Anything that is customized or personalized suddenly becomes very much more valuable. We like our own names and our company names and our sports team names, don’t we? So when we customize a product or service for an industry or a specific business, we create massive increased value at very little cost.

Here’s How It Works

You can private label an innocuous shampoo for a good hair salon and make serious money. You can make a seminar or sales training program industry specific and sell ten times as many. I was recently talking with someone who created exercise DVD’s. How about making one for seniors, one for travelers, one for children, one for ladies, one for teens, one for busy executives… then market each one through the marketing and distribution channels reaching that particular demographic? For example, you would Joint Venture with seniors publications and clubs, AARP and seniors tours to reach seniors with your seniors exercise DVD.

Private Label Training, Seminars or Teaching

When you find excess inventory, you can re-purpose it in this way. You can also approach someone who presents training, seminars or teaching, and Joint Venture with someone who has access a particular market segment, while procuring the rights to market their products and services to that segment and receive ongoing commissions. For example, how about Training for Realtors? Get more specific with Training for Female Realtors and you’ll make more money. The more specific, the more terrific.

Let Your Access Lead the Way

Which segment of the population do you have access to, or can you get access to? Once you have access to a demographic/psychographic sector, you can go out and find products that can be customized or relabelled for that sector. Once you have strategic alliances in that sector, it’s easy to expand to the entire sector.

I once did seminars for an Executive Women’s Club and ended up serving all their clubs nationwide. Had you set that up, you could have asked for and received up to 20% of all my income from that market, and that would have put at least $20,000 in your pocket. All it took to get me into that market was a friend making one, single phone call. One phone call can be worth $20,000 to you. Do Joint Ventures work? You’d better believe it!

Sales Tip

Specialists get paid more and have more credibility. Understanding more about an industry than your prospect positions you as an expert. In order to do this, use statistics and education to differentiate yourself from the generalists who think they can cure anything from recessions and receding hair to bad knees and bad attitudes.

Management Tip

The more you understand your prospect and his business, the more likely you are to sell to him. Train your employees to ask questions, make notes, do research and create industry specific solutions. Learn the language and jargon of the industry you’re targeting. Become familiar with their hopes, dreams, challenges and unique opportunities.

“I am an innovator. This is a term of distinction, a term of honor, rather than something to hide or apologize for. Anyone who has new or valuable ideas to offer stands outside the intellectual status quo. But the status quo is not a stream, let alone a ‘mainstream’. It is a stagnant swamp. It is the innovators who carry mankind forward.”
~ Ayn Rand

Have You Been Behaving Like a Baboon?

Most businesses are like African baboons – these furry fellows race through the cornfields, picking corn and stuffing it under their arm. As fast as they stuff the corn under their arm, it falls out the back, but they keep on picking and stuffing! By the time they get to the edge of the cornfield, they are carrying one corncob and they’ve left a trail of corn on the ground. This is how many entrepreneurs handle customers. They’re so busy getting new ones that they neglect and lose their existing customers out the back door. Attrition spirals out of control and yet they continue to spend more money on finding new customers.

Invest in Your People

We know it’s far more affordable to resell existing customers than to get new ones. We know that it’s better to retain our customers and to encourage referrals through added value service than to spend a lot of money finding new customers. So why don’t we act accordingly?

Why don’t we spend 80% of our marketing budget on our EXISTING customers?

Invest in your people and they will bring you a lot of new ones. Building strong relationships with the customers you have will:

• increase loyalty
• reduce attrition
• increase transaction values
• lengthen customer lifespan.

Why not put a program together to REACTIVATE inactive customers?

It’s much easier than trying to buy new ones.

A happy customer is good – an elated customer is better.

By redirecting our marketing dollars to our loyal clients and creating unprecedented added and unexpected value, we can engender massive reciprocity in the form of referrals and goodwill. But only strategists will understand this. Tacticians, those “instant gratification” types, will never understand this. A satisfied customer might stay with you, but an inspired and enthusiastic customer will bring her friends, family and associates. You can buy a lot more new customers than advertising with:

• A surprise party
• An unexpected gift
• A personal phone call
• A complimentary dinner

Use Joint Ventures to add value at no cost to you. Partner with other businesses to increase the value to offer and to differentiate yourself from the competition. Put yourself in your clients’ shoes and take the time to find ways to make their lives easier and more comfortable. Look after what you have and they will look after you.

Sales Tip

Act in your customer’s best interest. Reward referrals generously. Don’t skimp on packaging. Create referral systems that make the customer happy. Protect your customers; they’re hard enough to get and they can be worth their weight in gold.

Management Tip

Teach your team to listen and to go the extra mile. When I go into Safeway and ask where the bathroom is, the employee will walk me to the bathroom. When I go to the competition, the employee points in the direction on the bathroom. Big difference. A nice bag with a pretty bow and a big smile, a follow-up telephone call and even a thank you note can generate a massive return on investment. Get creative and set the example.

Which are you right now?

I worked with a real estate company to help them increase sales and saw the “tortoise and the hare” fable come to life right before my eyes. One of the salespeople (the tortoise) was slow, not highly skilled, not a great communicator and she had a long commute to work, which cut into her flexibility. But she was steady, consistent, reliable, very enthusiastic and totally focused and committed to reaching her goals. Some of the other “hare” salespeople tended to be highly skilled and polished, but they were often erratic and unfocused. They worked in fits and starts. They got side-tracked. The tortoise beat them every single month. The results I see a salesperson accomplishing are in direct proportion to his or her consistency and focus.

The “Magic” Formula

The formula for Momentum is p=mv where p is momentum, m is mass and v is velocity. If we were to translate that into sales, momentum would be branding and results, m would be the amount of effort, action and focus and v would be enthusiasm and belief or:

Your Brand’s Momentum = Your effort, action and focus + Your enthusiasm and belief

It’s the Accumulation of Great Action

Branding and momentum is not achieved overnight. It takes consistent sowing and nurturing to build a brand, whether that brand is you, your website, your product or your business. Imagine someone pushing a car up a hill. As they push, they gain momentum and it gets easier. If they stop and let go of the car, it starts rolling back down the hill! Momentum is a vector. That simply means that momentum is a quantity that has a magnitude, or size, and a direction.

Are you headed in the best direction?

Some businesses have momentum in the wrong direction, and they require a turn-around expert to deal with them. We need to be sure that our efforts are taking us in the right direction and we need to know why we want to move in that direction.

Use this Reality Check

• It’s good to stand back and take along, hard look at your business.
• Re-evaluate your goals.
• Look at your activity.  Is it building momentum and the branding you want?
• Are your sure you’re creating the right image?
• Most of all, focus and consistency should be built into all your systems.

As Michael Gerber tells us in the E Myth, work ON your business, not IN it. And continually adjust and improve upon every aspect of it. Concentrated effort and persistence is the mark of a winner. Once you gain positive momentum in the right direction, make sure you continue to feed the fire, and the sky’s the limit.

A client of mine who owned a chain of restaurants radically improved his business when we tested his employees for the personality styles and re-organized the business. We all have characteristics of all the four major personality styles, however one is normally dominant. In business, it’s important to acknowledge our strengths and leverage them, and to find others to supplement our weaknesses. There’s no right or wrong character type. Here’s a quick overview.

The High D - Dominant style

Dominant style (minority of people, hardest to find) is bottom-line andresults oriented, impatient, sometimes tactless, driven and extroverted, with weaknesses in details. Major fear: being taken advantage of / ripped off. Good closers, great pioneers. Need the numbers and systems guys.

The High I - Influencing style

Influencing style is an extrovert, “party animal”, great at meeting people and starting relationships, popular, good opener, weakness is details and time management. Major fear: being embarrassed in public. Needs closers and numbers guys.

The High C - Cautious style

Cautious style is introverted, loves details, numbers and systems more than people, excellent numbers guys and accountants, computer experts, analyzers. Weakness is over analysis; fear is criticism of their work. Needs the extravert’s and the drivers.

The High S - Steady style

Steady style (majority of people) is an introvert, loyal, team player, family type, great systems and support person, needs security and long term relationships, fears risk, conflict and change. Needs others to make things happen and to create change and to take unpopular action when necessary.

Optimizing the Strengths of the Styles

This is a simplistic approach, but understanding our strengths and weaknesses and allowing people to do what they’re good at, while avoiding tasks that they’re weak at, is simply smart business sense. For technical sales we use High C’s and S’s. Ideal salespeople are normally High D’s with secondary I’s. One wouldn’t an accountant who is a High D, or a High S to launch a new business. You don’t want a High C to be the host at a cocktail party and we don’t want two High I’s behind a reception desk because they’ll talk all day!

Using personality style analysis has helped many of my clients to be better entrepreneurs and hire the appropriate people. Self knowledge is essential to success. I use the DISC style analysis – there are many others available, including the excellent Myers-Briggs Type Indicator.

Sales Tip

When selling to:

• High D’s - Talk results and ROI and close early and hard.
• High I’s - Build relationship, have fun and close early.
• High C’s - Provide copious details and proof and take time to close.
• High S’s - Prove that the support and relationships will be in place long after the sale is made and close slowly.

Management Tip

When Managing:

• High D’s - Give them lots of control and clear objectives and do what you say you will do.
  High I’s - Reward them publicly, make them look good and watch their time allocation.
• High C’s - Be specific, don’t rush them, and compliment their work (catch them doing something right), set time goals.
• High S’s - Make changes slowly, provide lots of security, share long-term plans.

When you have a service or a product that is bought many times over, it makes sense to pay to get a new customer. For example:

• I showed a hair salon owner client of mine how to invite high-end potential clients for a hair free cut and blow wave. His cost was negligible; however 82% of them were so impressed with the quality of his work that they became regular customers.
• A Tree Surgeon may offer a free service in order to obtain long-term customers.
• An accountant or lawyer may offer a free initial consultation.

Try These Excellent Money Making JVs

Combine the above with a Joint Venture and you can create the opportunity to access a large base of potential customers, especially if you have a consumable product.

• If your research and experience shows that most people who try your product go on to consume it on a regular basis over a period of time, why not ask JV partners to advertise your product and keep 100% of the first sale income for their trouble?
• Or they might want to give it away to their clients as a gesture of thanks for loyal patronage.

The clients who like it can be directed to make all future purchases from you.

A Little Upfront Profits You Greatly in the Long Run

Smart coffee shop owners can target business people who work in the area with an offer of three free cups of coffee. The prospects will get used to coming in to the shop and probably buy muffins or sandwiches anyway, and if the food and service is really good they could very well become regulars. Three cups of coffee costs about 60 cents. What is your profit on a sandwich?

The Law of Reciprocity works.

When most people get something for nothing, accompanied by excellent packaging, friendly service and a good product, they feel obliged to reciprocate. What is the marginal net worth or lifetime value of a customer to you? Being generous and allowing them to taste and experience your products and services at no cost is a smart marketing strategy. People whom you would never have met will have a reason to try your products and services.

“Successful people ask better questions, and as a result, they get better answers.”
- Anthony Robbins

There are only two types of questions: Those that get negative or negligible results, and those that get great results. What questions are you asking yourself and your associates, employees and customers that can result in a better bottom line? What questions will reduce customer attrition, improve loyalty and profits and motivate the people you work with?

Design the Right Questions

• The answers to the questions we ask should result in answers that inspire, motivate and initiate innovation and positive action.
• They should encourage, cheer, challenge, energize and drive.
• The more specific the question, the more specific the answers… And the more specific the answers, the better. Specific is terrific.

By designing the right questions to ask those involved in our business, we direct the business to greater success and focus everyone on the goals and objectives for which we have taken responsibility. When you ask the right question, you create an answer that begets a success strategy.

Try Asking These for a Self Check:

1. “Which three things can we do to increase the amount of people coming into the store by 5% without any cost or risk to us?”
2. “How can I pay for results instead of promises when it comes to advertising?”
3. “Who do we need to work with in a Joint Venture to double the amount of prospects we are currently exposed to?”
4. “How can we create three new streams of increasing, passive income?”
5. “How can we benefit from someone else’s advertising and marketing activities?”
6. “What can we do to double the value we offer our clients, without increasing our cost of sales?”
7. “How can we get customers to increase the amount of times they visit our business by 30%?”
8. “How can we reactivate 40% of our inactive customers?”
9. “How can we create back end sales without increasing our overhead or the time it takes to sell the back end?”

Sales Tip

Learn to ask questions that result in a buy. “O.K., Bill, I’m going to charge you card now for the basic Widget. Now shall I add the Blue Squink for $100 as well as the Rutten for another $800, or shall I just add the Blue Squink?” The answer should be, “Sure, add both”, or, at worst, he says, “Oh, just the Blue Squink for now.” Either way, you have upsold him.

Management Tip

Management questions can help or hurt. Ask, “What could I have done to help you achieve even more sales?” “You’re really at the rock face, Candy. What do you suggest we do to improve customer service even more?” “Bobby, I want to pay you a higher commission. What can we do to ensure a higher transaction amount per sale?”

We are all leaders; in our families, churches, temples, lodges, clubs, businesses and fraternal organizations.

Manager vs. Leader

Have you ever heard of a Cult Manager? What about a Religious Manager. Of course not!  Yet, where have we ever seen more loyalty, commitment and blind obedience? They’re leaders and there’s a huge difference between management and leadership. “Semantics”, you say. Well, when I went to Hotel School and was taught how to be a Hotel Manager I found that I had to become a Leader in order to gain the loyalty and commitment of my staff.

How I Created Loyalty as My Staff Tested Me

When I first arrived to work as a manager in a hotel in Rhodesia, now Zimbabwe, the staff did the usual hotel staff things to test me. The cashier would mix up the cash register, and see if I could sort out the problem. The night chefs would stay home, and see if I could handle the kitchen at night and prepare the breakfast. I had to prove myself. How does a manager cope with that, as opposed to a leader?

I was called in to a meeting of my management peers and they told me to fire a certain Functions Manager. He was a rebel and no good, they said. Lazy. Obstinate. Get rid of him!

His name was Oral and as I watched him at work I saw his staff of waiters set up the conferences and do all the work perfectly while he sat outside, smoking.

I called Oral into my office and fired him. Then I said, “Oral, I’ve done what everyone here wanted me to do. I fired you. Now, I’m rehiring you on my terms. Here are my terms: You can sit outside and smoke all day. You never have to enter the hotel. As long as the job gets done to my satisfaction, I’m happy. If not, we will talk.   How’s that?”  Oral beamed.

He thanked me profusely. He was happy. He did a great job. I was happy. And one day he saved me from being badly beaten up. Oral, you see, was a natural leader. He understood leadership.  Suffice is to say that after a while I had a loyal following instead of an obedient staff.

A Leader Understands

A leader understands that she is leading personalities with value systems, goals, fears, hopes and dreams. She knows that she can get people to work 24/7/365 when she pushes the right buttons. Never run, raise his voice or panic.

Creating Real Motivation

When I was 17 I was drafted into the army. I saw what leadership was and I saw what psychopaths did. The psychopathic, racist South African army officers got people to do things by force. They achieved very little. The true leaders in the army got a lot more done, without fear, manipulation or force. They got soldiers volunteering for things. When your people are motivated and have a vision and a goal, they will achieve their goals and your goals together. Without pay, if necessary. Financial rewards and incentives are not the most powerful there are.

Questions You Should Ask the People You Intend to Lead:

1. What is your greatest fear and your greatest dream? Why is that your fear? Why is that your dream?
2. If you had a million dollars and lots of time and energy, what would you be doing right now?
3. What feelings do you want to experience, and what feelings do you want to avoid in your life?
4. What’s the best book/movie you ever read/saw?
5. What are you most proud of about yourself? What is you greatest skill? What do you do best?
6. What are you weakest at?
7. If you could have any job, what would it be, and why?
8. What is your greatest worry?
9. How do you feel about…?
10. What would you change about this business/organization?

Ask open ended questions; draw them out. “Tell me more? What do you mean by that, exactly? Why do you say that? And? Yes?”

Characteristic of a Phenomenal Leader

The true leader knows that she has to know a lot about the people she wants to lead.

• Empathize and care.
• Show them how to measure their progress.
• Treat them fairly and be consistent in how you lead.  Regularity, honesty and consistency is important.
• And there must be clear guidelines, consequences and reasons for what happens. Everyone must understand why they are to do what they do, what the outcome is supposed to be, the consequences for failing to do the right thing and the BIG PICTURE. The vision, the overall strategy, should be understood by everyone concerned.
• Most of all, each team member should know that, by reaching the company or organization’s goals, they will reach their personal goals as well. They should have a vested interest in the success of the venture. This is vitally important.

Mortimer Adler was quoted in Time Magazine in 1974 as saying, “In Aristotelian terms, the good leader must have ethos, pathos and logos. The ethos is his moral character, the source of his ability to persuade. The pathos is his ability to touch feelings, to move people emotionally. The logos is his ability to give reasons for an action, to move people intellectually.”

Very few managers know how to lead. It’s never too late to change. Leaders are firm, flexible, value-driven and honest. They have Magnificent Obsessions, driving goals and clear action plans. Their followers feel loved, secure, cared for and lucky. Together, we can do amazing things.

When I attended a Dale Carnegie Management Course, the trainer, Deon, told us a story I’ll never forget.

A Change of Heart

He owned a successful jewellery store in a mall. After attending his first Dale Carnegie course, he decided to treat the security guards in the mall, whom he’d always ignored, in a friendly and respectful manner. He started asking them about their families and greeting them. Suddenly, they started arresting thieves in his shop, for shoplifting.  He called a meeting of the security guards and asked them what they thought had caused this rash of shoplifting.

Kindness DOES Effect the Bottom Line

To the best of my recall, this was their reply, as Deon conveyed it to me: “Sir, there has always been shoplifting and theft in your store.  But you treated us so badly that we simply chose to ignore the thieves.  Since you started treating us well and showing a genuine interest in us, we started catching the thieves.” Deon estimated that he had lost tens of thousands of dollars over the years because of his uncaring and haughty attitude towards the security guards.

Two Simple Exercises to Build Relationships

#1 - We tend to underestimate the tremendous untapped profit that can be released when we start to treat our employees well. I’m not talking about being soft or compromising our standards; I’m talking about being sincerely interested in their well being, dreams and goals. Remembering their family members’ names and their birthdays is a good start.  One simple exercise that works well for me is to have a piece of paper in my pocket where I jot down personal information about employees and file it for later reference.

#2 - As a group exercise, we hang a paper card around their necks, on their backs, and have them each write a positive, up-building, sincere and honest compliment about the person on the card on his or her back. At the end of the exercise, each person has a whole list of good things that other people think about them. I have known employees to keep these lists for years.

It Pays to Notice (& Compliment) Good Behavior

Many people seldom receive specific, honest compliments. They dress as well as they can and nobody notices or remarks on it. They have their hair done, and no one says a thing. They work overtime and it’s taken for granted. Notice their contribution, reinforce good behavior and reap the rewards.

It All Starts With You

And, if you really want to massively increase your sales, stop whining about your staff and attend the Dale Carnegie Management Course. It all starts with the owner of the business. That’s where the buck stops. And that’s YOU.

The same principle applies to Joint Ventures, the most powerful business tool ever discovered. Good relationships are the basis for good business. Together, we can do amazing things.