The Invisible Touch: The Four Keys to Modern Marketing by Harry Beckwith

The Invisible Touch: The Four Keys to Modern Marketing Reviews

• 
  C

  Useful advice on the marketing of services based on 4 keys: price, brand, packaging and relationships. It isn't as astute as
  Selling the Invisible, which I highly recommend. I like the advice on pricing, branding, specialization, and showing passion. Like Beckwith's other books that I've read, this one is based more on his experience and opinions than research.
  
  I like that Beckwith’s answer to the question, “What one marketing change would help most?” is to appear more successful and confident, because people want to buy from successful companies.
  
  Fallacies of Marketing
  “Successful marketing hinges on creating distinctions; best practices quickly become a common practices. Best practices also become a trap; you keep waiting for other practices to emulate rather than creating your own.”
  
  Before you try to influence a prospect’s decision, find out what they've already decided, and why. Ask prospects, "What do you know about us? What are our strengths that led you to invite us to talk with you?" That conversation reveals the prospect’s misconceptions, and can help change their decision.
  
  "Before you try to sell yourself, make yourself familiar." Prospects treat the unfamiliar with indifference or contempt. Use marketing to become familiar to the prospect before you try to make a sales presentation.
  
  Your competition isn’t other firms; "You are competing with your prospect’s view of your firm."
  
  "The more you bundle into a sale, the more you risk losing the sale entirely." Adding more elements to a sale complicates the transaction and confuses the prospect.
  
  What is Satisfaction?
  "Your job is not to deliver a service; it is to create satisfaction. Make your clients believe they will be satisfied, and they will be, especially if you do it with passion.”
  
  The First Key: Price
  "Price creates perceptions, then creates satisfaction.” “A price tells us how good a service probably is, then convinces us how good the service probably was."
  
  “A high price actually improves the experience.” “Higher prices don't just talk; they tempt,” because people want to experience high-priced things. Faced with two identical services, someone who can afford the higher-priced one often chooses it, simply because of its high price.
  
  “Increasing your price will not necessarily decrease your volume, any more than decreasing it will increase your volume.”
  
  Offer tiered pricing. For example, offer platinum, gold, silver packages. The client who wants more pays more.
  
  The Second Key: Brand
  "Your brand is your most valuable asset," even if you view your business as nothing more than its people.
  
  The Third Key: Packaging
  "To make your service better, make it more beautiful." People believe that the more beautiful option is better.
  
  What one marketing change would help most? “Look like you want to succeed.” Use your marketing to show that you believe in your business, and buyers will believe in it too. "The longer your office says struggling young attorney, the longer the struggle."
  
  "Choose images that at least imply that you are different. And at a minimum, choose images that convey quality."
  
  "Your package is your service." "What does your offer look like? Does it look like excellence? Does it fit the prospect’s image of an extraordinary service?"
  
  "The client who feels important feels loyal."
  
  The Fourth Key: Relationships
  "Choose the clients who are most like you." They "will do more to build your business and any other clients."
  
  Tell the prospect something they really care about: themselves.
  
  "A service provider’s ability to explain what he does, rather than to do what he does, is what most influences a prospect’s impressions of his skill.” Communicating clearly is the essence of creating the impression of competence, skill, and mastery.”
  
  "Find your specialty – no matter how narrow it is – and communicate it convincingly." The title “specialist,” however fraudulent or comical, packs a persuasive wallop. The specialist’s claim, “We do not know everything and do not try to, but we really know X,” can win business against larger and better-qualified competitors.
  
  "A marketing firm tends to evolve to match its background and special knowledge." Think about which prospects would be attracted to your background and knowledge, and communicate appropriately.
  
  Nothing bonds someone to you more than your sacrifice. You must sacrifice a lot to bond clients to you, because they weigh the balance sheet in their favor.
  
  “Help your client with any request reasonably related to your business.” “An extraordinary service can do whatever their client needs done. If they can't do it themselves, they can find someone who can.”
  
  Passion attracts clients, and helps keep them. "The passion to do something extraordinary, as much as and often more than the actual achievement itself, drives employees and bonds their clients to them." Excellent isn’t easily seen, but the passion for it is.
• 
  Theresa Connors

  A concise book about marketing and client relationships. Some of the business examples are dated but Beckwith's strategies are practical and still relevant.
• 
  Max Cherepitsa

  Хуже, чем первая книжка, но хорошо освежает этот фишечный подход и даёт 4 пункта, на которые важно обращать внимание в сервисе
• 
  Elizabeth

  I really enjoyed this book. Harry Beckwith shares some terrific tips and advice on how to effectively engage with clients and great ways to share your business' story.
• 
  Jesse Jones

  Both this book and his first “Selling the Invisible”, are most read books for improving both marketing and customer service/success. All businesses, whether they be product or professional services, are all in the customer service business.
  
  A lot of what he writes seems like common sense, however, the *application* of common sense is not that common.
• 
  AlJohara AlShegri

  An indispensable book.
• 
  Alicia Verstraeten

  Very interesting book, and written in an accessible manner too.
  
  
• 
  Linda

  Got a bit bored by the end and resorted to skimming. Some examples are completely out of date, though the book's not yet 20 years old. Makes good points about service businesses being more about an experience than just a product, and the appreciation of customers on over-delivery and over-selling by extraordinary sacrifice within the service. Some of the common-sense advice, "avoid the discount shopper", would be worthless when compared with an industry (Wal-Mart, 99-Cent Store, Dollar Tree) that caters to that person no one wants to serve. However, some suggestions, like "live your brand", were true gold:
  
  "You make grass greener by watering it constantly and strafing it with chemicals. Constantly watered grass never has to dig down deep to quench its thirst; the water is within easy reach." Could apply to American believers developing Christian knowledge that's skin deep.
  
  "The shallow roots also develop root-free spaces just below the surface where insects and pests can set up camp, and later attack the grass. These attacks fire the first shots in the unending war between the pests and the greenskeepers, which the attackers often win in very dramatic form, forcing the closing of courses for entire years so the fairways can be reseeded, overwatered, and killed again." Heresies, anyone?
  
  "We were born craving beauty."
  
  "Most people cannot fight because they do not want to, or cannot commit to winning. Fighting is 90 percent attitude."
  
  "What are the points of contact between a bookstore and a customer? You quickly realize that this list is long. A partial list includes the bookstore exterior; parking (including convenience, comfort, and validation); accessibility; hours; signage; entrance; greeting; book products offered; nonbook products offered; amenities (free coffee, cookies, and others); shelving; payment and terms; printed information; personal advice; packaging; programs for frequent buyers; author events; nonauthor events."
• 
  Andy McIlwain

  "A great follow-up to "Selling the Invisible". Focuses on broader business communications and marketing.
  
  Some examples are a bit funny due to the book's age (published 2000). Yahoo! is cited as a strong brand; e-commerce is written off as irrelevant; HP is considered a company that doesn't focus on computer systems.
  
  Nonetheless, check this book out.
• 
  Marcus

  His four books are the basics on Marketing, written in a very direct way.