I stumbled across this article in the Wall Street Journal last week and it reaffirmed a general principle I teach my clients. 

That principle:  Every business should have a luxury offering.

Why?  Luxury purchases are emotional and value is in the eye of the beholder.  Here are four of the emotional triggers associated with luxury products and services:

Pride of Spending – Clients will be proud to show off a product or service for which they have paid a premium.  Remember the line “if you have to ask you can’t afford it”?  Who wouldn’t want someone to say that about your product?

Perception of Quality – “You get what you pay for”.  Think about a good defense attorney.  If you were on death row would you want the public defender (who’s free) or would you want the guy who charges $750/hour?  Note:  this is the perception of quality and not necessarily the actual quality.  Still, people buy based upon their perception.

Confidence in the Brand – For some reason, paying more will often increase the confidence that people have in your brand.  The thinking is that if it costs a lot it must be good.  See Mercedes vehicles if you doubt this.  Lexus vehicles are more reliable and arguably better built but what do most of the affluent folks in your neighborhood drive?

Buzz – Spending big bucks certainly gets people talking.  Some people like it when others talk about them.  Why not have people talk about their friends because of  the money they are spending on your product or service?

So let’s say you’re a local business – how do you add a luxury brand extension?

In retail I advise clients to start a Private Client Group that includes personal shopping or clientelling.  In most cases this involves shopping by appointment, sometimes during times when the store is closed.  In other cases this involves access to products or services days or weeks before the general public.  In still other cases this may mean not going to the store at all. I have one client who brings the latest fashions to her Private Clients twice per month.

For service businesses this could mean 24–hour service at a moment’s notice – or a regular “check-up” that other clients don’t get.  I have a plumber as a client who performs monthly “check-ups” on the air conditioning systems of his Private Clients. My auto repair shop clients go to their Private Client’s homes, pick up the car and drop it off after the repair is finished.  They also provide a loaner car to the client.

Finally, I have a restaurant client that provides limo service to and from the restaurant for their Private Clients.

Oh, by the way, luxury clients are at least twice as profitable as their “affordable” counterparts.  Is this something you can work into your business? 

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Why would you prospective client or customer want your product or service?

This is one of the key questions your marketing must answer.

Notice the verbiage.  I said WANT and not NEED.

People will often ignore needs but they will always chase after things that they want.

For example: 

I may NEED to lose 20 pounds.  It may be the best way for me to stay healthy.  Yet I don’t want to spend the time exercising and I don’t want the pain of modifying my diet.  So losing the 20 pounds will not happen.

But I WANT to hit a golf ball straighter and farther off the tee.  So I’m willing to spend $300 on a new driver and $500 on golf lessons.

If it is your desire to get really, really rich, figure out what your target customer WANTS and find a unique way to give it to him.

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Yesterday we talked about how to sell more stuff by qualifying your prospects.  Today we are going to talk about the role of marketing in your business.

I teach my clients that marketing should bring qualified prospects to their doorstep.  The way this is done is through education.   The company that educates the prospective customer usually wins them over.  That’s a fact.  Your marketing should teach the prospect as much as necessary about the industry, you product/service and it should position you as the obvious choice. 

To do this your marketing must help your prospective customer answer five key questions:

• Why should they want your product/service?
• Why must they get it from you? 
• How will it help them?
• Why do they need to buy it now?
• What will happen to them if they don’t buy it now?

The answers to these five questions must be present in their mind before they ever meet with you.  

Your marketing must answer these questions over and over again.  The answers to these questions must be second nature to your client by the time they sit down and meet with you.

Over the next few days we’ll discuss each question and why answering them are important to good marketing.

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When you become a business owner you automatically earn the right to do things you own way.

I am one of the highest priced consultants you will ever meet.  When it comes to corporate work, my team is among the best in the industry.  We charge high fees.  We do not negotiate.  We produce results.

I take the same approach with my coaching of entrepreneurs and independent professionals.  I can teach any kid with a lawn mower how to make a million bucks.  I guarantee it.  I literally put my money where my mouth is.  I can only work with a handful of people at any given time.  But what I teach works.  I charge a lot.

I provide great value in everything I do. That gives me the right to charge whatever I want.  People can choose to work with someone else if they don’t like my pricing.

In Ivy League schools all around the country there are courses on how to competitively price your product or service.  You should only take those courses if you want to know what not to do. I took those courses.  It screwed me up for quite a while.  I wish I could unlearn that stuff.  There was actually a class on “rational pricing”.  Why the hell would you ever price your product or service rationally when people buy for emotional reasons?

There are only three factors that play into how you should price your product or service.  They are:

• How much value do you provide?
• How good is your marketing?
• How much money do you want to make?

That’s all there is to it.

If you provide value and you can communicate that value effectively to your clients, you can charge whatever you want to charge.  Keep in mind that you don’t have to be the best at what you do in order to charge the most.  You just have to be good at your craft and excellent at marketing.  Marketing influences the customer’s perception of value. 

The better you are at marketing the more money you can charge.  Want proof? 

• Digital Research mp3 player $10 – Ipod $199 (The music sounds the same)
• Leather Briefcase (Target) – $27 – Coach Briefcase $428 (The leather looks the same and smells the same)
• Steak Dinner for Two at Tad Steaks (no booze) $49 – Steak Dinner for Two at Mortons $129 (Steak tasted exactly the same)

Why do people regularly pay more for the identical product or service?  Because of the perception of value created by marketing.

I know, I know.  You’re worried that people will suddenly stop using your services or stop coming into your store if you charge a lot.  I understand.  You don’t have faith in your ability to market your services properly. 

Look at it this way:

What’s the worse case scenario?  I’ve thought about that and I decided a long time ago that there were two ways to go broke. 

You can go broke charging too little – working hard and not making any money;

or

You can go broke sitting on the couch at home because you charge too much and you’re marketing stinks.

I guess it makes sense to learn how to market your product or service so you can charge what you want.

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Everyday I get at least one phone call or email from a business owner asking me to help him acquire new customers.  I’m happy to receive these calls because I know I can help these folks almost immediately.

When I meet with these business owners I ask them to describe their best customers. This description is an essential first step in helping them build a marketing plan. 

Acquiring a new customer requires an investment of time, money and effort.  If we’re going to make that investment, we need to make sure it pays off.  We want to profile customers who:

• Buy from us frequently.
• Buy multiple products or services.
• Introduce new customers to us.

As we begin to develop a marketing plan, we act like detectives looking for clues.  We want to know who these folks are.  We want to know where they hang out.  We want to know why they do what they do. And we want to know how we can track them down and bring them in.

We’re doing something right with these customers and we want to replicate it as often as possible.

A good marketing plan starts with defining the customer that you want to attract.

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Do you ever get the feeling that people are just not listening to your advice?

If the answer is “yes” the problem is probably not in what you are saying but in how you are saying it.  There are three specific steps involved in convincing people to take action based upon the wisdom you provide.  Those three steps are:

1. Make an emotional appeal to the other party
2. Give them specific action steps to follow
3. Associate negative consequences with NOT taking action

To find out more, click here to read the entire post.

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Nobody is born to be your client.

Clients are created.  It takes work to turn strangers into clients.

In order to understand how to develop clients, we need to understand how they evolve.  I call this process the marketing ladder.

Click Here to Read the Entire Article

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When you become a business owner, the last thing on your mind is marketing. You don’t have the funds to do in-depth research into your customers’ behavior. You don’t have the time to interview potential customers yourself.   There are no charts and graphs that you can thoughtfully reflect upon as you decide a marketing strategy.  Let’s face it, you don’t even have the time to go through your old marketing textbook and tear out good ideas.

In order to be successful, good marketing should start with the basics.

Click Here to Read the Entire Article

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Many of you may know that I am a Cable News Junkie.  I am fascinated by the marketing aspect of the Cable News Wars.

The Christmas Day programming choices of each of these networks speaks volumes about their leadership/marketing savvy.  

Many people are with family and friends on Christmas Day so it is not a big TV ratings day.  It is also probably not a great day for the staff of a news network to work (most people, regardless of their religious beliefs, find something interesting to do).  Bottom line – there’s not going to be many big stories on Christmas Day so the cable news networks take a break.  Below is how each of the big three handled Christmas this year:

CNN went with a Larry King Marathon.  They ran 18 straight hours of the talk show.  If you missed a compelling episode of Larry King this year, chances are good they re-ran it yesterday.  If you like Larry, yesterday was a great day.  I’m certain that there was an army of agoraphobic senior citizens on the edge of their seats as they watched Larry pitch softballs to the likes of Donald Trump, Katie Courric and Jon Stewart. 

MSNBC went with a Christmas Crime Marathon – broadcasting the real life trials of murders, rapists and pedophiles.  Heart-warming tales for the whole family.  Pass the eggnog and the arsenic.  Clearly MSNBC was trying to capture the fringe element of teenage males who takes a break from burning ants with a magnifying glass on Christmas Day.  Seriously, who wants to watch an entire day of horrible crime on the most peaceful day of the year? 

Fox News Broadcast Pastor Rick Warren’s Church Services over and over again.  They also augmented this coverage with some topical programming hosted by their regular news anchors (Brit Hume had a look at the involvement of Evangelicals in environmental causes).  There was just enough original programming to get your attention – and the re-runs (the church service) had contextual significance.

At the end of the day, all three news networks ran their programming over and over.  Fox News however remained true to their brand and stayed relevant to the events of the day.  You don’t need to agree with everything you hear on Fox News Chanel  but you should respect their focus on their viewers.  It is clear that they “get it”.  Even on Christmas Day, Fox News was giving viewers what they wanted. 

The other two networks would have been better off running the Yule Log for 18 hours.  At least that would have had some cultural relevance.

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Google’s Zeitgiest report is out.  It is a list of what people have been searching for on the internet.  Here’s a taste:

Google.com - Top Searches in 2006
 
  1. bebo
  2. myspace
  3. world cup
  4. metacafe
  5. radioblog
  6. wikipedia
  7. video
  8. rebelde
  9. mininova
10. wiki 

Google News - Top Searches in 2006
 
  1. paris hilton
  2. orlando bloom
  3. cancer
  4. podcasting
  5. hurricane katrina
  6. bankruptcy
  7. martina hingis
  8. autism
  9. 2006 nfl draft
10. celebrity big brother 2006
 

There are also links to What’s Hot, Current Events, etc.  Click Here to check it out.
   
 

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From tosmagazine.com:

Market research is the process of learning what consumers want, quantifying the size of the market, discovering the number and nature of the competitors, and finding collaborators or organizations that exist in the market that are interested in your success.

In the life of your business, there will be many critical points at which you’ll want to take the time to research your market, but the two most important times are before you start a new business, and when launching a new product or service.

Some questions to get you thinking are:

• Who are my customers and potential customers?
• What kind of people are they?
• Where do they live?
• Can and will they buy?
• Am I offering the kinds of goods or services they want?
• Are my prices consistent with what buyers view as the product’s value?
• Are my promotional programs working?
• What do customers think of my business?
• How does my business compare with my competitors?

So how do we find this information? As home business owners, most of us don’t have the budget to hire a consulting firm to prepare a market research report, but there are many other ways to research the market ourselves. Go here to read how to do the research on a budget.

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What is the return on investment in a relationship with your company?

When people work with your company they expect, no they deserve, a substantial return on investment.  It is your challenge to show them the return you are capable of providing. One way to do this is to take results you have achieved for past clients and compare them to the prospects current situation.

If you help the prospect see the potential return on an investment in a relationship with your firm, you move one step closer to making it a reality.

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How often do you take time to get to know your prospect’s assistant?

In companies large and small the keys to getting a meeting with a decision maker often lye with that person’s assistant.  Before you can establish a relationship with the decision maker you should have a solid relationship with their assistant.  After all - this person has access to the decision maker each and every single day. 

In many small companies, the assistant may often be a relative of the business owner.  Take great care to get to know the person because they often have a significant amount of influence over the purchase process.

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How many of your voice mail messages get returned?

Most people leave boring voice mail messages.  Asking a question when you leave a voice mail message is a great way to engage your prospect.  Here’s how it works:  Introduce yourself.  Let the client know that you are conducting some research and that you have an important question to ask them. 

This is true.  You are conducting research on how to get their business.  When they call back make sure you have a compelling question to ask to start the conversation.

Most people hate to return calls to people who are selling but they will return calls to people who are conducting research.  Be a researcher first and a sales person second.

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Tip Seven:  Create a Lasting Impression

Does your prospect remember who you are?

It usually takes at least three different contacts with someone before they remember who you are and what you can do for them. 

The best way to make sure you have impressed your client is to vary your contact.  I always send a letter an e-mail and I make a phone call.  This helps reach out to your prospect through multiple forms of media.  It helps them make a connection through visual media (letters and e-mail) and auditory media (the phone/voice mail). 

If you can follow up these three points of contact with an in-person meeting, you will have made an unforgettable impression on your prospective client.  The in-person meeting adds a third dimension to the relationship.  Being in the physical presence of the client makes the final, memorable connection in the mind of the client.

Three points of contact are the key to success in making an impression.

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Tip Six:  Become a Follow-Up Fanatic

Does your prospect have any “unasked” questions you can answer?

Too many opportunities slip through the cracks because business owners don’t follow-up aggressively.  You can literally pick up a couple of new pieces of business each and every week if you return calls and e-mail in a timely fashion. 

Keep this in mind:  If a prospect asks question he is looking for a reason to buy from you.  Answering the question quickly and thoroughly is a great way to close a deal however sometimes the most important questions go unasked. Some of the most successful entrepreneurs I know follow up with prospective clients until the client tells them to stop. 

There is no shame in providing good service.  Keep checking back with your prospect until they tell you that you have the business.

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Tip Five: Give in Order to Receive

Who Can You Help Succeed?

Pick someone out of your contacts and help them become successful.  I’m not talking about giving away money – I’m talking about giving something more valuable.  Help people make connections.  Help people learn how to be successful. 

Remember the expression “Gives a man a fish, feed him for a day – teach a man to fish feed him for a lifetime”.  If you are the person who teaches others how to fish you are valuable.  Creating value is the key to a successful business relationship.

Reach out to help someone else succeed today.  You’ll be glad you did.

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Quick thought:

Why are we obsessed with the concept of the “Business to Business” segment?

Don’t people still need to interact with people?

Isn’t B2B really just P2P?

In fact, all business is ultimately P2P.  Why do we need to over-complicate it?

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Tip Four:  Use Testimonials to Enhance Credibility

Who else uses your services?

Answer this question so that people know that you can deliver.  You marketing is a promise to your potential customers.  They want to trust you.  In order to create this environment of trust you should include testimonials from customers who have had a great experience in dealing with you.

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Tip Three: Solve a Problem

How can you make the pain go away?

Your marketing must answer this question. Clients want to work with people who can help them make things better.  Your marketing must offer your services as a solution to a problem.   People take action to solve problems.  If you want people to choose your product or service you need to show them how it will solve a specific problem.

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Tip Two: Have a Call to Action

What should I do first?

Answer this question for your customers so that they know how to work with you. Every piece of marketing material must ask a prospective client to do something.  After all, that’s the point of marketing and advertising – to motivate people to take action.  That action should preferably move your prospective client one step closer to doing business with you. 

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Kevin Maney of USA Today asks and answers this question while shopping for Weber Bar-B-Ques .  Here is an excerpt:

Tellme’s (a company that specializes in voice recognition technology) next generation of services, McCue says, will be through a single button on mobile phones. So instead of dialing 1-800-DOMINOS to find the nearest pizza outlet, you’d push a button on the phone and say, “Pizza.” And then the phone’s screen would show a list of pizza places in your area. Click on one, and the phone would dial it. If you just said, “Domino’s,” the phone would show the nearest Domino’s and dial it.

That kind of service will be another reason a business such as Domino’s or Weber would not need to spend money on an 800-number. If I’d had one of these phones — which are going to start appearing at the end of 2006 — at the hardware store, I would’ve just pushed the button and said, “Weber.” I would’ve been connected to that nice grill expert in Mumbai.

I think there will always be a market for toll free numbers.  General inquiries, information lines and live interaction will demand some form of toll free number. As technology evolves, the use of a toll free number will take new forms.

Imagine a personal toll free number that someone could call to find you where ever you are.  Sure, most people have cell phones with liberal calling plans but 1–888–dlorenzo is still a catchy way to help people remember how to reach me.

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Over the next ten weekdays I’ll be posting 10 Tips that help drive more customers to your business.

Here’s Tip One:

Tip One: Stop sending out brochures.

What can you do for me?

This is the question your clients want you to answer with your marketing material. Brochures may look good but they are all about you.  In order to be effective, your marketing must be about your client and what they will receive from working with you.

This is a bit of a departure from what we normally hear so I need to say it again. 

Your marketing must be about the benefits your client will receive from working with you. Provide a brief sampling of your services in your marketing materials.  Give people a taste of something they can use to improve their business or their lives.  Demonstrating benefits to your client is one of the best ways to sell your services.

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Once again Buzzoodle Ron is right on the money.  From his blog today:

In many ways, I am less a marketer and more an educator.  I enjoy writing, thinking, speaking and training.  I love creating buzz for our company and those products I really like and care about.  I do not take clients if their product does not get me excited. 

So I am telling people day in and day out, this is not hard. Have a good product.  Help people.  Care about your clients. Write. Promote. It is not hard.

Establish yourself as an international expert. It is not hard.

Write a book. It is not hard.

Blog. It is not hard.

Network and speak. It is not hard.

Then people say to me, “It is not hard for you because you are a writer and a speaker and an international expert….”

I made myself that and it was not hard.

Amen.

Ron is a friend I made through blogging.  He is my friend not just because he is smart and successful.  He’s my friend because of his attitude. 

Attitude is everything, folks.  It’s absolutely everything.

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Business schools teach the “Five P’s” of Marketing but for small businesses, the “Four C’s” equal money in your pocket. 

Here they are:

Credibility – Everything about you and your company must communicate that you are a professional.  It is not just enough to be able to do the job, you have to be the best firm to do the job. Communicating this to your target audience is of paramount importance.

Consistency – Do not deliver mixed messages.  Being concerned about repetition is secondary to driving your message home.  When people hear your message consistently they know what to expect.  Managing expectations helps develop trust.  Customers who trust you will buy more frequently.

Clarity – Your message must be easy to understand.  People must be able to comprehend and repeat it.  If a customer can’t explain what you do and the benefit they get from working with you, then your message is not clear.  I’m not advocating that you patronize your customers.  Just make sure your message translates well as it spreads.

Compelling Presentation – If you want to win people over you must engage their emotions.  Help them understand how your product or service will make them feel.  Take them somewhere in their mind with your marketing.  Entertain them.  Help them experience a benefit of your product or service with their imagination.

Want to know more?  Check back with me the rest of this week as I cover each of the Four “Cs” in detail. 

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