4 Harry Potter charms that can teach you better marketing
Here’s the boring line again: The pandemic isn’t showing any clear signs of waning.
Globally, businesses have been sparring with economic downturns, lowered demands, drop in incomes and a general sense of almost-catastrophic uncertainty.
In the view of all this, it is evident that your traditional methods of marketing will produce quite limited results, if at all they do. Things have come to such a pass that most marketers are bewildered as to what can possibly drive their growth.
Naturally you need to apply marketing creativity to transform your lacklustre performance into something that’s a marketing superstar.
In this article, I discuss 4 lessons your marketing teams can learn from Harry Potter charms to bring about magical results.
Don’t take this too seriously; this isn’t a marketing strategy document.
That said, I do hope it will help realign a couple of ideas you have about marketing.
Here goes!
1. The levitation charm: Wingardium Leviosa
Harry Potter uses this charm to lift objects above the ground and send them flying — literally.
What we marketers can do:
Humans cannot fly by themselves, just like birds do. But if they use another object, a vehicle like an aircraft that can fly, then yes, humans can definitely fly.
So here’s the message. Rise above the ground level, and partner with non-competing businesses to start flying.
Let’s say you run a coffee shop. Look around and find a small company or some individuals who run online coaching services.
Since you two belong to very different businesses, you can join hands.
From your end, you can ask the coaching company to offer a 3-hour (or whatever) free coaching in an area they are really good at.
Put that on your website and also on your indoor notice board where your customers can see that. Share a promo-code.
The coaching service, on the other hand, can give the promo-code to their students or trainees. This promo-code will be used at your outlet.
If you’re looking for a resource that finds you stuff like websites your customers visit, you might want to check out SparkToro.
And your business begins to fly!
2. The unlocking charm: Alohomora
This charm unlocks doors, even the hidden ones. Anytime you are locked out of your car or your house and you don’t have the keys, you can request Harry Potter to help you unlock the door.
What we marketers can do:
Don’t take the term ‘unlock’ literally. It must be understood at a deeper level.
When we say unlock, we mean unlocking the value of your customers and prospects.
Let’s say you run an online printing business. How can you unlock value from them?
Reach out to existing customers. Ask for their feedback and testimonials. Request them to share their experiences with you.
You will be surprised that most people (and companies) will be happy to drop a good word if they’ve had a great experience with your company.
After all, you aren’t asking for anything fake, you’re merely asking how their experience was.
Similarly, you can unlock value by talking to prospects. Ask them why they didn’t buy from you. Understand what are their fears and how you can best remove those fears. You can also consider sending them small samples to help them see your quality.
The point is this ‘Harry Potter charm’ lets you collect an extremely important asset: information. Testimonials and customer feedback are two pieces of important information. They will help you grow and improve your service.
Don’t be surprised if marketing communities like the one Superpath has built can help you unravel huge mysteries!
Go ahead. Unlock your fortune!
3. The magnifying charm: Engorgio
Another fascinating charm that J K Rowling let Harry Potter have. By using this charm, the target is magnified — it becomes bigger and larger.
What we marketers can do:
The most important thing you can do is understand how you can deliver value for your customers.
And to do that, you’ll need to understand all the aspects of your prospects. Obviously the best way to do that is to make your prospect bigger so that you can notice even the smallest of their details.
Start by using small details. Their email address is a powerful tool with which to approach and understand them. Send them emails and observe how they respond to your message.
Do they like free shopping? Are they looking for a wider choice of products? Is a better product guaranteeing their priority?
Of course, before you send out emails, you will want to verify if the email addresses are valid. You can choose from different email verification tools and clean your list.
When you clean your list, you’ve removed the invalid or fake addresses. (As a matter of fact, there’s a Harry Potter charm to clean up things too — it’s called Scourgify!)
All this will give you extremely valuable insights. Use these insights to raise your marketing ROI.
There, hit them an email today!
4. The summoning charm: Accio
When an object is very far, Harry Potter uses this charm to bring the object close very quickly, almost instantly.
What we marketers can do:
As a marketer, what would you bring close to you, if you had the power of using this charm?
Chances are, you said your markets. You want transportation and logistics to be so powerful that they wouldn’t be a hassle at all. You wish you could send your products to your customers at the snap of your fingers, right?
Well, while this cannot be done magically, there are many ways you can greatly simplify things. Explore how you can use your non-competing partners’ (see Tip #1) distribution channel. In marketing, that’s called piggybacking.
Let’s say you sell rooting hormones and garden supplies, while your non-competing partner sells pet-food that they deliver in places you can’t reach.
Here’s a great opportunity for you to use their channel to send your products.
Because you are both sharing the logistics resources, your costs will get divided. That way, both of you benefit from the arrangement. And you can use the money you saved in better serving or delighting the customer!
Iterable has some great resources you can learn from — who knows what magical outcomes you might be able to summon!
Go ahead, charm your customers!
Conclusion
Sure, businesses are having a tough time today. But if your business is going slow, it’s a great time to explore and understand different solutions.
Don’t expect all tips to work equally well for you. Some tips will turn out wonderful while some won’t. As long as you keep using your creativity and experimenting, you will ultimately come out a winner!
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Note: None of the 3rd party links above are affiliate links.
