Why Not GYNOT? (Get Your Name Out There)

By admin • September 16th, 2010

I received an email from a local company today. The title of the email was:

Get Your Name Out There!

My first thought went something like – oh no, not another small business succumbing to the notion that simply getting one’s name out there is the key to success! Or worse – recommending others simply get their name out there.

But fortunately I read further and noticed the body of the email was really an advertisement for a company that sells promotional items like engraved key chains, pens, toys, etc.

The email got me thinking – Why NOT just Get Your Name Out There? What’s the harm in that? Aren’t we all competing for an ever-increasing slice of the proverbial Customer Pie? Well, first let’s look at what constitutes Getting Your Name Out There (I’ll just refer to it as GYNOT for sake of brevity) and then you decide if my argument makes sense.

What is GYNOT?

Just Get Your Name Out There! - NOT

If you’re like me you’ve probably heard a lot of the “old timers” in business talk about getting your name out there to gain more customers. Most of the ones I know who hang on to that old axiom came from the advertising industry – or have dealt with the advertising industry for years. If you haven’t noticed lately the advertising industry has taken a severe beating because times have changed – A LOT – over the past decade.

Yellow Pages, radio, TV, magazine, and even many direct marketers and salesmen hang on to the old GYNOT practice due to lack of understanding of the new dynamic age that we’re in.

Our customers and we ourselves have become a society of numb and apathetic consumers due to the overwhelming amount of advertising we receive on a daily basis.

It was bad enough prior to the information age with billboards, magazines, newspapers, signs, vehicles, tv, radio, etc. And the advertising overload compounded exponentially as personal computers have become a household appliance. Now add in the hundreds or even thousands of emails we get every day, not to mention the banner ads, squeeze pages, cross-marketing and affiliate links that are shoved down our throats every day… ARRRGH!

As a consumer, I’m confused. Aren’t you? I don’t know which one of the 3,000 ads I see everyday is telling me the truth, or even what I need to know. I’ll bet the same holds true for you as well, doesn’t it? This is the very reason why NOT GYNOT – we can’t just get our name out there any longer. It doesn’t work unless we have an endless amount of advertising money in our budget – and even then – do you really expect to get noticed over the thousands of other ads your prospect sees in a day?

So why advertise?

You’re probably thinking that I don’t advocate advertising. You are partially right – I don’t advocate “GYNOT Advertising”. GYNOT advertising is using a shotgun approach thinking that all you have to do is aim in a broad enough swath and you’ll pick off a bunch of targets. You probably will kill a few birds; but you’ll also miss or wing more than you’ll pick off – and that’s expensive.

The alternative to GYNOT advertising

Take a look around practically anywhere these days and you’ll hear of new marketing concepts like Twitter, Blogs, Social Networking, Facebook, Linked-In, and the list goes on. These newer-aged forms of marketing seek to establish relationships between the business and the consumer leading up to, during, and after the sale. Very smart!

But there is still a huge problem. Too often these mediums are being used for GYNOT type advertising. I went to a friends’ company Facebook Page the other day and all I saw were discounts and pitches to buy his product. There was ZERO interaction between the would-be buyer and the company. It’s as if he copied his Yellow Pages advertising and pasted it on his Facebook Page. Not surprisingly there were only a handful of “Likes” on his page – probably from family members or close friends. I shook my head and closed my laptop. I couldn’t take it any more!

Sadly, he’s not the only one who is lost on this new thing that I call “Brand Relationships”. He is just one of dozens I’ve seen who is using Social Networking in a totally inappropriate GYNOT way; and it’s not limited to our industry.

Here’s the challenge with Brand Relationship building: Connecting with potential buyers. That’s it. Overcome this challenge and you can’t help but grow and, if done correctly, dominate your online presence, which means more loyal customers and referrals.

In future blog entries we’ll delve into building your Brand Relationship with your customers and prospects.

Scott Rendall
The Big Banana of Business
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