When I say educational marketing, I mean that the presentations, collateral, blog posts, etc. shed new light on subjects your prospects are interested in.  One of the first educational events I personally attended (as a prospect), was just after having received great news, “Your wife is going to have a baby!”  It was our first of seven, and what an exciting time it was.  In the process of signing up for things,  buying at baby stores, and perhaps visiting the doctor, we ended up on the marketing call list for Baby Tenda-care, a company that manufactured and sold a multi-purpose contraption for babies.  It served as a height chair, porta-crib, and several other things.  As you can imagine, anything that looks like a porta-crib, can’t easily turn into a height chair, but they claimed it did.  Our first introduction to this amazing device was through an invitation to attend a free dinner at a low-end buffet steak house; a place where you pay about seven dollars for steak, sides, and desert.  (Another sign that this wasn’t going to be good).  While the speaker did spend time on educating us, most of the talk was high-pressured sales.  It was distasteful and aggravating.  I told my wife about ten minutes into it that we were absolutely not buying anything.  We didn’t buy that night, but it was uncomfortable not to.  Many did, and the guy signing up new customers did his best to make the husband feel like he was cheating his wife out of a great, time saving tool that was almost guaranteed to take the work out of parenting.  As far as I can tell, this product is no longer on the market, and I know why.  This can’t be your approach to educational marketing if you plan to succeed.

© 2011, David Stelzl