You have to do better than that. Listen to this episode. See where I'm going with this one. Hi, it's Alan Berg. Welcome back to another episode of the Wedding Business Solutions Podcast. This is something that I'm sure we're all dealing with these days, and it just has come up so much lately that I wanted to address it here. 

 

I get messages on Facebook, on LinkedIn, on Instagram. I get emails. I get people trying to connect with me, people commenting on posts that I do, which are clearly People that either are spam or scams, but also they could be people that just, they didn't do enough research. So think about this. I, I get an email that says, Hi, your professional background is outstanding and is a perfect fit for the professionals our company is looking for. 

 

I'm excited to work with you on our project and think your experience and skills can bring value to our team. Can we talk? No, we can't talk. And here's why. Because nothing in that message says that you've done any research about me, that you know anything about me. It's clearly, you're just blasting that out. 

 

The part of the message here is, do your messages feel like that when you're sending them to people? Whether it's following up with a wedding expo, whether it's a list you get from another let's say a venue or somebody because you're on the preferred list, or whether it's just people that have inquired through your ads or through your website. 

 

Does it sound that generic to them as well? Here was a LinkedIn message. Hello! I'm my boss's assistant. That's a great way to start it. Your professional background is a perfect fit for our company. You have excelled in your field industry and are deeply admired for your expertise. We are excited to work with you on our projects and thinking your experience and skills can bring unique value to our team. 

 

Can we talk? No. Once again, we cannot talk because clearly you don't know anything about me. And then I, you know, then of course you get this one Hey Alan, are you okay? I'm Abigail. Nice to meet you. No, don't put that comment on my Facebook posts. You're getting deleted. You're getting blocked, right? 

 

Or these you've probably gotten these also. I've noticed you pop up on my Facebook recommendations a lot. Are we connected in some way? No. And now you're blocked because we're not connected in some way. And then this one that just came in Hey, accept my request. No, I'm not accepting your request. 

 

Now. I will say I did get one in the other day where they clearly did some research. They were commenting on things on my site. Now they were obviously there, things you could read, fill in the blank, kind of like remember Mad Libs, when you know you'd have a paragraph and there'd be a blank and you get to write a word in there. 

 

And they did a little bit better than that, right? They definitely talked about. What I do. So somebody spent some time looking at my website, looking at my experience and things like that. I'm still probably not interested because that's a cold call on the airport. That's a cold outreach. However, I will give them kudos for at least having done their research. 

And that's the thing. If you're going to reach out to companies for holiday parties, or if you're going to do any kind of cold calling like that, or even reaching out, let's say you have reaching out to your, looking at your wedding couples and looking to see where do they work and then looking at their companies, doing a little bit of research and finding out that their company throws parties, throws different kinds of events, and maybe your venue, your caterer, your music, your pictures, your video, your flowers, your whatever could also be beneficial for them.  

When you reach out, you can say, Hey, I noticed that, you know, the company you work for does a holiday party every December. You know, who can I talk to over there that I might, might be able to be a good fit and then ask for the introduction. Now you've done your research and now it's not just this generic thing. 

 

And that was the point of this, you know you have to do better than that. You need to know more about the company. So that you can have a more intelligent conversation. It's kind of like me when I do sales training just the other day I did for a rental company and one of their comments was on their video testimonial, because I asked for it, was about how I understand their industry. 

 

And the thing is, I've never worked in that business, but I've also never worked as a DJ. And I've also never worked as a photographer, yet I know your business and I can talk your language and then you know that I understand what you do because it's not just some generic thing. And, and that's really what this is all about is if you make the customer feel like they're just another number, that this is some, you know, one size fits all thing. 

They're going to find somebody else who's going to show more interest and talk to them in a way that they understand this is not just generic. So this goes right from the way you're responding to inquiries and it goes all the way through everything else that you do with them. What do your communications look like? 

 

Does it feel personal? Does it feel generic? And you know, Again, I know that there's the genuine scams out there and a lot of the stuff that I read you are either, you know, spam or scams or things like that because they were clearly, they're sending this just to whomever, right? And I'm going to keep deleting them. 

 

You get the text messages like I do. Hi, are we still on for dinner? Like, no, I don't even know who you are. No, delete, report, block. You're not on for dinner. So you want to get my attention and you want to get the attention of your customers. You need to do better than that. Hope this gives you something to think about. 

 

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I'm Alan Berg. Thanks for listening. If you have any questions about this or if you'd like to suggest other topics for "The Wedding Business Solutions Podcast" please let me know. My email is Alan@WeddingBusinessSolutions.com. Look forward to seeing you on the next episode. Thanks. 

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