“In Business” by Roland Millward

The title of this post may sound strange.

However there is an important sales principle behind this.

When you sell a product what are actually doing? Are you selling a product or what the product will do?
The saying “it’s the sizzle that sells the bacon” is very true.

Imagine the difference between a packet of wrapped bacon on the supermarket shelf when compared to walking past a cafe with its door open and the sounds and smell of frying bacon (vegetarians please imagine harder!) What is most appealing? In essence the product is the same but now your senses tell you what it is for and how good it is even before you taste it.

When you are selling a product or service work on the sizzle. What can this product or service do for your customer? Give them a taste let them see the sizzle. Create a ‘wow’ factor. Then when they do they will really want to buy from you.

One of the best sources of business has to be when you get referrals from your customers. Now often we wait until a customer recommends our service to someone and such recommendations are greatly appreciated. However that is leaving things to chance. Is there a way of increasing those recommendations?

The answer is ‘yes’.

You can ask your customers for referrals! How? Well simply put you could say, “so John which one of your work colleagues has been showing an interest in getting xxx..” You may well find that John has been talking about his future purchase and others too said they would like one. There is your referral.

For customers on your mailing list you could ask them to write down the names and address of 2 or 3 people that they feel would like to know about your product or service. You can then follow those people up with a letter saying that ‘John has said you would be interested in xxx and you are pleased to tell them that you can help’.

There are many ways you can get referrals so don’t delay and don’t leave it to chance. Build into your sales pitch and follow ups a referral system. Remember too that referrals are more likely to buy from you than people that respond to an advertisement.

Good copywriting is vital for you to succeed with your sales letters, advertisements, web pages, news releases etc.

Here is a formula that will help you develop your material into something that will really work.

We will use the AIDA principle.

A: Attention
You need to capture your customers attention. Don’t write about how good you are. Write about something that will solve your customers problem or fulfill a need.

I: Interest
Once you have their attention it would be a shame to lose it! Keep their interest by adding relevant material that follows your opening lines. Show how you will solve that problem of fulfill that need.

D: Desire
Create or arouse in your customer Desire. Give them a powerful reason to buy your product or service.

Action:
Make sure you tell your customer what they have to do now. How do they order?

By using AIDA it will help you focus on your customer not you or your business. Customers are not really interested that your business has been operating for 30 years. They want a product or service. How will you supply it? How long you have been established and other such points can be tucked under logos and so forth but there is no need to promote that overtly.

If a person is looking for a plumber because they have a burst pipe they want to see things like: Call us anytime 24 hours a day – 7 days a week. We guarantee to be with you in 2 hours! Emergency telephone helpline! These are things that will solve their problem.

Sit down and write with specific problems and solutions in mind and target customers accordingly. Remember AIDA and you will find your copywriting will be greatly improved.

When someone wants to start a business they will hear many reasons why they should not do so.
It’s a bad time to start in a recession!
You don’t have the expertise!
You are too young!
You are too old!
and so on and so on—–

Let’s think about the last two points. Too young or too old.

Age is no barrier to someone making a success in business. Many of today’s leading entrepreneurs started when they were just kids. Sir Richard Branson (Virgin) and Cameron Johnson readily come to mind. Others have started very successful businesses in what can be described as ‘retirement’.

Never let any one put you off your goals because of age! If you plan to succeed you will do so.

With millions of websites how can you make sure that yours is successful?

There are 3 principles that you need to follow to make your website work. We can remember these by using the letters A C C. What do these letters stand for?

A is for Attraction
Your website must be attractive to visitors. It must be easy to read and grab the viewers attention in 8 seconds. People that visit the web are by nature looking for information quickly and they need to see that your website will offer what they want in a few seconds. Make sure that is the case with your landing pages. If you are using per per click it is vital that the landing page responds directly to the search terms used and that the page they land on is the one that will provide the information searched for.

Your website is your shop window to the world and once inside your web pages it is your store / office. It needs to represent quality, trustworthiness, efficiency, value, service and all the other qualities that customers are looking for from a business.

C is for Conversion
It is one thing getting customers to your website and staying on it for a while. You now need to convert those visitors into customers.
It is a good policy to try and capture the details of as many visitors to your website as possible by using an online form via a company such as Aweber (this will be vital for the next stage). How do you capture these details? There are 2 ways: You could require everyone has to ‘log in’ to access your website. This method I would not recommend and you will lose more customers than you will gain. The best way is to have a sign up form for a FREE gift such as a FREE eBook or other promotional tool. Aweber will provide you the forms to do this. Here is an example from my website FromeMortgages.co.uk. Notice on the home page there is a drop down form that appears. It is set so that returning visitors will only see it after a space of 5 days between visits. On the left column there is a ‘sign up’ form that appears on all pages. I am only collecting names and email addresses but you can collect more information.

Once you have customers information what is the next step?

C is for Communication

It tis said that it can take around 7 contacts with a person before they become a customer. Good communication from you is vital to build the trust that a potential customer will feel before he buys. This is where email using an auto responder is vital. Then we must not forget the telephone and old fashioned mail.
When you keep in touch with customers it does not mean that each time you try to sell them something. In fact is far better that you don’t. Use your communications to keep them updated. You might tell them about a change on your website or maybe you are extending your stores opening hours or closing for a holiday. Give them information not hard sell. Build up trust for you and your business. Don’t bombard them with forms of communication so that they will begin to get weary. Vary the style and type and make it genuine. For instance if you have posted a brochure of free book then a follow up phone to ask if they have received it would be a good idea, but again on that phone call be brief and don’t push for a sale. This may seem strange for those hard nosed direct sales types but the softly softly approach works far better even if it seems to be a slower process for the impatient one.

So there is my brief of summary of ACC. Take a good look at your website and see how you can put ACC into practice.
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