I have noticed that a lot of the social media gurus such as Mari Smith and Amy Porterfield have started to be a lot more obvious with their social media selling. On Mari’s webinar there was a lot of selling being done for a new Facebook course she is selling and the same with a recent Amy Porterfiled webinar.

I know we have all got to eat and I don’t have a problem with this approach but in her webinar last night Mari was telling her audience that we should not be afraid to monitise social media by using strong calls to action, as social media audiences were becoming more mature.

My discussion topic is this! As established social media gurus with massive fan numbers and engagement already I can see this strategy working for them and whilst their fans may be mature users of social media, I found myself wondering if this approach was suitable for the small business that was perhaps just starting out on the social media journey. Is this not moving away from content marketing and moving back towards more traditional approaches to marketing.

I would love to hear from other group memberbers to see if this move to monetisation is a trend that others are observing and is it appropriate for all businesses to adopt! 

@fredericgonzalo Thanks for your observations! I have watched a number of Mari’s webinars in the past and I did feel that the selling was a bit OTT but then maybe that is just because I have attended previous webinars where it has been all about the content without the sales angle thrown in. Perhaps new viewers (and I get the impression the webinar was being pitched at social media newbies) would not notice anything out of the ordinary in this. I also noticed a similar thing on a recent Amy Porterfield webinar (but then Amy has always had a stronger sales focus).

In her webinar last night Mari mentioned Hubspot as a great example of how they are monetising SM so I checked again by downloading one of their latest e-books and right-enough at the end there is a pitch for a free trial of their paid-for service. These three things together got me wondering if this was an emerging trend.

@dongrandy Hi Don, I have not come across Lori before. Who is she?

@chatmarketing @fredericgonzalo @dongrandy @debbielynnava

Great thread guys! I have mixed opinions here – and I didn’t attend Mari’s webinar last night (but I do have a tab open with the replay to watch later), but it seems to me that they’ve established this really, really great reputation and shouldn’t necessarily need to give the hard-sell, especially when we know and love them for their great content and very soft-sell. @dongrandy may be right, maybe they’re feeling squeezed… but they’re the masters so I doubt that they should.
Then another part of me says they’ve given their free content, established their expertise, so maybe now it’s their time to maximize on their revenue… but not if they will be upsetting, disappointing or turning their fans off…

@rich-brooks I agree with you. You said it best: charge for the webinar, then there should not be any sales pitch. Maybe that’s why Mari’s webinar was so sales-driven yesterday – because it was a free webinar.

Nevertheless, if you position yourself as an expert and, smoothly pitch at the end (or beginning) that you have a book, or ebook, or do consulting on this matter, that should be enough in itself to get some leads, assuming the content provided during the webinar was useful to the audience.

Shortly after posting my reply earlier today on this thread, I received an email from Mari Smith as follow-up after the webinar. Act before midnight to get bonus material… Sheesh, a bit more and I am expecting “phone operators are waiting for your call, please call now to take advantage of this time-sensitive offer!!”…

Too much, IMHO.

Hey, sorry about the incorrect name used earlier, I meant Mari not Lori.  I think Amy and Mari are excellent faciltators and their product knowledge is amazing. 

I do expect to get pitched at some point but not over the top.  As mentioned before, the topic could be covered in less time by cutting out some chatter leaving lots of time for Q & A  and a sales pitch at the end.

I consider myself a newbe to social media and joined Mari’s webinar yesterday –  disappointed. While she was delightful and I love her accent, there was very little info. I was hoping for so much more on the timeline changes and solid suggestions. Not a sales pitch. 

A good business person identifies a need or burning desire and creates the product that will solve that person’s problem.

If you can show people how your product will solve their problem, you don’t even have to pitch… they rush to buy. The key is to mentally focus on the customers’ needs while you speak. All good businesses satisfy needs. People gladly trade money for solutions.

I’ve sat through presentations where I didn’t even know I was being pitched and rushed to the back to buy. I’ve sat through others where I gained no valuable content and knew this was a blatant attempt to get me to pay the speakers’ bills.

Let me toss this out there.

I attend an Entrepreneurs for Christ Club at a San Diego church and they teach you to do business God’s way. My 80+ mentor tells me… it’s not about money. Focus on meeting needs and providing service, and the money will follow. Focus on the money and down you go.

People can smell the difference.

When you need to pay bills sometimes that’s hard but my mentor is so right… the truth is serving your customers is very gratifying. I did a 180 after attending that club and I can see a big difference, not just in sales but in my personal gratification.

The key with presentations, is to get inside the head of the audience and find out what they need… then show them you know that you know your stuff. Give them enough good content that they feel they traded their time for valuable info. Some will like it so much that they want more.

This is easy to describe and oh so hard to do. I’ve been brilliant and pitiful. We all have good and bad days. Such a fine line to walk but to me it’s about about attitude and mindset.

Hi Everyone,

Thanks very much for your comments on this issue! I just wanted to clarify a couple of points. Firstly I am a big Mari fan and have bought her two books and very much enjoyed watching her webinars in the past.

My observation was just that recently I have noticed that more and more presenters (including Mari) seem to be shifting away from the content minus the pitch (content marketing) to a more sales orientated approach. 

I am not even necessarily saying that there is anything wrong with this approach but I do question whether this model would work for less well-known speakers who have not already built up a massive fan-base. Leading from that I ask myself another question, is this a model we should be trying or should we be concentrating on building our fan base before attempting such a strategy?

I recently took part in a LinkedIn webinar with Lewis Howes and again there was a pitch at the end but the content that came before it was so useful that it did not seem to be such a hard-sell and I think that is the key for those of us that want to go down this route. Getting the right balance between content and selling is absolutely crucial.

Having just read Mike Selzner’s book ‘Launch’, I would love to hear his comments on this subject! Is there a subtle departure from the content marketing approach written about in the book?

@Jennifer Swanson… I find that folks will buy a lot even when you don’t pitch if your content is really good. We all struggle to find the balance. It’s an inexact science.

The good thing is to attend webinars now and then to see how it feels on the other side.

@donpurdum Hi Don, I am with you on the young company thing! I am in exactly the same boat as you and want to concentrate on building an audience first. If you have not read Mike’s book yet, I am sure it would be right up your street.