One of the most expensive costs of doing business is acquiring new customers...especially today, as it becomes easier and easier to design, build and launch products of any kind (digital or physical).  As the volume of products increases, and the amount of marketing noise increases, customers increasingly just shut everything out, ignoring everything.

These trends will only worsen over time, making it harder and harder to get the attention of customers.

However - one thing always cuts through the noise: relationships, especially trusted advisor relationships.   Word of mouth marketing has always been the best (most effective and most cost-efficient), but it's impossible to harness or predict in a sustainable way, across multiple companies or multiple product lines.

Many people with fantastic talents and products hate "selling".  Selling, while it directly contributes to revenue, is also an incredibly costly and unproductive function when compared to companies that can live on word-of-mouth, and not have to 'sell'.

What if you never had to "sell"?  And by 'selling', I imply trying to convince someone to buy your product.  What if you could design ways to put your product into the market in a way that the right people could find it, trust it and buy it, profitably, without pressure or stress? (On either side - for you to sell it, or them to buy it.   Theoretically, this kinds of word-of-mouth, no-pressure, authentic way to acquire customers would be the most profitable, least stressful, and best way to build trusted relationships. 

For example, as a sales consultant, I never have to "sell".  Instead of selling, I do inform people that I know of what I do and provide a certain set of services.  I do this through email, blogging, meetings, etc...the normal course of business.  Call it marketing.  But a large enough set of people are out there that trust my talents and, through word of mouth, plenty of business comes my way without me ever having to do any selling.  I engage, not sell.  And with BlackBox Revenues, now Ryth and I are building the "layers of the onion" to make it easier than ever to engage with more, and more kinds, of clients.

(Note...the "layers of the onion" section is important here too!)

Now the executive or VC in you is going to say: "That sounds great, and I can see that happening for a consultant who's working with people they already know, but it won't scale."

True...but let's assume our goal isn't to build a single monolithic company.

Let's assume we want to be happy, which equals: more fun, less stress, more money.  And we get to work on what we want, when we want, with who we want.  What if we start, with multiple people, a variety of new projects (pebbles) instead of a single company?  And each pebble, through it's varied founders, has a set of trusted relationships.  When the pebble is ready, it's launched just to that set of relationships, and, with the layers of the onion, a certain percentage of new customers will engage.  And later, once they're happy, they'll spread the word.

Now do this with dozens, or hundreds, of overlapping pebbles.  Many are interrelated, building on themselves with complementary sets of services, products and relationships....here are some examples of sales and marketing related pebbles:

Sales consulting

Leadgen services

Book case studies

Sales talent placement

Content site / reviews

Logo and marketing materials development

etc.

If this is done right, none of these pebbles every have to "sell". They simply build off the success of existing relationships, other pebbles, and the outwardly-expanding 'success ripples'.  There are positive feedback mechanisms...when one pebble grows, the others feed off of it.  And vice versa.  It's a virtuous circle!

And there's no selling!  You just have to put the right pebbles, ideas and relationships in motion...and then be ready to receive sales.