In this episode I interview New York Times best selling author Jay Baer and learn why we need to be creating Youtility. This is a great reframe from the old story of Moments of Truth and Wow customer service. Jay has documented excellent examples of how companies (some tiny, some huge) can help customers instead of hyping to them.

This isn’t all about Zappos, Amazon, and Apple. These are very cool examples we can model in our own business (even though we don’t have a COO or marketing department).

He defines 3 types of marketing:

1. Top of mind marketing as traditional outbound marketing (think billboards and print advertising).

2. Frame of mind is inbound marketing. This works, but is limited to attracting people already looking for what you have.

3. Friend of mine is all about being useful (hint: this is Youtility). You are so helpful that your clients will pay attention to you and be an advocate for you.

And there are 3 ways to delivery Youtility:

1. Self-serve information. Let your customer see how you create your solutions (“People want to see the sausage being made.”)

2. Radical transparency. Be proactive and let them know about your shortcomings (McDonald’s Canada offers “Our food, your questions” hotline).

3. Real time relevancy. Always be listening and asking questions, change what you offer to best match your market’s needs quickly (think: Facebook, Twitter, blogging.)

Youtility ties in content marketing theory with ideas around customer retention. Plus it’s a fun read. Taxi Mike is just a taxi driver in Banff, Alberta who does one thing differently from his competition that sets him apart. Columbia Sportswear created a free app What knot to do in the great outdoors that is pure fun (if you are into knots like me).

Here are some insights I had from Jay’s book.

I can’t do enough and I have to be focussed on a consistent approach. Yes, I can be on Twitter, run a client survey, and update Facebook 2X a day, and blog like a mad man. But should I? The #2 source of leads to my website are from LinkedIn – so, obviously, I need to be there. I also know that Facebook is starting to work for me and my emails and webinars always get a strong response. Rather than have a long list of “should do’s” I need to have a short list of jobs that publish helpful information every week.

I need to listen and respond to my customers. I already invest in learning at every live event and I could be doing more on-line to periodically reach out and learn from my list. Meet up groups and promoting more comments on my podcast and blogs will give me great information to work from. Plus I need to spend more time looking at our analytics, starting with Google analytics on our web sites.

Great lines from this interview:

“If you sell someone you create a customer for the day. If you help someone you create a customer for life.”

“You have to give away information snacks to sell knowledge meals.”

“People want to see the sausage being made.”

“Be massively useful.”

“Nobody goes to Google and thinks ‘surprise me, I don’t know what I want’”

Links in this episode:

Youtility  – book

Meeting Burner - host your webinars and teleseminars

Mind Meister - be brilliant first, then present later.

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