Think drip...not flood.

I learned many things growing up on the farm. Like you do, I connect my life lessons to my experiences as a child and teenager.

• Hard work won’t kill you; in fact, it will make you strong in both body and mind.

• Working together with others toward a larger goal is very satisfying.  Usually strong effort leads to great results.

• Perseverance. For the times when great effort DIDN’T turn out well initially or at all, we learned to pick up and carry on. Sometimes it meant doing it all over and other times it meant learning to do without.

• Be resourceful and use what you have to make, build, fix or create what you need. Resourcefulness is a valuable life skill that not everyone has.

• You cannot control the weather and as such, you need to make the best of things regardless of the circumstances. Out of this, comes a great marketing lesson.

A farm kid learns the meaning of a ‘soaking rain’. It means that ever drop is absorbed into the soil where it will do the most good. In contrast is the ‘gully washer’. That is a downpour that comes so hard the water runs across the ground so quickly that it takes good soil with it…on the way to the creek or river. Not only didn’t it soak in, it took good things with it.

So when you market…regardless of the strategies you use…are you a soaking rain or a gully washer?

Many think if they flood the market with messages, customers will have no choice but to see, hear and then react to the messages, and they might to some extent. However, most of those messages run off into wastebaskets and email trashcans or the like. And, if all the messages do connect with customers, are you prepared to service all that business in a way that represents your brand like you want it to be represented?

Using a soaking method might work better. Always staying in front of your customer in some way, which is relevant to them, will go much farther in delivering your message. There are many great strategies to use to ‘drip’ market and you can read them here. In some cases it puts the customer in charge of when and how they get your messages, so your points have a better chance to soak into them.

Sometimes a flood tactic is needed to have an impact or to make a point, but using it as your only philosophy might not be the best choice for your brand or your budget. Think drip…not flood.