Internet Marketing Digital_marketing_for_dummies | Page 348

Asking Prospects for Too Much, Too Soon
Imagine that a nice, good-looking, successful guy walks into a bar and immediately
proposes marriage to the first single woman he sees. Although she may want to get
married someday, and from a pure “feature set” perspective he’s a good catch, that doesn’t
mean she’s ready to commit to him. And it doesn’t mean that she wants to commit to a
marriage right now.
This idea seems super obvious when we put it in terms of human relationships, but for
some reason, we often “propose marriage” (ask prospects for a major commitment) too
early when marketing. Your business might be marketing Business to Consumer (B2C) or
Business to Business (B2B), but every business is actually marketing Human to Human
(H2H).
As a result, the offers you make to prospects and existing customers should progress in the
same way that people develop normal, healthy human relationships. Human relationships
go through a process, and the same is true of businesses and their customers. How can you
structure the offers you make to prospects and new leads in a way that helps them progress
through the relationship?