sincerely appreciate the excellent service you provided for me on ________. Please let me extend a special “thank-you” with a discount of 20% off anything in my store (or whatever you’re offering). Bring this card with you, and in case I’m not in the store when you come in, my initials below will alert my staff that you’re a friend of mine.

__________
(Initials)

If it’s appropriate to your business, you could offer them a “lifetime discount”, for instance! Wutta deal.

Initial the card in their presence, place it in their hand with a sincerely warm handshake, look them in the eye and say “Thanks for everything! I look forward to having the opportunity of reciprocating the wonderful experience you gave me today.” Hand them the card with the backside UP…you don’t have to worry about them turning it over, trust me.

The best way of expressing your gratitude to someone other than giving them your repeat business would be to “give them” something from your own business.

For instance, say you have a shoe store. Sure, you can buy your next appliance from this guy at Sears, and that’s great, but you could also make him a real special deal on his next shoe purchase!

Or, say you help people with Web marketing. Make him an intriguing offer. Tell him you can help him set up a website that will drive local customers to see him at Sears. He probably never thought of doing that…and then, of course, he becomes YOUR repeat customer. You’ve just flipped the equation while still being genuinely grateful for what he did for you.

There’s a big difference between “I’ll let you do something for me in the future” but “Let me do something for you.” This is gratitude that comes back around full circle to your own business, and benefits both of you, but instead of just GIVING repeat business you’re GETTING repeat business.

Oh – and these aren’t mutually exclusive. You can do both.

We KNOW it makes all the difference in the world and that we should always practice making those connections and treating people with uncommon respect and service, but we all slip on that as time goes by.

It’s the people who need less reminding of this fact that reap the biggest rewards in business.

We came home and had a message on the machine that he was able to get someone to assemble a grill for me today and I could come back and pick it up this afternoon.

He clearly saw that I wanted to grill this weekend when I was there and remembered that after I was gone and worked on finding a solution.

He already got his commission. He didn’t have to call and I could have just come back Tuesday and not known the thing was already put together the day I bought it.

Guess what? I am going to find that guy the next time and make sure HE gets the sale. He placed something in my mind that won’t soon disappear. He basically put more money in the bank that he can withdraw the next time I need lawn and garden stuff, which will actually be soon.

And look what’s happening again because of that. Mike’s getting more love for something he did years back.

Some people will Google him and find out more about him and his products because they are just hearing his name for the first time in your reply.

Your story is more powerful than any other form of marketing because 1) you gain nothing monetarily from telling it and 2) You aren’t Mike, and for that reason people believe such a thing more than a testimonial on a sales page or any thing else a marketer could use to gain new customers.

Understanding the power of this kind of marketing (what everyone who has been to a mom and pop hardware store has experienced first hand) is the key to understanding why it doesn’t take a million visitors to be a success.

It takes far far less traffic to generate goodwill and clients and sales.

The reason most people think they need a million visitors is because their system is so pedantic and cold that it would take that many visits to convert enough people to customers to make the venture worthwhile.

Of course having a product that is in demand is a given. Assuming that is the case and one still thinks they need a huge amount of traffic to succeed, they either have a product designed to suit the masses and need that many visitors even at a good conversion or they have a marketing system that is too automated that makes a human connection nearly or entirely impossible.

In any case, even with automation, people should strive to make their marketing system more personable because that is proven to hit home with customers of all kinds, including me!

Favorite: “There’s a very successful marketer of dental services who was asked for a way to get 100 new patients. He said…”I have no idea. In fact, I don’t know of any way to get 20 patients, or 5 patients. But I know 100 ways to get ONE patient, and I use all of them.”

Hope even more pick up on this discussion. This is a good one!

The “virus” in marketing is nothing more or less than a single unique message…and, just like viruses require a host, the marketing message requires a host…and another…and another.

A host can become a “vector”….meaning not merely a “carrier”, but a “transmitter” of the virus. To give a crude example, a male mosquito might carry a virus, but since it doesn’t feed off of warm-blooded animals it won’t be a “transmitter”. Only the female mosquito will become a transmitter.

…and not all female mosquitos “infected” will “transmit”. Some, for instance, will be squashed or killed with insecticide before they can “transmit”.

An “epidemic” occurs when a sufficient number of vectors become transmitters. It’s a numbers game. Viral marketing, then, is the process of:

1. Implanting the “virus” into enough individual hosts that the vector process has a chance to take hold and to overcome the rate of natural “transmission dropouts”. If only one in 100 vectors (“carriers”) become transmitters, you have a high dropout rate to overcome and if you want to start an epidemic you have to be personally implanting your virus continually using as many of the well over 500 methods of implantation that are available as you can.

(There’s a very successful marketer of dental services who was asked for a way to get 100 new patients. He said…”I have no idea. In fact, I don’t know of any way to get 20 patients, or 5 patients. But I know 100 ways to get ONE patient, and I use all of them.”)

2. To deal with the dropout rate, you have to enhance the probability of “transmission”, and this is really where the “tipping point” is achieved.

What, then, enhances the probability of transmission?

1. Surprising service (like you describe with John Reese in your article) enhances the probability of transmission.

2. Unexpected value, ditto.

3. Encouragement and gratitude expressed to “transmitters” in the form of special “rewards” or benefits, ditto. Sometimes the product or service itself becomes more valuable the more it is shared. For instance, LinkedIn becomes more and more valuable to you yourself the more people that you invite to join…and then those people develop value for themselves by inviting people to join, etc. This isn’t accidental and it can be applied to many situations.

4. Providing a platform for user personalization, participation and sharing, ditto.

5. Capturing the deepest possible understanding of the interaction between users and your product or service, coupled with continuous extension and improvement that addresses their frustrations and wishes regarding the product or service, ditto. (Version 1 only needs to be “good enough”…but you’re always working on the next version.)

Many think that “viral events” like the explosion of Facebook, YouTube, etc. just happen for some mysterious reasons that no one knows why or how. Not so. Items 1 through 5, to varying degrees and in different ways, were present in all of these.

But it all starts with personally implanting viruses and then continuing to do so, just like John Reese.