THE POWER OF DECODING THE CUSTOMER BUYING IMPULSE

It’s no surprise that we are in the middle of an economic slump right now. The majority of the retail sector has taken a beating. With major corporations like Circuit City filing bankruptcy and calling it quits, it is apparent that consumers are gripping their wallets tightly.

But right in the middle of the doom and gloom, certain niche markets are exploding. While most retailers feel the pinch from their once-loyal clientele staying at home and not spending money, those same people are spending money like there is no tomorrow in other areas. What is it that motivates these same cash-strapped individuals to run out and spend their money on certain other things as if money is no factor at all?

Its due to the fact that someone figured out their buying impulse hot button. When you hit the buying impulse hot button (BIHB), the wallets fly out and the purses snap open at super subconscious speed, almost in an involuntary reaction manner. The people who decode the buying impulse and then push the BIHB are the ones stuffing money in their pockets while everyone else whines about the recession. It’s a fact.

But this is nothing new. In fact, the Bible tells us that there’s nothing new under the sun. This same concept has been used for good and evil since time began. The snake in the garden used the BIHB to get Eve to eat the apple. Moses used the BIHB to get his people to follow him when he led his people out of captivation. Hitler used the BIHB to convince his formerly WWI war-torn citizens to follow him on his quest to world domination. I could go on and on, but you get the point.

Activation of the BIHB is what is behind people spending money to buy things they can’t afford, even when it is to impress people they can’t stand. Something drives them to impulsively and subconsciously come to an immediate buying decision regardless of what logical thinking would say otherwise.

If you decode the customer buying impulse (CBI) for your target market, and then act upon it by hitting the BIHB, you will stuff MONEY into your pocket.

More on the CBI and BIHB later. Stay tuned. You won’t want to miss this.

Carlton Flowers
Social Media Marketing Consultant

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THE “LOCAL SEARCH” SECRET – LEARN IT, OR GET LEFT IN THE DUST!

Social Media Marketing is catching on in Central Missouri. There are
companies in Jefferson City who are now capitalizing on snatching up
the attention of the local market. Why? Because of the hot new trend
among consumers, which is LOCAL SEARCH.

What is “local search”, you ask? This is what people are doing instead
of picking up a copy of the Yellow Pages. We used to flip through the
big phone book to find a dentist, doctor, chiropractor, or local auto
repair shop. But now, studies show that people are sitting down in
front of their computers to find local businesses by typing in the
keyword terms along with their local township, and state.

For example, a person looking for a local chiropractor would type in
“chiropractic doctor Jefferson City Missouri” to find a practitioner in
our home town. This now yields targeted results, and Google even
provides a map right there on the search results.

With local search becoming a new habit for consumers, it is no longer
necessary to spend thousands of dollars to optimize websites on a
national scale. Instead, local businesses can optimize their sites by
doing basic SEO work (that stands for “search engine optimization”)
along with a social media marketing campaign strategy to land on page 1
of their local market.

The “Web 2.0 SMO Guide” is coming out soon, which will provide local
business owners and professionals a top-secret step-by-step process
that will allow them to secure page 1 of Google within 24 hours. But
time is of the essence. The best results will occur for those that
snatch up the search terms in their sector before their competitors.

Personal training will be provided along with my proprietary guide to
help your local business get the results you need to conquer page 1 on
Google for your market. But remember, it’s the leaders that will stand
to benefit the greatest!

If you have questions or would like more information, call me at (573) 893-9498
or write carlton.flowers@gmail.com and I will be glad to provide you
with a free analysis and consultation for your business. I look forward
to hearing from you!

Carlton

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HAVE YOU CONSIDERED PLR GIVEAWAYS FOR MARKETING YOUR BRAND?

I recently had this question from a Twitter friend: “@naomadoriguzzi: @carltonf so what is a good twitter give-away?” I gave a short answer, but then decided that this was such a good question, I needed to ramble on more than the standard 140 Twitter Post Characters on this subject!

I’ve been talking about PLR products for a while now. But for those not “in-the-know”, PLR stands for “Private Label Rights”. This is usually in reference to articles, guides, or eBooks that you can purchase and sell as your own. There are numerous sources of PLR products that you can obtain for a fee, or even for free, and they are often used as giveaways to build a marketing presence.

To answer the question presented by @naomadoriguzzi, PLR products do make great giveaways, but my recommendation is to give them a “work-over” before giving them away.

First, you should proofread the entire article or eBook that you are wanting to use as a giveaway, correcting all of the obvious grammatical errors. Second, check up on any references, and make sure that the information presented is accurate and relevant. Third, give the PLR product a “facelift”. Not only should you spruce up the article or eBook with some nice custom graphics, but you should also take advantage of the opportunity to “brand” the item with your business or service that you provide at the very end.

By giving away the eBook or article, you will be helping others by providing usable information that helps to solve a particular problem or challenge. You will also be able to start spreading your brand and increasing your visibility among your colleagues. That’s a win-win situation for everyone.

The next time someone needs your product or great service that you provide, they will remember that you shared a resourceful article with them, and your “brand” will stick in their mind. You can take it a step further and provide a guide or reference sheet that might be used on a regular basis, which will keep your picture in front of your prospective clients. This is the theory behind real estate agents getting business cards made for refridgerator magnets.

This is an excellent low-cost method of promoting and marketing, and allows you to keep top-of-mind presence with your audience. Find a few PLR products, work them over, brand them with your identity, and re-release them. It’s that easy. Good luck, and happy re-branding!

Carlton Flowers

Social Media Marketing Consultant

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HOW TO CRUSH YOUR COMPETITION USING SOCIAL MEDIA MARKETING & SEO

Missouri small businesses, organizations, and corporations, I have good news for you… I have added yet another weapon in the arsenal. In addition to social media marketing strategy, search engine optimization, and the SMO 2.0 guide, I now have an expert programmer and SEO guru!

My “special agent” is a highly intelligent young man with a strong programming background, possibly one of the best in the country. He can program in all major languages, including the new popluar “PHP”. He also is a seasoned veteran in search engine optimization, website redesign, website construction, servers, hosting, and just about anything else related to technology.

But back to the subject… crushing the competitors in your sector. I can’t stress enough how critical it is that business owners optimize their web presence through SEO. Equally as important, you MUST back up your optimized site with a strong social media campaign. If you do this now, you will leave your competitors in the dust.How so, you ask? Let me give you an example…

When I mention athletic shoes, what is the first brand name that comes to mind? If you said Nike, you answered like 90% or more of the general population. Putting aside marketing, advertisements, quality, design, and everyting else Nike has done to perfection, what is the main reason that they have top-of-mind brand identity? It’s simple… they were the FIRST ON THE SCENE.

There’s nothing anyone will ever be able to do to unseat Nike as the first to pop on the athletic shoe scene, becoming the first household name in this field. As long as they don’t have a major meltdown and screw up their image and reputation, they will not be unseated.

YOU have the same opportunity right now, more than ever, to set your mark as the “top-of-mind” source for your product or service in your sector. The greatest news is the fact that most people are resting on their laurels, waiting for the masses to make a move.

This is the exact time that leaders leaders take full advantage. It is what sets them apart. Fairly soon, most of your competitors will be rubbing their heads wishing they could turn back the clocks and establish themselves as the leaders on the social media forefront. But by then, it will be too late.

This is your 1-shot chance to dominate! Stay tuned for my real-world example of how I have capitalized on this opporutnity for my very own business. Until then, action is the word!

Carlton Flowers
573-893-9498
carlton.flowers@gmail.com

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Twitter Marketing Hits the Radar of Missouri Businesses

Since the fall of 2008, I’ve been doing a lot of my own social media marketing prognostication. But now it appears that the predictions of the social media experts are starting to materialize, albiet slowly. The corporate “groundhog” is finally peeking his head out the hole, looking for his social media shadow. The result? He didn’t see it, because the impending social media marketing boom is shining down so brightly. That means the arrival of the social media marketing revolution will come earlier than we thought.

In the corporate world, people are now talking at the water cooler. They are asking each other, “what in the world is this ‘Twitter’ thing all about? Don’t we need to be learning how it could affect or enhance our business?” Twitter has been in the news so much recently that you would have to be hiding your head under a rock not to realize that it has infiltrated corporate america and society as a whole.

But now that corporate employees and leaders are scratching their heads wondering what to do next about the fact that a social network like Twitter can mean the difference in dominating their market, the fun truly begins! Previously, talk about Twitter and social media marketing fell upon deaf ears, even though many Fortune 500 companies like Dell, Apple, and Amazon.com have long since proven its viability and positive impact. But that day has passed. Any competent business leader will have to admit that social media marketing is a must, even if they have very little knowledge of how to implement a workable campaign.

I have paid special attention to the local scene as this trend develops, particularly in Central Missouri. Among the Missouri corporations doing some serious head-scratching, for example, are companies like State Farm, and Shelter Insurance, neither of which have made the first move to conquer and corner the social media market for their sector.

I’ve recently been blogging about my very own creation, “Twitter Turbo”. Its a seminar product geared towards local businesses, corporations, and sales professionals on how to capitalize on the impending paradigm shift in marketing. Twitter Turbo is not only a grassroots fundamental social media marketing guide, but additionally gives highly advanced techniques that gives the trainee the ability to conquer their competition and own their market or sector.

We now see that phase one of the social media marketing revolution has passed, which is the general awareness of its existence by professionals and business owners. We now enter phase 2, where we will see the bold pioneers of each sector jump out to stake their claim in the social media frontier, thus leaving their competitors in the dust.

As I sit, I wonder, “which corporations will be the first to ring my phone for help?”

Only time will tell, but I already have a feeling who the leaders will be…

Stay tuned to find out!

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Here’s another short family video (more coming soon) of me and my son Scott. He’s the oldest of the 4. We were out in Holts Summit at the farm I grew up on, cutting wood for the outdoor furnace that heats my parents’ house. You can see the old farm house in the background that we first lived in before we built the house I grew up in. But anyhow, this is how you take care of business… “Country Style!”

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I’ve got to share this little family video with you. It was my wife’s 42nd birthday today, and we celebrated by going out to eat at her favorite dining spot in town, “Ria’s”. About a week ago, while she was busy with Parent-Teacher Conference time, me and the little ones (Christian & Sydney) kidnapped one of her many pigs from the mantle (also known as the “Pig Shrine”) to take it into town for a little project. We visited my cake artist friend Kelly, so she could take pictures and study the pig to make a Piggy cake!

As you can see in the video, the Piggy cake turned out exceptionally well. I didn’t expect it to look as much like the porcelain version as it did. Kelly did a spectacular job on it, as she usually does, and it was a big hit with the family. We enjoyed the dinner, and had “pork chops” for dessert! It was a great birthday for my wife, and I just had to share it with you!

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