A former computer-crime investigator shares two tactics that exploit how people react to their own names. He writes public letters praising executives by name, prompting them to Google themselves and call him back. He also teaches staff to memorize customer names with visual tricks, which he says creates loyalty that keeps people coming back.
My background, I've had the good fortune of owning and selling a couple businesses. One of my businesses was in computer crime investigation, and we would solicit large clientele. We'd work with some of the largest corporations in the US, and my key contact there was usually directors of security, the CIO, CTO. So what I would do is write an open letter, say John Smith of of Ford Motor Company was my target and I wanted to work with them, I would write an open letter on my own website saying, "John Smith, I so admire what you've achieved, what you've done for Ford. It's truly a remarkable CV that you've accumulated. It would be such a privilege one day to meet you and learn from you and perhaps even be a vendor of yours." Well, guess who is searching for his own name on Google? John Smith. And sure enough, he would be Googling, and I get inbound calls from people that discovered my open letters and said, wow, this is amazing, how do we do business together? What names do you Google? I sure suspect you've Googled your own name a couple times. Your customers are magnetized by their own name, and they cherish those words. When they come into your pharmacy, You should be memorizing their names. In fact, there's techniques to do it, and I wish we had time for me to share with you how to memorize names. There's a technique called mnemonics. I'll give you the basic formula. If you wanna remember my name is Mike, what's a popular rhyme with Mike? Mike, Mike motorbike. You can picture a motorbike racing over my head. Now you got a good visual that you'll never lose. And next time you see me, you can say, oh, hey Mike, and you have me magnetized, you have my absolute attention because you're speaking the most important word to me. Have yourself and your employees memorize the first name at least of your patrons, and they will come more often than ever, because no one cares about their names, but they do, and now you do.
