Most business owners think the primary purpose of their business is to generate lots of money.

Although making money is very important, it is not the core purpose of your business or practice.

You see, you can sell a handful of people some very expensive products and make a lot of money.

But, unless you are able to get and keep truckloads of clients who buy from you on a regular basis, and who like you and trust you enough to give you plenty of referrals, you will never be able to reach the true financial potential your business can provide you.

Unfortunately, most Business Owners, even the ones with fancy ideas, don’t know how to acquire and keep tons of customers. So, as a result, many of them have to struggle just to get by.

How does this apply to you?

It is simply this. If you want to become incredibly successful in Business, you must learn how to obtain and retain an avalanche of customers profitably.

Technorati Tags: acquire customers, acquiring customers, attract customers, Attracting More Clients, attracting prospects, creating curtomers, creating customers, get new customers, get referrals, getting new customers, Grow Your Business, growing a business

In a previous post, I went over ideas on how to Wow a customer. Here’s another thought I had on that topic.

The Art of Listening. You are probably saying that you do listen. You hear every word a prospect or customer is saying, or do you?

Here is an example of what I mean. When I wanted to purchase a specific vehicle, I went to the dealer and outlined for the Salesman that I wanted a Two Seat Convertible. He proceeded to show me a 4 seater that wasn’t a convertible. I don’t know what he was thinking.

My business went to the dealer in the other town who showed me specifically what I wanted. He listened.

Has anyone else had a similar experience?

Many of you don’t do Yellow Page advertising anymore, but for those of you that do, here’s what I suggest.

When someone is looking in the yellow pages, they are actually ready to buy, so your ad has got to jump out at them, and then have them contact you instead of all of the other so-so ads that are listed.

I often hear many business owners grumble about the high cost of Yellow Pages advertising, but those who insist it costs them anything are simply foolish.

For 70% to 80% of all business, you have to work at Not making a profit from Yellow Pages advertising. In most of the businesses I created, Yellow Page advertising wasn’t useful. But for the others it was a Gold Mine. For most businesses, Yellow Pages Advertising will work.

The reasons many Yellow Pages ads do not pay off for their advertisers are very simple and common. All you have to do is look and you will know what I mean. They can be summed up as not having a direct response ad at all.

-They don’t have a headline to grab the reader
-There aren’t any reasons to choose you verses the other advertisers.
-No offer
-They look just like all the rest of them.

Here’s just one example

FREE Special Report Reveals What the Real Estate Industry Never Tells you About.
“How you can get top dollars When Selling Your Home in Today’s Slow Market!”

Call 1-800, 000-0000 Extension 11 for Free Special Report and Recorded Message.

It will jump out at the person looking for your specific product. If you do advertise in the Yellow Pages, change it to the above and let us know the results you get.

Technorati Tags: acquire customers, acquiring customers, acquiring leads, ad testing, ad writing, Advertising, attract clients, attract customers, attracting leads, Attracting More Clients, attracting prospects, boost sales

There is a lot of power in Coupons.  Notice how Groupon has become a huge phenomenon within the last year. Currently, it is planning an IPO at a valuation of $15 to $25 billion. This is a coupon issuer folks; not a high tech innovator.

It has merely taken a thing of value (coupons) and combined it with the Internet to better reach potential customers and bring them to offline (though not exclusively) retailers and businesses.

The power of coupons cannot be ignored.

Retailers and service business owners should understand the power of coupons.  Consumers clip ‘em and use ‘em.  Coupon usage in America is huge, so you might as well participate and create such a system if it fits your enterprise.

Incidentally, when you offer a coupon, it is usually best to put a big, thick coupon border around the coupon, or for that matter around the entire ad, so that there is no confusion.

I have found that a thick border beats out a thin one and the dotted coupon border beats out other borders.  I’ve had my consulting clients test this over and over and it works all the time. 

For one of my clients, I created a promotion, to expand their customers’ usage—to get regular, retail customers who were buying and using only a few items, to try additional ones and to redeem “store-brand” coupons for like products. It always created lots of sales and lasting usage expansion.

Here’s the concept and idea.  If you are a retailer or operate a service business, accept your competitors’ coupons.  This puts all their advertising to work for you. 

If it is possible and you can afford it, DOUBLE, the value of the competitors’ coupons that you redeem. They will be redeeming your competitors’ coupons that they paid a lot of money to advertise, with your company. 

You have to create that system and educate your customers/clients that it is available.

Let me know what you think about this. And if you are having difficulty, let me know and I will try to guide you in this process.

Technorati Tags: businesses and coupons, buying coupons, coupons, groupon, retailers and coupons, service providers and coupons, using coupons

Back on 9/2/2010, I published a blog article entitled “The no. 1 strategy for getting new customers”.  I want to continue that thought here for this reason: many business owners are passing up a large revenue source by not including offline marketing in their marketing arsenal.

How would you like to reach 50,000 to 100,000 prospects, already pre-selected as being likely to buy from you, at no cost whatsoever?  These prospects may be waiting for you offline through “Host Relationships.”

Here’s how it works.  You research and find a non-competing company whose customers are the same type of people as your customers.  You convince the company to pay for a mailing to their customers promoting your product.  You split the profits 50/50 with the host company.

Does it sound too good to be true?

In my years in business, I did it dozens of times. The profits it generated were huge.  The Host Relationship, and it has some variations to it, is one of the most leveraged marketing techniques I can teach you about. 

It’s the most leveraged because the host company may have spent many years and millions of dollars identifying prospects and winning the trust of their customers.  By accessing that customer base, you get the benefit of all that effort and expense without having to spend a penny yourself.

One thing though.  I want to stress that you should be very generous with the host company when you set up the deal with them.  If you can’t get the host company to pay for the mailing, offer to pay for it yourself.  Or you can offer them 100% until they double their investment, and then a lower percentage thereafter.

The key thing is to make it happen. Offer them whatever it takes to get them to do the joint venture with you.  You will have invested so little up front and you will have so much to gain yourself.

Here’s an example:

Let’s say you own a home or an office cleaning business, you should contact every carpet dealer within a geographic area you think you can handle.  Offer to pay the cost of a mailing to their customers. 

For the mailing to the customers, you should write a letter that will look like it came from the dealer. In it, you recommend your cleaning service to his customers.  The carpet dealer receives a percentage of the sales. 

This is a win-win for both of you—the carpet dealer wins because he generates more revenue and you win because you are accessing only qualified prospects.

The cost of acquiring a customer via a host relationship is a fraction of what it would be if you ran an ad or did a mailing of your own.  This results in a higher profit on every sale for you.

You must offer a good product or service so that the host companies have nothing to lose by recommending you.  It will mean thousands of dollars of profits for them with almost no effort on their part.

Hope this gave you an idea you can implement soon.  Let me know your thoughts on this strategy and the results you’ve gotten when you implement it.

If you want to re-read the previous article I wrote on this subject, you can see the article here: http://www.kenvarga.com/news/the-no-1-strategy-for-getting-new-customers/

Technorati Tags: acquire customers, grow revenues, grow sales, host beneficiary relationships, host relationships, joint ventures

Each of us has a customer that had such a wonderful experience in doing business with us that they rave to others about that experience. 

This should be capitalized on and used to promote your business.

Remember Victor Kiam?  He was enormously successful for quite awhile with his commercials for Remington.  This was his statement.  “I was so impressed with this shaver that I bought the company.”

These kinds of ads take great advantage of the fact that what your customers say about you is much more powerful than what you say about yourself.

The first thing you should do is to locate the customer that can be your spokesperson and create a project around them.   Then show it on TV and all of the local media. 

Subway sandwiches did this very successfully when they started running the Jared Fogle (The Subway Guy) commercials.  Those commercials ran for more than 5 years.   

Obviously, Subway felt that Jared’s story was influencing their upswing in sales; otherwise, they would not have run the commercials for that length of time.

The truth is that you and I are not likely to hit a home run like Subway did with Jared.  But if we purposefully pursue having our clients/customers experience extraordinary results like Jared did, we’d be way ahead in our game.

Think of all the benefits that will flow to you and your clients as you pursue a goal like this…the enormous positive side results.

And who knows, maybe you too will hit a homerun.

How can you use this as a strategy for building your business? 

Technorati Tags: building a business, customer, customer experience, grow business, growing a business, market strategy, marketing strategy, promote your business

I spent almost 5 hours trick or treating with my grandchildren.  It wasn’t house to house like it was years ago.  Today it was a section of three local towns that had almost 10 blocks of stores. 

I bet in the three towns that I took my grandchildren, there were at least 100 businesses in each of the towns that missed the opportunity to capitalize on this holiday season. 

There were hundreds and hundreds of children with parents walking up and down the blocks. 

Here are two examples of opportunities these businesses missed…

The first opportunity…missed business.  Three out of four storefronts were closed and never took advantage of the opportunity to generate customers or business from the crowds that were walking up and down the streets.

The second opportunity…none of the businesses, except two, handed out any flyers.

Here are some examples of what they could have done.  

Children’s shoe stores could have handed out a flyer announcing a magician and face painting event for next week.

Beauty salons could have handed out a flyer for a free haircut this coming week.

Restaurants could have handed out a 50% discount card for the coming week on their slow nights. 

Dress shops could have handed out a flyer announcing a fashion show this coming week, where champagne and snacks would be given.

Any way, you get the idea of what could have been done. 

Out of over 300 businesses, only two did something out of the ordinary.  One handed out a 10% coupon on their next visit and the other store a 35% coupon for shopping in the coming week if they spent over $50.00.  Big deal.

This holiday, like every holiday, should be viewed with the idea that there is opportunity to create a prospect and/or a new customer.  Events such as the three I attended with my grandchildren were missed opportunities for their owners. 

We, as grandparents, and my daughter were standing around while the children trick or treated.   We could have been engaged in a conversation by someone who worked for the business.  He or she could have helped us understand how it would benefit us to try them out.  They could have possibly gained a customer.

There are probably many other things you can think of to capitalize on holidays.  Let’s hear some ideas from all of you. 

Happy Halloween.

Technorati Tags: halloween marketing, halloween marketing opportunity, halloween's marketing opportunities, holiday marketing, holiday marketing opportunities, holiday marketing opportunity, holiday selling opportunities, holiday selling opportunity

When I started my first company, it was a struggle.

Over the years I realized how difficult it was to create a customer, so I decided that I wanted to create companies that would keep customers longer and have them spend more with me. This way they would spend more money with me. I became very successful because of the relationship I built with my customers and I treated them all as dear friends.

After 5 years of doing this, I wondered why I was putting all the time and effort into building these companies. After some “quiet time” I realized it was because I had a “passion” for what I was doing. There were times I couldn’t wait to get into my office.

What is your passion?

You must find it if you don’t know what it is.

It will keep you motivated and keep you going in the bad times. We all dream, so it will keep your dreams alive and keep you on track in order to accomplish your goals.

There is an old saying, “without a driving passion, you will become one of the “95% group.” Those are individuals without dreams, ambitions, and goals.

I’d like to offer a suggestion…

Right now, this minute, list the 10 things you have always wanted more of. Then rank them in order of personal passion to you. Review that list and look for the one that jumps out at you and gets you in the gut. That’s the one that will change your entire life.

I promise you that when you find your driving passion, everything in your life will start happening faster and faster.

Now, let’s get to your customer’s “why”…

Why do your customers purchase from you? It could be because of the great service you give, the great product you offer, or it could be a multitude of things. Whatever it is, you must find out why they purchase from you.

Once you know why, your job becomes about how to satisfy that "why" in a way that gets your customers to be passionate about doing business with you.

This is probably something new for you to try. But trust me, when you create a passion in your customer for doing business with you, you will have created an advocate for your business and services. Passionate customers will do business with you over and over and will refer everyone they know to you.

So your objective in dealing with your customers is to create passion in them for what you do.

When you are passionate and your customers are passionate, can you think of a better way to do business?

Let me hear your ideas about this.

Technorati Tags: customer experience, customer loyalty, Customer Retention, customer satisfaction

The following 9 ideas have helped me and will help you grow your business on a limited budget when you apply them.

1. If you don’t have a journal, I would suggest that you purchase one at your local Staples.  If not grab a sheet of paper.  It doesn’t matter what your business is, write down this question at the top of a sheet: ”How can I personally make my clients’ lives better?” 

   This is a very powerful question.  Think about it.   How many companies you know of, both offline or online, apply this model?

   Most of them are out to get the sale and then move on to the next “prospect.”  Can you imagine how effective they could be if they actually considered how they could help your life be better.

   For instance, I spend a lot on educational material for my grandchildren, and I never hear from the businesses after I make my purchases.  If they remembered the above quote and thought about how they could help me and my grandchildren have a better life, they would realize that they could offer me products to help us, and probably offer them on a monthly basis.

   I’m sure you’ve experienced this at some point in your life.  Think about how this applies to your business and what you can do.

2. Create your Stadium Pitch.  Someone once told me, “What would you say to a group of 50,000 people if they were in a stadium and you had 30-60 seconds to convince them about your offering?” How can you get your point across so convincingly that they would feel like idiots to say “no”?  

   Plus, consider the fact that any one of them can leave at anytime during your pitch.  Would your message change?  What can you say to make them stay?  What can you say to make them buy?  Some call this an elevator speech.

   Keep refining your stadium pitch (elevator pitch).  A great one can help you generate many new customers on a limited marketing budget. 

3. Look for valuable lessons in everything that you do, hear, or experience.  No matter if what you are doing fails or succeeds, write down what you learned from it in your journal. 

   Every person you meet, every person you listen to, has a lesson you can learn.  I try to teach with each blog and marketing tip I create. ..just for you.  But the lessons you learn from them are up to you; the insights you gain are up to you.  Whatever the lessons/insights are, write them down in your journal before you forget. 

   I carry my journal with me always.

   With a large repository of ideas it’s easier for you to find ones that readily meet your budget. 

4. Read your” Lesson Journal”.  Find out what lessons you can apply today to your next project or problem.  Then do it.  Find a way to apply and use that lesson today.  Now record your results.

   As you consistently apply ideas and track the results, you will produce bigger and bigger results with whatever money you have budgeted.

5. Referrals are one of the most important tools you can use to grow your business.  There are probably hundreds of ways to generate referrals.  Two of them are: pay for them per lead; bribe people in a fun way. 

   If you haven’t done your job on making your clients happy, you shouldn’t ask for a referral. The key is to start writing down the ideas you get, and then start doing them.

   Referrals are the least expensive way to grow your business on a budget.

6. Barter. Learn how to barter.

   Attend your local networking events, look around at the people you work with that need what you have to offer and you need what they have to offer.  What types of products or services do they need to make their lives easier?  Where can you find those products or services?  Apply this principle to people you want to work with and by helping them they will help you.

   Bartering allows you to grow with a minimum of cash outlay.

7. Dare to do what no one else does.

   Giving yourself permission to do what hasn’t been done before allows you to find new inexpensive ways to grow.

8. Ask what you don’t want in life and in business. Then decide what you do want (What you want is the opposite of what you don’t want).
   

   Knowing what you want shortens the journey to getting there, and therefore also lessens the expense.

9. Get rid of the “box”.  Forget about inside or outside the box thinking.  Don’t put parameters around your thinking.
   

   This is a variation of no. 7 above.  By removing parameters from your thinking, creative ways to use your budget open up.

The key in all of this is to be systematic and consistent.  By systematically and consistently applying these ideas, you are sure to see compounded results.

Technorati Tags: barter, elevator pitch, grow business, growing a business, journaling, out of the box thinking, Referrals, stadium pitch, using a journal

I’m often asked that if I had only one method of getting new customers, what would it be.

My answer is that it would be using endorsed mailings.

Endorsed mailings work for any business on a local level, global level, or via the internet.  It should be at the forefront of almost any set of marketing strategies.

The concept really is quite simple.  You want to look for a company that has the customers that you would also like as your customers.  Naturally, you won’t be going to a competitor for their list.  It will always be a non-competitor, even though I’ve worked out endorsements with competitors in rare situations.

That said, the endorsing company would send out a letter, on their letterhead, to their customers.  The letter would be addressed from the principal of the company, if possible.   Or an endorsement letter could be sent out as a cover letter with your sales letter or literature along with it.   You want the mailing to be done, using the endorser’s identity on the outside of the envelope.

Because the endorser is known by the customers being mailed, there’s almost a 100% chance that the mailing will be opened and read by the receiver.

Of course the one variable is the quality of the relationship the endorser has with his/her list of customers.

If your letter is done properly, approval of your business by another business, almost always builds an understanding in the prospect’s mind of honesty and believablility.

There are two requirements that must be met in order for an endorsement situation to work.

1. The customers of the endorser must need and want your product.

2. They must trust the endorser. 

You might look at your present vendors to find a good endorser.  Here are some examples:

1. A carpet retail store might look for a rug-shampoo and cleaning company.

2. A florist might consider wedding planners, caterers or bridal stores.

3. A bridal store could endorse a florist, a dry cleaner, decorator, or furniture store.

4. A CPA could endorse a lawyer.

5. A doctor could endorse a dentist, chiropractor or a veterinarian.

You get the idea, right?

Here are some phrasings I found effective when I sent out endorsements to my customers:

1. “I value you as a customer, and I want to share with you the benefits I’ve received from (whatever)”

2. Jimmy Smith of Smith and Company holds our relationship in very high esteem, and he felt you would want to know about our (whatever)”

3. “Because you are a very good customer of mine, I have arranged for you to get two free hours with this very talented financial planner.  I’m giving you this in appreciation for being my customer.”

I feel that # 3 here is one of the best ones to test.

Do you use endorsed mailings as part of your marketing strategy?  If so, have you been pleased with your results?  If not, what do you think has not worked?

Also, if you have not used endorsed mailings as part of your marketing strategy, why not?

Technorati Tags: endorsed mailings, get new customers, getting new customers, marketing strategy