PAGE 8 • Disc Jockey News • JUNE 2015
Everyone Will Love You - The Three Cs By Jason Spencer
Perhaps the most influential Greek philosopher out there is Aristotle. He was also a brilliant teacher, and his lessons can be found in a book called Rhetoric. By definition, rhetoric is the art of improving upon the ability to inform, persuade, or motivate particular audiences in specific situations. Aristotle considered it a counterpart to both logic and politics. His book teaches that the most powerful tool of persuasion is ethos, or image. If people love you, they’ll follow you anywhere and do what you ask of them. Aristotle taught that a compelling character is more persuasive than perfect logic. Even research today shows that just 5% of our buying decisions are based on logic. In other words, image trumps logic. So how can we apply Aristotle’s Rhetoric teachings to our businesses or everyday life? It can be summed up in just three words: Caring, Craft, and Cause. CARING means your audience – customers, colleagues, family, friends – believe you have their best interest at heart. Remember the movie Jerry Maguire? Five minutes into the film, Jerry (played by
Tom Cruise) recalls the words of his great sports agent mentor saying, “The key to this business is personal relationships.” He then continues with his epiphany. “Fewer clients. Less money. More attention. Caring for them, caring for ourselves and the games, too.” Aristotle called Caring eunoia (youNOY-ah). Loose translation: selflessness. In persuasion, the important thing is not just to be selfless, but also to convince your audience that you truly are. When was the last time you overheard someone say “I’ve always gone the extra mile for my clients”? When it comes to entertainment, Randy Bartlett describes it best – that our “job is to help people have one of the greatest days of their lives.” He says that your motivation must be to do whatever you can to make this event the best that it can be. Being CRAFTY is about knowing your stuff and making your audience know you do. A crafty individual knows the difference between following the rules and truly choosing wisely. This is your MacGyver moment. Apollo 13 is a movie, but based on a real historical event. When the flight malfunctioned in space, NASA engineers had to literally fit a square peg into a round hole. In producing a working CO2 scrubber, they used only what they had on board, including the cover of the flight manual. It really doesn’t get much more symbolically crafty than that! The word phronesis (fro-NEE-sis) is Aristotelian for Craft. Its literal transla-
Annual Marketing Calendars By Justin Miller
Greetings from the newest contributor to Disc Jockey News. I ran into John Young at Photo Booth Expo in Las Vegas while I was there speaking on marketing and we thought it would be a good fit to share some of the info here in DJN. My b a c k ground is that of a DJ. I started when I was 14 and now own (but do not work events for) one of the largest companies in the Quad City area in Illinois and Iowa. While I enjoyed DJing, my real passion was always the business of it all and overcoming those challenges. How to get new leads, new customers, higher ticket sales, more referrals, etc. I have a Masters degree in Business as well, but most of my advice for you comes from the trenches of operating an event company as my sole source of income since my teens. Lately, my time is devoted to my passion at Profit 911 Business Consulting where I help others overcome business challenges. In every article I will be writing for the Disc Jockey News, it will be my goal to provide you actionable ideas that you can take and apply immediately to make more money in your business. As they say, on with the show… One of the most important business management documents in our event business is the annual marketing calendar. The concept is simple, but too many small business owners leave their marketing to chance and memory instead of plotting it out ahead of time. At the macro level you plot out each promotion, each sales letter,
each postcard, etc that you want to send throughout the year. At the micro level, the calendar includes each step and deadline that needs to be hit in order for the promotion to go smoothly. For the DJ business this is a very natural fit as we tend to deal with “seasons” such as wedding season, homecoming season, holiday party season, etc. The problem is that by the time the season rolls around, if you did not do your marketing in advance, chances are that you have a slow or empty calendar, and it is too late to do anything about it. Despite the fact that these seasons occur every year at the same time, the entrepreneur gets busy and “forgets.” As a DJ, we wear a lot of hats and oftentimes the marketing gets put aside as it does not seem to be as urgent a priority as the wedding coming up this weekend. The truth is that in the long run the marketing is more important and you must excel in all areas to keep growing your business. Let’s take a look at what details should be on the calendar for each promotion. For this example, let’s use promotion for corporate holiday parties. The third week in January we schedule follow-up calls and letters to rebook clients we just worked with. We also mail letters to clients we worked with in previous years but not this year (might have wanted something different, cancelled party, or hired someone else and been dissatisfied). Deadlines must be put on the calendar for when to mail the letters, when they need to be sent to the print company, when you should start writing them, etc. In July, we will then begin mailing postcards to generate new leads for holiday parties. Items on the marketing calendar for these postcards include deadlines for: designing postcard, upload to print house, mail date, etc. Each step needs to be clearly marked so that each deadline is hit and you get the results you are looking for. Our company will continue to mail to good potential leads every 3 or 4 weeks
tion: Practical wisdom. Aristotle thought that practical wisdom was the key to happiness, and he was right. Crafty people know when and how to bend the rules. Crafty people know how to improvise. Craft means fine-tuning solutions to specific problems. When consulting with your clients, I always encourage two types of listening: Active listening to learn what truly matters to them (what they are saying), and perceptive listening to read between the lines (what they are thinking). The next time someone asks you a question, throw out your industry rulebook and simply answer with, “that depends.” Where is the best place to deliver toasts? That depends on the room, the lighting, and if the guests are seated or standing. What’s the best client management system (CRM) on the market? That depends on the business. CAUSE is your audience’s belief that you stand for something larger. You share their values and represent them perfectly. In 1883, the United States Marine Corps adopted the motto “Semper Fidelis.” A Latin phrase, it stands for “always faithful,” and guides Marines to remain faithful to the mission, to each other, to the Corps, and to their country – no matter what. Aristotle believed cause to be Arête (AR-uh-tay), or “virtue” – behavior showing high moral standards. A great cause embodies the values of the audience. In Jerry Maguire, when Jerry is on the phone and asks what he can do for Rod Tidwell (Cuba Gooding, Jr.), Rod’s response is
“It’s a very personal, very important thing. Hell, it’s a family motto…” Like Jerry Maguire, you need to discover the most important thing to you – or rather, the cause that will make your audience love you. A good cause is summed up in just a couple of words. Rod’s cause? “Show me the money.” So, let’s beef up your ethos. Perform a character check on your website copy, your emails, sales meetings, even that elevator pitch you’ve been tossing around for a while now. Search for elements of Caring, Craft, and Cause. Really show where you’ve gone the extra mile for your clients. Don’t just list achievements, show innovative solutions to specific problems, and make sure to state a cause that appeals to your target market. Eventually you’ll find yourself trying to balance Caring, Craft, and Cause in your daily life. People will love you for it. This article was inspired by the bestselling book Thank You for Arguing: What Aristotle, Lincoln, and Homer Simpson Can Teach Us About the Art of Persuasion, by author Jay Heinrichs. Jason Spencer is a Certified Profit First Professional Business Coach with over 20 years events industry experience as a wedding master of ceremonies, disc jockey, lighting designer, and ordained minister. He is the owner of Spencer Weddings and Entertainment in Northern California, and can be reached at 916264-9777 or via email at jasonspencer@ discjockeynews.com.
for several months. Each of those mailings have additional details on the calendar. Other promotions we have on our calendar include: employee recruitment campaigns, monthly newsletters, bridal shows, prom promo, banquet hall referral campaigns, homecoming promo, black Friday sale, chamber of commerce promo, lost client campaign, thanksgiving cards, valentine’s day promo, and a ton of others. It should be obvious that if this was not all plotted out with deadlines in advance, chances are half of these things would never happen. Every single one of these campaigns are profitable for us, so without the annual marketing calendar we
are missing out of work and money in the bank. As you may imagine, your marketing calendar may start to get packed with a lot of ‘to dos’. That’s a good things as those tasks lead to sales. Take a moment to look in your business at what you have done in the past for promotions that have worked and any you have forgotten about or gotten lazy about. Get them on the calendar now. Your business depends on it. For more DJ business tools, tactics, and training from Justin visit www.profit911.biz/just4djs You can reach justinat: justinmiller@ discjockeynews.com.
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