Many businesses realize that they need a web presence. However, this is not magic. To show up on a Google search, you must regularly add content. This was emphasized in both of these books. However, in They Ask You Answer, Sheridan stressed that you must put up the right content.
Sheridan discussed that his pool business almost went down the drain in 2008. He lost $250k in one weekend. He then started to research content marketing and inbound sales strategies. He and his partners began to write articles for their blog. They weren’t any articles. They wrote articles that answered customer questions and concerns such as costs, product problems, etc. As a result, they gained the trust of their customers, and their customers started to buy from them. Sheridan could trace one specific blog post to $3 million in sales.
They Ask You Answer is 226 pages long. I was able to read it in two nights. I took a ton of notes. It generated many great ideas that I will try with my business. Sheridan arranged the book in four major parts and 44 different chapters. The four primary elements include:
- A Very Different Way of Looking at Business, Marketing, and Trust
- The Impact of They Ask, You Answer on Sales Teams
- Implementation and Making It a Culture
- Your Questions Answered
Throughout the book, Sheridan leaned on his personal experience and how it helped him with making his pool business successful as well as start a new successful business. He also highlighted how this approach helped other companies.
I will caution that this is not an overnight solution. It will take months to see a change in your bottom line. Even before I read this book, I was implementing these strategies, and I have started to see a positive upturn in traffic and business. This book reinforces what I have believed to be the right approach. Take care of customer needs. I picked up this book after listening to his message on a Social Media Examiner podcast and reading A Revolutionary Marketing Strategy: Answer Customers’ Questions.
“Today, on average, 70 percent of the buying decision is made before a prospect talks to the company” (Sheridan, 2017, p. 9).
How are you informing your prospects? What could you be doing more to get your prospects to know, like, and trust you so that they will become your customer?
They Ask You Answer will put you on the right path. If you are a small business, you need to read this book. I am strongly encouraging my clients to read this book. I believe it is a smart way to position your business.
Additional Reading
- Book Review: The 1-Page Marketing Plan: Get New Customers, Make More Money, and Stand Out From the Crowd
- Books Review: Starting a Business QuickStart Guide
- Interesting Findings Regarding Chautauqua Area Businesses Digital Presence
- Book Review: Master Content Marketing: A Simple Strategy to Cure the Blank Page Blues and Attract a Profitable Audience
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