Often in our marketing, our efforts are focused on detailed descriptions of products and services. We see this all the time in advertising. The business goes into great detail talking about the great features of the product and the specific process of how they will do this for you. Sometimes these details are critical to the buyer’s buying decision and it does have merit.

However, don’t spend too much time describing the details when the customer really wants to know the results. They want to know what’s in it for them.

The old adage that you can’t see the forest for the trees may apply here. If you describe in detail the physical make-up of the trees of a forest, you might do so at the exclusion of adequately describing the entire beauty of the forest. If a beautiful forest is exactly what the customer is shopping for, you have now made an error in the way you are describing it by focusing on the trees.

It’s not just limited to trees in the forest, of course. Let’s talk about it in terms of products and services

Let’s relate that to a maid service. The specifics of what they do is not really that important. They do clean house, but that’s not necessarily what I’m interested in. What I’m interested in is having a great looking, clean, germ free house without lifting a finger.

Whatever your business offers, you need to tailor your marketing to communicate to your customers what your products and services do for them. You want to give a description of the product and a list of features, but you really want to focus on the benefits to the customer.

Until next time.

Here’s to Your Success,

Tim

The lifetime value of a customer is determined by how often you continue to sell to them. The more you continue to send them offers, yours or someone else’s, the more that value will increase.

First, you want to upsell or re-sell those customers immediately after the initial sale, hopefully at the time of purchase. A one time offer (OTO) works quite well for this.

If you can get them to order another item that compliments what they’ve already purchased, you can dramatically improve your profits. You want to experiment with add-on products and services.

You can offer a package of related items at a discount, since you don’t have to worry about advertising costs.

You could offer to upgrade their sale. If they’re buying a basic service, you can offer them a deluxe service but at a big discount.

Upselling is just one of the many different techniques that you can use.

You can also contact your customers shortly after the initial sale to see how they like the purchase and offer them a deal on something else.

You can secure the rights to high profit or repeat-type products that make sense to your customers, and you can keep following up with emails and salesletters.

If you sell something additional to half of your customers, you could add $1,000s and $1,000s of profit to every sale.

And then, once you know how much extra income you can earn on the back-end, you can dramatically increase the amount of money you spend to get those customers. Thus you can outspend your competition. This will allow you to increase your market share, which in turn will make you more money. Then you can spend more on acquiring customers and repeating the cycle over and over until you have little or no competition left.

I wish you and your family a very happy and prosperous New Year!

Until next time - Here’s To Your Success,

Tim

One of the most profitable things you’ll ever do for your business is to understand the actual value of your customer. It’s been called the Marginal Net Worth and the Lifetime Value.

What is the current worth of one of your customers or prospects? It’s the total profit of an average customer over the lifetime that they do business with you. That includes all subsequent sales minus advertising/marketing and your fulfillment expenses.

Let’s say the average customer brings you $75 profit on the first sale. They re-purchase 3 more times in a year with an average order amount of $300. On each $300 reorder, you make $150 gross profit. The average life lasts 2 years. So every new customer is worth $975.

You reach the $975 by adding the $75 initial profit to the 3 other purchases each year of $300. Only $150 is profit, so $150 times 3 equals $450. If they do that for 2 straight years, that’s $900 plus the original $75.

Therefore, our average customer is worth $975 in profit. Now lets say it costs you $30 through your advertising/marketing expenses to get them. Then every time you spend $30 you receive $975 back.

At this rate, you’d be crazy not to increase your advertising/marketing and promotional budget to produce as many of these $30-cost customers as you could.

Theoretically, you could spend up to $975 to get that customer because you know they’ll eventually spend $975 and you’ll break-even. But of course, we don’t want to do this.

But you could easily spend 100% of your $75 profit to get that first sale. You’d break even on the first sale and then bring in an additional $900 over the next 2 years.

So why not give away the original $75 service for free and gain as many additional customers as possible. Theoreticlly, if you could double the number of customers by doing this, you’d double your profits over the next 2 years.

If you take the time to learn your numbers and put them to use in your business, you’ll be light-years ahead of your competition. Most of them don’t have any idea what their numbers are.

Until next time – Here’s To Your Success,

Tim

Hi Friend,

It’s Tim again.

I just got an email from my buddy Keith Baxter.

He just released an 11-page Free report called:
“Give Pay-Per-Click The Finger”.

I just love Keith’s subtle style! And wouldn’t you know it, I connected with the title right away. After having Google Slap the crap out of me a couple of months ago, I’m constantly on the look-out for new ways to diversify my traffic sources.

So if you can relate, if you’re tired of getting jacked around by the big PPC search engines but you’re not ready to spend the time and money it takes to learn or pay for SEO, then you’ll want to read this report.

Actually, even if you’re an SEO expert and love PPC… if you’re looking to drive more traffic to your website, you’ll want to read this report too.

I just finished it, and it’s packed with a ton of powerful content. I highly recommend it.

Get “Give Pay-Per-Click The Finger”… Click Here!

Here’s to Your Success,

Tim

P.S. Let me know what you think in the comments section.

#1 - Select a name that speaks for your business

A business name ideally tells a prospective customer something about your business. It could describe the product or service. Whatever name you choose, you want to consider how it is perceived by potential customers and make sure it’s not confusing to the degree that you have to spend extra time and dollars in overcoming the confusion.

#2 - Enhance your image with logos, business cards, envelopes, stationary, and maybe a color scheme

Even though you may be a small business, if you put all that together, it gives an impression of big business. In other words, fake it ‘til you make it. This has long been a motto of the real entrepreneur. Anything that actually enhances your image is the next step in credentializing yourself and your business. They can separate you from 99% of the wannabees.

#3 - Credentialize yourself, your product or your service

As an owner, you’re an active participant in a service business and you need to be aware of the importance of your background and the importance that your expertise plays in your prospect’s buying decision. Your credentials are vitally important to the success of your service business. This means that you want to structure your marketing efforts by promoting yourself, your education, background, experience, etc.

The next step is to market yourself 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. The suggestion that as a business owner you should always be marketing applies more to some types of businesses than it does to others.

Some businesses, particularly those involving personal services, require that the owners continue to communicate to potential customers the fact that they’re in business and they do provide certain products and services. If your business requires constant effort, you need to consider doing things like positioning yourself in your local community or market in such a manner that you come into contact with potential customers as often as possible.

You need to always be prepared to discuss your business, yourself, and your product. Prepare your 10-second response to two questions, “How’s business?” and “What do you do for a living?” Incorporate your USA (Unique Selling Advantage). Carry business cards and brochures if possible at all times. Don’t hesitate to bring up your business when appropriate. In fact, you need to do this just to maximize tax deductions.

Use any other activities that will give your business proper exposure in the marketplace.

Here’s To Your Success,

Tim