C-Suite Network™

Search
Close this search box.

Category: Entrepreneurship

Categories
Best Practices Entrepreneurship Sales Skills

33 Ways to Improve Your Year

1. Fewer resolutions. More resolve.

2. Increase your daily level of optimism. AMAZING things will start to happen!

3. Be a lamp. Or a lifeboat. Or a ladder.

4. Mean people suck. Don’t become one of them. Not even for a second.

5. Write more. Journaling, blogging, morning pages, notes to friends, and loved ones.

6. Feature and leverage other people.

7. Be more gracious and more grateful.

8. Less excitement. More execution.

9. Let it go. Yes, you know EXACTLY what I mean. (Thanks again, Joe Calloway!)

10. Create a mastermind alliance or partnership. It will make all the difference.

11. Write your damn book already.

12. Drink more water.

13. In case of emergency, oxygen masks will drop from the overhead compartment. Secure your own mask before assisting others.

14. Clean up. De-clutter. De-pile.

15. Make more lists and use them wisely.

16. When it comes to social media: Post value (not ego); Retweet generously; Shout-out loudly; Thank abundantly.

17. Carry a notebook everywhere. Got an idea? Write it down. With today’s date. And a “next action” step. Repeat.

18. Get more sleep.

19. Do more of what makes you happy.

20. If you speak or present regularly, your ideas deserve beautiful slides. This might help.

21. If you DON’T speak or present regularly, you are missing out on the #1 way to boost your career, grow your business, and magnify your impact on the world.

22. Nobody buys your products, services, or ideas “sight unseen.” So go get seen!

23. “If everything seems under control, you’re not going fast enough.” ~ Mario Andretti

24. Read Getting Things Done by David Allen.

25. Master your inbox once and for all. Massive freedom will follow.

26. Tap into trends to generate more and better ideas for both your business and your life. Start here or here. (Read this to see how Harvard Business Review connects trend hunting with sales success, too.)

27. Stop worrying about the HOW. Focus on your bigass WHY and a small set of very specific WHATs. The rest will take care of itself. Honest.

28. Become more in tune with the time/space continuum. Seriously. Rather than wanting everything to happen “Now, now, and now” (which only causes overwhelm and frustration) focus more consistently on what you need to do “Next, next, and next.”

29. The three factors to your long-term success: 1. Your Authenticity 2. Your Expertise 3. Your Enthusiasm.

30. Replace “Who’s going to let me?” with “Who’s going to stop me?” (Hint: Maybe no one?)

31. Reflect on the shortness of life. And pack as much goodness as you possibly can (for you and for others) into every single day.

32. Always pick up the check and leave a big tip.

33. You’re pumped… You’re peaked… It’s game time… Bring it!

Categories
Entrepreneurship Personal Development

Capitalizing on The Power of the Network

You’ve undoubtedly heard the saying, ‘everything old is new again.’ In this era of big-tech and bigger solutions to problems, it seems to be more accurate than ever.

 

Recently, I interviewed Christian Cotichini, the co-founder and CEO of HeroX, a crowdsourcing platform on my show, “All Business with Jeffrey Hayzlett.”

 

One of the first topics we discuss was learning the difference between crowdsourcing and crowdfunding. What’s the difference, you ask?

 

I think Christian said it best:

 

“Crowdsourcing is your (using people’s) brain, their talent, their ingenuity, their ideas, their experiences. We’re really about talent, genius, and people,” he said. “Crowdsourcing is just an extension of what we’ve been doing for thousands of years, which is relying on our network of people are trying to support us, help us, and we’re just using technology to extend that further.”

 

We live in a hyper-connected world. We used to say there were five degrees of separation between all of us. Christian says these days we’re closer than you think, and you can measure our connection in a completely different way.

 

“We are all two clicks away from each other. So, if you’re an organization and you need innovation, you have a problem that you know you haven’t gotten the best answer inside the building. It’s crazy to just sit there and try to call another board meeting, buy some post-it notes or some beanbag chairs, and get creative. Right?”

 

Don’t confuse crowdsourcing with crowdfunding, made famous by websites like go fund me. On HeroX, companies pay people for their ideas.

 

“There’s so much talent in the world. There are so many amazing people who are desperate to add more purpose and meaning to their lives. A lot of them are underemployed. A lot of them are bored. They’re tired of watching cat videos on Facebook,” Christian said. He added, “The internet allows us to create a structured, brand-safe way to post a challenge.”

 

You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to contribute; however, you may end up helping rocket scientists. One of the platform’s most well-known partners is NASA.

 

“NASA is one of our big partners, we’ve done dozens of projects for them, and they’re a great example of crowdsourcing because they literally have rocket scientists they can ask,” Christian said. “Even they know when they’re taking tackling these tough problems, that there’s value in going to the power of the crowd. When they get stuck, when they feel insufficient, they go to crowdsourcing.”

 

A recent project NASA put forward is being called the “Lunar Loo” project. When trips to the moon return in 2024, they need to figure out what to do when astronauts need to use the loo. While the project may make for a good headline; the idea behind it is serious business. Engineers have to deal with the waste, different types of gravity (or no gravity), and how it reacts in those environments. Through HeroX, NASA has seen more than 20,000 ideas, many looking at the problem in ways its scientists haven’t even considered.

 

HeroX does more than government work. Many private companies like Lululemon have come to rely on the platform as well.

 

“(Lululemon) is an amazing brand that’s really focused on neighborhood engagement through its retail outlets. Crowdsourcing for them was really brand-friendly,” Christian said. “They reach out to their tribe and asks them, ‘Hey, how can we transform and revolutionize the retail experience? What is the future?’ (Crowdsourcing) is unbelievably cost-effective for an organization like that.”

 

Christian says most organizations are hesitant to go outside their walls and ask for help. When they do, it can be a real eye-opener.

 

“We have about a 90% success rate. (companies) have to remember that if there is no failure, there is no innovation. That’s one of the reasons it’s hard to innovate internally. Most organizations (are) failure adverse, and it’s hard to generate those crazy ideas where one out of 100 ends up being a brilliant idea.”

 

In just a few years, HeroX has gone from just an idea to a reality, and while its mission is to help people, it also wants to be an example for other businesses by leading with values.

 

“We balance off seeking profits…with the social impact that we have,” Christian said. “I believe that the way we’re going to create a sustainable and vibrant economy is by balancing the positive impact with entrepreneurship and business. Doing good by being good.”

 

HeroX was also ahead of the COVID curve as the company never had a physical office. When we spoke, Christian was sailing near the Strait of Georgia off the southwestern coast of British Columbia, Canada. They definitely proving the old adage that you really can work from anywhere.

 

“Crowdsourcing is inherently an online process, so we decided to start as a distributed company,” Christian said. “I’m a big believer in the power of a strong culture and creating a company culture grounded on some shared core values. I’m proud of how we’ve created an amazing team and high-performance culture doing a great job remotely having never had an office.”

 

Christian admits, there are some pros and cons to not having a physical office, but one of the most significant advantages is the labor pool. In theory, anyone can work for HeroX, helping the company attract top talent from around the globe.

 

HeroX is a great idea, and it really should get us all thinking about the problems our businesses need help solving and if some outside voices can help.

 

If you’d like to hear my complete conversation with Christian, press play on the player below.

Categories
Entrepreneurship Personal Development Women In Business

Build Engagement and Loyalty by Sharing the Wealth

Probably the hardest lesson in entrepreneurship is learning how to hire. Sure, you can comb over resumes for the skillsets and experience you are looking for, but what do you look for beyond that? What is the key tell that promises loyalty and engagement?

Beyond Skillsets

We learned the hard way. After years of hiring for skill sets and having problems with engagement and turnover, we finally got it. Entrepreneurs can’t afford to hire anyone who doesn’t have the entrepreneurial spirit themselves. In other words, employees have to bet their salary on their own production. Anything short of that has the owner paying for attendance. And with that program you can expect to hear, “I was there. Pay me!”

So, what do you look for when you are a cash-starved entrepreneur and you can’t afford to just pay for attendance? What do you look for when you must pay for production? How do you know you have the right candidate?

In Chapter 9 of our Business Audio Theatre production of The Barefoot Spirit you can join us as experience actors play the parts in telltale scenes that demonstrate some answers to these critical questions. The chapter is aptly entitled, “A Smaller Slice of a Larger Pie.”

Mastering Michigan!

When Barefoot Cellars needed a territorial sales manager for Michigan, several qualifying candidates balked at the job. Even though the job paid a guaranteed base and had a commission structure with no limit, several candidates complained.

One immediately whined, “I can’t live on that guarantee.” We did not expect him to. We wanted him to be enticed by the big commission we offered. So we stood up, shook his hand, and said, “Thanks for applying at Barefoot! Good luck with your job search!” and showed him the door. Another complained right away, “That guarantee of yours is just too low.” You guessed it, same bum’s rush out the door.

A third candidate didn’t start with even asking about the compensation package. Instead, he opened the conversation with, “You know, you’re getting your butt kicked in Michigan …but I can turn it around!” He went on to describe his skills, experience, and contacts. 15 minutes into the interview he finally asks, “So what does the compensation package look like anyway?” We told him, “It’s a flat guarantee with a no-limit commission plan,” to which he said with surprise, “No limit?!”

We talked more about the market and the problems he saw. At one point, he interrupted himself mid-sentence and said “Are you sure there’s no limit?” After the third time, he asked about the no-limit commission, we interrupted him and said, “We are sure there is no limit and you are so hired!” He single-handedly built the Barefoot business from scratch and made it one of the fastest-selling wines in Michigan!

You see, what we had finally learned after 10 years in business was that it wasn’t enough to offer a big prize for performance. You had to wait until you found the candidate that was looking for the big prize, because they were a performer and were underpaid and overworked, and maybe, taken for granted in their last job! We found him! His nickname was “No-Limit Phil.”

Save Mono Lake!

This chapter is packed with stories like that, demonstrating the Barefoot Spirit approach to hiring and relating to staff in general. In one episode Michael and Bonnie are hiking along in a redwood park when an unlikely thing happens. Their cell phone rings. It’s amazing that they even had coverage, let alone forgot to lose the device in the car while they were embracing nature.

A startled Michael answered while Bonnie complained, “I thought we agreed to never bring those **** things out on a hike!” It was Randy, their National Sales Manager. “I’ve got to quit!” he said. “I’ve just been given a once in a lifetime opportunity to be a docent in my favorite part of the world, Mono Lake!”

Tune in to find out how we handled that situation to create a win-win-win for Barefoot, Randy, and Mono Lake. Discover how we not only gave Randy the opportunity, but also saved his job, became Mono Lake’s favorite wine, and helped save Mono Lake itself!

Taming Truckers!

One day, a young woman who had worked for Barefoot for only a year or two walked into Michael’s office and announced, “You need a Traffic Manager!” “A what?” Michael said. He had no idea what she was talking about.

She went on, “We’re going to lose a lot of sales in Minnesota due to out of stocks. A truck from our Minnesota distributer just drove all the way out here to California and got turned away by our warehouse manager because he did not have an appointment and drove all the way back to Minnesota …EMPTY!” “What?!” Michael said in disbelief. She explained that the manager was loading 4 other trucks who had appointments and couldn’t fit him in.

Find out how this young lady was given permission to create and occupy a new job to basically babysit the truckers to follow procedures and maximize their loads. Find out how this significantly improved Barefoot’s sales. And find out how this young woman overcame the initial verbal abuse from the truckers and ultimately had them sending her flowers and candy! It’s all there and more in Chapter 9!

Tune In!

You will hear and experience entertaining stories and learn valuable lessons as Hollywood actors play the parts to demonstrate how to treat your people, complete with sound effects, and an original musical score.

Today, we advise our clients, “If you are paying your people right, the producers can’t afford to leave, and the non-producers can’t afford to stay.”  And then we add, “Always take a smaller slice of a larger pie!”

Please takes us along on your next road trip and enjoy a free chapter on us.

Categories
Entrepreneurship Marketing Sales Skills

8 Powerful Book Marketing Lessons

1. Aim higher. Are you writing the book to just “have a book” or are you writing the book that your fans, subscribers, followers, clients, prospects, customers, and influencers want to read? The second one takes more careful thought and strategic action. But it will also skyrocket your book’s influence, impact, and income.

2. Act faster. How long have you been noodling on your book idea? According to surveys, 81% of people say they want to write a book but only a tiny fraction of a percentage take action on it. If you’re tired of years and years of wishing and you’re ready to start doing – now is your time.

3. Your book needs to FLOP. FLOP is an acronym for “Feature and Leverage Other People.” And you specifically need 3 groups of people to help propel your book’s sales – your endorsement posse, your contributor tribe, and your launch partners. Nothing great is ever achieved alone.

4. Books don’t sell themselves. Just like “good work should speak for itself” is a complete myth, good books don’t speak for themselves, either. You need to promote, market, catalyze, tease, tempt, help, and serve your readers in lots of ways – and your book is just one of those primary ways.

5. Offer value, invite engagement. Nobody likes to be talked at. But we all love to be talked with and listened to. Make your book marketing and promotion campaign more like a conversation and less like a data dump. Interact, interview, be radically generous, be radically helpful, seek to converse, and not to convince… and the sales will come flooding in.

6. Marketing your book = Marketing YOU. Don’t think about marketing your book as a one-off project. If you’ve written the right kind of book, it will serve and support your business for years to come and vice versa. In fact, the activities that you need to be doing to market the book are the same activities that you need to be doing to market your business!

7. It’s a marathon, not a sprint. Don’t fall into the trap of short-term thinking. Your book launch is the beginning – not the end – of your book marketing journey.

8. Focus is everything. If you make your book the focal point of your business, it will become the central driver of your high-payoff marketing, sales, and business development activities. Put massive goals in place and then create a game plan to take baby steps every single day. Rain or shine. Happy or sad. Feel like it or not. That’s the fast path to results.

Categories
Best Practices Entrepreneurship Human Resources Investing Management Marketing Negotiations Sales Skills Women In Business

“This Is How To Negotiate Better On Social Media” – Negotiation Insight

People have asked me, should you negotiate the same way on social media as over the phone, or in-person? And my answer, like always, is, it depends. Every negotiation has nuances that make it different from those prior. That’s true, even when the same people are involved in a negotiation. Social media is an environment that possesses opportunities to use tools, such as bots, that you may not be familiar with in a negotiation. Take note of the following to discover how you can become more proficient when negotiating on social media.  https://bit.ly/3bcPa3N

Remember, you’re always negotiating!

Categories
Entrepreneurship Marketing Sales Skills

Book Marketing Truths

Here are 13 rookie mistakes that kill your book sales:

1. Self-publish your book and wait by the phone – Ugh, been there, done that, it doesn’t work.

2. Traditionally publish your book and wait by the phone – also not recommended. Books don’t sell themselves no matter which publishing route you take.

3. Not establishing your platform sooner – you need reach and visibility to sell books (and anything else for that matter!)

4. No book proposal – Even if you plan to self-publish, creating a proposal serves as a blueprint and roadmap for your book marketing success.

5. Having only books in your arsenal – A book is a “gateway” into all your other investable opportunities. Make sure your high-fee offerings align with the content of your book.

6. Going it alone. You need book endorsers, launch partners, possibly even contributors to help you build a community of promoters around your book.

7. Using expensive PR firms – almost every single author regrets doing this for the simple reason that their campaigns do NOT generate book sales.

8. Paying for “Amazon #1 bestseller” campaigns. As you may know, a dirty sock became an Amazon #1 bestseller and there are a ton of scammers and goofballs promising “guaranteed” bestseller status. We’ll reveal why that’s not the point — and how to hit your goals regardless of this phony metric.

9. Not branding the book. Your book is your brand and you should be able to build your business around that book and its ideas for the next 3-5 years.

10. Being afraid of sales. Don’t worry about hawking your books. Focus instead on selling your ideas, value, impact, results, outcomes, and gifts – and selling everything (including your book) becomes much easier!

11. Buy into an anthology. For most authors, this is a shortcut that seems very appealing until you realize it’s a money-making ploy for the so-called “publisher” and you get very little juice from being in a book with 20 other authors who couldn’t cut the mustard on their own, either. Sigh.

12. Marketing overwhelm. Having no idea what to do – when to do it – how to get it done – and thus ending up frustrated, confused, and doing next to nothing to market your book. Lack of marketing leads to a lack of sales leads to a lack of monetization. That’s called a doom loop.

13. Mistake size for value. If you’re writing your first (or next) book, don’t give in to the false assumption that you have to write a 300-page tome. Many of the highest-grossing and bestselling business books of the past 20 years weigh in at less than 125 small-format pages.

Categories
Entrepreneurship Skills

6 Self-Limiting Habits

Here’s a checklist of attitudes, traits, behaviors, and beliefs that the Top 1% of consultants, coaches, and experts wrestled with – but then STOPPED so they could become the Top 1%.

How many of these have been problematic for YOU?

It’s time to ASSERT your rights.

Because you DESERVE success.

And you must STOP getting in your own way with these 6 self-limiting, revenue-killing, success-preventing BAD habits.

Ready? Here they are…

  1. Lack of time, focus, and a game plan to build a serious “speaker/ expert” platform that could be generating an additional $10K-$15K per month on speaking/training fees alone AND helping you reach more high-probability buyers with your impactful programs
  2. Small potatoes thinking and doing: Settling for local chambers, libraries, and business organizations with no overall game plan to target high-fee niche groups on a national level and build a revenue-generating machine for ALL your investable opportunities, including speaking, training, coaching, consulting, and online products.
  3. Generic sounding programs and No target market that is hamstringing the efforts that you ARE making with your limited time. What needs to happen here is a way more effective and efficient approach. (Targeting specific decision-makers with a value prop they’re already seeking.) Transforming your generic-sounding programs into 2-3 well-branded ones in your “integrated product suite” and dropping the Chinese menu approach that is commoditizing you to death!
  4. Gaps in the sales process, sales execution, and sales follow-through with little proactive selling – too much distraction and thus, falling back on reactive “catch as catch can” marketing and taking on random low-fee opportunities as they fall in your lap. Replace with a buyer-centric DAILY dose of high-touch, high-relevance outreach.
  5. Lots of good ideas but too little activation and too many “spinning plates” which you can no longer afford. It’s high time you started making more money – in other words, it’s time to STOP paying your dues, and start paying your bills! Even seasoned experts are often OVERDUE in raising their fees because they’ve gotten complacent or wrongly believe that clients won’t or can’t pay more. There’s always a bigger fish – and if you’re not moving ahead, you’re falling behind.
  6. Mindset, self-esteem, self-worth, and the impostor syndrome. Nobody will value your programs, services, and solutions higher than you do. Stop being your own worst enemy and get out of your own way. Sales, significance, and happiness will follow.

Ready to assert these rights?

Ready to BUILD or REBUILD or PIVOT into the high-fee expert business you’ve always wanted?

Ready to start down the path of doing so quickly, with all the steps laid out so that you get a reliable, repeatable process that brings you the clients, the impact, and the freedom you deserve?

We can help you: https://www.expertprofitformula.com/

Categories
Best Practices Entrepreneurship Human Resources Investing Management Negotiations Sales Skills Women In Business

“This Is How To Detect Fraud In Negotiations Easily” – Negotiation Tip of the Week

“You become susceptible to fraud when your greed outpaces your logic.” -Greg Williams, The Master Negotiator & Body Language Expert (Click to Tweet)

 

Click here to get the book!

 

 

People don’t realize; they’re always negotiating.

I’ve heard some negotiators say all is fair in love, war, and negotiations. And some of them will stop just short of fraud to obtain a favorable outcome. Others will outright attempt to defraud you. The latter negotiator types are the ones whose shenanigans you must be alert to – they’re the ones that can leave you financially and emotionally devastated.

They’re signs to observe, in both the spoken and written words, that someone uses, that can serve as a forerunner announcing their pending trickeries. Take note of the following. You’ll see what I mean. You’ll also discover how to detect fraud to protect yourself from those that attempt to defraud you in your negotiations.

Do you ever consider how easy it is for someone to commit #fraud against you in your #negotiations? Fraud occurs in one form or another more than you realize. Learn how to detect fraud before it’s unleashed on you. bit.ly/3gASVRN

Categories
Entrepreneurship Marketing Skills

17 Tips to Create Audio That Rocks

I’ve done a lot of homebrew audio – on my laptop – with a Zoom H1 digital recorder – and with my trusty Blue Snowball microphone and Audacity on my Mac. And I’ve also done a fair amount of studio recording in studios ranging from the scary to the awesome.

Here are 17 tips for speakers, authors, consultants, and independent professionals who want to create better sounding, more professional audios for their podcast, radio show, audio products, or voiceovers.

1. Stand up when you record – it makes a HUGE difference to the way your voice sounds. For example, I recorded the entire 12 hours of the Do It! Marketing audiobook standing up. (Wear comfortable shoes!)

2. Speak close to the microphone – you want to get right up in that bad boy’s face. Somewhere between 4 to 8 inches from the microphone. If you’re doing this at home, test different distances and use the one that sounds the richest, warmest, and most clear.

3. Use a pop filter. You will totally thank me later. It’s going to be the best money you spend if you’re serious about creating great audio.

4. Don’t overinvest in equipment. You don’t need a lot of fancy gear to sound great. A good USB microphone, a mic stand, a pop filter, and some basic recording and editing software like Audacity (free at this link) will go a long way.

5. Don’t skimp on studio time, either. If it’s an important project where production quality counts, find a great local recording studio near where you live. Top-notch studio time is surprisingly affordable these days. Expect to pay between $75 and $125 an hour for a top-notch facility and technical staff who can help you produce top-notch work.

6. Don’t over-prepare. If it’s a big project especially – it doesn’t make sense to over-prepare. You should be familiar with the material (if you wrote it, you will be!) and that’s about it.

7. Don’t under prepare. If you’ve never done an audio recording before, paid studio time is not the place to learn the ropes. Invest a few hours with “practice recording” at home. Your studio time will go that much more smoothly and quickly.

8. Read – but don’t “read.” In other words, don’t make it SOUND like you’re reading. Speak naturally. Pretend you’re talking to a friend so it’s not boring.

9. Mix it up. Use vocal variety – just as professional speakers and seasoned storytellers know how to vary their pace, tone, pitch, and volume to keep an audience engaged in what they’re saying… YOU should use the full range of your vocal variety to emphasize keywords, transitions between points, and to underscore important ideas.

10. Use your body. Since you’re standing, you’ll have the ability to do more physical movement. Use it! It’s amazing how the voice and the body are connected. Have you ever seen actors like Robin Williams or Whoopi Goldberg or Tom Hanks in those “Making of” special features on the Disney movies that they do voice acting for? They are gesturing wildly with their hands, bouncing on the balls of their feet, making silly faces, leaning into the microphone, sometimes even jumping up and down. And it’s for a VOICEOVER. That’s because your vocal energy is tied to your physical energy. Use it – and your voiceover range and variety will improve dramatically.

11. Remember the art of the pause. Listeners need a pause to comprehend the last thing you said. Think of pauses – some short, and some not so short (for dramatic effect) – as the punctuation in your audio. If you never pause, you exhaust your listeners who lose the thread of your long sentences or complex ideas. If you use pauses to insert “natural phrasing” into your script, it makes it much easier for your listeners to understand, absorb, and they WANT to keep listening!

12. Take it one page at a time. For the Do It! Marketing audiobook, I had to get through 60,000 words and 280 pages. If I had thought about it that way during the recording sessions, I might never have made it! I took on the task one page at a time. Do longer recordings with this mindset, and you’ll sail right through faster than you ever imagined. I cruised through 150 pages on Day 1 (6.5 hours) and 130 pages on Day 2 (5.5 hours). And it was fun!

13. Have a “keep going” mindset. Voiceover professionals know that their main task is to “get the job done” – and that momentum is their friend. Don’t think about stopping. Don’t take too many breaks. You’re in the studio (yes, even your home studio) to crank out the work, not to obsess over minor details or do endless retakes. Keep going!

14. Flaws are good. Good professional audio editors will take out every inhale, smooth over every rough patch, edit out every vocal aberration. GREAT editors will leave in just enough of those same aberrations to make the voiceover pro sound human. When we chat in coffee shops, over breakfast or lunch with friends, or in front of prospects or clients in meetings, our vocal and verbal delivery is never 100% perfect. There’s a difference between sounding professional and sounding sterile and robotic. So leave a few “personality flaws” in your audio. Maybe 5-10%. It makes all the difference and you’ll sound like a REAL human.

15. Pause whenever you need to. Ah, the magic of editing. Whenever you screw up a line, swallow a word, stop to fix a typo in your script, or for any other reason (sneeze, cough, get a drink of water) – keep the audio rolling and pause. Then pick up where you left off. Most professional audio engineers will mark the script at that point to help the editor, but you just pause as long as you need and jump right back in when you’re ready. You don’t need to ask permission, you don’t need to apologize, you don’t need to get flustered. Pause so you can GO!

16. Eat! And drink tea, bring lozenges, avoid dairy and coffee, and bring water. Don’t forget to eat breakfast on the day you’re recording. Why? Because stomach grumbling is audible on good audio equipment. Yes, really. Avoid coffee – it dehydrates you. Drink tea – especially lemon tea or ginger tea that has a little bit of acid to clear and soothe your throat. Bring lozenges with you in case you need a midday vocal recharge – I like the Ricola classic Swiss herb cough drops. Avoid dairy products like milk or yogurt which tend to generate phlegm and block up your throat. Also, bring a water bottle so you have plenty of water available in the booth as you record. Water is your friend!

17. Personality not included. No matter how great your script, it doesn’t have any personality until you pick up the script and put YOUR personality into the words you’ve written. Don’t be shy – in fact, if you don’t bring your full personality to the recording, you’ll miss out on the biggest opportunity that audio programs and products present – the opportunity to connect and build rapport with your listeners and have them experience what it’s like to have a warm and personal conversation with you! If you’re loud, be loud. If you’re a little edgy, sound edgy. Don’t hide your personality for the sake of a “professional sounding” recording. There’s no such animal – the whole point of recording audio is so that you CAN marry your content with your personality.

Categories
Best Practices Entrepreneurship Investing Personal Development

Your price defines the customers you get

Have you ever thought that the price of your product or service selects what customers you get? Your price will differentiate how the market perceives your company, and by what kind of customers are attracted to your products or services.

In short, you need to consider that your customers will fall into three categories:

  • The price-sensitive customer
  • The neutral customer 
  • The loyal customer

Let us start examining the price-sensitive customer. The main (and possibly only) reason why this type of customer decided to buy your product or service was because it was the cheapest. They care very little, if at all, about the features and functions and benefits of your products or services that makes it different from the competitions’ products or services. They do not value the extra work and resources your company has spent to develop a better product or service. Moreover, because they don’t really care about the product or service, they are also less likely to learn about how to use it (for a product) or understand it (for a service). The result of this is that they will clog your customer service lines with question after question on the most basic functions. They need a lot of “handholding,” and despite all the effort your company puts into meeting their ever-demanding needs, they will still be somewhat dissatisfied with your company, products, or services. So, to be clear, the price-sensitive customer is an expensive customer in two ways: they cost more to support in cash, and they are likely to express their dissatisfaction with your product or service to their friends, family, and anyone else who cares to listen to them. 

Then also, there is the “ticker” to consider – you spent lots of time and effort supporting the price-sensitive customer, and you finally think you’ve got the customer on your side. You think the customer finally understands why your product or service is not only cheap but it is better, too. But wait a minute. As soon as a cheaper alternative to your product or service shows up in the market they will switch as quickly as a flash. The alternative may not be nearly as good as your product or service, but it has one thing going for it – it is more affordable. So, all your hard work and effort to keep your price-sensitive customer happy and loyal will be for nothing – as they will disappear in a flash! You’ve been unceremoniously dumped – for a “cheaper model.” So, you are lucky if you ever made a profit from that price-sensitive customer in the first place. A lot of time and effort for little, if any reward. 

Next, let’s examine the loyal customer. This customer is the polar opposite of your price-sensitive customer. The loyal customer loves your product or service. The loyal customer does not care much about price. That’s a good thing! But they do care genuinely about the value they receive from your product or service. You need to hear that – it’s important! 

They are unlikely to use your customer support. Another good thing. In the rare occasion, the loyal customer will contact the company’s customer support function, it is more than likely to tell them they have figured out something about the company’s product or service the company itself did not know, or that they have figured out ways to use the product or service in ways that were never really intended for in the first place, or in ways to add even more value than its original design or definition had initially intended.

Whenever possible, the loyal customer talks about your company to everybody and anybody they meet. They are your most dedicated evangelist. This is worth remembering, too!

The loyal customer did not buy your product or service because of low prices but instead because it has some unique feature, function, or benefit that is particularly valuable for them. For consumer goods or services, this includes a wish to be associated with the brand’s messages and positioning.

Next, we have the neutral customer. Alternatively, maybe we should call them the “pragmatic customer.” Obviously, in their behavior, the pragmatic customer is somewhere in between the price-sensitive customer and the loyal customer. The pragmatic customer does care about the price, but price alone is not the reason for their purchasing decisions. For the pragmatic customer, it is essential that they receive what they would consider good value for money. Again, this is worth noting. 

So, of these three types of customers, which customer do you prefer, and is your pricing aligned with your preference? 

Let me review some examples:

Consider this cloud-based telco, focusing on customers in the B2B space. They started out very small and grew slowly. They decided to price very low to capture market share from potential customers. So low, that profitability became an issue. Willingness to pay research showed them there was room in the market for a substantial price increase. In fact, the company was able to, over some time, to quadruple its prices. The aforementioned price increases in itself generated to a 25% increase in sales volume which, in itself, is interesting, but even more interesting, is that with these new higher prices the company attracted a whole different set of customers. Customers the CEO described as “professional” and as a consequence, led to a significant decrease in customer support costs that further led to about a ten times increase in profit margin. 

But not all companies are so lucky as this telephone company. Consider this national seller of home-improvement products. Profit margins were slim, and the company wanted to increase prices to boost its profit margin. Their business model was in-homes sales, and they advertised heavily on TV with the central message of deep discounts. Willingness to pay research showed them that the general consumer population was not very price sensitive. With one exception, those customers who had a preference for buying this kind of home-improvement product by in-homes sales were extraordinary price sensitive. This meant that the company’s ongoing low-price marketing only attracted those customers for which price was the most import decision-driver. This led to a “big” problem for the company. They could not increase prices, because that would severally affect the sales volume among those highly price-sensitive customers. They could not change their TV advertising to a value or benefit message, as this would severely impact the number of sales leads the company received – as those customers who want to buy in an in-home sales model are those that are the most price-sensitive. The company had painted itself into a corner from which there was only one way out – start a new brand, which turned out to be an expensive and involved proposition!

So, think about this the next time you are considering your pricing strategy. The last thing you want to do is cater to the least favorable customer at the expense of your most valuable customer. Your sales volume, profit margin, and revenue depend on you getting your pricing strategy right. 

Per Sjöfors
Founder
Sjöfors & Partners
www.sjofors.com