3 Marketing Mistakes That Cost a World Famous Musician $45,000

 Let’s face it, we all have made our fair share of mistakes when it comes to marketing our network marketing business. But in the following story you will discover 3 marketing mistakes that will be absolutely fatal for your business.

Imagine for a moment…

You are a Grammy Award winning musician who has played for royalty and sold-out audiences around the world. You normally get paid over $1,000 dollars per minute, but because of a few marketing mistakes you only earn $32 for a 45 minute performance.

This really happened.

Fortunately it didn’t happen by accident, but was an experiment conducted by The Washington Post in 2007.

What was the purpose of this experiment?

To find out if people when they are busy and distracted would notice that something special is taking place, would they be paying attention?

Grammy Award winner Joshua Bell, one of the most talented musicians in the world, was to play a 45 minute concert in a D.C. subway station at the most busiest time of the day –early morning.  This wasn’t an ordinary street musician. People would fly all over the world to listen to him play. He even played in front of royalty and sold millions of CDs.

On this particular morning he was playing one of the most elegant pieces ever written and he was playing it on a 300 year old Stradivarius valued at $3.5 million dollars and often referred to as the most perfect instrument in existence today.

Watch this! You won’t believe what happened.

Joshua Bell played for 45 minutes. Over 1,000 people walked by him, not even giving him the time of day. Only 7 people stopped to listen.

That would normally have been a $45,000 performance. Instead he only earned $32.

Wow!

From over a thousand people who walked by, there was only one single person who recognized him and said hello. That’s incredible, given his talent and fame!

That’s less than a 1% conversion ratio.

There is a valuable lesson to be learned here about marketing mistakes.

Although this experiment wasn’t meant as a marketing lesson in particular, there’s one in there. A big one! From a marketing point of view, Joshua Bell’s concert in the subway was a complete and absolute disaster.

1) First, his timing was totally off.

At morning rush hour, people are preoccupied and busy. They have only one thing on their mind…their destination, which usually is work.

2) He performed for the wrong target market.

People in a subway usually aren’t the right audience for classical music. And if there were a select few, like the lady who recognized him, they certainly wouldn’t expect a musician of such magnitude as Joshua Bell to perform a concert there. He was totally out of place.

3) No branding.

Nobody knew who he was. No signs, no flyers, no posters, no announcements or third party introductions. Nothing!

What can you learn from these marketing mistakes?

1) Timing is everything!

People are busy. Your fellow networkers are busy. So if you want their undivided attention you have to give some thought to when the best time for your marketing will be.

According to 60 Second Marketer the best day of the week to send out email campaigns is Friday. What a coincidence, I have found this to be the best day to send out blog posts as well.

2) You have to target the right market for your product or service.

Just revisit the example above. Out of over 1,000 people, only 1 person recognized Joshua Bell. If you market to the masses, you will yield the same results.  Not good and very expensive on top of it.

Think about the junk mail that comes through your inbox or in your postal mail box. It is clearly not targeted to a specific niche, is it? It’s a total waste of advertising dollars. You have a much greater chance of making a sale if you target a specific niche, people who search for and want your products or service.

3) Branding is key!

If you want to be successful in your network marketing business then branding is Key. For one, you want to differentiate yourself from your competition. Stand out from the crowd! Be different. Make a name for yourself. You are uniquely YOU and you want to convey that to your audience with your unique selling point.

In time, people will get to know you and connect with you because you have what they want. They will recognize you by your brand and they will recommend and refer you to others.

Do you agree that making these 3 marketing mistakes can absolutely be fatal for your business? I always love your feedback so please leave your thoughts in the comments below.

To Your Success…

Ilka Flood
The Enlightened Networker

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