What Distributors Really Want From the Mothership

To cultivate a relationship with prospects and buyers while respecting the role of the distributors responsible for actually selling your product, you need to arm your distributors with powerful brand stories. Stories that describe in romantic detail how your well-crafted product is different and better than those of your competitors. Stories about why you do things the way you do.

Your job, as the brand mothership, is to create story-driven marketing that fosters the trust needed by buyers to feel confident in their commitment to purchase your product.

If you create the brand stories, your distributors will use them, which will create the direct brand relationship with the customer that will enable you (mothership) to reinforce not only the wisdom of their decision to buy, but also their sense of belonging to a family that really cares. As distributors use the stories to strengthen the dialog stream with their customers they will be weaving brand awareness into every touch.

Here are three things you can do right now to start creating stories that will help your distributors not only make more sales, but also drive greater awareness of the mothership/brand.

1. Get your storytellers straight.

Assemble a team of sales, service and support. Don’t forget representatives from distribution – particularly those that interact with the customer. Together, create the roles that the distributor and mothership will play within the story that is the customer journey.

The customer journey starts with how a customer first hears about your brand and progresses to their decision to purchase it, but it also should include post purchase “stops” such as how they maintain the product and ultimately how they become evangelists for it.

2. Make stories interesting and real.

Distributors need details of exactly how your products are different and why you do the things you do, but you also need to help them make it interesting by providing them with anecdotes, testimonials, graphics and video. Give distributors a way to convey the Real Stories of the people who have chosen your products and how they are using them to advance their business.

3. Storify the post purchase experience.

Give distributors a way to communicate what will happen to them after they write the check by providing detailed evidence of your rich history and your unified user community. Consider implementing a forum where satisfied customers can celebrate business-changing results.

As the mothership, it’s your responsibility to make the proposed unique value of your well-crafted product crystal clear. If your current marketing efforts do not achieve this, it’s time to take another look at your marketing program and your brand. Supply great brand stories and your distributors will do the rest – and all of you will profit for it.