Will It Soar Or Suck? 6 Business Techniques That Make a Difference
February 3, 2008
You can learn so much from watching what other businesses do and applying it to your own business. Here are a few observations on what I’ve seen this week that could make your business soar or suck:
Techniques To Make Your Business Soar
The Sullivan Nod: I hadn’t heard of this sales technique, which is mostly used by bar tenders. But, it’s a great idea. And, in this brilliant article, Maki explains how you can use The Sullivan Nod to increase your online sales.
Selling By Not Selling: If you suck at sales, or just don’t enjoy doing it, Ian Denny explains a genius way of not selling to make sales. He reverses a tactic which I have tried many times, with extraordinary results. And the great news is, you can do this for any type of business.
Customer Feedback – Just Ask: Listening to your customers is important. And if you’re worried that your business might be heading in the wrong direction, asking for their opinion is even better. And Terence at Internet Entrepreneur did just that, in this brave post.
Techniques That Make Your Business Suck
Advertise On The Non-Existent Website: We received a call today from a company wanting to make an appointment to come out and see us, with a view to advertising on their website.
Trouble is, they have some obscure name and their website has not even been built yet. Doing research is one thing – trying to sell before you even have a product, in a crowded market like advertising is just stupid.
Identity Theft Could Be Harmful To Your Reputation: The dangers of identity theft online have spread to social networking sites. This week, Problogger discovered that someone has been impersonating Seth Godin on Twitter. And Darren explains why this type of identity theft on social networks could damage your reputation.
Cold Calling: Some franchise directory guy called round a couple of days ago and insisted he had an appointment. This is not the eighties and cold calling is not smart – time is a valuable commodity to most of your customers. And lying about having an appointment won’t get your foot through the door. If you’re going to lie from the start, your customer is not going to trust you with anything else.
Comments
10 Responses to “Will It Soar Or Suck? 6 Business Techniques That Make a Difference”
Got something to say?
Cath Recommends
Change Your Life
Make Money
Talk To Me
Successful And Outstanding Blogger
Cath,
Thanks for the mention. Listening to your customers is great point.
What do they want most? I agree with keeping tabs on your competition, but doing that and ignoring your customers is dangerous.
The best way to keep up there is to listen to your customers FIRST and react to what they want.
If you do this, you’ll not have to worry about your competition if you always get there by reacting to their needs before they do.
“Not Selling” is a great tool to have under your belt. I’m not advocating exclusive use of this concept. But communicating in a way that gives people space to buy can get sales – I’ve seen “not selling” campaigns majorly out-perform typical marketing campaigns.
Ian Denny’s last blog post..Struggling Or Going Bust – Think Big To Get Out Or Even Rise From The Ashes After Your Demise
Hi Ian – you are welcome. It was a great post and I’ll be using your idea in a campaign this week.
I’ve tried the “What do you not like about your current service provider” question heaps and it doesn’t work so well, because they know you’re trying to sell them.
But – asking people what they do like about their current provider, as you suggested, doesn’t seem like you’re trying to sell them, just get feedback. And of course, they will start to think – what do I like about my current provider?
I’m going to try it out in a campaign and let you know how I get on.
Catherine,
I think we can gain so much by listening to our customers. Often, even if they appear to be upset about something, just letting them “have the floor and vent”, will resolve the issue….and often they are upset because of something that has nothing to do with us, as business people.
Customers are the ones who pay our bills. They deserve the respect of us hearing them out.
I love Ian’s “no selling post”. That is ingenious A great read which includes a “how to”.
Barbara’s last blog post..A New Reality Show – How Not To Blog?
Hi Barbara – that is so true. It reminds me of a difficult customer we had a couple of years ago. She was giving the staff a really hard time on the phone, so I decided to go and see her to try to resolve the issue.
Well, when I got there – I soon realised her problem wasn’t really with us. It was an insurance claim, and she felt that the people she’d dealt with initially – eg the loss adjuster and the insurers were trying to take advantage because she was a widow.
So, of course she didn’t trust anyone who was involved in the claim. And it was a shame because they did seem to have treated her unfairly, but once I’d spoken to her, I was able to help her out.
Ian’s post is brilliant isn’t it? I like the way he has transformed the look of his blog too.
Sorry Cath if the anonymous comment upset you in any way. I just laughed!
I’ve nothing against people developing their bodies. In fact I’m doing a great job of expanding my waistline.
Obviously I’m preparing to hibernate with the weather and all.
And as my esteemed colleague Steve says, anorexia is never far away. He fears slipping below 14 stone, and we all follow his wisdom.
His fear is deep indeed.
Anyway, back to the topic, I wish you the best of luck with the not selling approach! Are you linking it to your blog? Perhaps an email with link to click through so you can gather any comments?
Make sure you have a signature in the email with your phone number too.
But don’t refer to anything salesy of course. It’s just there for the people that want to buy if they can;t think of anything good to say of their current provider and fancy trying someone who cares enough to ask with a view to improving.
And keep trying different approaches – especially if it’s via email and not costing you anything but time.
Barbara – thanks for the compliment!
Ian Denny’s last blog post..Business Cashflow Nightmares Solved Within 10 Days
Hi Ian – don’t worry – it didn’t upset me too much. I just can’t stand people who choose to remain anonymous when attacking others. It’s so cowardly.
Waistline expansion can be really costly. I have gone from size 8 to 10 ( 4 to 6 American) up to a 12 (8 american). So, most of my clothes are too tight, and there’s no way I’m going to buy new ones!
Good idea re: putting a form on my site. Also, I was thinking of sending out some letters asking the question and maybe doing some calls. What do you reckon?
Yes – the calls are a great idea. Letters are great too, but cost and time can become a problem with letters (printing, postage, stuffing envelopes etc).
How are you getting on gathering email addresses?
Also worth asking non-selling questions of your customers.
I do with clients. I send them to the blog. They don’t comment much, but they do reply to the emails with the link quite often.
It’s good at building rapport. I would guess that your business could really create great word of mouth if you did a few non-selling emails to them.
Fun surveys perhaps. What colour should our uniforms be? Should we wear uniforms or just casual?
Maybe tips on keeping costs down? Suggest they send the tips to friends and family in the email?
Ask them to visit the blog to see the tip and in the article ask them for their own tips in the comments section?
That sort of thing. Keep you uppermost in the minds of clients who use you infrequently.
And I don’t advocate “not selling” all the time. Once you have a good list of people who have used your service and received your advice, you can send to occasional offer out and get a good response.
You can even say things like:
“We’re expanding. We’ve got more staff and mouths to feed, so I was wondering if you could help?
As someone who has sampled our response, I ws wondering if you could recommend us to friends and family in the area.
The expansion has meant our service is faster and better than ever, so if you can think of anyone that needs XXXXX, YYYYY or ZZZZZZ, please let them know how good we were when we did AAAAAAAA for you.”
Ian Denny’s last blog post..Business Cashflow Nightmares Solved Within 10 Days
Ian,
I agree but it a fine line. The salesperson that only calls at the end of the month to make their quota will only get one of two responses; 1.-Great, I need a deal then (lower margins) or 2. no thanks I am working with X (No sale at all)
Got to make the calls when there is nothing in it for you!
CathL -Weird on the Comment following you from ShoeM…Guess I am next as I teased as well.
RacerX’s last blog post..The Agony of Defeat…
Hi Ian – thanks. I have to confess, we’re getting on badly at collecting the email addresses. It’s hard to remember when you’re not used to doing it! We really need to put them on the guarantee forms.
Totally agree on the envelope stuffing – it’s so time consuming. Wonder if I should get some postcards done?
Hi Racer – Good point and that is true – you have to make it more like research or a survey – not just call expecting to make a sale. I’m giving Ian’s idea a go this week as we want to move into more commercial work – so even just the feedback would be great.
I thought the comment thing weird. He didn’t even say anything over there. The IP address was from somewhere in Australia. I saw your comment – and I’m wondering if a few people will be attacked also? I only said I didn’t like the pic – I hate that sort of stuff as much as I can’t stand Miss World and the like. But, some people said far worse – in fact, the thread has been closed to comments! Incidentally, i had another weird comment on here yesterday about bikers?? So I deleted it.
cathlawson’s last blog post..Will It Soar Or Suck? 6 Business Techniques That Make a Difference
Racer,
I agree. I haven’t done a salesy email for a while now. Just information or general questions.
I often forget about regular courtesy calls – we speak to our clients most days anyway, so it could be seen as overkill, or if we’re not careful a sales-motivated call.
We email them monthly to get their feedback on service from the previous month.
But I do think a regular phone call has a place.
Ian Denny’s last blog post..Business Cashflow Nightmares Solved Within 10 Days