You can distribute educational messages for free as web site downloads or as e-mail attachments. Five ways to educate your prospects include:

- White Papers. These analyze challenges and trends and show how to benefit from your products and services.

- E-books. These offer in-depth, procedural descriptions that demonstrate your competence and communicate how-to-buy and how-to-use tips.

- E-mail newsletters. You can keep in constant touch with customers without addressing, printing and postage costs.

- E-courses. You can automatically deliver information in chunks over a period of several days – or even weeks.

- Teleseminars. You can also present teleseminars, which permit prospects to get to know you in an informal, interactive environment. Free line rentals are available; others cost about $25 an hour.

Education-Based Marketing works best when you keep in touch and deliver information at frequent intervals.

A monthly One-Page Newsletter, for example, is far more effective than a bimonthly four-page newsletter or a quarterly eight-page newsletter.

Customers and prospects give you their total attention when you offer information that helps them achieve their goals.

Education-Based Marketing’s effects are cumulative. The more information you share, more your market will look forward to your messages and refer coworkers and friends to you.

Whenever possible, include photographs with your testimonials. Many car dealers, for example, photograph customers taking delivery of their new car. Since this is generally a happy time for customers, displays of these photographs project a positive image.

Even better, create posters for display at point of sale. Simply create a collage of customer comments and photographs professionally typeset and laid out.

Use testimonials as basis for your firms’ advertising. Nothing beats ads written in your customer’s own words. The ads inevitably attract attention and communicate with credibility unavailable in any other way. Create a variety of ads, reflecting different marketing segments your business serves.

Thank your customers for their support and time. However, avoid paying customers. This could detract from credibility of their words. Feel free, however, to show your appreciation with gift certificates or coupons worth savings or discounts.

========================================