Duane Zingale has made an interesting pivot in his life. He went from working in ministry to working in marketing. In making this transition, he looked deep inside his own life to build his understanding of how he wanted to do marketing. 

Duane thinks in terms of movements and transformation. Marketing is not just about selling to him. As he works with and helps his clients market themselves, he brings them into something deeper: viewing marketing as a relationship.

Duane joined us on Creating Your Encore Career to talk more about this philosophy. He helped us understand some of the ways we can transform our mindset on marketing as well as some concrete steps that we can start taking today to improve our marketing. 

 Marketing Is Not Just Automation

As business owners, we're not just leading businesses but are leading communities towards transformation. When Duane was working with one of his earliest clients, they hit a sweet spot where the client was making $12,000 a month and had over 1200 members. However, they then spent six months spinning their wheels. They didn’t know where the growth had gone. 

Duane realized that he had over automated everything in the client’s business; the relationship-building had dwindled away. He had created a false urgency in an attempt to trick people which led the business to get stagnant. 

This is when he discovered that there is a better way to do marketing. He realized he needed to leverage automation in a way that was authentic, created empathy, built bridges of trust, and didn’t just trick people into an impulsive moment of buying. 

LISTEN

After coming to this realization, Duane began forming his LISTEN framework. This is now the basis of his marketing philosophy.

• L: locate. This step covers knowing who you want to reach and then locating that perfect client.

• I: invite. After you locate your perfect client, invite them in. Invite them into your movement. Invite them to take action. This is often done by collecting their email address.

• S: survey. This means making proactive choices in your marketing tactics to get to know people and build a bridge of empathy. Ask questions in your emails or invite people to fill out a quick survey form.

• T: teach. Give people a taste of what you're bringing in terms of transformation. 

• E: empower people with a purchase. 

• N: nurture your newfound clients and customers. You could do this by getting referrals and helping your clients continue to experience transformation. This makes them want to come back and work with you in a deeper manner. From there, you’ll have a community that will begin to market your movement.

First Steps in Your Encore Career

Duane also laid out some concrete steps for those of you just starting your Encore Careers:

1. In phase one (the beginning stage of your business), think about three important things: who do you serve, what do you serve them with, and what story do they want to hear from you? 

2. Start selling the same thing over and over. Think of your business in terms of a system. Figure out the process by which you’ll lead people and trust that process. 

3. Communicate why you trust your process through a story.

4. Once you’ve got somewhat of a process going, then you can begin automating. One of the best tools in this step is having an email list because you own that audience. Figure out how to build that audience, even if that means starting with just getting 100 people onto it. 

Taking these steps will empower you to utilize the LISTEN framework well and start marketing your movement.