Linkcrafter.com – Blog

Most companies don’t know what to do with their customers once the transaction is done. The only thing they know to keep in touch with their customers  is to spam them with selfish advertising, new offers, sales, like:

“We’re having a huge sale! There’s tons of stuff we want you to buy! Come in now! Drop everything you’re doing! We don’t know what you’re doing, but it surely not as important as BUYING STUFF FROM US!”

These companies understand that it’s necessary to keep in touch with customers, but do it in a very bad way.

Spaming customers with selfish advertising, new offers and sales is not meaningful ways to keep in contact with your customers. Customers don’t want to hear pitches anymore. They don’t want to know how great your company is, how fantastic your product is, or what you’re selling this week at 10% off.

There is a second group of companies who understands the need to keep in touch with customers but don’t know what to tell them after the transaction. The usual question they will ask me is “What to tell them? I don’t know what to tell them.”

Keep in touch with consumers is the most critical function of marketing in the new economy. It helps you stay in front of clients and new prospects on a regular basis. For example, a contact in your database with whom you don’t keep in touch in meaningful way during the las t 3 or 6 months is a dead contact. Your database is becoming slowly a debris.

Survival of any business today depends on its continual advertising capability. Continual advertising is about your capacity to keep your business in your present customers mind and attract enough new customers to fill customers turnover.

Continual advertising is like the constant oxygenation we all need to survive. Without continual visibility on the marketplace, business survival is problematic.

If you keep in touch with your Customers in way that add value to their life, they will keep in touch with you in a way that create value for you.

So how to keep in touch in a meaningful way?

Adopt IRaaS marketing approach. IRaaS baseline is: “Send your customers to other businesses for free and See your business flourish”

Professionals and Companies that adopt IRaaS commit to actively paying attention to their customers’ needs and interests for products and services other than their own.  They also commit to actively seeking the necessary information and connections to help their customers achieve personal and professional goals.

For each member company, joining an IRaaS network is an opportunity to gain influence by becoming a trusted source of information and connection for customers and clients.

You become known as a powerful resource for others—and when you have the reputation for being a strong resource, people start turning to you for suggestions, ideas, names of other people, connections, etc. This keeps you visible and your business top-of-mind when people need your products and services. This, in turn, will greatly increase the number of referrals your customers will send to your business.

The IRaaS network is a technology-powered group of companies and professionals that collaboratively filter vast amount of information, verify it, put their “stamp of approval” on it, and deliver it to consumers based on their stated or unstated needs. Through IRaaS, you can fulfill your customers’ needs for contextual, relevant, trustworthy, and timely information.

We call it “Information as a Gift ™”. It’s delivered with the clear intention to please, help and create a meaningful experience for the receiver, the customer. It’s the best incentive and loyalty system, hugely loved by customers.

“The businesses that understand this stay in touch, They call, they write, they ask for your input. They are in communication when you’re not at the register or don’t have your credit card in hand. For that level of communication and loyalty the relationship will last. In addition, customers will sing their praises to others and that beats any marketing plan hands down.

Great business relationships happen in between the transaction.” Tim Andren

Dr. Stephen Farley wants to use the IRaaS system to find more patients for his clinic. As he goes about his daily appointments, he asks questions of his patients, learning about their work and personal life and some of the frustrations or problems they’ve been having.

The good doctor takes notes as he writes down symptoms and goes through the process of checking his patients’ health. That afternoon, when he has a spare few minutes, he goes to his IRaaS network and asks for help on a few of their problems.

He gets back several possible solutions from his network, which he then reviews. He finds what he thinks is the best solution for each of his patients, and sends each one a short email.

Dear Jerry,
I hope the medication I prescribed is helping your back pain. I wanted to drop you a quick note because you mentioned you were having trouble finding an insurance policy that offers comprehensive health insurance with a fixed cost and $25 co-pays. I’m enclosing the name of an insurance agent who provides a package I’m pretty sure would work for you. I’ve let him know you may be in touch.

Dear Mrs. Baxter,
I thought you might enjoy this article from Business Profiles – it seemed right up your alley. Hope all is well with the family and you’re feeling better soon.

*******

Dear Cameron and Jennifer,
I’m looking forward to your gallery opening immensely, and I was wondering if I could be of some service promoting it. It occurs to me that many of my patients may be interested – would you like to put up a poster or any flyers you may have in the waiting room? I can also include the exhibition in our monthly newsletter if you can give me the info by Friday. Again, I’m delighted to be attending and happy to do anything I can to help make the opening a huge success. Just say the word.

*******

Dear Claire,
Congratulations on the birth of baby Emily Rose! I know the wait was both joyous and anxious for you, and as your OB-GYN I’m relieved both as a doctor and a friend that all your hard work and devotion to your health has paid off. I wish you, your husband, and your beautiful new addition to the family much happiness. I look forward to meeting Emily soon.

*******

Dear Mr. Rosenberg,
I hope you’re feeling better; flu season can be wretched. You mentioned you were having trouble keeping up with the office while you were home sick because you haven’t a cell phone that receives email. I looked around a bit for you and had many people recommend me this phone as both affordable and easy to use. I hope this helps you keep up with everything – but don’t work too hard! You need lots of rest to get over that flu.

Every one of Dr. Farley’s patients just got a personal message from a man who sees dozens of people every week. They know he cares and they know that he is interested in their lives. The next time any one of those patients hears a friend complaining about his doctor, or needing a new one in the area, who do you think they’re going to recommend?

Trust in the law of reciprocity. You don’t need to ask for referrals. Customers who are devoted to you and your business will want to do you favors. They’ll not only be delighted to recommend you; they’ll sing your praises to anyone who will listen. A genuine gesture of selfless friendship is extremely rare. Don’t diminish it.

A Word of Warning: Never Ask Anything in Return

It’s tempting to tack on an extra sentence or two to push for that sale. The good doctor could very easily have added in something like, “Could you recommend my services to anyone who might be interested?” It doesn’t seem like it would do any harm, after all that goodwill. And the customer probably needs a boost to help them recommend me to others.

Don’t be tempted. Asking for the sale will immediately undo all the good work that’s just been accomplished. Instead of feeling cared-for and appreciated, your customer will immediately feel manipulated.

“He doesn’t care about me! He’s just using me to get new clients!”

“It is literally true that you can succeed best and quickest by helping others to succeed.” Napoleon Hill

IRaaS (Information and Recommendation as a service) requires nothing to implement. There’s no marketing plan, there’s no book to read, no training necessary, no content to create. It’s a Single Action Marketing.

It only requires one single action, which is easy and even enjoyable to do. Here is the baseline : “Send your customers to other businesses for free and See your business flourish”

To do So, All you need to do is create an IRaaS network of companies you trust.

That’s it. You’re good to go.

Here’s how it works:

1. You join an IRaaS network
2. You list your customers’ needs for products and services other than your own
3. Your IRaaS network companies show you their products and services, and give you the information you need to make a solid recommendation to your customer.
4. After reviewing and editing the information, you send the produces and services that best fit your customer’s needs to them.

You’ve built customer loyalty, trust, and advocacy, and made yourself a dead ringer for future referrals.

What are the benefits?

IRaaS is relationship-building solution for both existing customers and new prospects.  It has three immediate benefits:

• Referrals Strategy: Once you show your existing contacts, clients, staff or community that you care about them beyond your need for their business, you’ll develop a reputation for being a great company.  That reputation will earn you constant referrals.
• Networking/Reputation Strategy: IRaaS also allows you to become known and to build trust among peers and the business community. You create constant opportunities for other businesses. By doing so you build a network of colleagues and peers and you double your chances of referrals.
• Keep-In-Touch Strategy: This strategy helps you stay in front of clients and new prospects on a regular basis using two different types of content strategy:

1. Content Creation Strategy:  Create winning content about your business that gets distributed to qualified prospects through the IRaaS network. Through this strategy, you’ll be positioned as the most qualified to address the needs and interests of your prospects,
2. Content Distribution Strategy:  Imagine being able to consistently create thousands of reasons and opportunities to stay in front of your clients and prospects!  IRaaS lets you do this on a weekly, monthly, or per-event basis. The more content you distribute, the more you stay in front of customers, build trust, and become top-of-mind with your clients.

By following these basic strategies, you’ll improve your marketing productivity.

You’ll put an end to the stress and uncertainty of marketing.

And you’ll have fun doing it. Promised.

When we’ve started Linkcrafter we’ve asked ourselves  “Why 90% of the Internet traffic goes to ONLY 5% of websites”. We’ve discovered that:

• 7 of the top 10 web properties are search engines
• 22 of the top 50 web properties are search engines and web directories.

Browse and search have become the most time-consuming and frustrating activity for consumers.

People are looking for trustful and relevant information to reach the best services, companies and products that could satisfy their needs. 90% of the traffic goes to these websites because they are trying hard to help people solve this problem.

What will happen if you become a resources center or a knowledgeable friend for your customers?

You become a Traffic magnet.You are a knowledgeable professional. You Know a lot and Now  We need You. We Want YOU to Lead US.

According to a 2004 Forum Corporation study on cross selling, 88 percent of customers with spending power welcomed product and service suggestions that help them. The same is true in the B2B world—clients prize sales professionals who empathetically understand their business and make suggestions on how to improve it.

Linkcrafter helps companies and businesses to become solution providers for their customers through real-time interaction and involvement in their customer’s solution-hunting process.

Instead of giving Planners, calendars, T-shirts, Mugs, Foie Gras,  coupons, or other material or monetary gifts to customers as incentive to build relationship – most of these incentives fail to build loyalty - Linkcrafter solution helps you provide Information as a gift ™ to your customers.

What is information as a Gift ™?

“Information as a gift ™” means to pay attention to your customers’ and contacts needs and interests for products and services other than your own, and give them relevant and trustful information to help them reach good services providers.

Since one company alone can no longer autonomously create consumer experience, Linkcrafter members pay attention to their customers’ and contacts needs and interests for products and services other than their own, and send their customers to other business for Free as a powerful way to build loyalty and Growth.

You become known as a powerful resource for others—and when you have the reputation for being a strong resource, people start turning to you for suggestions, ideas, names of other people, connections, etc. This keeps you visible and your business top-of-mind when people need your products and services. This, in turn, will greatly increase the number of referrals your customers will send to your business.

You don’t need Money to start. Information, Recommendation are intangible things you can give again, again and again without being left broke.

“Information as a gift ™” has a tremendous power to induce positive emotional connections to customers and contacts. The positive emotional connections in turn has the power to turn customers and contacts into voluntary advocates for your organization, generating a consistent word-of-mouth referrals and a Nonstop Viral Buzz for your business.

How it works?

“Simply go to that address book and list out the 20 percent of your contacts who matter most. Do you know their interests? Their biggest dreams and goals (professional and personal)? If you don’t then that is a place to begin. Once you do, mark down next to each name what specific actions you can take that will help that person realize those goals. What connections can you make for them? What knowledge can you transfer to them? Call them up. No agenda. No ‘asking for the business.’ Just deliver value relevant to them and keep doing it.”

Howard Mann

Is Your Company Still in the Dark Ages?

Most companies aren’t prepared for this new approach to marketing. Companies who co-create customers experiences with other qualified companies will keep themselves far ahead of the competition.

How do you accomplish all of this? We’re not going to lie. It takes a change in mindset.

Business people become super-connectors, people who know a lot of people, and know their interests, skills, and needs of everyone in their social or business circle and connect them together.

“What you Say? Send My Customers to Other Businesses for Free as a way to Build Loyalty and grow my business!?”
It sounds like complete folly.
Why would I send my customers away?
It’s very unconventional, but terribly powerful.
And, It’s in this way that Linkcrafter is transforming the marketing landscape, changing the lives of small business owners, freeing millions of entrepreneurs from marketing stress and uncertainty.

Here we go, Instead of giving Planners, calendars, T-shirts, Mugs, coupons, or other material or monetary gifts to customers to build relationship, what in most cases fail to build loyalty, Linkcrafter helps you send your customers safely and securely to other businesses as a powerful way to build Loyalty and grow your business.

Yes, It’s about Sending your Customers to other businesses for FREE as a way to build Loyalty and Growth. And It works.

The old era of egocentric sales pitches never entertained the idea of sending customers to other companies, for any reason. They held on to their customers tooth and nail, even if they didn’t have anything the customer needed at the time.

Companies wanted customers to pay attention to their company, and no one else.

Apparently, no one ever mentioned to those companies that no business is an island.

Customers need more than one company to satisfy their everyday needs and desires. “No company owns enough resources – or can possibly own enough – to furnish unique experiences for every customer,” said C.K.Pralahad in The New Age of Innovation. “Companies must organize a constantly shifting global web of suppliers and partners to do the job.”

A customer experience includes satisfaction in all the customer’s needs for their everyday life. It isn’t enough to sell your customer the microwave oven that person needs. The customer also needs clothes, baby food, music, a good carpet cleaner, a certified massage therapist, and an antique hood ornament.

No company in the world could possibly give a customer every single thing he or she desires.

In short: it takes a village to create a customer experience.

You’ll be recommending companies to your customers that you personally have selected as the best for their needs. You won’t be giving them referrals to professional service and product providers simply because you’ve agreed to – you’ll be giving them the companies that you sincerely believe are the most qualified professionals to meet your customers’ needs.

And your customers will love you for it.

That reputation will buy you customer loyalty and enthusiasm that is impossible to get through any other means.

Linkcrafter marketing solution often sounds too idealistic to companies who have been in the era of the sales pitch too long. Many companies will be thinking, “Spending extra time and resources to help customers with their problems without any request for a sale, without any pitch at all? What’s in it for me?”

The more successful your company is at recommending other companies’ products and services that are relevant to its customer’s lifestyle and needs, the more likely it is that customers will extol the virtues of your company.

Your company gets a reputation for caring about people through this free exchange of information. When a person benefits from information you give them, they become an advocate for you. And the next time they hear someone looking for a service that your company provides, they’ll recommend you – in glowing phrases.

You can’t buy that kind of advertising.

Linkcrafter web based relationship management solution helps you to engage with other qualified companies to co-create customer experiences. You’ll work within a network of partners, all of whom can provide your customers with products and services that are outside of your area of expertise but that are essential to making sure the customer is completely satisfied.

Learn to Co-Create

Through Linkcrafter, you’ll be able to co-create complete experiences for your customers with other companies. You’ll collaborate with these companies to understand exactly what your customers need and how to get it to them.

Your customers will look to you as a resource, a guide, and a trusted ally.

Is Your Company Still in the Dark Ages?

Most companies aren’t prepared for this new approach to marketing. Companies who co-create customers experiences with other qualified companies will keep themselves far ahead of the competition.

How do you accomplish all of this? We’re not going to lie. It takes a change in mindset.

Business people become super-connectors, people who know a lot of people, and know their interests, skills, and needs of everyone in their social or business circle and connect them together.

Recently, the Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) Council has conducted  a study with channel executives, distributors, resellers, and other channel representatives, asking the question: “What is the most valuable source of leads?”

Customers referrals came at the top: four times more powerful and valuable than E-Mail or Direct Marketing campaigns, and nearly seven times more likely to result in sales and new business than leads from the Internet.

Here is how the results look like:

• 54% Customer Referrals
• 14% E-Mail or Direct Marketing
• 8% Internet
• 7% Events
• 7% Leads from Vendors
• 3% Third Party Lead Generation Organizations
• 8% Other

Why Customers referrals is so powerful and valuable?
Simply because they command instant credibility, and when customers talk about your business, they have personal stories to share, and could illustrate with real world examples how your solution worked and served them.

Customers are your Natural Advocates.

If your business is struggling to attract clients, it’s simple because you don’t have enough advocates.

Your advocates are customers, prospects and even strangers who like you and your business. They can’t help but singing your praises to the world.

Your business flourishes when more than 10% of your customers become advocates; You thrive when 30% turn advocates and you become irresistible when like Apple 78% of customers are your fans, and go beyond advocacy to create Ads for your brand with their own money and resources.

Frederick F. Reichheld and Thomas Teal found that an increase of 5% of your advocates will yield your profits 25 to 95%.

In average a person has 11 to 12 intimate contacts, 150 social contacts and from 500 to 1500 weak ties. Look what will happen to your business if you succeed in the next 12 months to turn 12 to 15  customers into your business advocates:

If you succeed to have 15 customers as advocates, you could reach up to 24 945 contacts, without measuring the cascading effect of their referrals. Your marketing will automatically go on autopilot: with the social medias, Blogs, E-mail, twitter, Facebook, Myspace, etc. customers today has an increased ability to share personal experience and sing your praises to the world.

IRaaS is helping Thousands of web-workers (designers, programmers, copywriters, publishers) and freelancers to build a continual referral stream around there business without spending a single Dollar in advertising or wasting precious time in networking websites and events.

James Dean is a graphic designer in Los Angeles. He loves his job and clients. He knows deep down that when a client comes to him for a graphic work it’s because he has a much bigger project. James knows well how difficult is it sometime to find good services providers. So, He is always trying to help, asking his clients about their needs for services other than what he could provide  directly to them. He asks about their business purposes and challenges. In this way, he collects precious information and send his customers to a network of trusted providers.

James send his customers who need website search engine optimization to SEO experts, his customers who need content edition to copywriters, etc.

The system works the same way for the Seo experts who send his customers to copywriters, copywriters who send their clients to graphic designer and so on.

When James doesn’t know a contact to refer directly to, he posts his customers needs to the community on Linkcrafter who send him proposals that he reviews and rates before sending them to his customers.

James uses Linkcrafter as  an utility to build customers relationship, and create bonds that make his customers talk positively about him and his business.

Besides, James gains reputation inside his business community. James sends his customers to other businesses for Free. He NEVER ASK anything back. The Power of Linkcrafter is in this very simple sentence:  James sends his customers to other businesses for Free, He NEVER ASK anything back.

Each befriended  customer by “Information as a Gift” becomes James advocate, infecting the world with the narration of his positive experience.

The more successful your company is at recommending other companies’ products and services that are relevant to your customer’s lifestyle and needs, the more likely it is that your customers will extol the virtues of your company.

They’ll reward you for it, too.

Your company gets a reputation for caring about people through this free exchange of information. When a person benefits from information you give them, they become an advocate for you. And the next time they hear someone looking for a service that your company provides, they’ll recommend you – in glowing phrases.

“Information as a gift ™” has a tremendous power to induce positive emotional connections to customers and contacts. The positive emotional connections in turn has the power to turn customers and contacts into voluntary advocates for your organization, generating a consistent word-of-mouth referrals and a Nonstop Viral Buzz for your business.

Hello Friends, Hello World,

We did a voice narration of what our company, Linkcrafter.com, is trying to do.

Please Listen, and Check out How we could Help you.

• Are you struggling to attract clients? 
• Do you have a great product / service but getting no interest or attention to grow and succeed?
• Have you tried few things or many things, but the results were not what you hoped for?
• Have you wasted thousands of dollars in advertising with no sustainable results?
• You’ve tried networking everywhere without no concrete results?

If you answer yes to any of the above questions, it comes as no surprise to us. Like our friends Mitch Meyerson and Jay Conrad put it, It’s a Jungle Out There! 
You are surrounded, All around, by thousands of same businesses vying for the same bounty.
Several of these businesses are grossly larger than you. 
Some have the power and personality of Godzilla. 
Many of them are far better funded than you. 
Some have been successfully operating their businesses since prehistoric times. 
They thrive on competition. 
They’re out for the disposable income currently held by your hot prospects and past customers. 
They’re out for the attention of every red-blooded consumer who reads the newspaper, listens to the radio, watches TV, or grabs a handful of junk mail out of the mailbox. 
Some of them can run more ads in more papers and more commercials on more stations than you’ll ever run. 
They can mail more materials to more people than you’ll ever mail. 
They can outspend you in every area of marketing that money can buy. 

But they can’t outspend you in areas that money can’t buy. 

You can gain the same marketing leverage that many of these businesses get by putting up megabucks

Switch to a marketing solution money can’t buy : emotional marketing. 

When we’ve started working on Linkcrafter our goals were very clear. We wanted: 

• A solution that brings peace of mind to entrepreneurs: simple, easy and durable, not another short-lived marketing solution
• A solution that works consistently, what ever the background of the user
• A solution with zero advertising cost and Zero time wasting in networking 

We have reached all these three goals.

We have the perfect marketing solution for you.  
It Only requires One Single Action, which is easy and even enjoyable to do. Here is the baseline : “Send your customers and contacts to other businesses for Free and See your business flourish”

Yes,  Send your Customer and contacts to other businesses for Free. 

It sounds like complete folly. Why would I send my customers away? 
It’s very unconventional, but terribly powerful. It’s In this way that Linkcrafter is transforming the marketing landscape, changing the lives of small business owners, freeing millions of entrepreneurs from marketing stress and uncertainty. 

Now we are making the system available to you. 

How it Works ? 

All you need to do is to : 

• Join Linkcrafter.com
• List, as soon as they emerge, your customers’ needs for products and services other than your own
• Linkcrafter network companies show you their products and services, and give you the information you need to make a solid recommendation to your customer.
• After reviewing and editing the information, you send the produces and services that best fit your customer’s needs to them.

By doing so, You’ve built customer loyalty, trust, and advocacy, and made yourself a dead ringer for future referrals.

Linkcrafter in action: How Linkcrafter is helping Thousands of web-workers (designers, programmers, copywriter, publishers) and freelancers to build a continual referral stream around there business without spending a single Dollar in advertising or wasting precious time in networking websites and events. 

James is a graphic designer in Los Angeles. He loves his job and clients. He knows deep down that when a client comes to him for a graphic work it’s because he has a much bigger project. James knows well how it’s sometime difficult for his clients to find good services providers. So He is always trying to help, asking his clients about their needs for services other than what he could provide  directly to them. He asks about their business purposes and challenges. In this way, he collects precious information and send his customers to a network of trusted providers.  James send :

- his customers who need website search engine optimization to SEO experts on Linkcrafter, 

- he send his customers who need content edition to copywriters

The system works the same way for the Seo experts who send his customers to copywriters, copywriter who send to graphic designer and so on.

When James doesn’t know a contact to refer directly to, he posts his customers needs to the community who send him proposals that he reviews and rates before sending them to his customers. James uses Linkcrafter as  an utility to build customers relationship, and create bonds that make his customers talk positively about him and his business. 

Besides, James gains reputation inside his business community. That what Linkcrafter is it about: customer relationship, to help your customers to find solutions you can’t directly provide them. James sends his customers to other businesses for Free. He NEVER ASK anything back. The Power of Linkcrafter stays in this very simple sentence:  James sends his customers to other businesses for Free, He NEVER ASK anything back. 

Each befriended  customer by “Information as a Gift” becomes your business advocate, infecting the world with the narration of his positive experience.

The more successful your company is at recommending other companies’ products and services that are relevant to your customer’s lifestyle and needs, the more likely it is that your customers will extol the virtues of your company.

They’ll reward you for it, too.

Your company gets a reputation for caring about people through this free exchange of information. When a person benefits from information you give them, they become an advocate for you. And the next time they hear someone looking for a service that your company provides, they’ll recommend you – in glowing phrases