Let the game come to you

I remember when Michael Jordan and Larry Bird were at their peak, people used to say that “the game came to them.”

They did less to get great results. Somehow they could read the court and respond to the situation, while also creating new situations.

I hope you are doing the same with your marketing. Having “the game come to you” in marketing means:

– Customers contact you, so you don’t have to chase them.

– You are known as the go-to professional in your marketplace.

– When you do reach out to prospects, they see your value and are happy to speak with you.

That’s the opposite of most marketing strategies, where you feel like you are working too hard for too little in the way of results.

How do you get the game to come to you?

– Get visible with educational and informational pieces (speeches, articles, research).

– Develop and nurture proactive referral networks and systems.

– Describe your business in ways that set you apart as having a specific edge (and have raving clients do the same on your behalf).

I like writing for Sitepoint because the range of reader experience is so broad. Some of you understand the above intellectually, but haven’t experienced it. Some of you already are the “go to” professional and know what it is like to have the game come to you. And others of you are in between, sometimes feeling like you are struggling and other times feeling like everything comes to you.

Another way to put it is the difference between push and pull. With push marketing, you feel like you are pushing against a wall. It gets tiring, fast. With pull marketing, you are attracting clients. Even when you use a “push” technique, like reaching out to a prospect with a phone call, you do it in such a way that the prospect wants to take you call, speak to you, and see if there is a fit or not.