What a Wonderful Response — THANK YOU ALL !
Thanks to every one of you who gave the time and care to take seriously the idea that most of traditional marketing language does not work in the Soft Sell market.
You agree that we must create new language to accurately and authentically reflect what we uniquely believe and feel marketing is and how we want to practice it.
And Judith and I have enjoyed every single one of your entries in our “Drive Traffic” Replacement Contest! And we’ll have a lot more to say once the winner is selected.
But for now, here is the list of entries.
community ………….. guests ………….. potential connections ………….. touches or contacts
trusting relationships ………….. visitor ………….. friend ………….. potential partners
connections ………….. prospect ………….. potential ………….. ideal clients ………….. contribution
associate ………….. footprint ………….. interested seekers ………….. authentic associates
people ………….. participants ………….. riders ………….. guest list …………..
community members ………….. interest ………….. tourists ………….. honored guest …………..
comrade ………….. company ………….. Soft-Sell Vanguard ………….. prospectors …………..
flow ………….. mirror
As we said “We’ll choose what we think are the best three and we’ll have everybody vote.”
So here are our choices:
prospectors ………….. potential partners ………….. ideal clients
Please enter your vote in the Comment Box below - and we’d love to hear your reasoning.
The Deadline for Voting is Sunday August 24th at Noon PST.
Once the voting is complete we will announce the winner Sunday evening.
Then on Monday we will share with you why we chose the 3 finalists and not the others.
AND remember, the winner will receive -
** The MP3 audio files and PDF transcripts of a 2- hour discussion on “The Basics of Keywords” that I (Jim) enjoyed developing with Matt Aaron, a Google Pay Per Click Pro.
Because It’s All in the Connection,
Jim
August 22nd, 2008 at 5:25 pm
I personally think “prospectors” fits best with the rest of your soft sell approach.
Count 1 for PROSPECTORS
-Jae
August 22nd, 2008 at 5:32 pm
I personally think the “potential partners” is a great choice.
I see the relationship with others as a partnership because without the other there is no relationship.
1 for POTENTIAL PARTNERS
MaryRose Regan
1-866-310-3348(EFit)
www.EFitInstitute.com
August 22nd, 2008 at 5:32 pm
I vote for ‘prospectors’. I loved it the first time I heard Jim and Judith speak and I love it now. That’s what they really are…………love it! I had a great one yesterday and she’s now a client of mine. Amazingly like-minded to me…..love it!
Anna Banana
August 22nd, 2008 at 6:11 pm
Of the three, I pick “prospectors” because they are beginning to seek and pan for soft-sell gold. The other entries suggest a different different level of relationship with BH&M.
- Signe, VODKAA Process with a Twist
August 22nd, 2008 at 6:11 pm
Another vote for prospectors.
August 22nd, 2008 at 7:04 pm
“Prospects” reminds me of gold diggers. I like to visulize “ideal clients.”
Thank you for bringing this to our awareness!
August 22nd, 2008 at 8:09 pm
While I get the alliteration of the prospectors, it still sounds too much like “I see you as a walking wallet and I want your money” because the term prospect is normally used to define a potential buyer.
If you are doing relationship marketing, then partners seems to fit better.
August 22nd, 2008 at 8:35 pm
I vote for potential partners. I like the idea that each person represents a partnership with potential.
August 22nd, 2008 at 10:41 pm
Definately IDEAL CLIENTS. Prospecting has that feel of feeling around trying to find something, which may or may not be fruitful. We need to be clear on exactly who our ideal clients are and focus specifically on what they need. Then we will recieve a flood of traffic from IDEAL CLIENTS. Isn’t that what we really want??
Krishna
http://www.healthpracticesuccess.com
August 22nd, 2008 at 11:45 pm
Ideal Clients, hands down. Those are the people who I want coming to my business. They are the ones who read what I have to say and “get” how they can benefit and because of that, we are a perfect fit. namaste
August 22nd, 2008 at 11:53 pm
My input…prospectors
August 23rd, 2008 at 5:16 am
I like prospectors too. But I know you have already counted your votes! There is something bright about this word - like someone actively looking for precious things. Traffic sounds very metallic - like a thing instead of a nice person. Much better to imagine someone hoping to find a precious jewel!
August 23rd, 2008 at 7:06 am
I vote for “potential partners” as this is what in essence we are all really looking for. All “traffic” can’t possibly be “ideal clients” as some of them would only be lookie-looks or just not fit requirements, and “prospectors” sounds too much like gold diggers to me. The word alone irritates me for some reason.
Namaste
Paul
August 23rd, 2008 at 7:32 am
None of them. Prospectors as others have commented has the connotation of people panning for gold, looking for something that may or may not be present.
Potential partners - Big stretch for me. Some clients, customers whatever you want to call people who buy from me aren’t my partners, and many, many of them will stay customers as they should. While they may be like minded as to have been attracted to me - I don’t feel like most would wind up being partners.
Ideal Clients - while you would hope that you attract only these the truth is that some people that visit your site won’t be ideal clients. So, this sounds like just an attempt to use a nice sounding euphemism that doesn’t really ring true.
I agree that the term traffic is offensive - but I think you’re swinging the pendulum of vocabulary too far in the opposite direction with your choices.
August 23rd, 2008 at 8:25 am
The idea behind traffic is people visiting your site to see if the information is there that they are searching for-the best translation, and what I believe people are doing, is prospecting. People are visiting the site looking for those gold nuggets of information that will give them the answers they are looking for–my vote is prospectors.
August 23rd, 2008 at 10:15 am
potential partners
August 23rd, 2008 at 10:29 am
I will log another vote for potential partners as it is still the essence of what I suggested. I just avoided using the word partner, as it is a word already used often and over a pretty broad range of types of relationships.
Still says the same things to me.
August 23rd, 2008 at 1:00 pm
I vote for ‘potential partners’ because it has the sense of working ‘with’ someone - not them working ‘for’ you (like ideal clients) or hunting someone down (like prospectors). It helps me visualize them as partners - what better way to start a working relationship! Just my 2 cents.
August 23rd, 2008 at 5:09 pm
I vote for Ideal Clients