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Kevin Mako: Hello, product innovators. Today, we learned from a 30-year marketing executive on how to smooth out the customer buying process for your product.

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Narrator: You're listening to the Product Startup Podcast, the show that helps bring your product idea to life by chatting with successful inventors, product developers,

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Narrator: and hardware industry professionals. Our goal here is to get to the bottom of what makes a product successful, from initial idea to getting your product on store shelves.

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Narrator: We're taking you step by step to build a functional product and scale your product business. Hosted by Kevin Mako, one of North America's leading experts on hardware development for small product businesses.

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Eric Dickmann: Now, on to the show. Welcome back, everyone.

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Kevin Mako: Today I'm very excited to introduce Eric Dickmann to the show. Eric is the president of the Five Echelon Group, a full-stack marketing agency. He's also the host of the virtual CMO podcast, which educates businesses on

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Kevin Mako: how to maximize their marketing and messaging efforts. With 30 years as a marketing executive, Eric today is going to tell us how inventors, startups, and small manufacturers should market their new product

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Kevin Mako: and how to cut out all the potential restriction points among potential customers who are in the buying process. Now on to the interview.

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Kevin Mako: Eric, welcome to the show.

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Kevin Mako: Kevin, thanks for having me.

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Eric Dickmann: It's great to be here today. Yeah, I understand you're not in your usual setup at the moment.

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Eric Dickmann: I am not. You know, I live in Orlando, Florida, but have a place down here in Tampa, Florida as well. It's Super Bowl weekend. It's in the middle of COVID. So I wanted

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Eric Dickmann: to come down and see what all the hollabaloo is all about. I know there's things set up all over the city, as you can imagine. For a marketing guy, the Super Bowl is

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Eric Dickmann: sort of the Super Bowl of marketing as well. And so you've got a lot of brands who are coming down here to show off their products and try to get some attention. So

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Kevin Mako: IRS, in case you're wondering, this is a business trip.

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Kevin Mako: Yes.

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Kevin Mako: I don't know how many folks that we have listening from the depths of the IRS right now, but I'm glad you provided that footnote. Yeah. That's great. So you're also testing out your

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Eric Dickmann: kind of virtual podcast set up. Last time I talked to you, you know, you had this big podcast studio. And I guess now you're setting out, you know, testing out your remote setup. Sounds great. Looks good.

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Eric Dickmann: Well, thanks very much. Yeah, it's fun. You know, we live in an era where video is becoming so increasingly important to not only your personal brand, but to company's brands. And so being

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Kevin Mako: able to sort of do video wherever you are, I think is becoming increasingly important. So, yeah, this is a test of my remote setup as well. Good stuff. Yeah, I can tell you've got the remote mic and everything. That's pro level right there. I feel like a news anchor.

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Kevin Mako: Much appreciated. Well,

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Kevin Mako: Eric, let's jump into it.

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Eric Dickmann: Let's go back in time. What's your, what's your backstory and what's led you to kind of where you are as a leader in your space in the marketing world today?

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Eric Dickmann: Yeah. So for most of my career, I've been in the financial services segments. And sort of I started out as a product guy, literally sitting designing software, UI designs. And eventually,

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Eric Dickmann: I graduated into product marketing and then true marketing. I spent about 18 years of my career at Oracle Corporation running their global retail financial services business. And, you know, I decided

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Eric Dickmann: I really wanted to get out there and help small and medium-sized businesses, a lot of startups, you know, help get their footing. Marketing is getting increasingly complex, and there are a lot of

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Eric Dickmann: things that you need to know as a business to be able to be successful and market your product. And so I really wanted to take the things that I had learned from my 30-plus years out in the corporate world and start applying those to small and mid-sized businesses and really help them grow.

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Eric Dickmann: So I started a consulting company called the Five Echelon Group, and for the last two years, I've been really focused on being what I call a virtual CMO, which is really, you know,

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Eric Dickmann: a fractional executive to these small businesses who really aren't ready to bring on a full-time marketing leader, but they really need somebody to help create a strategic

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Kevin Mako: marketing plan and then help them figure out what they need to do to get that plan executed. So it's a fractional executive, and I work with a number of small businesses helping them get their marketing programs going.

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Kevin Mako: You know, building the marketing plan and executing it is so key. You know, I think of a number of our clients, lots of hardware products.

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Kevin Mako: And, you know, one of the big kind of issues is, okay, once you build the product, you know, what are the keys to selling and what is the key to selling successfully? And really, that trickles back to marketing and truly understanding. how to make that happen.

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Kevin Mako: So I'm very excited today to go in and kind of deep dive into that to really figure out how hardware startups can plan ahead, even if they're not ready yet to market. How can they plan ahead get there?

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Kevin Mako: And then when the point that they are ready to get into marketing and sales and all the rest, how can they be best positioned to do that? And I'm really excited to have you on the show to talk about that because you have quite an extensive history in the game when it comes to marketing and a lot of experience

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Eric Dickmann: and physical products and such, too, with that. So first and foremost, a question at top of mind is, why is it important to understand your customers

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Eric Dickmann: and how they're making their purchasing decisions?

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Eric Dickmann: I think that's a great question because, you know, when you're building out a product, when you're designing any kind of service that you're going to sell, you really need to understand who that customer is. And that may sound simple.

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Eric Dickmann: Well, I'm designing a, gizmo and that gizmo is applicable to a lot of different people, but is it really? Who is going to be that ideal buyer for your widget?

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Eric Dickmann: And I think many companies kind of fail to do that and the companies that I see as being very successful are the ones who invest time and effort ahead of

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Eric Dickmann: time to really get in, understand who their true ideal buyer is and the audience that they're trying to reach.

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Eric Dickmann: So from a marketing perspective, marketing's expensive, right? Marketing is a cost center for your business.

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Eric Dickmann: And in order for you to realize the benefits of the dollars that you're spending, you have to be laser focused on where you're going to be spending that money.

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Eric Dickmann: And so in order to be laser focused, you really have to understand who your buyer is. So instead of casting a very wide net and just saying, hey, world, we've got this great new product, I

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Eric Dickmann: think you're going to love. You need to say, hey, target buyer, we've got a product that is going to solve a specific problem for you. And here's why we think you should investigate it, look at it,

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Eric Dickmann: consider it, and spend your marketing dollars wisely to reach that very focused niche. And so a little bit of work up front to really understand your market, really understand who that ideal

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Eric Dickmann: customer is, and then build your marketing program around that is so important. And, you know, I think the second part of that question is sort of understanding where your buyers are.

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Eric Dickmann: So is this the kind of thing that they are going to purchase in a physical location? Are they going to go to a hardware store or retail store to purchase a physical product? Are they going to buy it online through Amazon?

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Eric Dickmann: Where would they be researching this product? Would it be through a promotion that you would be sending out through the mail, through an email? Would it be on LinkedIn? Would it be on Facebook?

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Eric Dickmann: You have to understand where that ideal buyer is going to be doing their research. And then when you sort of bring all of these things together, then you can start to develop

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Kevin Mako: a very focused marketing strategy that really sort of attacks the problem where you're going to find the greatest chance of success.

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Kevin Mako: And it sounds simple, but it's amazing how many businesses don't take that step ahead of time to really understand who their buyer and their market is going to be.

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Kevin Mako: Eric, this is music to my ears because one of the big things that we towed on much earlier in the process, which is in the design and development, is focus. Yes. Now, you know, it's interesting that it's a big priority when you're developing a product

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Kevin Mako: to essentially prevent feature creep. Now, I get too crazy, not trying to be everything to everyone, but I find it very interesting. Now you're talking about marketing in the exact same.

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Kevin Mako: principle applies. You know, who is that laser-focused niche and how do you figure out who that person is? And then, of course,

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Kevin Mako: how do you actually attract that individual? But the more focus, the more niche you are both with your product offering, the more niche and the more targeted you can

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Eric Dickmann: be with your marketing. And those two align very well. And I think that is a big misconception. We hear it all the time, especially at the early phases of development, people who are afraid that they're going to lose out on that potential bigger market. However,

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Eric Dickmann: if you never make a sale because you weren't targeted enough, then what's the point in worrying about the broad market spectrum? And you can always do that later. You can always do that with your second campaign or your second product or whatever else.

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Eric Dickmann: So that's brilliant. I think there's always this fear of, well, if I get too specific, I'm going to miss out on some potential buyers. I'm going to miss out on a particular segment of the market. And just like you said, you're going to have time to address

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Kevin Mako: a bigger and bigger market over time, but get some traction, get some momentum where you can be successful and then go from there. You know, you're talking about feature creep. When you're designing a product, right, you want to have that minimum viable product that you can release

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Eric Dickmann: to the marketplace and then build from there. And I think the same is true in marketing. You want to sort of identify what is that minimal viable target audience that you can address and then build from there. Right. Okay. So let's assume we've got a great product.

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Eric Dickmann: We've got a great, you know, MVP, we're ready to go to production, and we're ready to laser focus on who our competitor is from a marketing standpoint. How do you differentiate your product and really add value from a marketing perspective?

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Eric Dickmann: Oh, that's easy. You just talk about all the features that your product has. No, that's not true. So really what you have to remember is you're trying to establish an emotional connection with your buyer. You're really trying to say,

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Eric Dickmann: hey, my product is solving a specific problem that you're having, or it's an aspirational product, it's something that you want to have because you feel somehow it's going to make your life better.

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Eric Dickmann: And in either case, you want to be able to sort of establish that emotional connection with your buyer so that they are moved towards a purchase decision.

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Eric Dickmann: and what companies sometimes do is they want to tout all the benefits that there are the features that their particular product has. And in reality, many products in the marketplace, if you really are honest with yourself,

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Eric Dickmann: we'll probably have a fairly similar feature set. Maybe your product has one thing that a competitor doesn't have or two things, but it's that emotional connection that is going to drive the sale.

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Eric Dickmann: And I think it's so important to really understand your competitors and what they're doing and how they're selling to the marketplace. What strings are they pulling? Are they just focused on those features?

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Eric Dickmann: If so, you've got a real opportunity to reframe the marketing message to say, hey, we are going to solve this problem for you.

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Kevin Mako: We're going to address this pain. We're going to give you something that you don't have in your life today and let them focus on the features. That is not ultimately going to win the day. Neither is price. Price tends to be something that people focus on when they don't know what else to focus on.

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Kevin Mako: If you look at some of the most successful brands out there, they are not the least expensive brand in the marketplace, right? I'm talking to you on my MacBook Pro and my iPhone is sitting over there and I'm wearing my Apple Earpod.

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Kevin Mako: These are not the cheapest products on the marketplace, but I have a strong emotional connection with that brand. Yeah, that's brilliant. You know, the emotional connection, too, you're really talking about selling that end users,

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Kevin Mako: really identifying the value or prevent. preventing the pain point, not necessarily what your feature is to prevent that pain point. The features are almost like the backup evidence. You're supporting evidence. So here's what we're going to sell you.

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Kevin Mako: We're going to sell you, you know, the dream.

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Kevin Mako: But on the back end, how we're going to do it is through our unique features or our special benefits. You know, something you mentioned there too in terms of competition, which always think about a lot of, a lot of inventors or startups think, well, I'm the first mover. I don't have any competition.

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Kevin Mako: Well, that's also not necessarily true because although you might have the first unique feature or benefit of that particular product, usually buyers have an alternative option.

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Kevin Mako: In fact, one of those options, one of your competitors is the do nothing competitor to not choose your product.

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Eric Dickmann: But also, there's other ways for them to solve that pain point or there's other ways that a customer might perceive that that pain point could be solved with a competitive product.

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Eric Dickmann: So I think it's brilliant that you bring up the competitive element, even if it's a newer proprietary or whatever else, you still need to focus on what your key advantage is, both from

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Eric Dickmann: a feature standpoint, if you keep that MVP, but also thinking down the road in positioning your marketing to what value are you selling the customer. What do they get out of it? How does their life change with it, not what the feature is? That's great.

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Eric Dickmann: I may be, you know, looking at buying a new car, for example, and looking at the marketplace

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Kevin Mako: and saying, well, there's Lexus and BMW and Audi, I could look at all those and say those are my competitors, but actually a competitor might be a new set of tires because that's all I really need to make my current car better than it is today. And that's a purchase decision

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Kevin Mako: that I could make. And so I think your point is spot on. It had no decision or choosing to spend your money on something else or some kind of alternative, putting a Band-Aid on

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Kevin Mako: what you already have is, you know, is equally important to look at. I mean, many times you lose business to no decision. That's a very common thing, especially with bigger and more complex products.

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Kevin Mako: Right. Exactly. I mean, yeah, it's the same in our business too, right? I mean, we are, we've got a very specific niche targeting startups for product development in the hardware

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Kevin Mako: space. However, our biggest competitor isn't another business. Our biggest competitor is an entrepreneur, you know, losing steam or deciding, ah, you know what, I, I really don't want to,

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Eric Dickmann: I don't feel like moving forward or I don't feel the vision or I don't feel the, you know, the outcome.

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Eric Dickmann: So, so I understand it just from our own perspective, let alone our clients, they run into the exact same, you know,

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Eric Dickmann: thoughts. How do I educate a market to believe in the value and then execute on that purchase? So, you know, let's get into the nuts and bolts here.

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Eric Dickmann: let's assume we've got our MVP product, we're targeting our messaging, we understand that we need to sell the end value. How do we optimize that interaction or that selling interaction or that

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Eric Dickmann: marketing interaction to those prospective buyers?

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Eric Dickmann: Yeah, I'm sure we've all experienced getting emails in our inbox or getting a message through LinkedIn. And it's somebody that you don't even know. And in the very first conversation,

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Eric Dickmann: they're asking to set up a meeting or we've got something that could solve a problem. How do you know that? You've never even had a conversation with me. You don't know what my issues are.

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Eric Dickmann: And I think when you're looking to sort of remove friction in the buying process, what you want to do is you want to add value, add value, add value, and then maybe ask for something.

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Eric Dickmann: So what I encourage a lot of businesses to do is to say, okay, you've got a product that solves a particular problem. in a niche. So what could you do then to add value to the people who might be looking for

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Eric Dickmann: that product or service? Is there some kind of a document or a report that you could share with them? Maybe it's just information. You've come across some interesting facts that you think

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Eric Dickmann: your target buyer might be interested in learning. You can become an authority, you can become somebody that they trust even before you've asked them for anything. And I think that

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Eric Dickmann: that's a very important point. You sort of, you want to give value before you ask for something in return. And there is a fear that maybe somebody comes to your website and they're looking around and you're like, well, I've got to get their email address. I've got to get their phone number so I can

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Eric Dickmann: follow up with them. If you are putting out good value, putting out good content, they will keep coming back. They will keep exploring. They will eventually reach out to you. There's a time and a place to

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Kevin Mako: ask for that information, but focus first on giving value. We've got, you know, all these social media channels that we can use. And if you'll notice that a lot of businesses, one of my favorite companies is HubSpot, I use them for my marketing automation and CRM,

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Kevin Mako: they put out so much content. And in the realm of marketing, if I go to do a search on Google about a particular topic, chances are within the top 10 listings, there's going to be some blog article or something that

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Kevin Mako: they've written that addresses a question that I have. They're constantly putting out that value. And I think as a business, you need to look at what can I do to sort of demonstrate that value

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Kevin Mako: and my interactions with my potential buyers so that I can build that trust. And again, I get back to sort of establishing that trusted relationship, that emotional connection. I think it's so important. Well, and you're like personally, you're a great example of that.

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Kevin Mako: I just know for your company, you've got the virtual CMO podcast.

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Eric Dickmann: You're providing all kinds of learning sources. Even on your website, I'm just looking at it right here. You've got the Learn More button. There's all kinds of information that people who are interested in marketing, understanding they're getting an assessment plan, understanding the different elements of a marketing plan.

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Eric Dickmann: You are a great example. You are providing that value. And it's free.

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Eric Dickmann: It's highly curated, highly experienced information that is getting passed along to folks. And then at some point, if they're ready to buy, they'll give you a call, right? And then that's how it converts into a leads.

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Eric Dickmann: I think that's a great example, just yourself, at how you are really being at the forefront of a thought leader.

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Eric Dickmann: And that is transitioning to value back to your prospective customers and existing customers, which will provide business in the end.

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Eric Dickmann: Well, thanks for that. And I would say that for many people,

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Eric Dickmann: if you're selling a physical product as an example, When I go on Amazon to look for a product, and this is no interaction with a website or anything like that,

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Kevin Mako: this is just browsing, looking for something in particular.

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Kevin Mako: I get a listing,

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Kevin Mako: and it has pictures of the product from all different angles. It maybe has a video showing somebody using the product or how this product fits into their work environment or their life. It's got a very thorough description. It's got, you know,

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Kevin Mako: a whole set of pictures and text that describe what the product. product does and how it can value. In other words, even in something as simple as an Amazon product

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Kevin Mako: listing, you can add a lot of value back because you're telling people how this product or service is going to impact them in a positive way, how it's going to solve a problem.

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Kevin Mako: Value doesn't necessarily mean that you have to create tons of white papers and infographics and things like that. It can be just in the way that you present your product or service to a potential buyer. That, you know, that's a very good point.

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Kevin Mako: And Amazon, I think, is a good example of this. I know when we're looking at products that you're considering buying or whatnot, there's a huge difference between a product that just shows a couple of pictures

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Eric Dickmann: and has a two-line description. And maybe there are, you know, there are four bullet points, which is at the top of the page. But only a handful of companies truly take advantage of that middle section of the page,

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Eric Dickmann: which you can put huge amounts of both image and text content in there. to really explain the value, but then go one step beyond that and say, well, you know, here's some information surrounding this product that can help either,

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Eric Dickmann: you know, help you buy it or even not buy it if it's not the right customer. But the reality is if you're very focused and if you have a focused message and you're providing that great value, you have a far greater conversion rate with those types of, those types of ads,

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Eric Dickmann: those types of essentially, because that's what it is. Essentially, it's an Amazon, that page, once you've landed, once you actually have a customer

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Kevin Mako: sitting there looking at your page, that's your one moment of opportunity to truly help them understand how your product is valuable and how it fits into their life. And also everything

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Eric Dickmann: surrounding that. So if you don't take advantage of that, you're wasting that click.

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Eric Dickmann: That's so true. You know, you think of a company like a Best Buy or an IKEA, for example. You know, they have virtual reality now. So you can see how that 65 inch TV is going to look in your room. Or you can see

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Eric Dickmann: how that chair is going to fit into your living room or the bed into your bedroom or whatnot. Those are technologies that they are employing to help build that emotional connection because

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Eric Dickmann: once you see that TV hanging on your wall, you're like, I've got to go get that TV.

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Eric Dickmann: It's a way of sort of adding value making people feel comfortable with the purchasing decision before they ever have to do that. And you're not asking them to buy. You're not saying, hey, will you buy this TV? You're saying, I want to show you what this is going to

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Eric Dickmann: to look like and show you why it's going to be the best option for you.

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Eric Dickmann: That's great. So how do you then, you know, from your experience, from a marketing perspective, how do you really lubricate or simplify that buying process?

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Eric Dickmann: Yeah, I think this is really important because you want to make it super easy to buy things. You don't want to make layers of paperwork that people have to fill out

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Eric Dickmann: or odd payment systems, you want to make things very straightforward. I'll give you a great example. I just recently got the Apple credit card. As I said, I've got an emotional connection to that brand. So I got the Apple credit card. You know, I opened up my phone.

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Eric Dickmann: There was a thing, you know, we'd love for you to have the Apple credit card. I clicked on it. They said, of course, you're approved. And they said,

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Eric Dickmann: the only thing that I needed to enter was my income. Everything else was pre-filled. the process showed an approval,

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Eric Dickmann: the card ended up in my virtual wallet immediately, and three days later, I got this nice little package in the mail with a titanium physical card. It was a seamless

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Eric Dickmann: process from a buyer standpoint. Now, compare that to other buying processes where people ask you to fill out forms, maybe you go to a company where you've made purchases before, they don't

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Eric Dickmann: remember your password on the website or they're not using key chains and things like that. So you have to figure out what was there a password. You have to reenter information. They don't accept different kinds of payments. So they make the buying process tough. You know, oh, we don't

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Eric Dickmann: accept Amex. We only accept this or we want you to pay by by this format. There are a lot of things that you can do that just streamlines that process. What I, you know, Amazon made a name for themselves

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Kevin Mako: with one click ordering, right? Push this button. it's on its way. That is the ultimate simplification in terms of the buying process. So if you've got a more complicated process that does require more steps, that does require the collection of more

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Kevin Mako: information, you've got to figure out, if I know information about my potential buyer, am I at least pre-filling this information to save them keystrokes to do that? Am I putting this

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Kevin Mako: information in a way that makes it very easy and streamlined for them to fill out? Am I saving things like passwords on the website. All of this may sound relatively straightforward, but every little point of

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Kevin Mako: friction in the buying process gives your potential buyer an opportunity to opt out, to say, oh, this doesn't work.

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Kevin Mako: I remember I was actually buying some camera gear,

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Eric Dickmann: and I was trying to buy it on the website, and I kept hitting the pay now button and getting errors. Well, how many times am I going to do that before I say, okay, I'm going to go to a competitor's website, and purchase it there.

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Eric Dickmann: So I think whatever you can do to remove those barriers to streamline the process is a win for your customer and a simplification of the buying process.

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Eric Dickmann: It's clear that there is a common thread here, and it's MVP simplification,

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Eric Dickmann: no extra bells and whistles, really just hitting the nail on the head for that key target demographic, all the way from original development, now all the way right through to the payment process, really.

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Eric Dickmann: The more that you can simplify and smooth out every single element, the less headaches you have, the less people that are going to leave, the less frustration that's going to occur. Of course, which leads to the last thing, which I'd like to talk to you about, which is

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Eric Dickmann: after sale. I think that's a huge missed opportunity for a lot of product companies. So what have you seen as some best practices for the point where you've actually closed that sale?

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Eric Dickmann: They hit the buy button, you know, that your job as a company isn't over yet. In fact, one of your greatest opportunities is right around the corner. So talk to us about that, Eric.

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Eric Dickmann: You know, it's interesting. We talked at the beginning of the show about the fact that I'm doing some remote work today here in Tampa. And as part of that, I've had to buy some equipment, some lights, some microphones and things like that.

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Eric Dickmann: And I'm very interested to see how it arrives because we talked a little bit about this emotional connection and there's nothing more exciting to me as a marketing guy than receiving a product that I purchased.

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Eric Dickmann: And it comes in this box that is clearly thought out in a way that says, we are excited that you bought our product. Now let us introduce you to this product and make you feel good about that buying decision.

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Eric Dickmann: So that emotional connection now has carried over from, you know, the dopamine rush that I got by pushing that buy now button to now opening up that package and seeing the product in its physical form.

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Eric Dickmann: And you compare that to, you know, something that you get in a standard, you know, cardboard box that, you know, maybe just has a little instruction sheet. And oh, by the way, they put something in there that says, please give us a five-star review on Amazon.

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Kevin Mako: What a difference in the experience, right? You want to sort of keep that emotional connection going after the purchase, because if you've done a good job, your customer likes your product or service, chances are when they need something

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Kevin Mako: similar or they need another one, they're going to come back. So what you want to do is you want to keep thinking about how can I add value after the service. Don't ask them immediately for a five-star review when they just have opened up their product.

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Kevin Mako: How about following up with them, you know, a week later and say, you know, we hope you are enjoying your new product. We'd love to hear some feedback. And then maybe, oh, by the way, if you really like our product, we'd love for you to leave a review.

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Kevin Mako: And oh, by the way, to thank you for your business, we'd love to give you 20% off your next purchase. Or something along those lines, thanking them for their purchase, rewarding them for being a valued and ongoing customer,

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Kevin Mako: and giving them offers and incentives to do business with you again. And if it's a complicated process where maybe you have dedicated salespeople that try to sell this physical product.

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Kevin Mako: Well, then, are your salespeople following up with that customer? Are they asking how the purchase went? Are they asking how the implementation went? Are they asking if the customer is satisfied? Do you ask them for feedback? What would you like to see in future versions of this product

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Kevin Mako: or the next release or whatever it may be? It's keeping that dialogue open. People really appreciate it when they feel a company cares about them after the sale. Absolutely. And that adds to a big topic, which is authenticity.

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Kevin Mako: So if you're very focused and you're dedicated to providing real and true value to your customers,

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Kevin Mako: that is going to come out in a very authentic,

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Kevin Mako: almost non-big corporate way, which is as a small business, one of your biggest advantages against the big corporations that you're either competing with or that may want to compete with you. You are nimble. You are agile.

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Kevin Mako: You are very passionate about a very specific problem. product or very specific offering or very specific value add to those customers. So that allows you a great opportunity there. Three things I think about that I like to tell people when they're delivering, especially

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Kevin Mako: their first product run.

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Kevin Mako: And this ties exactly into what you're saying. One,

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Kevin Mako: on the first, let's say, 100 units or whatever is reasonable to do, just handwrite something on it.

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Eric Dickmann: Even if it's on the back of the box, it says, thanks, exclamation mark, smiley face in an actual real marker or something like that.

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Eric Dickmann: Second, an easy one.

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Eric Dickmann: Again, because again, you don't have to make the super fancy packaging to have that emotional attachment.

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Eric Dickmann: If cost is a major issue, just include a letter from the, a letter from the owner, a letter from the sales rep or a letter from whoever else and say, thanks for your purchase. Again, if you can hand sign it, if you have the time, great.

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Eric Dickmann: If not, if you really don't have the time, then even just a letter describing, you're only writing this letter one time. describe what it means to you that they've purchased it, that they've actually invested in your future.

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Eric Dickmann: And I think that that can be so powerful. The final thing is, again, if you have the time, but this one can be really valuable, especially on a first product launch in a number of ways,

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Kevin Mako: A, making your clients really happy, but B, and arguably more importantly, figuring out how to perfect and improve and refine or add to your product in the future, it's just give them a call

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Eric Dickmann: or shoot them a quick email, at least your first 50 or 100 users, right, either from the sales rep or whatever else. And that's what you said about following up. But that's a dual edge sword,

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Eric Dickmann: which is beautiful, right? Which is learn and learn from that information and make somebody incredibly happy that they just spent whatever it is, $10, $20, $50 on your thing. And magically,

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Eric Dickmann: you've got all of these little very personal touches to it. Because those first customers are your most valuable customers. That's almost the make or break of your new offering, especially as a startup. Or even if you're further along the road, if this is a new

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Eric Dickmann: If you're a mid-sized company and it's a new product launch, you still want that same emotional attachment with that new product. So I'm really glad you brought all that up. Well, you know what I love about what you just said is all of those ideas cost a whopping

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Eric Dickmann: $0.0. It's just the thought that counts, as they say, right?

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Kevin Mako: It's just it's having that personal connection with somebody and doing something that shows you cared. And I think that's so true when you're talking about a startup or an initial product launch, you know, people in some ways are taking a bit of a risk, right? You're a bit of an

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Kevin Mako: unknown. You don't have necessarily that authority or that reputation that's already built up. So making people feel comfortable that they took a chance, if they, if you will,

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Kevin Mako: on something that's new and maybe a little unknown, I think is an excellent idea. And just,

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Eric Dickmann: again, it shows you're authentic. It shows that you're really looking. to build those relationships on a long-term basis.

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Eric Dickmann: That's great. Eric, much appreciated for all your insight. If people want to get in touch with you to help with their marketing strategy, their marketing plans, their execution of marketing, what's the best rate to reach out?

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Eric Dickmann: Yeah, I appreciate that. So my company is called the FiveEchelon Group. So that's FiveEchelon.com on the web. I would be happy to sit down with anybody and just talk about their marketing plan. And if they have one or if they don't have them, what they need to do.

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Eric Dickmann: to put a plan in place. As you mentioned, I also run a series called the Virtual CMO. It's a podcast. It's available on Apple Podcasts or Google or Spotify, wherever you listen to your podcast. And we bring on thought leaders each week

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Eric Dickmann: to talk about different elements of marketing and how they can help small and mid-sized businesses really grow and accelerate. Kevin, you were nice enough to be a guest on a show recently. And it's just a joy to meet all of these people

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Eric Dickmann: out there in the world who have real world, experience and are willing to share that value with other businesses to help them accelerate their growth and maybe not go down a path that's going to cost them time and

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Eric Dickmann: money. So I'm also on LinkedIn. Eric Dickmann would love to connect with anyone. Eric, much appreciated. Again, that's five echelon.com for your website there. And the podcast

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Eric Dickmann: is the virtual CMO podcast, which is chief marketing officer podcast. So it's all things marketing. Eric, thanks again for taking your time, especially when you're

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Eric Dickmann: I know you're very busy with Super Bowl marketing, which is a crazy thing going on right now, but I really appreciate taking the time and getting the full virtual remote setup for us going so that you could share these insights. Thanks again.

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Eric Dickmann: Hey, Kevin. Thanks so much for having me on the show. It's really fun of pleasure. Much appreciated. Take care.

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Narrator: Thanks for tuning in to this episode of the Product Startup Podcast, the show that teaches you what it really takes to bring your product to market and turn it into a big success.

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Narrator: This podcast series is brought to you by Mako Design + Invent, the original and leading firm in North America to provide global caliber in-to-in physical consumer product

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Narrator: development to startups, inventors, and small product business clients. If you're looking for product development help on your invention, head over to Mako-design.com.

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Narrator: That's m-a-k-o-design.com for a free consultation from one of Mako Design's Ford Design Studios from Code. to coast. Thanks for listening and see you next time.