Apr 6, 2015 | Marketing
5 Keys To Telling A Great Brand Story
One of the best ways to introduce or re-introduce a brand in the market and make sure that the customers will remember it is to tell a great brand story which will grip the target market with interest. A gripping story is the best way to captivate the audience and make the brand come alive for everyone. The more interesting the story, the more relatable your brand is. And customers just love a brand they can relate to.
So what are the ways to tell a great brand story? Here are the 5 things that make a brand story a sure success and help a company attract the attention of your target market.
1. Choose True Stories
Your brand identity should never be marred with a falsehood. If you associate one false story with your brand, your customers will lose trust and you will do irreparable damage to your organizational brand.
Make sure that the story you choose to tell, is simply – true. Tell any story that signifies what the brand is really about; just don’t craft a false story for the sake of telling one. While being creative and honest, you have a high chance of wowing your audience with your brand story.
2. Have Relatable Characters
Choose characters which your audience will love and which are easily relatable to your brand story. Characters they will have run across in their own experiences and lives.
3. Connect With The Audience
Make sure that your story keeps the audience waiting for more! The next story, the sequel, and the next promo. Meet your purpose by keeping them captivated.
4. Follow The Story Writing Rules
Start off with a strong opening to engage the audience from the start. Then proceed to discuss a problem or issue, the solution, and close with a value added message, information, brand introduction or a resolution which will keep your audience gripped for more.
5. Flaunt Your Brand Personality
Showing off the features of your brand is the primary goal, so design a story which has the brand personality as a spotlight. It is not advisable to have a salesy story. Just infuse the personality of the brand, maybe with an element of fun, to create something unique! Make your brand story stand out from the others in the industry.
With a number of social media platforms to tell your brand story, make sure that you prepare the best to interest the audience, and have them coming back for more every time!
Need more? Get in touch to schedule a one to one session.
Mar 3, 2015 | Self, Time Management
Stop Blaming Time
How many times have you heard people say “I don’t have enough time to do …” or “If only I could find the time to do …” Or “I am too busy to do …” Perhaps the person you heard saying these or similar things is the same person who stares back at you every morning in the bathroom mirror. Well, it is time to stop blaming time!
Time is an absolute-there are 24 hours (1440 minutes, 86,400 seconds) in a day and that will never change. We cannot “manage” time. What we can manage is what we do during the next 60 minutes.
How we use time is one of the great determinants of how successful we are both as business owners and as individuals. Everyone from Bill Gates to the small business owner is given the same amount of time each day, 24 hours. Think of it like the auto races where they make all the drivers drive identically built and tuned race cars. The winner is then determined not by who has the fastest car but who can drive that identical car the best. Similarly in life the “winners” are those who learn how to drive their use of time the best.
So how do you take control of your time?
- Accept that there is no such thing as too much or too little time. There is enough time available for you to be successful-others have been successful and they had no more access to time than you do. Take ownership of your situation. Be accountable for your results and your actions.
- Decide what you want to accomplish. How do you define “successful”? To some it may mean making a million dollars, to others it may mean being healthier while others are looking to have better relationships with their family and friends. This is your goal. You must also understand the benefits to you of achieving the goal – how will it make you feel when you achieve it. Both the goal and your “why” must be written down with a timeframe.
- Once you have decided the goal and your “why”, you must now determine the actions that will be necessary for you to accomplish that goal. What do I have to do? What time commitment will I make? What do I need to stop doing? What will I need to adjust/sacrifice/reduce/delegate in order to have the time to do the activities identified? Remember if it was easy everyone, including you would have already done it. What separates the successful users of time from the unsuccessful ones is the discipline and determination to obtain their goals no matter what. Winners never give up and they never quit on themselves.
- Understand that life and business are about choices. You choose how you will spend your time – on what activities and how much on each. This is a marathon, not a sprint. Being successful in many different areas takes effort and time. Success comes from laser-like focus on one or two goals. Once you accomplish them, you move on to the next set of goals and focus on those.
- Prepare your calendar each week by creating “appointments” to do the activities that you have identified. These are entered into your calendar before anything else. Treat these as if the appointment was with your most important customer. Would you easily change your Monday 2-3pm “meeting” just because someone asked for that time slot? No, you would negotiate – “I am booked at that time. I can see you at either 1pm or after 3pm, which would work for you?”
- Be militant about your schedule. If you don’t care how you spend your time, why should anyone else? Learn to say “No”. In Stephen Covey’s book “7 Habits of Highly Effective People” he breaks activities into 4 quadrants based on Urgency and Importance. 1) Not Important/Not Urgent, 2) Urgent/Not Important, 3) Urgent/Important and 4) Not Urgent/Important. The danger for most people is the Urgent/Not Important category. This is when we are responding to other people’s urgencies, however the activity does not move us toward OUR goal – by definition it is Not Important. Beware of the time and effort devoted to those tasks. Conduct your own time usage study. Every minute that you can divert from ‘not important’ categories to the important categories will move you closer to your goal.
- Review your successes/challenges in meeting your schedule each week and adjust where necessary. Be honest with yourself and continually reinforce your “Why” – what are you trying to accomplish and how important is that to you.
- Find an accountability partner or mentor to help keep you on track. We can all use help every now and then – it is a strength to admit this, not a weakness.
In summary, stop blaming time, take ownership of your time and commit to the discipline necessary to win the race by being the best “driver” of time you can. If you are really serious, come to the next TimeWise seminar on March 13th.
Feb 23, 2015 | Finance, Marketing
Increase Profit Margins Now
Welcome to step 5 of the 5 Steps to Increased Profits framework – focusing on one of the five steps each week. As a review, the five key profit-generating metrics are: Lead Generation, Conversion Rate, Average Dollar Sale, Number of Transactions, and Profit Margins.
I’ve highlighted the five keys in the following equation:
Lead Generation
x
Conversion Rate
=
# Customers
x
Avg. Dollar Sale
x
Avg. # Transactions
=
Revenues
x
Profit Margins
=
Profits
I talked last post about the importance of ensuring you boost your number of transactions, which is another way of measuring customer loyalty – or repeat business. This week we focus on how to increase profit margins – because that IS the bottom line. Who cares how much revenue you’re generating if there is nothing left at the end of the month, you’re just working too hard for nothing.
Profit Margins are critical to your overall profitability. You can have a fast growing or high revenue generating business but without acceptable profit margins, all of your growth efforts will be for nothing. It is critically important that you not only know your overall margins, but you must know them by product or service type.
Why is this so important? Because you want to promote your highest margin products and services whenever you can. These are the game-changers for you. These products and services are the ones that provide the resources to cover your costs and provide you with resources to invest in your business.
There are two primary ways you can improve the Profit Margins in your business – reduce your expenses or raise your prices. Most cringe at the thought of raising prices, especially in fragile markets, but if you have done the hard work of creating a Unique Selling Position and have truly differentiated yourself from your competition, and know your target market extremely well, then raising your prices may be an option – but don’t do it blindly.
It is mainly fear of the unknown that keeps business owners from taking the bold step to increase their margins through a price increase. Know your numbers, your market, your customers. Studies have shown that your loyal customers are not doing business from you because of price alone. Most will understand and appreciate your rationale and will remain strong, loyal customers – that is if you have treated them like they were special and found ways to deliver MORE than they expected of you.
Cutting is costs is often times easier, but not necessarily the right move to make when you are trying to grow your company. Eliminating waste is always good, but often times expense cutting comes in the form of eliminating services, reducing marketing programs designed to grow your business, or reducing staff and degrading your ability to deliver on your promise. Be careful not to impact your operational efficiency and speed of delivery when reducing your expenses. The last thing you want to do is to become a “me too” business simply because of your efforts to cut costs.
Now, with that caution in mind, there are always ways to gain efficiency and reduce the effective cost of your system. Toyota and other large manufacturing companies, are masters at eliminating costs through waste reduction, efficiency gains, reduced work in process inventories and unnecessary movement of people and supplies. If they can do it, so can you. When was the last time you critically evaluated your business operations with an eye towards gaining efficiencies and reducing unnecessary steps on your process? Creating systems for your business is a powerful way to reduce your costs –while at the same time, improving your productivity and customer satisfaction. If you are not familiar with the tools and techniques for doing this, drop me a note and I will direct you to them.
The challenge is to first know your margins, then be purposeful about improving them on a regular and steady basis. The trend for your margins should always be favorable. While this is the last of the 5 Steps, it’s actually the one you should work on first (now she tells me!). Work hard on this last segment of the Business Chassis and you will position yourself for phenomenal growth and incredible profits!
Feb 17, 2015 | Customers, Systems, Uncategorized
How to Keep Your Customers Coming Back
So we’re on step 4 this week of reviewing the 5 Steps to Increased Profits framework – focusing on one of the five steps each week. As a review, the five key profit-generating metrics are: Lead Generation, Conversion Rate, Average Dollar Sale, Number of Transactions, and Profit Margins.
I’ve highlighted the five keys in the following equation:
Lead Generation
x
Conversion Rate
=
# Customers
x
Avg. Dollar Sale
x
Avg. # Transactions
=
Revenues
x
Profit Margins
=
Profits
I talked last post about the importance of ensuring you boost your Average Dollar value of each sale. This week we focus on increasing Number of Transactions by looking at how to keep customers coming back. Many businesses think that once they have a new customer, the work is over, but in fact the work has only just begun!
When a prospect buys from you for the first time, they step on to the first rung of what we call the “ladder of loyalty” and become a shopper. Then when they buy again they take the next step and become a customer, and so on up the ladder, as can be seen in the following diagram. The framework to keep customers coming back and generating Repeat Business, is to increase lifetime value by using the 7 rungs of the Ladder of Loyalty:
| RAVING FAN |
| ADVOCATE |
| MEMBER |
| CUSTOMER |
| SHOPPER |
| PROSPECT |
| SUSPECT |
On the lower levels of the ladder, there is very little customer loyalty and if a competitor comes along with a better price, customers are more than likely to give them a try, and you may never see that customer again. The art of achieving a high level of customer loyalty is to move them further up the ladder, so that they become loyal clients and eventually raving fans. Once they become a raving fan, not only can you guarantee they will always buy from you, but they will go a stage further and start actively recommending other people to come to you, so helping to fill your sales pipeline.
So how do you turn your customers into raving fans? Well, the first stage is to know who your customers are and categorize them based on how much they spend with you and how much of your time they take up. I use an ABCD system:
A = Awesome
B = Basically sound
C = Could do better
D = Don’t want to deal with
There is little point in spending time and effort with your D clients. These are the ones that haggle over price, take up your time over pointless queries and spend so little with you compared to the effort you put in that if you checked, you’d probably find that they bring you no profit at all. So just pass them on to one of your competitors; you never know, they might become their awesome clients!
C clients are those that have not yet been educated in how you like to do businesses. They have some of D’s habits, but buy sufficiently from you that they are worth trying to upgrade.
B’s are the clients who form the bread and butter of your business. Some you will be able to upgrade but others will need more attention and appreciation to maintain their loyalty
A’s are your advocates and raving fans. These guys make what you do enjoyable. They not only buy from you but they can’t wait to tell others about you.
So what do you do to upgrade and maintain your clients at the appropriate level? Well, the answer is simple. You keep in contact with them and create a loyalty program. There are many ways that you can keep in contact with your customers, and technology has made this far easier than ever before. Through email, blogging and social media, you can remain in contact with your customers as regularly as you like for the minimum of investment.
The more traditional method of keeping in touch with your customers include telephone calls, newsletters, direct mail and entertaining. Whichever method you use, you must bear in mind the appropriateness of the medium and its effectiveness and importantly, make sure that you give value to the customer.
The easiest method to set up and systemized is the quarterly newsletter or email. Some people dislike newsletters because they are full of dull boring information about the company, which is of no benefit to them. So the best way to appeal to people is to be more creative and have some fun with it and provide high value content. People like to be informed of interesting things, learn something new and have fun. With some thought and creativity, you can make receiving your newsletter a highlight of your customers’ quarter.
Loyalty schemes there are some very simple schemes you can use that will have just as much effect as the big airlines programs. All you have to do is monitor the level of business a client does and then reward them when they hit certain targets. You can do this via databases, accounts systems or plain and simple printed cards. Rewards need not be money off; in fact you can get really creative with this – all you have to do is give perceived value.
One great strategy is to find a non competing business in the same sector and offer each other’s clients something from your range, e.g. a photographer and a florist could swap a bouquet for a portrait. Remember that this will have the added advantage of putting a new person onto each other’s loyalty ladder.
Another great way to reward loyalty is to invite clients to a special event, such as an educational seminar, a new season products launch or even arrange a celebrity visit.
Whatever you do to keep your clients coming back and stepping up the ladder, make it interesting, add value to your clients’ lives, have some FUN, but above all, TAKE ACTION.
Jan 26, 2015 | Marketing, Sales
Avoid These 3 Mistakes and Increase Your Average Dollar Sale
My focus is helping you grow your business and achieve your goals – be that reaching a certain profit level, a quality of life or the ability to sell the business and retire. For any of these goals, creating a consistent, high level of profits is critical. So we’re on step 3 this week of reviewing the 5 Steps to Increased Profits framework – focusing on one of the five steps each week.
As a review, the five key profit-generating metrics are: Lead Generation, Conversion Rate, Average Dollar Sale, Average Number of Transactions, and Profit Margins.
I’ve highlighted the five keys in the following equation:
Lead Generation
x
Conversion Rate
=
# Customers
x
Avg. Dollar Sale
x
Avg. # Transactions
=
Revenues
x
Profit Margins
=
Profits
This week we’re focusing on Average Dollar Sale – this is the average amount of each transaction in your business. If you focus on increasing your average dollar sale, you won’t need to spend more on generating more leads. It’s a much more cost-effective way to increase profits. Over the past 20 years in which ActionCOACH has been working with business owners, we have developed over 70 ways to improve your average dollar sale.
It’s easier to increase your average dollar sale than you might realize. The main reason is that this happens with an existing customer-one that already knows you, likes you, and trusts you.
Because it’s at least six times easier to sell to an existing customer than a total stranger, here are some common mistakes to avoid:
-
You assume your customer knows every product or service you have available.
Most customers are doing business with you in one area and would be pleased to give you the business in a related product or service if they only knew about it. For example, the same insurance agent that handles your car insurance can also sell homeowner’s, boat, motorcycle, RV, etc. Every business has multiple products that complement existing ones and deepen the relationship. All you have to do is ask: “By the way, did you know that we also have…?” You will be shocked at how many say: “I didn’t know you did that!” On average 5% of customers would give their business to a friend. Why not get that 5% increase from your friends?
-
You fail to offer an upgrade.
Again, many businesses, including yours, have premium products or services available. At the point in time that your customer decides to purchase, it only makes sense to offer the opportunity to upgrade. Fast-food restaurants proved the wisdom of asking a customer: “Would you like to supersize that?” or “Would you like ____ with that?” A few years ago when a client operated a supermarket, we participated in a scratch-off lottery ticket promotion. For two weeks the cashier asked every customer: “Would you like a scratch-off lottery ticket with that?” Our ticket sales increased exponentially versus the previous period. And it costs nothing to ask. What could you offer your customers as an additional up-sell?
-
You offer what you think your customer will buy even if it’s less than what they really need.
This is where “pre-qualifying” goes awry. It is usually a function of you or your Team’s limiting belief around sales. I remember the wise advice of a professional fund-raiser who said: “Always be willing to ask for too much.” The reasoning here is three-fold. First, you just might get the higher amount! Second, you compliment your customer by implying that they are financially capable of a higher level. Last, you give yourself a “fall back” that is still a good value for both of you. Increasing your average dollar sale takes some commitment, training and practice.
Make the commitment to improve your business, invest the time and effort to train your Team, and remember that professional salespeople need practice to keep their skills sharp. The effort you put into this will pay dividends both short and long-term.
Jan 19, 2015 | Marketing, Sales
Increasing Profits with Sales Conversion
My focus is helping you achieve your business goals – be that a certain profit level, a quality of life or the ability to sell the business and retire. For any of these goals, creating a consistent, high level of profits is critical. So last week we started reviewing the 5 Steps to Increased Profits framework – focusing on one of the five steps each week.
As a review, the five key profit-generating metrics are: Lead Generation, Conversion Rate, Average Dollar Sale, Average Number of Transactions, and Profit Margins.
I’ve highlighted the five keys in the following equation:
Lead Generation
x
Conversion Rate
=
# Customers
x
Avg. Dollar Sale
x
Avg. # Transactions
=
Revenues
x
Profit Margins
=
Profits
This week we’re focusing on Sales Conversion Rate – this is the percentage of your leads that you convert into customers. If you focus on increasing your sales conversion rate, you won’t need to spend more on generating more leads. It’s a much more cost-effective way to increase profits. Over the past 20 years in which ActionCOACH has been working with business owners, we have developed over 80 ways to improve your sales conversion. Here are my top seven:
-
Written Guarantee:
What are your customer’s key frustrations in buying from you, or from your industry? What could you guarantee that would eliminate or reduce the risk of that frustration? For example, a hairdresser that guarantees ‘you will like your haircut and so will 98 per cent of your friends’. For an attorney the guarantee could be a fixed price — You’ll get for patent filed for $5k.
-
Use Sales Scripts:
These are absolutely essential whatever business you’re in. Once you find the right (or very close to right) way to sell something to someone, why change it? Write down exactly what you said, and then do that every time. And make sure your team does the same. Every customer is different, but the objective is always the same: match the product to the buyer. You should have scripts for everything – from answering the phone to saying good-bye.
-
Define Your Unique Value Proposition:
This one is critical. If there’s nothing different about you, people will only buy from you because of convenience, or price, nothing more. Added to that, you’ll never be able to raise your prices; if there’s anyone doing it cheaper, people will buy from them. You need to work out what is special about you, and then articulate it clearly and communicate it loudly.
-
Benefits and Testimonials:
Create a sheet (and a page on your website) that you can give to every person who meets with you. It contains the 4 most important benefits of your product, or the 7 reasons yours is a better choice for them. It should include testimonials – that is, direct quotes from your past customers about how good you are. A video testimonial is the most powerful way of communicating all that you do for your customers. If you say it about yourself it’s a lie, if someone else says it about you, its true.
-
Use a Defined Sales Process
In order to determine the optimum way to sell to your customers, you have to create a process to do it consistently. Only then can you find the best way. If you’re always shooting from the hip, or your sales team is all doing something different, you’ll never know what works the best to generate the most profit.
-
Provide Something Extra:
To seal the deal, throw in something they didn’t expect – something that gives them the perception that they are getting a great deal. Then place a time limit on it, which pressures them into making a decision. Make sure it’s something that they will value highly which doesn’t cost you very much — i.e.: high perceived value, low cost to you.
-
Provide Quality Products:
People will buy quality when it’s affordable and they perceive a high value. Sell value not price. By providing the best, you put yourself a cut above everyone else.
To learn more about the 5 Steps to increased profits, come to one of my seminars or workshops.
