Gaby Awad - “Buying Customers” Episode: 2020 Season Recap Introduction My name is Gaby Awad AKA The Coach on Wheels (you have to watch my YouTube channel to know why 😉), and I am your host for the BUYING CUSTOMERS radio show 🔥🔥🔥 It would be awesome if I could hear from you in real time during the show. If you’re listening live or to one of the recordings, you can always connect and interact with us on Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and Twitter at IBGRNetwork. How many of you have a written business plan for the next 3 years? How many of you have a written action plan for the next 90-days? You see 2020 was a special year and we learned a lot from it. We learned that business disruption is a must in this new normal kind of days we live in and any business that is not ready to disrupt, change, and adapt will not surely thrive in 2021. This season we talked about:
If you missed any of the episodes you can still listen to the podcasts. Just go to goodsession.me and enroll in Buying Customers course. It’s for free. Or visit IBGR.Network or subscribe to the podcast show on apple podcasts, android podcasts, amazon music, or Deezer. Streetwise client acquisition and lifetime value Client acquisition is a dear subject to me. Actually the show name is buying customers and the whole concept of farming for customers and not hunting is a mindset shift that all sales and marketing professionals should adopt. Marketing is not advertising. It starts well before the first purchase and continues well after the last sale See marketing is not an Expense… it is rather an Investment… for every dollar spent, many dollars should come in. So to improve the score in marketing we have to first keep the score. The most important scores in marketing are 1. Acquisition cost… and 2. Lifetime Value… If you place an ad and it cost you $1,000 and you have converted 10 clients as a result then your ad acquisition cost is $100 per client. If a customer spends $550 a year for 6 years, that's $3,300 of lifetime value. In this case a $100 dollar investment in advertising retuned $3,300. See this is why marketing is and investment… not an expense! Marketing should be integrated marketing. I tell my clients that marketing is a temple and you should have at least 10 pillars holding this temple… So the rule of 10x10 says… allocate 10% of lead generation for every marketing strategy or pillar and the result is a 100% Pillars could be: Direct mail, speaking engagements, networking, social media, print, media, broad media… strategic alliances, workshops and seminars, digital funnels, … etc. Marketing is creating a DIFFERENCE or NICHE… to me it is not about ‘we are the first’ … it is about we are ‘different’ that will open doors and wallets for you! NICE= NO PRICE COMPETITION I cannot stress the importance of your Unique Selling Proposition. Add it to your 90-day action plan, work it out, find it, and let the world know about it. 7 Ways to Improve Sales and Profit Another dear topic to my heart and a clear chartered roadmap to improve your sales figure, revenue and profit. To build yourself a bigger or better business you need to find the money to invest in the business. To find the money there are 7 areas that you should be concerned with… I call those the “7 Ways”, and massive results are possible by achieving only small improvements in each of these areas...
Find the strategies and tactics to improve every area of the 7 ways and add them to your 90-day action plan. While at it, don’t come up with things like we want to bring more clients, have more sales, or increase our profitability. Clients, sales, and profit are results of you doing things. So these are the outcomes and not the activities themselves that will lead you to achieving these outcomes. Now imagine the framework like a series of multiplication (and this is where the compounded effect magically fits in) … small improvements on each area multiply… a 10% increase across the board might have an 80% increase in profit… you know due to the compounded effect. Lead Generation and Nurturing Many times during my first weeks on a coaching I ask my clients do you keep a database of your target market? And then I ask do you test and measure the number of leads you generate in a year? 90% of the time the answer comes: “NO” to both questions.
Let’s say we have identified our niche market to be around 100,000 suspects. How we tell them we exist and that we have the solutions to their buying needs? How we nurture those needs and show the benefits of our products and services is in the core of their buying journey. To nurture leads we discussed previously on the show some example strategies like: Use Giveaways to add value Referrals Find a Partner for Host/Beneficiary Strategic Alliance “Unique Selling Points” or USP’s Video Testimonials Guarantees Offering Samples or Demonstrations – “I call this try before your buy” Engagement and asking the right questions in sales Before we dig deeper into the power of asking questions let’s step back and think of the new role of the sales person. Since people hate to be sold but they like to buy, in this case the new role of the sales person is to PROFESSIONALLY HELP PEOPLE DECIDE WHAT TO BUY The best weapon for the Problem Solver is asking powerful questions. There is a process to asking questions: First: you ask questions to build rapport e.g. “where do you kids go to soccer school?” Second you ask questions to establish credibility: “what do you know about executive coaching?” Third, you ask questions to draw picture: “What does a 61% increase in profit mean to your business?” Fourth, you ask questions to build emotions: “How are you managing your cash flow gap at the moment?” To come up with powerful questions:
Three powerful questions I always ask in my coach on deck meeting:
VALUE FIRST IN SALES Your clients want to visualize the VALUE they’ll receive. It’s your job to do this by using your imagination and by being prepared. As a coach who is always working on upping my coaching game, I work on improving my offering, like I invested in good lighting since I am doing all my coaching now on Zoom, and I have invested also in learning how to broadcast using OBS using a professional mirrorless camera. I am not your average coach sitting behind his webcam or even worse, don’t want to use technology and prefers not to learn. My value is I learn and I evolve to give the best every time. 20 years ago it was a challenge to find people and meet with them physically In today’s world, both face-to-face, and online must be managed. But most salespeople, marketing people, most C level people misunderstand and issue the word VALUE. Today, we are converting the world PRICE to the word VALUE FIRST in your mind and then in your actions and lexicon. It’s about the value of your product or service, the value of your response, the value of your reputation and it’s about the value you bring to the table. The value of YOU! Things you must understand to stop losing on price, and start winning on value:
Do you have a reputation of delivering value? THE MORE YOU START OUT WITH VALUE, THE EASIER IT IS TO WIN MORE SALES AT A HIGHER PRICE! Think about this:
You have to really put yourself in their shoes and try to come up with valuable solution options to their problems. You value is expressed in terms of you. So,
Sales Objections and how to anticipate them Every prospect you speak to has sales objections or reasons they're hesitant to buy your product. Sales objections are bound to happen and they are unavoidable. Every sales has 5 basic obstacles:
Objection handling is when a prospect presents a concern about the product/service you are selling, and you responds in a way that alleviates those concerns and allows the sale to move forward. Objections are usually around price, product fit, competitors, not the time, or the good old “no perceived value YET!”. When can you guarantee objections? Well, when:
The best way to overcome objections is being prepared. A systematic approach to handling objections goes like this:
The cure is: PREVENTION. Prevent objections by discussing them before the prospect has a chance to voice them. If you can overcome and objection in your presentation before the prospect raises it, you are more likely to make the sale… ANTICIPATION = PREVENTION It just takes preparation and practice. It takes time, creativity and focus to make the sale happen. Prepare by anticipating objections to your presentation… Data and testimonials are great objection preventers. WHAT ARE THE COMMON OBJECTIONS?
Sometimes they are true but the key is in:
None of these have to do with price… some of these may relate to cost… all of these have to do with value. The important keys are: your creativity, your attitude, and your persistence. Price is NOT a barrier, if you provide value… Networking with the Intention to Help Getting back to the first seconds of networking and what should you do or say, I cannot stress enough the need to establishing and building rapport. Networking and connecting has a secret power. But fist let’s list the biggest networking mistakes or pitfalls:
The TRUTH is:
When you network, do not go with the intention to sell… rather go with the intention to help and sales will follow. But first you have to like to serve, like to help, like people, and like to network. Anyone you meet is a potential connection. Whether formal, business, referred… don’t pre-judge others. This is the biggest pitfall of networking. Bob Burg said: “All things being equal, people will do business with, and refer business to, those people they know, like, and trust” This is the true power of connection and business friendship. Being friendly is a key to your success that cannot be measured. During a networking event, meeting, or social activity, it takes creativity and action for people to memorize you. Personalize the event to improve your WOW factor… Make it intentional to WOW more people… They become walking billboards… Raving fans… They will do the selling for you WOW = Word of mouth advertising = Repeat business Everyone I give it to will show it to somebody else. See WOW factor…. Networking does not end after the event itself but should be nurtured along the way Staying in touch is very important so they will remember you tomorrow when life happens… In summary: communicate VALUE to every person every week. You might say “I know now the importance of networking but I don’t know where to start networking in” Make a list of the places to network. Find the link to these places to deepen the connection; you know passion, places you’ve been to, places you grew up in, etc. For me the best places that work for me are:
Go where your prospects and customers go or are likely to be found. Let’s wrap up… Remember that you should work ON your business and not only IN your business… Working ON your business means you are strategizing, planning, and implementing ideas to acquire customers and to increase their lifetime value. But it all starts with knowing who you want to serve in business, who is your target market, who you want to deal with, then design the marketing campaign that talk their language and answers their needs and passions. Test and measure everything from take up %, number of leads, conversion rate, number of transactions, average $ sale, acquisition cost, lifetime value, etc. If you don’t keep the score you won’t be able to improve the score of your business game… As an action plan for the next 90-days, consider:
Written by Gaby Awad As a Business and Executive Coach, Gaby helps business owners, leaders, and teams grow and achieve their goals through alignment, business re-education, coaching, and mentoring. He has more than 25 years of experience in executive positions and transforming businesses. Currently he is the Franchise Owner of ActionCOACH in Lebanon and in this position he also coaches Business Owners, CEOs and other top level executives. Gaby hold international accreditations as certified coach from ActionCOACH, Marshall Goldsmith, The John Maxwell Team, and Jeffrey Gitomer Sales Academy. Gaby is also the founder of Good Session Coaching, an online learning platform for executives and business professionals where leaders can go through self-paced learning. You can connect with Gaby on any of his seriously social platforms Connect on LinkedIn Follow on Twitter Follow on Instagram Like on Facebook Send an email: gabyawad@actioncoach.com C2.13.3PM
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