The top two strategies to reach potential customers: they’re probably not what you think.

What’s the most effective way you can get the attention of a potential customer?

You probably want to begin by talking about what a good job your company does. But this is not the most effective approach – and could blow your opportunity to engage the potential customer more quickly.

Sales coach Dean Minuto of SalesBrain says your first step is to focus on the customer’s fear of loss — “if you don’t do this, then this could happen.” Fear of loss, it turns out, is twice as effective a motivator as the potential for gain.

Try focusing on what the customer’s competition is doing well and how your can help your customer overcome that… if they’ll take this action now.

The second tactic Dean talks about got my attention because I’ve seen it work so well: online video testimonials.

Dean says, in business, we’re all concerned about making safe choices. Most of the time, we don’t necessarily want the best choice or even the cheapest. We want the one that carries the least risk that ensures we won’t be fired.

How do you convey safety? By presenting customers on your website, talking about the great job you do. A customer is an impartial third party who has already chosen you and seems pretty happy about it.

Unless they’re prevented from participating because of corporate policy (or because they don’t want the outside world to know they use vendors), customers usually love to give testimonials.

Give ‘em some questions in advance, put ‘em on camera or behind a microphone, make them feel comfortable, ask a few questions and — voila! — you’ve got a powerful sales tool.

Online video testimonials should include visuals of your product or service in action and should run no more than 2½ minutes.

Online audio testimonials should only last a minute or so, though you can create a second version that’s 6-10 minutes long describing what the customer learned from working with your company.

Fear and safety: we’re all wired the same way. Might as well profit from it!