Yeah, I know. You’re an author with a gift for the written word. You’re a public speaker with the gift of gab. You’re a business or life coach with a talent for bringing out the best in people.
Marketing is something that other people do. It’s something you hire others to do. It’s something you have absolutely no interest in even learning about, much less doing.
I know how you feel . . .
. . . because I used to feel the same way. Until I learned that even if I spent a fortune on marketing agencies or consultants, nobody cared as much about my books, my public speaking topics, or my life-changing coaching abilities than I did. EVEN IF I PAID THEM A BUNCH OF MONEY.
The Quest
So I set out on a quest to find out as much about marketing as I could. Granted, I had previous experience as a public relations director, a direct salesperson and sales trainer, and a university professor specializing in teaching persuasive writing and speaking. But in most of those cases, I had the power of large corporations with huge marketing and advertising budgets to back me up. When I called and said, “I’m so-and-so from Company X,” the person on the other end of the line had usually heard of my company before I called, which automatically created an open door for a conversation.
When I struck out on my own, though, most people had not heard of Lawrence J. Clark, PhD, no matter how much of a legend I was in my own mind.
So how was I going to get the word out about my books, my speaking topics, my coaching, or my amazingly valuable consulting services?
The Discovery
After reading close to a hundred books on the topic, attending a variety of seminars and workshops and conferences, and hiring knowledgeable but expensive coaches, I found that one name and concept kept coming up again and again: Guerrilla Marketing, and its founder, Jay Conrad Levinson.
Levinson was the brainchild behind such household-name brands as The Jolly Green Giant, The Marlboro Man, The Friendly Skies of United, The Pillsbury Dough Boy, and many others. After escaping the rat race of Madison Avenue advertising (think Mad Men) Levinson moved to Berkeley, California and began a quiet life teaching marketing concept to small business owners.
What he found, though, was that the majority of marketing textbooks catered to the multi-million dollar corporations for which he had previously worked, but had little to offer to the struggling small businessperson. So he began compiling notes and handouts for his students, and those notes eventually became the basis for his seminal book, Guerrilla Marketing, published in 1984.
Since that time, the book has sold over 24 million copies, and launched a series of almost 100 books written or co-written by Levinson. And his concepts have been used not only by small businesses, but also by Apple, Microsoft, Dell, Coca-Cola, and a host of others. Unfortunately Levinson passed on in 2013, but his legacy will live on through the many books, articles, and audio and video recordings that he left behind.
My life’s journey has fortunately led me to read a good number of those books, and to also become officially certified as a Guerrilla Marketing Master Trainer, which means I not only have learned to apply the concepts in my own writing, speaking, coaching, and consulting, but am now able to help thousands of other authors, speakers, coaches, consultants, as well as small businesspeople in a variety of industries, to use Guerrilla Marketing concepts to grow their businesses.
So what is Guerrilla Marketing?
Well, Levinson defined it as using unconventional, free, and low-cost methods to grow your business and create profits. That’s the short answer.
Over the next few articles, I will be exploring and explaining several Guerrilla Marketing concepts (there are over 200 Guerrilla Marketing “weapons” in all). Check back often and apply the ones that make sense to your business, and like me, you’ll soon start to appreciate the life, wisdom, concepts, and legacy of the man who brought them all to us, Jay Conrad Levinson. AND make more profits in your business, which wouldn’t be a bad thing, eh?
Dr. Lawrence J. Clark is a specialist in copywriting, sales psychology, and consumer buying behavior, and is a Guerrilla Marketing Master Trainer. To learn more, visit https://thecommunicationleader.com/16-monumental-secrets-of-guerrilla-marketing/ , email lawrence@thecommunicationleader.com , or call 505-585-8594.
