Smart Moves
Here are some simple ways to incorporate knowledge-added marketing into your business.

• Provide context - Learning comes faster and is better retained when delivered within the "student's" frame of reference. Don't simply provide a litany of facts; instead wrap them in a case study or a human-interest story that demonstrates how the information could benefit the reader.
• Think broadly - Integrate knowledge-added marketing into all of your promotional efforts rather than viewing it as a separate "educational" program. White papers and research reports are great starting points, but don't ignore corporate brochures, flyers, newsletters, websites, blogs, podcasts, tip sheets, seminars, bylined articles, media interviews, and every other means you have to communicate with clients. Think of yourself as a teaching rainmaker and don't ever miss an opportunity to share and educate.
• Forget what you're selling - The less you mention your product name, the more attention you'll command. Your job as an educator is getting the customer to recognize that there's a problem and a solution. Emphasizing your specific product from the get-go makes the prospect focus on what's in it for you; emphasizing the larger need makes the prospect focus on what's in it for himself.
• Don't educate beyond the close - Like every other aspect of sales and marketing, you need to closely read your audience. You have to recognize information overload long before it arrives. Knowledge-added marketing does not try to make someone an expert. Rather, it is a way of conducting business that enhances credibility, builds rapport, and inspires confidence. As a rainmaker, what you've done is create the ideal environment to close the deal. And while education should certainly continue after the sale is made, closing the deal is the ultimate knowledge-added bottom line.