I wish I could LIVE in a Ballard Designs catalog! REALLY!

Yes, yes, I love their furnishings, just love them, yet that isn’t my focus for YOU!

The creators of the catalog really stepped into some brilliance with something they did this month in their catalog, bravo!
This is probably how the idea came about: A Ballard Design team was sitting in a meeting and someone says “Why does our prospect most often NOT make a purchase? What’s stopping them?”
Someone else replies “Maybe indecision?”
Everyone chimes in that this is a likely reason. Hence, they decide to create a tool for prospective buyers to use in choosing items for their homes. Ah, and here, my friend, is the result!!!

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They took a photo of a fantabulous living space and then they broke down the main components and gave you the price, description and item number. It causes you to very quickly see those items, in your mind’s eye, in your space. I would bet this has been a successful addition to what was previously beautiful catalog with an average success rate.

So, how can you use this? You are thinking, “I don’t sell furniture, have a catalog or a team of people to brainstorm like this. What does this have to do with me?”

Ok, lesson 1. Know thy customer and why they DO AND DO NOT purchase. If you are a retailer, this could be that you don’t have an attractive store front or your store is not well-known. OR it could be that your store clerks have been rude or the store isn’t merchandised well.
Lesson 2. Build a smoooooth chute for your prospects to slide through on the way to the purchase (make it very easy to go from being a prospect to a buyer/client/customer). Make it clear how to interact with you or your company, don’t allow indecision to be a factor because of your indecision in creating a package or other offer choice. Question what the sticking point is… ALWAYS. Where are your prospects getting stuck in the funnel?

It might be that your clients look into what you offer, but then stop. Ok, then figure out how to make the decision easier and faster.

OR maybe they are purchasing the first time, but not ever again (this is a problem if you make little margin on the first purchase, your customer acquisition cost is high, or the like). This has been one of my client’s problems and it has been quite an evolution to transform, ah but I regress…

So, check out how Ballard Designs has done this in these photos of the catalog pages.

Let me know if you figure out how to apply these lessons to your business. AND let me know if you don’t.

My best as always to you,

C

Waiting for your fairy godmother (venture capitalist/ investor) to save you?

There are no EASY ways to do business. When talking with a client today, I realized something I had never really admitted before, BUSINESS IS TOUGH!

There is no magic bullet, no get-rich-quick. It’s about something much more.

Now, that’s not to say SOME people may find success by being in the right place with the right thing at the right time, but those times are far and few rather than the norm.

Expecting that fairy godmother to come and make all of your dreams come true is a great way to feel like a failure!

THE SMARTER AND MORE SURE WAY TO SUCCESS? FOCUS! Focus on the right things at the right time. Focus on serving your current clients/customers/patients better! Focus on making loyal followers, die-hard fans. (See my post earlier today about Facebook fans and their worth, if you are using social networking as part of your plan.)

Here’s another way to think about it, to quote our man, Seth Godin, “Delight the audience you already have, amaze the customers you can already reach, dazzle the small investors who already trust you enough to listen to you. Take the permission you have and work your way up. Leaps look good in the movies, but in fact, success is mostly about finding a path and walking it one step at a time.”

SOOOOOOOOOOO? How will this change your day, your month, your year?

C

Why having NO Money or Budget when you start your business can be an ADVANTAGE! A Seth Godin case study.

So, Seth Godin tells about this company that did not have the money to spend on a sign that truly describes the product type, and amazingly this probably contributed to MORE success!!

“When Blythe and her partners started Lula’s Apothecary, the best vegan ice cream stand in this hemisphere, they didn’t have enough money to afford the letters to put “Dairy free” on the sign in their window. They couldn’t even afford “vegan.” So the signage says nothing about what they don’t put in their ice cream.

What they discovered was that word among the tribe of vegans in the East Village of New York City (an even bigger group than you might imagine) spread fast. The product was remarkable enough that just a few happy customers were enough to spread the word.

The other thing they discovered is that non-vegans were willing to walk on in if the place looked cool enough. In fact, the lack of ingredient-declaration on their window actually helped them reach out to people who might have been scared away at the lack of milk.”

So, allow the LIMITATIONS of your budget or time or employees, to work FOR your benefit! Allow this limitation to equate to a WIN! See how this can work for you rather than limit you!

If you don’t have money for a sign, then how can that actually be a benefit?

If you don’t have the money to redecorate your retail store, how can you make this an opportunity?

When you don’t have an advertising budget, how can you use that to inspire improvement?

Change, improve, make this work for you!

I want to hear about it!

C

How to charge thousands and be absolutely worth it!

Be a linchpin!
Seth Godin relays this story to illustrate: I had a college professor who did engineering consulting. A brand new office tower in Boston had a serious problem–there was a brown stain coming through the drywall, (all of the drywall) no matter how much stain killer they used. In a forty story building, if you have to rip out all the drywall, this is a multi-million dollar disaster. They had exhausted all possibilities and were a day away from tearing out everything and taking a loss. They hired Henry in a last-ditch effort to solve the problem. He looked at the walls and said, “I think I can work out a solution, but it will cost you $45,000 if I succeed.” They instantly signed on, because if he succeeded, the project would be saved.

Henry asked for a pencil and paper and wrote the name of a common hardware store chemical and handed it to them. “Here, this will work.” And then he billed them $45,000. That’s quite an hourly wage. It’s also quite a bargain.

Read Linchpin to get ideas on how to be a linchpin, but the bottom line is: WHAT VALUE do YOU bring to your buyers?

The problem with us humans is that we over value what we do. You may fight to admit it, but it is a REAL problem.

If you don’t believe me, read Harry Beckwith’s book, Selling the Invisible.

So, IF you want to grow your hourly wage? OR just continue to justify it in a poor economy, then get honest, how much VALUE do you bring? And then concentrate on how to bring even more value. Under-promise, over-deliver! Thre was never a time where this was more important.

Ok, so here we are again, at the point where I ask you, what will this change, improve, alter, in what you do today, tomorrow, next week, month and year.

As you know, if you change nothing, you have gained nothing and you have lost the time you have spent reading (sigh), once again. SOOOOOO, get to it.

My absolute best,

C

How To Create Something So Fascinating That People Can’t Help But Be Drawn In

Read this book with me, let me know how you will use these 7 triggers for your business benefit.

Or take the f score test, see which you use naturally and how to do that better! AND find out which you do not use by nature, and determine how to infuse a bit of that so as to grow the potential from that.
See a new video interview from mixergy, here, fascinating!

C

The ONLY thing you need to do to build your business!

There is ONE thing that you need to build your business. I know! I know! You have all of these other things that you need to do to RUN your business.  Believe me, there is ONE thing that will make you successful! That one thing will create leads or create sales, create followers, whatever you want to achieve.

What is this, you say?

Well, it is different for each company. Sometimes, it is one referral source that works like gangbusters and all you have to do is manage the leads and convert them and of course, rake in the money.

Maybe it is one type of marketing, like radio or social media or PR. You know it is the old rule of 20% of your activities will bring 80% of the results. Actually, the pendulum swings even further, 5-10% of your efforts will make 90-95% of the results.

NOW, I don’t mean that you should only put in 5% of the effort! I MEAN you should spend 80-90% of your efforts on very strategic activities that will bring you major results, RATHER than spreading yourself SO THIN, that you only get a 5% return here or there for your efforts.

So, how do you know what those high-return activities are? Well, think back, what have you done in the past to create most of your success? If you want more leads, then how have you found the right leads en masse?

Has it been with referrals?

Then, how do you improve what you used to do? How do you systematize that effort and build on that success?

THIS sort of strategy, DONE WELL, can rock your world and change the game for you!

1. Think about your problem or a goal you would like to achieve.

2. List how you have found the MOST success in the past with solving this problem.

3. Determine how you improve this, then systematize it, and of course DO IT!

As always, hardly any one will improve according to something they have read, so be the upper echelon and allow this to improve and change what you do today, tomorrow and next week! Otherwise… (read in a singsong voice) we are wasting our time here!

Absolutely my best to you!

C

Retention, referrals or acquisition? Which is most important to you?

When it comes to you and your clients/customers/patients, do you spend more $, time and energy on retention, on getting referrals or on acquiring new?

Which should you be concentrating on?
I have seen through practice that retention is cheaper, and has a bigger payoff, than the other two! Hence, I recommend YOU start there and stay there. When resources for a referral plan exists in ADDITION to the plan for retention, THEN and only then should that take resources from the business for referrals. Lastly, the attention/resources should be brought to acquisition of NEW clients/customers/patients.

What do you think?

What could you do to make what you do in all three arenas better?

C

Typical Media is dying, what can you do about it?

The last flight I took, I browsed the shelves of the magazines. I LOVE MAGAZINES! I had my own magazine, once! I published, wrote and LOVED it!

As I browsed those shelves, my heart lurched, I ached to work with magazines again. My brain slipped right into working with a magazine, marketing a magazine, designing a magazine, the possibilities!

But, I then moved through the thoughts and jerked back into REALITY! In reality, magazines are dying! As are most brick and mortar versions of media! Unfortunate as this is, IT IS TRUE, whether you admit it or not!

So, how can you deal with this shift if you are a part of brick and mortar media?

OR even better, how can YOU benefit from the shift? Because SOMEONE WILL WIN! Someone will succeed! You can be part of that or not…

Seth Godin has a BRILLIANT take on this, basically, he points out that the opportunity is there for you to take! The opportunity is that YOU can reach and build your fan base with micro-magazines!

“There’s room in the market for 100,000 profitable micro-magazines. Why not have one about Aruba, for example? If all the people who vacation in Aruba could read about the island in detail every month, read about restaurants, resorts and politics, for free, in an easy to share format… Multiply this by every destination, every interest group, every type of profession (how about a micro-magazine for ethnobiologists?)

Surely you can think of a group of people that share a demo- or psychographic, that are appealing to an advertiser base and want to learn and share what they learn… for free.”

Here is how he defines an ideal magazines:

• Being digital (probably a PDF), that’s free to ‘print’, fast to make and easy to share. (Newsweek spends seventeen million dollars a year on paper.)
• Having subscribers, either by email or RSS
• Focused on issues that appeal to some, but not all
• Having a very specific audience (call it a tribe)
• Enabling that tribe to connect by sharing the ideas in the magazine among them, as well as supporting it with a forum or blog
• Containing ads that are relevant to that audience
• Being longer than 140 characters or even a blog post, so significant ideas can be exposed in detail.

So, what group could you target?

How could you use this to your advantage?

What will this change, improve, create for you?

C

Retailers – You are losing buyers to the internet retailers! What are YOU doing about it?

Retailers – You are losing buyers to the internet retailers!

What are YOU doing about it?

ONE TOOL IN YOUR ARSENAL THAT WORKS LIKE NEVER BEFORE:

COUPONS!

A study by Inmar reveals that 2009 consumers used coupons at a faster clip than they did the year before – the first increase in coupon redemption in 17 years.

Online coupon access increased 92 percent and traditional newspaper inserts are still a stomping ground for bargain hunters – 89 percent of coupons are distributed that way, and the paper vouchers account for more than half of those redeemed at the checkout counter.

Many who never used coupons are now forced to use them – what about you and your household?

Are you maximizing your opportunities with these?

If you are not improving your business each and every day, internet retailers WILL and they offer coupons, everywhere!

SOOOOO, create an offer, a coupon, something to put online, on twitter, on facebook, in the newspaper OR all of these, GRAB THOSE customers today!

As always, my absolute best to you,

C

How to Name Your Business! Or Brand Your Image!

In working with  a client yesterday, we discussed at length HOW to name a new company. Many people get caught up in semantics, opinions from others, and what has already been DONE! The same issues happen with branding an image or company. And more often than not, time is lost striving in the wrong direction.

The key with naming a business is to understand the core concept that no one should do this for you, whether you are a soloprenuer, inventor, retail store owner, or doctor, because with time, generally you will see that this “definition” of who and what makes your business special will be inaccurate.

Seth Godin says that the problem with hiring a consultant or a company to find your brand essence is that “if you have to search for a brand essence, you are unlikely to find one”.

He goes on to say:
Standing for something means giving up a lot of other things, and opening yourself to criticism. Most people in the financial services industry (or any industry, actually) aren’t willing to do that, which is why there are so few Charles Schwabs in the word.

First, decide it’s okay to fail and to make a ruckus while failing. THEN go searching for the way to capture that energy and share it with the world.

Clothes don’t make the man, the man makes the man. Clothes (and the brand) just amplify that.

So, how does this help you name your company, brand your image, define your company?

Well, one is that it needs to be true and pure for YOU, not your colleagues, friends, or competition.

Second, the name is not EVERYTHING, but instead the ancillary information is going to support what you want your brand to be, that is the logo design, the exterior and decor of your location, the advertising and marketing pieces you put out to the world.

I believe one of the most important parts of branding and naming is to be bold! People today recognize and adore a strong opinion and personality in a company, if you think about some of the most profitable and successful companies, you will see this to be true.But, this discussion is for another day.

Last thing that is important, don’t feel like you need to EXPLAIN everything in the name. If you think about retailers or medical offices, if they explain everything in the name, then they are perceived and generally are value priced. So, unless you are offering value pricing, stay away from highly descriptive company names or marketing messages.

Instead come up with a name, it can even be obscure, then support the accurate definition of your brand with the ancillary words and styling.

I could write about this literally all day! SOO, more on this later!

C