Here we are, right smack into 2011. By now you have created your vision map, and got going on creating your Goals Statement (see last week's message at http://bit.ly/f3A7iV). So it is about time to step in and take some action.
Hopefully the action you take will be right in line with what you have squared away as your 3 major goals for 2011. That's great. I am ready to give you some simple ideas to move on. Since every business owner and project manager has such different goals, I am leaving you this week with a list of 11 possible things (for 2011) you can take immediate action on.
Do one, or do them all. The point is, doing any of them will help make your business more profitable in the new year!
1. Encourage people to sign up for your list with a $25 gift certificate (no strings attached) instead of a free report, or better yet, give both.
2. Send great content to your list instead of flooding them with sales offers each time. This is especially important if you have not yet established a meaningful relationship with people.
3. Schedule a free informational seminar and let your list know about it (just go ahead and DO IT ALREADY), and of extreme importance: Don't get caught up on the numbers. Even 6 people at your event can translate into phenomenal sales. Wine and dine and Love the One's Your With!
4. Create a contest. Make it really fun and tie it to a great prize (and no, you may not have the prize be 10% off a purchase)! Give away a Nook, or an Ipod, or a $200 Starbucks card, or a home makeover for any room. Now, tie this contest to a blog devoted just to the contest. Have people post to the blog as part of the contest. Put someone in charge of the blog. Get people selling YOU to each other (less work for you).
5. Consider becoming smaller to become bigger. Take a good look at the waste and unnecessary parts of your business so you can save on expenses and streamline and focus on what you do best. Stop trying to impress the Business Jones’s with your bells and whistles that just bog you down. Impress yourself and your banker instead! You can hire a Virtual Assistant (VA) in place of a full time employee (that employee can even become your VA). You can drop the products and services that have become a drag and that clutter up your website, your marketing materials, and your brand. You can move to a smaller building or let one go. If you are already a very small business, you can become home-based, and use your rent expense money for sensational marketing and local events like trunk shows, seminars, and VIP events. Focus on what you do best with razor clarity, and have more of yourself to give to your tribe, and more cash to line your pockets.
6. Up sell on every "Thank You Page" of your website or product sales pages, and up sell during every person-to-person consultation-sale. You have not because you ask not, and THEY have not because you didn't ask! Don't leave an easy 18%-27% of increased sales on the table, especially when they are the easiest sales to get and the most meaningful to customers.
7. ASK your customers what they want. Ask, ask, and ask. Be open-minded, and listen. Make the necessary adjustments from there. Don't be a know-it-all. Your customers and clients are incredibly knowledgeable, opinionated, and tuned in. They know what they want and what they would want if it existed.
8. Do the UNHEARD OF in your industry, no matter your industry. Let's take as an example the custom drapery industry. If the "norm" is a turnaround time of 6-8 weeks on custom products, offer a 2 week turn around time. SEE, you already blocked your own prosperity by making an excuse of why that is impossible (I can hear those thoughts)! Look, if there is a will there is a way (and believe me, there is definitely a way, plus a demand and a competitive edge here). I know of one very exceptional drapery workroom for example, that has a 48 hour turn around time. It is possible, since most workrooms only work on an order for a day or three. The rest of the "wait" time is them just "getting to" the job. Find new systems to be amazing, and see if the referrals don't fly home to YOU! Do it different than anyone else in your niche ever did!
9. Don't treat all of your customers the same way. Have packages, promotions, emails, services, products, and events for distinct sets of clients. Create systems to help you do this onsite and especially online. Hire someone to help you do this (a project manager or a VA even).
10. Write an article once a month, and submit it to an online article marketing site (or hire someone to write it on behalf of your business, with your business name as the "author"). The article can be a "How to" or "5 Best Tips", or anything useful that relates to what you do. You can write and post an article as small as 250 words! Place your best website links in the author's resource box (the link could be for your blog, your website, or your Facebook page, whichever you know will drive the most leads). The article does not have to be deeply profound. Just type out some very helpful ideas or information people will be searching for online, and use great keywords in the article body as well as in the keyword field (in a special box, they let you list keywords people may use to search online). In no time flat, hundreds of people will be reading your articles and coming to your site (so have something great for them to see when they stop by your site).
11. Take one day a month to reflect, plan, and strategize. Write it in your calendar, and keep that appointment as if it were your most important, because it is!
Have a Wildly Productive and Successful Week,
Margo
Margo M.Ed. is a Business and Design Coach in the Home Fashions Industry. She creates and delivers custom training programs for managed businesses and their sales consultants to help them communicate better with customers and increase sales and profits. Margarett is a Writer and Professional Speaker, and the President of The DeGangi Group and The DeGangi School of Interior Decoration, with both on sight and on-line courses in Interior Decorating, Marketing, and Redesign. For almost 20 years she has helped individuals and managed business owners in the interior fashions and decorating industries to earn more while fully enjoying the process.
Two of Margo’s popular products for furniture store owners and their sales professionals are The Decorating School Crash Course Power-Ed Pack (9 design lessons on video/audio with 12 hours of content), and the matching Decorating School Crash Course Learner Files to measure learning, provide added interactivity, and motivate sales consultants to own their opportunities for growth.