Tag: Business success tips

Categories
Sales & Marketing

7 Simple Secrets to Reducing Your Refunds

There are few things in life as deflating as refund requests can be.

You’ve spent weeks or months (or years in some cases) creating a product. You work so hard to market it and get into your ideal clients’ hands. And they buy! It’s so exciting when you make sales.

And then you get a request for a refund. Argh!

Luckily I have good news. There are things you can do to reduce your refund rate. And many of them won’t cost you a dime. I’m going to walk you through these 7 simple steps about simple tweaks you can make to your product to make it more valuable and easy follow-up strategies.

Let’s get started.

1. Put a Quick Start CD or report in the product. Information products can be overwhelming. You open up the product and you have all these CDs and DVDs transcripts and worksheets and you don’t know where to start. A Quick Start guide (either audio or written) can give people a place to begin and it can help them consume the material more easily.

If people are feeling overwhelmed, they may just decide they don’t have time to figure this out after all and pack it all up and return to you.

(And yes, you can still include this even if the product is all digital.)

2. Include a Welcome letter or extra gift (or both). Let’s go through the Welcome letter first. A Welcome letter should:

* Reassure them they made a good decision by purchasing your product

* Get them excited about digging in and using the product

Welcome letters can also give them additional information and resources, or it can double as your “Quick Start guide” and give them instructions on how they should get started. Either way, it should make them feel good about their investment. (This again can and should be included with digital products.)

Now let’s look at gifts. A gift can be small, just a little extra bonus. Maybe it’s a promotional item, such as a pen or a bookmark. Or it could be an extra bonus, maybe an additional unadvertised report. Whatever it is, it just adds to the value and helps make your ideal clients feel like you’re overdelivering on value.

3. Send them an extra, unadvertised bonus at a later time. With this one, instead of bundling the bonus in the product, save it and send it to them later. This accomplishes a couple of things — your ideal clients feel taken care of plus it gives you another opportunity to reach out and connect with them again. This is a good way to further build the relationship with your ideal clients so they don’t feel like they’re simply a “walking wallet.”

4. Call them to thank them for their purchase. Yes, you read that right. Pick up the phone and give them a quick welcome call.

This can be a very powerful strategy for a number of reasons. First off, almost no one does it in the Internet world so you’re really going to stand out. Second, it’s another way to overdeliver value to your customers. Third, it’s a way to connect with them so they know they’re more to you then simply a sale.

I can hear all of you saying “I don’t have time.” That’s fine, have someone on your team do it. It doesn’t have to be a long call, just a quick phone call to welcome them into your community and to see if they have any questions or need anything from you. That 5 minutes can go a long way to really communicating a high level of customer care.

5. Set up a welcome auto-responder series. I’m currently working with a client to create a very integrated 30-day follow up email campaign. You don’t have to do something that elaborate, but even 5 or 7 follow up emails to help your customers get started with your product can go a long way. These emails can:

* Reassure them they made a good decision by purchasing your product

* Give them some additional tips for using the product

* Tease them about what’s in the product, to get them excited about diving in and getting started (remember, people who actually go through your product are far less likely to return it)

* Ask them for a testimonial or encourage them to refer a friend

* Upsell them to the next level

6. Add in live calls with you. There was a time where you could sell an information product and get top dollar for it and not include any interaction with you. Those days are gone. If you want to sell an information product with no calls or support from you, the price needs to be lower and be prepared for higher returns. But if you add in a couple of training and/or Q&A and live coaching calls, then you can raise the price plus it will reduce your refund rate.

People want accountability (and having those calls does add a level of accountability because they’ll need to go through the program to keep up with the calls) and they also want to interact with you. The more you can give people what they want, they more likely they’ll become loyal customers and raving fans.

7. Follow up with snail mail. I’ve found mailing people a postcard or a newsletter is a great way to build and deepen the relationship with my customers. Again, you’re reaching out to them outside the online world, sending something physical and doing this after the sale. So it’s a great way to stay connected with your clients. Of all the tips I gave, this one is the most costly, but over the long run, it can really pay off in a big way.

Categories
Business Ideas

What Hollywood Can Teach You About Business Success (and Keeping Your Clients Happy)

A few weeks ago I decided to go to the movies with a girlfriend. We chose Prince of Persia.

As it happened, it was opening weekend so I hadn’t seen the reviews. However, I was a little worried about seeing it. The previews made it look sort of muddled and I was a bit puzzled by the choice of Jake Gyllenhaal as the lead. (He never struck me as the action adventure type hero.) Worse yet, it was based on a game.

Yee gads. Why did I agree to see this movie again?

Needless to say I walked into that theater with VERY low expectations.

So imagine how happy I was when the movie DIDN’T suck. Yes I know, it got some bad reviews. But truly, if you’re looking for a light, mindless, action-packed summer flick, Prince of Persia delivers. (And I was also pleasantly surprised at Jake Gyllenhaal — talk about some nice eye candy.)

The interesting part about all of this is I think my impression of that movie is higher than it should be. Why? Because my expectations were so low and the movie beat them so significantly — thus my overall impression is that it’s a good movie.

Now, let’s take another movie where I went in with HIGH expectations and the movie DIDN’T deliver. Like The English Patient. Won an Academy Award. Everyone was buzzing about it. I found it slow and terribly depressing. I also didn’t quite get why the Kristin Scott Thomas’s character would have an affair with the terribly depressing Ralph Fiennes’s character when her husband seemed like such a charming fellow. (This was before I saw the Seinfeld episode where Elaine fell asleep during the movie and was ostracized about it. Happy to know Elaine and I have something in common.)

So my overall impression of The English Patient is that it wasn’t a very good movie at all. Despite winning an Oscar. Because it came in so much lower than my expectations.

(And if you take this one step further, it certainly seems like I’m saying The Prince of Persia is better than The English Patient. Hmmm, maybe I shouldn’t go there.)

So what does all of this have to do with you and your business? Well, let’s take a look at your client and customer expectations.

If your customers and clients are hiring you or investing in your products and service with high expectations, and you aren’t meeting them, their overall impression is going to be they had an unpleasant experience with you. Even if your offerings are better than your competition, they’re still going to be disappointed.

But if your customers and clients come in with slightly lower expectations, and your products and services blow those expectations away, they’re going to be thrilled to death with you, tell all their friends and associates about you and maybe even write a newsletter article about you.

This is why it’s so important to underpromise and overdeliver. Especially now. Because people are becoming more careful with their money so the last thing you want to do is leave them with a sour taste in their mouth after doing business with you.

Categories
Business Ideas

3 Simple Steps To Taking a Quantum Leap in Your Biz

If you want to grow your business, there are 2 ways you can go about it.

Slow and fast.

Most people end up growing their business slowly. Now there’s nothing wrong with slow. It’s not easy to grow your business period, so even growing your business slowly is better than what a lot of entrepreneurs do.

So let’s talk about fast. Another way to view growing your business quickly is by taking a quantum leap, which basically means you leap frog ahead versus taking your growth one step at a time.

Taking a quantum leap means transforming your business quickly. It means going from $200,000 to a million in a year. It means seeing opportunities fly to you effortlessly.

So if you want a quantum leap, how do you get one? Here are 3 steps to get you started:

1. Think big. Taking a quantum leap isn’t going to work if you’re thinking small. So the first thing you need to do is make sure you’re thinking big. And, maybe even more than that, make sure you’re READY for your business to BECOME big. If you’re not comfortable or if there’s some blocks or obstacles around you growing your business to its fullest potential, you’ll never have a quantum leap.

2. Invest in yourself. There are different ways to invest in yourself. Do you need to build a team? Hire a consultant? Maybe you need to take time to go through a program or information product. Or you need to hire a coach or get into a coaching or mentorship program to move yourself ahead.

Money is a form of energy. And when you invest in a program or hiring a team, that could be the catalyst you need to move you forward in a big way. Because now you’ve put your money where your mouth is (so to speak). You’re taking yourself and your business seriously by investing in yourself.

So how do you know what you need to invest in? You know. You know right now what you need to invest in to grow your business. Whether or not you do it is another story.

3. Failures means you’re moving in the right direction. What?? I can hear you all saying. Here’s the thing. If you design your life and/or your business around never making a mistake, do you REALLY think you’re stepping outside your comfort zone? If you’re trying to never make mistakes, then there’s no possible way you can ever have a quantum leap. Quantum leaps require you to think differently than you have before, to try something you never have. And when you do that, you may end up having a failure or two (or ten) along the way.

Successful people don’t like failure anymore than you do. But they know if they don’t get out there in big way and try new things, they won’t be as successful overall, even though that means risking failure as well. It’s a choice they make because they know the payoff is worth it.

One way to deal with failure is to look beyond it. Focus on the end goal, where you want to end up. Then, when the failures happen, you’re not as concerned with them because you’re looking past them to the where you want to be.

But the biggest part of taking a quantum leap is just to do it. Take a deep breath and jump. And believe the net will appear.

Categories
Online Business

3 Keys to Building a Successful Online Business

After building a successful online business myself, not to mention being a part of my clients’ online businesses, I’ve found there are 3 main keys you need to have in place to enjoy a solid successful Internet business.

Although it’s not easy to build a successful anything, these 3 keys will go a long way to putting the foundation together for a successful online business.

Ready to get started?

1. Send warm leads to your web site. Every successful business needs a fresh source of new leads and a great place to find those leads is on the Internet.

But that’s just easier said than done. Alas, the “if you build it, they will come” just doesn’t work for web sites. So how do you find new prospects on the Internet? Here are 6 ways to get you started:

* Social networking (i.e. Twitter, Facebook, Linked In)

* Article marketing (placing articles on article portals such as Ideamarketers or EzineArticles)

* Paid ads (pay per click or Facebook ads)

* Online press releases

* Podcasts

* Videos

The key is to integrate several ways to drive traffic to your site. If you rely on just one or two, and something happens to those sources of traffic, it could dramatically impact your bottom line. (In a bad way.) The more sources of traffic you have, the more stable your business becomes.

2. Get those warm leads in your database. You may have heard the saying “the money is in the list” and that’s because there’s a lot of truth to that. When you have a warm list of names to market your products and services to, it makes building a successful and profitable business that much easier.

So how do you build a warm list? (Note — a warm list is defined as people who know who you are and are inclined to buy your products and services, versus a cold list that doesn’t have any idea who you are and needs to be convinced you do indeed have the solution to their problems.) You build a warm list by first capturing leads (from your web site, from speaking on stage and teleclasses, etc.) and then by making sure you get in front of them on a regular basis so they get to know you. A regularly published ezine is an excellent way to do that. You also want to regularly sell to your list, because if you don’t ask your list to buy your products and services, you’ll create a list that is only interested in what you offer for free.

3. Turn warm leads into paid customers. This is where direct response copywriting comes in. Actually, it starts in the second key as you need to use direct response copywriting to get people on your list in the first place.

Copywriting is writing promotional copy for business (it has nothing to do with copyrighting a book or piece of artwork, note the spelling difference). Direct response means the copy itself is persuading people to take action (the copy is causing a direct response). This is a learned skill, no you don’t have to be a writer to be a successful direct response copywriter. And once you master this skill, selling online becomes a heck of a lot easier because you can make money directly from emails and web site pages.

If you master these 3 keys, you will be well on your way to building a successful online business.

Categories
Business Ideas

3 Secrets to Succeeding Online with Your Business

Succeeding online is easy, right? Just throw up a sales page, drop in some “buy now” links and sit back and watch your bank account grow.

Well, if you’ve been in business any length of time, you already know it doesn’t work like that. (No matter what “promises” or “hype” you might have seen.) It’s never that easy. But there’s no question it IS possible. (My client list is proof of that.)

So how DO you succeed online? Well let me share 3 secrets to get you started.

1. Know what you’re highest payoff activities are. The successful entrepreneurs I’ve worked with know exactly what they should be focusing on each day. They know what they’re strengths are and what’s going to bring in the most money. That’s what I mean by highest pay-off activities. They know what’s going to bring them the biggest bang for the least amount of time.

So how do you figure out what your highest pay-off activities are? Start by making a list of your strengths and weaknesses.

Now look at your strengths. Out of those skills, what brings you the most money in the shortest amount of time possible? What you might want to do is make a list of activities and evaluate how much money you make versus time spent, then you’ll have a better idea what bring you the biggest bang for the least amount of time.

2. They DO their highest pay-off activities. Ah, yes. It’s not enough to actually know them, you need to actually DO them. And, better yet, you should organize your day around your highest-payoff activities. That way, you know you’re spending as much time as possible on your highest pay-off activities.

3. They delegate out or delete their weaknesses. Without a doubt, the successful entrepreneurs I know spend little to no time trying to “strengthen weaknesses.” What they typically spend their time doing is strengthening their strengths and outsourcing (or just plain dumping) their weaknesses.

Why do they do that? Because they make more money when they spend most of their time doing their highest pay-off activities. And they can’t spend their time doing their highest pay-off activities if they’re busy strengthening their weakness or doing low pay-off activities. We all only have 24 hours a day, so you need to know how best to use that time so you can become the biggest success possible.

Now, you may have noticed these aren’t specific for the Internet, these are general success strategies. I did that on purpose — if you master success habits that work online, you’ll master success habits that will work in pretty much any other situation. Next time I’ll share specific tips you can use online to be successful.