That’s a question my mind will consciously or unconsciously pose when suddenly I find that I need what you sell or want what you sell. And if my internal answer isn’t “yeah, I know YOU”, then it’s quite likely that you’ll get very little, if any, consideration for my pending purchase!
Familiarity breeds trust. 
Let’s explore that important concept.
A couple of summers ago I returned to my Virginia home from a couple of weeks on the road. My 10-year-old son was with me for an excellent summer father/son weekend. But when we opened the front door we were immediately slapped with an odor that can only be described by his instantaneous reaction: “Dad, I think there’s a dead animal somewhere in here!”
What was dead was the refrigerator.
And everything in it… meats, milk, cheese, eggs the runny remnants of an ice cream cake dripping and hardened along the inner walls.
It was time to snap into action. I needed to quickly find an appliance store who could answer “yes” to 3 very basic – but important – questions:
How late are you open tonight? (It’s already a little after 6pm when this is happening.)
Do you have refrigerators in stock?
Can you have one delivered by at least some time tomorrow?
But I won’t ask those questions to your store before asking internally: “Do I know you?”
Two stores were immediately available in the forefront of my mind. All I need to find is their phone numbers. Google search. Done. Call.
The first store I called went unanswered. Closed? The second store was open and had fridges in stock but delivery by the next day was a little shaky. Not a prized option.
Now the google search expanded out into the more random category search. The “Google crap-shoot” I like to call it. Among the list of 10 or so that immediately come up there is another store name I recognized. This store name didn’t come to me initially, but upon seeing it in the resource, I remembered, recognized, and reacted with something sub-consciously like: “oh yeah, I should call them.”
They came through on all 3 questions. They got the sale. And we got a refrigerator.
The stores that were considered options for me were the ones that I already knew or recognized immediately. The one that got my money was the one capable of coming through with what I needed at that moment.
These were businesses that had been proactively communicating messages to me – to the market – before I ever needed or believed I might need their products. The stores that waited to introduce themselves to me at that crucial moment with perhaps a colorful ad in the yellow pages, or who hoped I’d click on them from the google search, remained as nothing more than anonymous appliance stores. Stores that I actually hoped I wouldn’t even need to consider.
Familiarity breeds trust.
When I recognize your business or know of it I can convince myself in a time of need that yours is more likely to be a trusty business. I might subconsciously believe a friend told me about you. What’s far more likely is that you’ve just been consistently communicating through proactive media like radio or television. Or that you found a way to draw attention to me via new online media. In the end it doesn’t matter at all to me WHY I know you. Only that I do.
Of course just knowing you isn’t, in and of itself, a guarantee that you’ll get the business. There will be other factors (like, in this case, being able to come through on my 3 basic questions, and then having what I believe to be a fair price). But isn’t it a HUGE advantage for your business when you at least get the call? Well the chances are far more likely you will get the call when more consumers who suddenly need or want what you sell are already familiar with you BEFORE that need or want arises.
That means communicating consistently, with a specific message, in media that allow you to do so proactively before I’m ever in the need or want of what you sell.
I may need you. But do I know you?
-Steve
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