I come up with writing ideas from almost anything and everything, and this week I had a long discussion with a friend of mine who is trying to promote his own product. The reason why we had a long discussion is because he doesn’t necessarily understand what promoting a product or involves, and he seems to have some beliefs about how things work that are incorrect, as far as I know. So, I thought I’d write about this matter this week.
This post is not meant for me to be mean, don’t get me wrong, and the friend in question knows that I am writing this. I won’t mention his name or his product either, so no one would know who I’m talking about. But it’s for the own good of whoever might be thinking the same way as my friend, and wonder why what they are doing doesn’t work.
I would like to use this post to try to clarify a few things that you should know if you are trying to sell a product or a service. So here I am going to mention three things that my friend told me, and analyze why it might not be such a good idea or just don’t make any sense all.
I Want to Make my Video Go Viral
You CANNOT make a video go viral. A video will or will not go viral, but it’s out of your hands. It’s exactly like a movie. The director and the actors are making the movie, and then the editor comes in and make sure everything looks perfect, but that’s NOT necessarily going to make that movie a hit.
The fact that the movie has a good story, top actors or even stars, with the best picture and sound engineers there is, it’s not a grantee for the movie’s success. All they can do is a prediction. We all have heard of movies that were expected to roll and that didn’t and some that weren’t and did. Didn’t we?
You can’t make your video go viral, but you can make the best video you can to make sure it’s attractive and informative. The viewers will decide and help make it viral or not.
I Want to Have a Cat in my Video to Make it Entertaining
Now, if you know me just a little bit, you know how crazy I am about cats, but I don’t put my cat in my professional videos that are meant to promote my online services. No, of course not. If I put my kitty in a video it’s going to be for the fun an entertainment of those who are looking for cat videos, not for the sake of entertaining people who are just trying to get some information about what I might be selling. It just doesn’t work that way. By the way, if you do like cat videos, it’s my 4 legged daughter’s birthday today!
Do not make this mistake. People interested in your product or service might have an aversion for cats, and cat lovers might be not interested in your product whatsoever. This would just be a very bad idea.
It’s not the “entertainment” part of a video that will make you sell your product. Your video could go viral with 2,000.000 views, and not selling a thing. Usually videos that go viral don’t sell anything, as a matter of fact.
Now, I could use videos of my cat to reach people who love cats, and include a link to my blogs down below. So if cat lovers find my video and want to know more about what I do, they can click and see. But that’s the only way it works, and I’m not going to expect anything at all in such case. If they click, great; if not, great too!
I’m Not Good at Building Relationships
I told this friend of mine more times than I can count by now that he needs to build relationships with potential buyers, and what he keeps telling me in response is “I’m not good at building relationships”. Well, if this is the type of excuse you are coming up with, let me tell you bluntly that it’s not a good excuse.
Do you know what I told my friend when he came up with such a silly excuse? I said, well, then, people might not be good at wanting to buy your product either. If you are not good at building relationships, become a cop or a tax inspector, but do not be trying to make people fall in love with your product. Chances are your success will be limited. If you are human, and can speak and write, you have not excuse what so ever not to build relationships. Period.
To Summed it All Up!
When you come up with a product that you want to sell to people, you need to understand what works and what doesn’t, and most of all, what makes sense and what doesn’t.
You can’t really control the impact that you will make with just with one video, and you should avoid the mistakes of trying to attract people with the wrong items. Bottom line, use common sense.
Then, even if you are not a relationship butterfly, you need to develop some skills in the matter. If you have a product or service that you want “people” to buy, you need to do your very best to try to become more of a people person. That’s the least you could do.
If you are selling a product or a service online, I hope that you are not making these 3 mistakes as my friend was about to. If you do, stop now and learn more about what it takes to become successful at selling online.
So, now your turn, give me all your feedbacks, my friends!
Hey Sylviane,
That’s good advice that you gave your friend. I have a video that now has over a million views and it’s about four years old now. It’s still getting views so they continue to rise but I’m not promoting anything on that video. I just wanted to share some positive and inspirational messages and people loved it. I’ve made about four like that and that is the only one that has taken off. See, I would have thought they all would. It’s out of our hands.
I have a friend that wanted to come online and build an online business too but he didn’t want to deal with people. He wanted to be way way way behind the scenes and never have to talk to anyone. I told him he better keep his day job because there’s no way you’ll ever be successful unless you talk to people. He kept his day job.
Great advice…
Enjoy your week.
~Adrienne
P.S. Loved Sophie’s video. Happy Birthday to your girl.
Adrienne invites you to read..13 Steps to Relationship Marketing Success I Learned While Getting My Hair Cut
Hi Adrienne,
Wow, you have a video that has over a million views? I’d love to know which one it is!
Well, that is the perfect illustration of what I’m saying. You didn’t plan that, it just happened, then you have other videos of the same type, but somehow they haven’t reach that million. That’s what I spent an afternoon trying to explain my friend.
Thank you for this very apropos testimony, Adrienne. I’m glad you could meet my Sophie. She is a pure sweet heart and glad you enjoyed the video too 🙂
“I told him he better keep his day job because there’s no way you’ll ever be successful unless you talk to people.”
He still would have the option of working for somebody if he found an OK job. 😉 I’ve actually been thinking about working with ABOUT.COM and doing that in conjunction with my gaming blog I’m doing. But yes… I agree. You really need to have good communication skills if you really want to succeed with the whole ‘online thing’.
Right on, Sylviane! You are absolutely right about not being able to “MAKE” ANYTHING go viral or be a success. All one can do, and all one should EVER do, is simply do the very best that one can do, and do it with their target audience in mind. On the subject of cats, I’m a cat lover, too, but I’m not necessarily interested in seeing somebody else’s cat entertaining me while I’m considering the possibility of doing business with its owner. One has absolutely nothing to do with the other.
Oh . . . and if your friend is not very good at building relationships, perhaps accounting or engineering should be a consideration. Or maybe a prison warden.
Steve Vernon invites you to read..Where Are You Going?
Hi Steve,
Thank you for telling us your view on the subject. Yes, even as a cat lover we might not necessarily want to be distracted by those lovely creatures if we want to focus on a product or service.
About relationships, I get it that not everyone is good at that, but everyone can make the effort and try his or her best.
Thanks for coming by 🙂
I love that first part. You cannot make a video go viral! Good grief, how many times do you read advice where people tell you to make a viral video? Drives me nuts!! I could complain about that all day but I won’t 🙂
Sounds like your friend needs a little self-hypnosis, hm? Especially for the part about not being able to build relationships. Maybe he should be a toll-collector?? That’s one thing he’ll have to get over fast or be doomed. It’s the most important one. If you don’t have relationships it doesn’t matter how many products or videos or anything else you have. The nice thing about online relationships is that even if you’re a bit scared or shy you can still interact with people easily. They can’t really see you and you can think for a while about what you want to say. He should start at least with some online relationships, just asking questions, getting to know people. get a little practice. It will get easier!
And happy birthday to Sophie! I can’t believe she sat there with you that whole time during the video and didn’t move. My cat would be trying like crazy to jump off onto something else. Does she get any special birthday treats?
Carol Lynn invites you to read..The Getting Started Guide: Deciding Whether Facebook Marketing Is Right For Your Business
Hi Carol,
Again you made me laugh 🙂 🙂 🙂 out loud when you said that my friend needs a little self-hypnosis! You must be a very funny woman!
I know, girl, I’m so tired of telling him that he needs to get over is pre-made ideas and get on with it already. He keep telling about the movie “Social Network” and that the guy had a brilliant idea, but wasn’t good at everything, therefore, he doesn’t have to be good at everything either. I told him that in this case he need to pay someone to do for him. If he won’t build the relationships, someone’s got to do it 🙂
Thank you for watching my baby’s video. I knew that a cat owner would pick up on how docile my Sophie is. I know she didn’t move a bit, but that’s how she is. As a matter of fact, all the cats that have touched my life, have been docile as can be that’s why some people have nicked named me the “cat whisperer”. As for treats, my cats never cared for treats, because I just never get them use to it, but she doesn’t eat cat food anyway, she eats chicken, fish and tuna which I mixed with some veggies and cereals for a balanced meal. She is just spoiled everyday! 🙂
Thank you for coming as always 🙂
I bet if he is a friend of yours he is better at building relationships than he realizes 🙂 It all takes time and too many people expect things quickly. They expect because they build a website with products or do a video that it will get people flocking to them. It doesn’t happen that way, Rome wasn’t built in a day. He can develop relationships over time. Those are better than instant friendships any day 🙂 Good luck to him Sylviane.
Lisa invites you to read..Is Your Keyword Density Making A Difference?
Hi Lisa,
Nice to see you here 🙂 It’s true he’s a very nice guy with a good heart, but he is the one saying he’s not good at going on Social Media to build relationships. Truth is that he is not an internet person, but nowadays, whatever you might want to sell you are going to need the internet.
Thanks for your input, Lisa 🙂
Good for you Sylviane!
You gave your friend the best advice. Sometimes it is not easy to do, but being honest and telling it like it is will do more good for him than anything else. The truth hurts sometimes, but we, as responsible marketers, must say it.
It has happened to me too. I had to actually make a checklist for people to go over before I will even get into a marketing strategy.
Of course, relationships are a must!!! I know a few marketers that are low key on the social media platforms, but, they do have a strong relationship marketing strategy via their email lists.
Which ever way we want to sell a product or service, relationships are a MUST!
Great job!
Donna
Donna Merrill invites you to read..Porchfest Ithaca
Hi Donna,
I know my friend is OK with me being bluntly honest, because he knows I have his best interest at heart.
As you mentioned, there are several ways one can build relationship, and as long as they work they are all valid. But we need to pick one at least.
Thanks for adding to this great thread of feedbacks.
The first point got me to think a lot. I always thought this, a video will go viral at its own free will, you have no option to make it go viral. However, as recently as last week i met a marketing women who set out to make a viral video to help stop teenage pregnancy, and well they released it and it went viral.
Obviously as you said, it is the users who make it go viral or not, but at the end of the day, if you plan it to and it does, it is you who has created that incentive for people to share. It is the same as saying that people make a product sell, not the marketing.
As I type this I can see you can look at this from both sides, but the above iks just my 2 cents.
Thanks for the information
Regards,
Simon Duck
Simon Duck invites you to read..A Little Bit of Goals
Hi Simon,
I really appreciate you two cent.
As a matter of fact, in the case of the woman you mentioned here, as a life coach teaching people about the law of attraction, I can also tell you that you can do some meditation and visualization. In other word, “create an intention” to make your video viral and it can if you know what you’re doing. No doubt.
But this is ONLY for those who master that type of stuff. I’m guessing this woman and her team might. But my friend knows close to nothing about such things, and I know that he is NOT ready for this, and neither are most people, that’s why this is NOT applicable to them either.
Thank you for those good points 🙂
Hi Sylviane,
This is a awesome article and a reminder to me for many of the things I’ve been taught. For sure building relationships is critical. I don’t get the thing about cats in a video at all. Why would you do that? Just curious. True only hard work, building relationships and providing good content in videos is what I keep hearing over and over. Maybe since your friend is new to all this, it will take a minute to sink in. I know it did for me. He’s got to get to a point of ‘no excuses’ and he will move forward. Thank you for sharing this for others who are just starting and for reminding us who are still learning what to do and what not to do. Thanks. 🙂
Barbara Charles invites you to read..You Can Be Out Of Business If You Keep Politics in Business
Hi Barbara,
We all keep learning don’t we?
When we had this discussion last week I knew that I had to write a post about this, because I thought, wow, how many people might be thinking just the same things. I’ve got to tell them 🙂
Thank you so much for your input, Barbara 🙂
Hey Sylviane,
Your friend’s lucky he’s getting advice from you. There’s a lot of weirdos out there who would probably make him believe otherwise, and then try to sell him some ridiculous product. 🙄 I’d have to say the 2 biggest things that stood out for me within your article are:
• Usually videos that go viral don’t sell anything, as a matter of fact
• The viewers will decide and help make it viral or not
I agree. I think professional video makers need to take this sort of advice into consideration, and try to do things that’ll orient there videos to being a success. Like for example: say I made one of those ‘viral’ videos that wouldn’t be included in the “one of the viral videos that didn’t sell anything, I’d simply just put the url in the description. BAM, a lot of traffic right there without mentioning the backlink juice.
I think the key to videos these days is to make it funny, insane, crazy, off the wall, sexy, very musical, highly thought out, a good preview picture for the video, and other things that stayed within the guidelines of Youtube (which usually involves, from what I’ve seen for the most part, copyrighted content). I know I’ve seen your Youtube channel and I definitely need to watch more of your videos. Videos are something I know that I’d take pretty seriously because to a professional marketer, they know it takes really awesome videos to really be a success, unless it’s one of those small LOL type of videos. I’m sure you kinda get what I’m saying.
Great advice and enjoyed reading your article. ttyl.
Hey Seth,
You are such an expert at what you know and you just gave an expert comment on how to use videos. I don’t have anything to add to this 🙂
I now use my YouTube channel mainly for my success/law of attraction tips, because that’s what I’m the most knowledgeable at that can work on a video. Yes, I have a few tutorials, but there are so many of those better than mines out there!
Thank you for your excellent feedback, Seth.
Thanks Sylviane. I know there’s different video editing programs that would be wise to use along with putting your website link inside the videos. There’s a good video I found once called “How to Win at Youtube” by Athene. He’s a big gamer I found once when I was doing some research on an old gaming blog I failed like 1 year ago.
I think the most important thing to consider about Youtube are people’s ability to keep watching the video. People know well there are a lot of crappy videos out there. If you have a weak introduction and a bad preview, chances are most of your traffic will just scroll to another video. For your tutorials, I’m sure they’re better than you think. 😉
Talk to you later.
Hi Sylviane!
i like your story and you give the good advice to your friend.i think your friend is good to make a relationship with you. some people have patience and think this work will take a time but some people have no patience they think this work should be complete just in some hours whether the work is long and impossible in some hours.so patience is necessary in every life.so making the relationship take a time.i like your your blog.
thanks for the advice and suggestion.
anshul invites you to read..Software for Hotel
Hi Anshul,
Yes, making relationships and building one’s business does take time, doesn’t it?
Thank you for your feedbacks.
Hi Sylviane,
Oops… I think they are some of mistakes we tend to do as newbies. Not all of ’em but some of them can be pulling us back from the reality. Being on that mindset can get people drowned unwittingly and prevent making more efforts to be successful.
I’m not talking about being negative minded and think nothing gonna work out the way we suppose. But effort and consistency are necessary to learn how to be successful. Failing is a FEATURE too 😉
Cheers…
Mayura invites you to read..How to Set Up a Company Page on LinkedIn
I’ve had my share of failing. 😆
Hi Mayura,
As always nice to see you 🙂
Of course we all make mistakes. I’ve made tons of them in my life, online and offline, but that’s why I love blogging and reading other blogs. We can learn how to get better and better every day!
You have given me food for thought (which is excellent for someone like me who likes to consume a lot, although I sometimes think I need to put my mind on a diet)
Even those whose techniques are incorrect or are no good at relationship building can learn, as long as they are willing and they keep an open mind.
There are a huge amount of resources to help them online as well as really listening to what other people have to say. Some people give up too easily and are not prepared to put in the work that is needed.
Others may work hard and are excellent in some areas. This does not mean they are experts in everything. They too need to listen to advice and continue learning. Taking notice of the experience and knowledge of others can also save us a huge amount of time rather than learning things from scratch ourselves.
Sue Bride invites you to read..Managing Multiple Gmail Accounts
Hi Sue,
I like your expression, “putting your mind on a diet” 🙂 .
Yes, the truth is that we all have to learn and adapt to new facts, new concepts, and new things, and we all have to do things that we are more or less good at. Bottom line, it shouldn’t stop us. We have a fantastic brain, and we need to use it to a maximum to be successful!
Thank you so much for your input 🙂
Hi Sylviane,
I agree with Adrienne that your friend received very good advice from you. It’s definitely true that you can’t make a video go viral – just like the movie, as you note. There’s so much randomness involved people can’t fathom it
The internet offers us a unique way to reach the right people – those that are interested in what we have to say, and yes, ultimately to sell, whatever it is. We don’t need to reach the masses, do we ? Just the right people.
In marketing it’s always a good idea to decide what we can influence and what we can’t. The focus on the things you can influence and let go of the those you can’t influence. We can inflluence the quality of our content for example, and the relationships we build – but we can’t force them to buy from us, not even to read our stuff.
Thanks for sharing your insights.
What did your friend do after they got their lesson ?
Best,
Oliver
Hi Oliver,
Yes, we can only influence people so far. We can’t make them do something they don’t want to do.
Well, my friend gave up the idea that he can make a video viral and adding entertainment that don’t belong. But I know that he will never build relationships online. That I’m pretty sure of 🙂
Thanks for coming by, Oliver
Great advice you gave to your friend, Sylviane! I’m sure that it came like a alarming wake-up call for your friend, but I have to agree with what you said. We can never dictate how the posts or videos we publish will perform. We can do some marketing and promotion to give it a helping hand. But that’s what it is–just a helping hand. After all, if there really was a 100% foolproof marketing scheme or strategy that will make anything viral, then we’d all enjoying every post and video going viral each time we publish one.
Adeline Yuboco invites you to read..How to Save Money While Traveling
Hi Adlele,
Yes, you’ve got a point here. If there was a recipe to make a video viral we’ll all be using it, or at least I know some people who would know that secret by now.
Thanks for your feedbacks and for coming 🙂
Great advice. When I see products that I want to buy, most times its either because I know that person and I want to support them, or its because the value it will give me is something that only interests me. There will always be a product that works or doesn’t work, but if it solves a person’s problem it will be a seller.
Will it go viral? We all wish, but then you might want to have a famous name attached for that to happen, but anything is possible. You have to keep things in perspective and leave your expectations at the door because if it fails, then you give up on everything else.
Sonia invites you to read..How to Schedule Pinterest Pins Fast with Pingraphy
Hi Sonia,
Yes, a lot of sales are made that way. You know the person and they are recommending a product, so you are going to give it a try because you know and trust them.
As far a something going viral, even with a known name attached to it it’s not a given.
Thanks for coming 🙂
Hi Sylviane
Like most others have said you gave your friend good advice.
As you know I worked with Robert Kiyosaki and a bunch of other authors and product creators that we promoted and sold their products in Australia and New Zealand. You can tell your friend that Robert Kiyosaki would not have been a best seller without the relationships he developed.
As promoters we could do so much but he had to show up at all the gigs we organised. The power of Oprah helped!!
Did your friend listen to you?
Great advice.
Sue
Hi Sue,
Very good point you’re making with Robert Kiyosaki, that show that no one is above the fact that relationship is very important to create any kind of success.
Well, my friend does some things with people he already know, but he still doesn’t build new relationships online. I think he never will 🙂
Hi Sylviane, these are some great ideas for article promotion. I struggle with promotion as well, once I get past social networks I am at a lost.
I could try a press release but they are too expensive to do every article. What are your ideas to promote articles everyday?
Hi Michael,
Well, you can do press releases for free, by doing a Google search you can find full lists of them.
If you are talking about promoting your blog/business you can use article directories and web 2.0. That’s what I’m doing. Have you ever used those?
People normally try giving excuses for anything that they are not good at. But I believe that instead of cribbing about their weakness they should actually try to overcome it by learning how to tackle it. Similarly if you are not good at peoples skill then learn about it. Believe me there is nothing in the world that you cannot learn if you put your heart in it.
It was a very amusing and different article. I can understand your frustration. There are people who think they can sell anything in the name of entertainment. It is really irritating to see the tagged link is something which is not even remotely to the information that we were looking for. People should understand they are giving false information when they do such a thing. Bloggers should be really responsible and refrain from doing such a thing.
Peter invites you to read..The Corefront Guarantee
Hi Sylviane,
You are a good friend to help this guy overcome his mislead beliefs. Your are correct that most of your advice is common sense. I never thought about how a video goes viral. Of course it cannot be forced, but I instantly thought of the really popular videos that have reached the viral status. I cannot think of one which was selling a product. As a marketer, my intent to create a product video is to share pertinent information. I never gave it a thought that it would go “viral.”
It sounds like your friend is a “newbie” and that is okay…we’ve all been there. As to not being good at relationships, he better rethink his chosen path of marketing. If he doesn’t want to develop relationships with people, it will be difficult for him. The common responses to this post is the importance of relationships. You summarized it nicely by saying, “If you are not good at building relationships, become a cop or a tax inspector, but do not be trying to make people fall in love with your product. Chances are your success will be limited.” He needs to work on it if he wants to have a successful online business.
“The aim of marketing is to know and understand the customer so well the product or service fits him and sells itself.~Peter Drucker
Raena Lynn
Raena Lynn invites you to read..Skype Traffic Ninja
Hi Raena,
Well, it’s about time that I reply to this comment of yours. When new posts are getting comments and yet older posts keep getting comments too it can get a bit busy, but I love it though.
My friend in question is actually not an internet marketer but he published a hard copy book few months ago and while he did some good work putting the book in a lot of hand, some of such hands are just not the right ones, so to speak. That’s why I told him that he needs to build relationships to be successful with his book, but he is still pretty stubborn that way.
Thanks for your input, Raena!