Client Magnets Official Blog

Posts Tagged ‘buyer behavior’

Running an event can provide you with a substantial profit. You can earn revenue from the event itself, or from selling items during the event. With the many revenue options available for making money from an event, people still miss out on some great revenue opportunities. Here are some insider tips for increasing your event revenue that most people don’t consider:

Provide Tiered Pricing
If you want to open your event to the widest possible audience, consider creating a tiered pricing structure. You can quote a relatively low ‘entry-level’ price for just admission to the event. You can also add a ‘premium’ or ‘deluxe’ event attendance, with carefully-considered extras. You might add a product free of charge for attendees who sign up for the premium package. You might also add one-on-one time with the event organizer, keynote speaker or other key event guests.

In this way, you can provide basic entry to wider range of people, while still raising the overall cost of your attendance. If you provide basic entry for $100, or a premium attendance for $200, your average revenue will increase, depending on how many people choose the premium option. You can also add a pre-registration option at a lower rate, and then charge the full rate for registration at a pre-designated cutoff point.

Offer Trial Memberships
If you have a product that functions as a subscription, such as an information distribution service, you could offer attendees at your event a ‘free trial.’ A 30, 60 or 90-day trial is typically long enough to provide attendees with a good understanding of the service and its benefits. You’ll find that many people like the service and stay in the program; giving you an ongoing revenue stream once the free trial has ended.

Open Up In-House Opportunities
One great function of an event is to promote your in-house opportunities and services. Events are a great way to convey information about your services to attendees, and convince them that you’re the person with the expertise and systems in place to serve their needs. If you’re promoting in-house opportunities, though, your event can’t be planned exclusively around that. Unless you’re hosting a free event to reveal a new product, people expect to receive a certain level of value from your event; not an extended marketing pitch.

Convey valuable information at your event. Answer important industry questions; questions that you have the expertise to answer because it’s in your field. Provide information about a product. Give your event a purpose beyond simply promoting your services or products. A good event coordinator can find opportunities to work in-house services into the event’s structure at key points, and begin to build a relationship with attendees to meet their ongoing needs.

Be creative in the ways you leverage revenue at your event. Offer a tired pricing structure, which typically yields higher event revenue than a single price. Provide trial memberships to subscription or ongoing services, to demonstrate the value to your attendees and create an ongoing revenue stream. Finally, find ways to promote your in-house services to your audience throughout the event.

Bernadette Doyle specializes in helping entrepreneurs attract a steady stream of ideal clients. If you want to get clients calling you instead of you calling them, sign up for her free weekly e-zine at http://www.clientmagnets.com

The thank you page is one of the most overlooked places of real estate on the web.

That quote, from one of my mentors, Yanik Silver, speaks volumes. There is so much opportunity to promote more business and further your relationship with a new client on your thank-you page.

That client has just indicated that they trust you by opting in to your offer. Signing up to your list is a sign that they want to hear more from you.   Don’t let them leave wanting; offer them even more before they click off your thank-you page.

When developing your thank you page, think about what you can do to increase your client’s involvement. Marketing research has shown that the more people are involved, the more likely they are to buy – again.

That’s one reason companies hand out scratch-off cards with prizes or discounts hidden beneath the ink. It’s called an involvement device. When someone physically has to do something, it increases their involvement, which increases response and increases conversion.

The content on your thank you page needs to be relevant to your target market. Think about what you want them to do next, where you want them redirected to, and if there’s an opportunity to make them another offer.

There are several key ways you can accomplish this.

•    Make another offer. While letting the client know you’re glad they signed up, also let them know about another offering. Make a special offer. Offer a special prize or a special bonus that new clients will receive, but only if they sign up there and then.   Remember to use language that encourages action.  For example, “This is the only time you will see this offer. It’s for new subscribers only and you won’t have access to it again.”

•    Ask for more information. Once a new prospect joins your list, ask them to describe their biggest problem. You can then direct them to other offers you may have to help with the problem, or develop that new offering if you don’t have one.

•     Create a “tell a friend” campaign. Invite people to tell three friends about your offering in exchange for a special bonus. “Congratulations. Your place on the call is reserved. But just before we continue I would like to offer you this free gift……..”

Everyone who opts in helps you spread the word to other people. This will make a massive difference to your opt-ins and really help to increase your list. You can automate this process using Viral Friend Generator software.

When saying “thank you”, the key is to include only one of these options on your page. Either attempt an additional sale by making another offer, ask new clients for more information, or create a tell-a-friend page.

Any one of these options added to your thank-you page will start increasing your sales immediately.

Bernadette Doyle specializes in helping entrepreneurs attract a steady stream of ideal clients. If you want to get clients calling you instead of you calling them, sign up for her free weekly e-zine at http://www.clientmagnets.com

Do you know what the most valuable page on your website is?

It’s not your “About Me” page. It’s not your “Testimonials” page.

It is the page where people give you their contact information and purchase your products or programs. That is the goal of your business.

To achieve that goal, you need to get people to opt-in. Nothing else can happen until they do this.  That is why the design of the page where they opt-in – your squeeze page – is so important.

Getting your prospects to hand over their contact info isn’t always easy, but if you focus on your squeeze page set-up, you will successfully obtain client information, build your list and make sales.  Use my tips below to maximize the effectiveness of your squeeze page.  These strategies work!

•    Make your homepage a squeeze page

To get maximum results, make your squeeze page your homepage. This will lead to a significant increase in your opt-ins and in your list.

•    Model successful squeeze pages

To get ideas for your new home page, model other successful squeeze pages. Look at other people’s pages with new eyes. Emulate the elements that make them successful while using your own unique copy that speaks to your own target audience.

•    The important information should appear within the browser window

The pages that are most attractive give the most important information at the top, without having to scroll down. Everything your visitors need to see should appear within the browser window in front of them. Don’t make them have to “lift a finger” to find the best of what you have to offer.

•    Use headlines and bullets to present your message

Announce your best information in the area that most people notice first – the headline. Develop a headline that will grab your visitors’ interest and get them to stay online to hear the rest of your message. Use a prehead and a subhead to deliver your best copy.

Successful pages don’t include one long paragraph of copy after another. A successful squeeze page presents its best content as great mini headlines in a bulleted format.

•    Make big, bold promises

Use numbers within your bullet headlines. State that you’re going to solve problems. Make big promises in your bullets. You’ve done the research, campaigns and surveys to determine what your target audience wants, now highlight that information in your bullets.

•    Make a personal connection

Your target audience want to know who you are.   Don’t keep your personality a secret. Make your squeeze page personal. People buy people. Although we’re all speaking virtually, on Twitter and on teleseminars, people want the personal human connection.

They want to know you. They want to see the person behind the site. At the very least, include a photograph of yourself. Add audio and video to increase the personalization.

•    Use a thank you page

Don’t lose that personal touch once your visitor has opted in on your squeeze page. Your thank-you page is a great place to further your relationship and offer your new client even more. You could make another sale just by asking for it on your thank-you page.

•    Remove Navigation Bar and Banner

There are a couple of web page staples that should not appear on a successful squeeze page. These items do nothing to help you get people to opt-in. So, strip out the navigation bar and ditch your banner. They should not be on your squeeze page.

•    Test, measure and improve your conversation rates

Make sure you test and measure your conversion rate on your squeeze page. Find out how many visitors are actually buying into your offer. Regularly measuring your conversion rates will tell you what’s working and what isn’t on your page.

When you apply at least one of these tips, and you will see an improvement in your conversion.

Make a checklist and work through it. Improve your squeeze page one component at a time and you’ll be in a much stronger position – I promise!

Bernadette Doyle specializes in helping entrepreneurs attract a steady stream of ideal clients. If you want to get clients calling you instead of you calling them, sign up for her free weekly e-zine at http://www.clientmagnets.com

Every consumer wants to know what’s in it for them.  If he gives a bit of his hard-earned money, what will he get in return?  If she donates an hour of her valuable time, what can she expect to receive?

Whether the consumer donation is money, time, or loyalty, those consumers want to know that what they’ll receive will greatly outweigh what they invest.  Dan Kennedy put it well when he referred to this concept as, “Selling money at a discount.”

This is the duty of your teleseminar’s registration page.  Not only should your registration page name a common problem, agitate it, offer a solution, give benefit bullet points, and offer simple registration and payment, but it should quell fears, silence objections, and calm arguments…with a call to action that springs to action, even before those objections are formulated.  Before your prospect has a chance to ask him or herself, “What’s in it for me?” or, “How is this going to better my position?” or, “How is this going to save me money?”, you need to thoroughly answer those questions for them.

You can quantify the cost of any topic. No matter the subject matter, you will always be able to find proof that you will save your customers money, time or grief.  Consider these examples:

• If your topic is business related, and the foreseeable objection is price, include a statement like this:  “For an investment of X, you’ll get the information to avoid the problem of Y, which if left unchecked, will cost you 100 times X.”  For example, you can show your readers how spending $50 will save them $5000.

• If your topic is weight loss related, you can quantify the cost in this manner:  “You’re already spending money on this problem, in the form of high insurance premiums, gym memberships, weight loss programs, and clothing.  You’ll spend far less than all of this to participate in this teleseminar, which will eliminate the need for most of your current money spending.”

• If your topic revolves around parenting, consider presenting your quantification this way:  “How much money are you spending on guilt gifts for your children?  What if a great parent/child relationship was to replace those gifts?  You would save money and gain what you really want.”

• Or, if your topic has little to do with money, and a lot to do with emotional cost, you can quantify your clients’ investments like this:  “Isn’t it worth X to never feel Y again?”

You must calculate the actual monetary amounts for your registration page readers.  Don’t expect them to do the math – they may click away without ever seeing the true monetary benefit that you’re offering.

Even if you’re not able to attain a sign-up from every reader, a good call to action will break through denial, and push those people closer to a sign-up next time you host a teleseminar with a similar topic.

Even if you’re hosting a free teleseminar, you must use your call to action to convince prospects that their investments of time will save them money, time or angst.  In other words, you must convince them that participating in your teleseminar will literally make them money, or trap the money that they already have in their pockets.  You must convince them that investing one hour can save them five hours of work.  Or, convince them that investing one hour will save them hours of sleepless grief.

Your call to action should do just that:  call for action to be taken.  In fact, it should be so powerful, so undeniable, and make such good monetary sense, that your readers won’t be able to help but spring to immediate action.

Bernadette Doyle specializes in helping entrepreneurs attract a steady stream of ideal clients. If you want to get clients calling you instead of you calling them, sign up for her free weekly e-zine at http://www.clientmagnets.com

Picture this image of two boys playing in a garden, trying to catch some birds.

One of the boys rushes around frantically with a net trying to catch the birds. Every time he gets close, the birds fly away. There’s lots of squawking, and feathers flying. The other boy stands quietly, holding out some birdseed.

One boy is trying very hard, and is probably exhausted, while the other hardly seems to be working at all.

Which one will get the results he’s looking for?

Instinctively you know it’s the boy with the birdseed who will be more effective, and a lot less sweaty.

When it comes to marketing and trying to attract clients, you want to act more like that second boy. Unfortunately, though, most people tend to act more like the first.

A lot of the things you might be doing, that are considered to be traditional marketing techniques, might actually be counterproductive. You could well be chasing people away.

Effective marketing techniques used on the wrong market will only provoke resistance, and build defensiveness. You could be running after people, figuratively speaking, with barrages of email, rounds of cold calls and direct mailings, and quite possibly be achieving the exact opposite of what you want.

For example, no matter how effective cold-calling may be for me or someone else, if you detest doing it, your negativity will prevent it from being effective for you.

Even if you are using marketing techniques that are proven to attract clients, if you do them with the negative energy of chasing – if you give off the sense that you are giving simply in order to get – you will end up like the boy who is chasing the birds. Tired and without any bird in the hand.

You want to break down the barriers between you and your prospective clients, not create more of them.

Make sure that the things you are doing marketing-wise, both online and offline, will attract clients to your business. Doing what everyone says is the right thing, but doing it with the wrong energy, won’t produce results.  Do the things that feel right to you. That will bring the positive energy into your marketing, and your clients will feel it.

You’ll know when you’re being a client magnet because it will feel easy. It should feel enjoyable, and you will have an abundance of clients.

Bernadette Doyle specializes in helping entrepreneurs attract a steady stream of ideal clients. If you want to get clients calling you instead of you calling them, sign up for her free weekly e-zine at http://www.clientmagnets.com

Would you rather be paid for your teleseminar, or give it away for free?  At first blush, your answer, of course, would be, “Get paid.”  But I must admit, I’ve presented you with a bit of a trick question.

The truth is that whether you ask for money for participation in your teleseminar, or you offer spaces at no charge, you can still harness money-making power.  A paid teleseminar will deliver up-front revenue, but free teleseminars also hold possibilities for making money:  from the subsequent selling of transcripts, recordings, packages, articles, e-books, newsletters and print books.

A common misconception is that people will jump on a free teleseminar just because it’s free; that sending out an email announcing it is enough to get participants – Not True.  If people view their time as more valuable than what you’re offering, they won’t set aside an hour to participate, even if it doesn’t cost them a penny.  For this reason, it’s important to realize that filling the phone line for a free teleseminar takes just as much effort as filling the line for a paid one.

When you use the word “free,” it’s important to put specifications on that freedom.  If a teleseminar is free to everyone, people might assume that it has little or no value.  But, if you make it free to members of a certain group (newsletter subscribers, new clients, current clients, members of your club, etc.), those people will see that they have earned the right to partake in its value.

It’s important to assign a value to every teleseminar, whether there’s a price tag or not.  Maybe participants are getting it at a discount, or maybe it’s free only to select people.  Either way, let them know what they would have paid.  This increases the call’s perceived value.

The free teleseminar has its advantages and its disadvantages. It’s up to you to allow its advantages to work for you.   Here a few pros and cons that might help you to find that balance:

Free Teleseminar Pros

• As long as the topic is exactly what they’ve been hoping for, people will be more likely to “invest” in a free call.

•  If the free call is marketed to members of a certain group, they will feel more inclined to partake in something they’ve earned.

• The law of reciprocity boosts your chances of selling post-teleseminar transcripts, recording, e-books, etc.

Free Teleseminar Cons

• If you don’t market the free teleseminar effectively, it could be dismissed as having little or no value, because it’s free.

• If you offer too many free teleseminars, you could find yourself being taken advantage of, for your free advice.

• Participants might not be serious about the topic, reducing your chances of post-teleseminar sales.  They might say, “It’s free.  I’ll take advantage of it,” and that will be the end of their commitment.

It’s also important to avoid making every teleseminar a paid-participation one.  It won’t be long before your audience is protesting (silently or audibly) that they never get anything for free.

To avoid finding yourself at either extreme of the free/paid teleseminar spectrum, it’s a good idea to offer a mixture of both free and paid.  This will prevent you from being taken advantage of, and it will keep your audience happy with occasional “free gems.”

Free isn’t a bad word.  In fact, it’s the root of freedom…which is at the heart of financial freedom.

Bernadette Doyle specializes in helping entrepreneurs attract a steady stream of ideal clients. If you want to get clients calling you instead of you calling them, sign up for her free weekly e-zine at http://www.clientmagnets.com

Looking for an opportunity to shine from the depths of the direct mail slush pile?

Though it might sound a bit cliché, everyone, even those of you who feel encumbered by a limited budget or a relatively small business volume, can do that.  Whether you’re sending out 10 pieces of mail per week, or 1,000 pieces, you can not only entice people to open your mail, but you can keep their attention with a creative, lumpy insert.

Maybe you have, at times, felt intimidated by the “big boys” – the companies who have thousands or millions of dollars to spend on direct mailing.  But, despite what you might have come to believe about these huge corporations, you actually have an advantage over them for creative direct mailing.  If you have an inventive idea for lumpy mail, you don’t have to sit in countless meetings with marketing committees, pitching your idea, enduring criticism, and perhaps, ultimately, having your idea shot down.  You are your final decision maker.

When you’re creative with your lump mail insert, you can spur your recipients to action.  Here are few examples to stimulate your imagination:

• If you’re intent on helping companies and individuals to find their own hidden treasures, you might consider including an old-fashioned scrolled treasure map with your promotional letter.

• If you consider a message to be of the utmost importance, you might want to stuff it into a bottle before mailing it.

• If you’re hoping to entice inactive customers to fall back in love with your company, you might insert a boomerang with a message like, “Boomerangs always come back, don’t they?”

• If your company has a mascot, you can have a lovable likeness of him or her reproduced as a lump.

• If your company helps people to find resources, for instance, you might want to include an ornamental needle-in-a-haystack.

• A complete comprehensive service might be accompanied by a small, silver platter and the statement, “I’ll give you everything you need for start-up on a silver platter.”

• Fortune cookies can be purchased, complete with customized messages inside, that deal specifically with your purpose or promotion.

If you’re stumped for lump ideas, there are resources that can help.  Two examples are www.LumpyMail.com and www.ImpactProductsMarketing.com.  There, you’ll find lots of creative ideas for lumps.  Maybe you want to announce a promotion, invite inactive customers back to the fold, broadcast an upcoming campaign, publicize a grand opening, or announce a new product or service.

Simply using bulk to create a piece of lumpy mail will, indeed, prompt people to open the envelope, but if you want to stay with them for longer than it takes to empty your promotional pen of ink, or to use that pad of custom sticky notes, you’ll want to put some innovative thought into your lumpy insert.

Make your mail memorable with creative lumps…because when your lump is specific to your purpose, and unlike any other lump, it deems you memorable, worthy of the call or the click, and the investment.

Bernadette Doyle specializes in helping entrepreneurs attract a steady stream of ideal clients. If you want to get clients calling you instead of you calling them, sign up for her free weekly e-zine at http://www.clientmagnets.com

Writing a sales letter is a practice in anticipating what your prospects will think, and overcoming their objections. When you’re writing your sales copy, it’s invaluable to be able to put yourself in your prospects’ shoes and predict what they’ll think when they read your copy. It may be difficult to predict all of the objections that your prospects will have to your sales letter, but one thing you can easily manage is this: catch the catch. Explain why you’re offering such a great deal or such a great product to your prospects, or they won’t believe your pitch.

Prospects Look Out for Deals that are Too Good
From an early age, most of us are told “if something sounds too good to be true, it probably is.” By adulthood, most people feel that they can judge whether a deal is good or not, but that little doubt lurks in the back of most people’s minds. If you do a great job of establishing the value of your product, and justifying your price, people might have trouble trusting you or your sales copy. If you make your product sound “too good to be true,” you have to explain yourself to your prospects or risk loosing sales.

Reasons for Offering a Great Deal
A few key phrases can help diffuse worry over a deal being “too good” and convince your prospects that you’re on the up-and-up. With one technique, you explain to your prospects why a product like yours normally costs more, and how you’ve managed to change the production method to realize a cost savings. Then, you can say something like “I can pass along my cost savings to you.” This lets the prospect know that you know you’re offering a really good deal, and gives them a reason for you offering a good deal. If you don’t explain this to them, they’ll think that you’ve misrepresented the value of what you’re selling, and will turn away from your product.

Another technique involves presenting yourself as the “good guy” and responsible community member to your prospects. For example, you could tell your prospects that a colleague has recommended that you charge more for your product, but you’re “not greedy,” so you’ve chosen to offer it for less. One successful copywriter said “This is such a valuable skill set that I’m offering it at this price so as not to price it out of the hands of the people who need it most.”

In most cases, it doesn’t really matter how you overcome the “it’s too good to be true” objection – just that you address it somehow. When you re-read your sales letter, look at it from the eyes of a potential prospect. If you find yourself thinking “What’s the catch?” then you probably need to re-work your copy, or add in some language explaining why you’re offering such a great deal. With this technique, you can overcome the mental objections of the prospects, and you’re that much closer to making a sale!

Bernadette Doyle specializes in helping entrepreneurs attract a steady stream of ideal clients. If you want to get clients calling you instead of you calling them, sign up for her free weekly e-zine at http://www.clientmagnets.com

People are busy.  When scheduling a teleseminar, it’s crucial that you choose a topic that will make people stop, adjust their schedules, and make a date with the telephone.

And what, you ask, is the best way to accomplish this magnetism?  Emotional Appeal.

When you respond to something that people want, they will allow you to give it to them.  Don’t tell them what they need – their mothers can do that for them.

When choosing a topic for your teleseminar, remember that you need a strong, satisfying hook that will make readers say, “That’s exactly what I want right now.”  In other words, you must promise to satisfy a profound want that they have.  If a teleseminar topic sounds like one more add-on to their busy schedules, you won’t make the cut.  But, if a teleseminar topic sounds like something that they simply can’t live without (or the answer to a prayer), you will easily take the timeslot.

Every prospect has a need.  It’s your job to find out what the overwhelming emotional needs of your audience are.  Every member of that audience will want at least one of these elements:

• good health
• wealth
• extra time
• popularity
• good looks
• confidence
• respect
• comfort
• success
• enjoyment
• parenting success
• personal prestige
• contemporary style
• pride in possessions
• efficiency
• authority
• more / better sex
• satisfied curiosity
• no more embarrassment
• attractiveness
• knowledge of secrets
• intelligence

Now you might be asking, “How will I know what the emotional needs of my audience are?” The answer is simple:  Listen.

When you get questions and feedback from your audience, take notes, determine where the biggest emotional desires lie, and use that data to create a teleseminar topic that satisfies the wants of a large portion your audience.

For instance, if you’re coaching sales people, you might assume that their biggest motivations are making money.  But if you read their e-mails and listen to their voices, you will uncover the deeper emotional needs beneath that desire.  Maybe you’ll find that a large portion of your audience is competitive – that they want to outperform their coworkers or their competition.  In that case, you would put together a teleseminar that hits on the notes of success, envy, and personal prestige.  More people will sign on, because you have chosen to focus on them (and their wants).

Even if you’re only getting comments and feedback from a portion of your entire client base, the statistical data will still ring true…listen to the emotional revelations of the majority.

Your topic is the foundation, and the biggest determinant of financial success, for your teleseminar.  It must fill an emotional need, no matter how buried beneath the surface that emotional need might be.

Don’t tell people what they need; cater to what they want. Know your audience as intimately as professionally possible.

You should never have to guess on a teleseminar topic.  If you listen closely and carefully, the pain in your audience’s words will determine that topic for you.

Bernadette Doyle is a marketing specialist who helps entrepreneurs become client magnets and attract a steady stream of their ideal clients. She publishes a free, weekly newsletter for trainers, speakers, coaches, consultants, complementary therapists and solo professionals. If you’d like to receive invaluable tips and advice on how to attract clients with ease, register at http://www.clientmagnets.com

Have you drawn the attention of potential clients? Are you giving off positive vibrations and getting plenty of hits on your web page?

Do you feel that you are doing everything right marketing-wise, but you’re still not closing the sale?  Are you blaming your business circumstances on the economy?

While this is a more difficult economy to operate in than it was a few years ago, and people are more prudent with how they’re spending their money, the economy has absolutely nothing to do with your ability to close the sale.

I recently compared notes with some of my internet marketing buddies. The general consensus was that up until last year, most of us had done quite well because we were getting the low hanging fruit. We were achieving our goals and earning revenue that was easily attainable and didn’t require a great deal of effort.

But last year, most of us had to go a little further, work a little harder and dig a little deeper to get the results. My business grew, as did the businesses of most of my mastermind colleagues.  We would not allow our businesses to be affected by what people were saying about the economy.

Nor should you. Your ability to close a sale has more to do with the effectiveness of your presentation than it does with the state of the economy.

If you’ve got the desire, the proper mindset, and the ability to communicate the need for your offering, the clients are out there.  And, they will buy.

If a customer has a need for your product or service, and the means to pay for it, whether or not you close that sale depends on how well you communicate why they need to buy it.

Have a good listen to what you’re saying to your potential customers. Make certain that you are giving an effective presentation and not backing off on any of your selling points.

Give customers all the information they need. Explain exactly how your product or service will deliver the results they want.

This may require you to explain your offering in a little more detail. Give clients as much of the finer points they need to make it just seem logical for them to make the purchase.

Once you get them to understand why, that sale is an automatic close.

If you have something a person needs, and they have the means to pay for it, you have every reason on earth to believe that you can close that sale.

Bernadette Doyle specializes in helping entrepreneurs attract a steady stream of ideal clients. If you want to get clients calling you instead of you calling them, sign up for her free weekly e-zine at http://www.clientmagnets.com