October 2016 - Principle Centered Marketing

Always Make it Easy to Do Business With You

One of the biggest business advantages you will ever have over your competition is to always make it easier for your customers and clients to say YES than it is to say NO.

Principle Centered Marketing, Selling & Business practices is holistic and encompasses not just your marketing but also your selling and business practices and systems.

It never ceases to amaze me how many businesses that I visit in person, on the phone or the internet, seem to have never looked at their business and practices from their customers perspective.

Every day, look at a different part of your business from your businesses practices to your signage and everything in between and ask yourself these questions:

How easy is it for someone to find your store or your website?
Once they arrive, how easy is it for them navigate and find what they want?

How diligently do you follow-up on inquiries, sales requests or orders?

How diligently do you keep your customers informed on the progress of their order with you?

How knowledgeable and friendly are all your employees?

Jay Abraham says we need to remember these 6 Things about our business:

1. You cannot serve too much.
2. You cannot educate too much.
3. You cannot inform too much.
4. You cannot offer to much follow-up and follow-thru.
5. You cannot make placing an order with you too easy.
6. You cannot make calling, visiting your website or coming in to your place of business too desirable.

There are two absolutely Essential Elements you need to have and tell the world about if you want to make it easy for your customers to say Yes!

One: You must have a UPS (Unique Selling Proposition) – see my article on that subject right here; USP! What is Your Unique Selling Proposition?

The more clearly you communicate what makes you the better choice (benefits, advantages, guarantee, etc) the more often people will choose you over your competition and see you as more valuable.

You can easily tell people why they should choose you in your marketing.

All your marketing should be built around explaining and reinforcing your new USP to your prospects.

Every business, every business owner and/or every product or service they sell is Unique.

You have a story to tell. Tell it to the world.

What makes you Unique is that distinct and appealing idea that sets you apart from all of your competitors.

Here’s a Key thought: Always realize that your clients and prospective clients are asking…WIIFM (What’s In It For Me).

How does what you offer Benefit me? How does it solve a problem I have?

If you can’t articulate your USP in 60 seconds or less, neither can your clients and prospective clients.

Some of the things that make you Unique are because of:
The buyer you serve
What you sell
An unusual angle
What your product or service does not do
The time frame you offer
Your Risk Free Guarantee

And that brings us to the second Essential Element: you need to provide a Risk Free Guarantee

Look at every aspect of your business from the products or services you provide to your clients and even your employees and make a list of all the obstacles that could prevent any of them from purchasing from you, dealing with you or choosing you over your competition.

Here are the categories to pay attention to:

Financial reasons – What could it cost you if the relationship or transaction didn’t work out?

Emotional Reasons – What emotional withdrawals could occur if the relationship or transaction didn’t work out?

Measurable reasons – Can it be measured so your clients can see the actual impact on their personal, business or financial life?

I know a car dealer in Canada that dramatically increased his business by offering a two week, 100% money back guarantee on any new or used vehicle purchased.

Now, in the state of Wisconsin, offering that on a new vehicle is tough because the very minute the customer drives away from the car lot, that vehicle now must be sold as a used vehicle, BUT…put your thinking cap on.

Bottom Line: The biggest secret to success in your business is to always maintain an edge in everything you do.

And the best “edge” you can have is to make it easier for your customers to say YES than it is to say NO!

We help small business owners Work less and Make More money by helping you to:
1. Leverage your time
2. Increase your cash flow & profits
3. Attract and keep the Right clients, employees & products/services

How: By implementing the 80/20 Principles of Marketing, Selling & Business practices

Essential Elements Discovery Process
Automated Email marketing
FB marketing
FB retargeting
Video marketing
1-on-1 “Do It For Me” coaching, consulting, mentoring

Contact me here

Larry Carey
Principle Centered Marketing, Selling & Business practices

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6 Ways to Disqualify Tire Kickers

These are based on the Marketing Principle: It is better to talk to 10 people who want what you have to offer than 100 tire kickers.

In marketing, we teach our clients that it is better to Reach 10% of the Market and persuade them 100% of the way than to Reach 100% of the market and persuade them 10% of the way.

When you are in the business of selling, you better be good at figuring out as quickly as you can, these 6 things.

Here are 6 Ways to disqualify the tire kickers.

1. Are they the decision-maker? Do they have the ability to say yes?
Don’t waste your time making a presentation to an audience that can’t make the final decision.

2. Are they a member of your target audience? Every business has customers or clients that can be broken out according to the 80/20 Principle.
20% of your customers are generating 80% of your profits.

By the way, this principle holds true for your employees and your products/services you offer.

If you want to be more effective, you have to separate these and start focusing on the 20%.

Let’s say you have 3,000 active customers.
This Principle or Natural Law will show you that 600 of those are generating 80% of your profits. And ultimately, you will want to know who the 4% are that are generating 64% of your profits.

Helping you discover this 20% is the 6th element of our Essential Elements Discovery process.

See my article on this subject here: “Who should you be selling to?”

3. Do they have the money?
My two main businesses have been the automotive retail industry and real estate.
Two big ticket items. You better be good at qualifying whether your prospect can afford what you have to offer.

In the auto industry, there are “tire kickers” and there are “buyers”.

When you are strictly on commission, you better learn how to quickly and respectfully qualify your audience.

4. Is there a sense of urgency? Do they have an immediate problem that they need a solution to?

Twenty or so years ago I spent a year having Jay Abraham teach me his marketing principles. One of his pieces of advice that really stuck was “It is better to talk to 10 people who want what you have to offer than a 100 tire kickers.”

Jim Rohn had a similar approach when he said “the best advice I can offer is for you to realize that you have permission to ‘talk about what matters’ only to people who care.”

5. Do they want what you have to offer? Does your USP (Unique Selling Proposition) match what they want?
A unique selling proposition (USP) is your unique answer to these questions:
• What does your product or service do that your competitors doesn’t?
• Why should I buy from you instead of anybody else?
• What guarantee can you make that nobody else can make?

These are the things that make it easier for them to say Yes rather than No!

Effective marketing/selling gets people to raise their hand and say “I want what you have to offer.”

It’s the difference between chasing leads versus having them chasing you.

Which one sounds like more fun, easier and more lucrative?

Read my blog on this issue here: USP! What Is Your Unique Selling Proposition?

6. Do you have a solution for their problem?
Whatever you sell needs to be in harmony with the natural and existing forces in their life right now.

The sooner you learn how to disqualify the 80%, the faster you will dominate your market.

Two huge mistakes almost every business makes

1. They don’t capture the contact information on everyone they come in contact with, name, address, phone number, email address are the basics.

But if you want to excel at this, learn as much as possible about them as you can so that in your future communications, you can share things that are of interest to them.

I used to find out all of the demographic and psychographic information I could.

2. Businesses have no consistent marketing strategy for follow-up.

Follow-up, follow-up, follow-up with things that add value to their lives.
That is why, over the course of time, the more you know about who you know, the better and more trusting your relationship with them will be.

Effective marketing/selling is all about creating trusting relationships.

How badly do you want to not only DOMINATE your market within your industry but do it with less time, effort and money invested?

How badly do you want to have more personal time and more consistent cash flow and higher profits?

Remember this: It is better to reach 10% of the market and persuade them 100% of the way than to reach 100% of the market and only persuade them 10% of the way.

Stated another way: Ten sales are better than 100 “be-backs.”

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Who should you be selling to?

As we have previously discussed, marketing and selling are all about creating trusting relationships.

When it comes to building relationships, knowledge is power.

It isn’t just “who you know” that is important, “it’s what you know about who you know.”

To market and sell your business, product or service properly, the very first thing you must do is become clear on who your ideal customer is, where they are hanging out, what their challenges are, etc…

Every marketing piece must have your clients and potential clients “hot buttons” included and always remember…what’s important or relevant to them.
They only care what’s important to them, not what’s important to you.

Remember the acronym: WIIFM (What’s In It For Me). This is what every prospect and customer is saying to themselves every time you make a presentation.

Once you find who your target audience truly is then you can know what those hot buttons are.

There are 6 elements to knowing who your Target Audience is.
In some cases, you’ll need to survey or have conversations with existing customers to accurately flesh out your target audience.

One: Demographic Information: Where do your clients come from specifically?

Geographic location
Income
Gender
Education
Marital status
Occupation
Religion
Age

Two: Psychographics:

Spending habits
Hobbies
Values
Concerns
Desires
Lifestyles
Associations they might be affiliated with

Three: Sources of Information: Where does your Target Audience [ideal customer] get their information?
Who are the thought leaders they follow like authors, bloggers, magazines, websites, podcasters, etc?
What Facebook pages are like by your Target Audience?
What Facebook groups does your Target Audience belong to?
What are the most popular online discussion forums in your niche?
What are the most popular LinkedIn groups in your niche?

Four: Pain Points or Challenges: What is the major problem they have that you have a solution to?

Five: Objections In Their Purchase Process: What are the reason your customer might choose NOT to buy from you or your product or service?

Six: What are their goals and values?

Here is what you are shooting for with Principle centered marketing, selling and business practices:

No cold calling. Your marketing should be getting people to “raise their hand” and say, “I want what you have to offer.” The prospect that “finds” you is exponentially more likely to purchase from you than the one you have to chase.
Before you even try to market or sell anything, you have to know how much you are willing to spend to get new customers. That can only happen once you know what the Lifetime Value of your customer is. This is one of the elements of our Essential Elements Discovery process.
One of the most effective ways to generate highly qualified leads is to stop selling. Instead, provide information of value to your audience. Show them ways to solve the problems they have.
The most valuable asset you have is a well-maintained and relevant customer data base. Your best customer is your current customer.

6 Qualities of a Good Target MARKET:

They have a problem that they need a solution to and, there is a sense of urgency to this problem.
They have money to spend and they are an audience that are known to spend money to have their problems solved.
This audience is big enough to sustain your business.
It is an audience that you actually enjoy working with.
It is an audience where you have valuable experience, expertise, and product and/or service offerings. You can add value.
It is a market that fits your lifestyle.

Who should you be selling to? Only to people who want to what you have to offer.

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