[AP]

Originally Posted by Lance K

AP, it appears the link to the attachment is now invalid.

Did you disable it or did the mods? I'd love to see it if you or anyone else who downloaded it (if that's ok with you) wouldn't mind PMing me or sending it via Skype.

Working fine for me, here's another link.

~AP

[Lance K]

Originally Posted by AP

Working fine for me, here's another link.

~AP

Thanks for reposting it. That one works fine. Not sure why the other one wasn't working for me. Also, thanks once again for your generosity!

[jacquic]

Originally Posted by DaveHughes

... I've been in radio broadcasting for 25 years in a small town in Mississippi (population of our county: 42,000, although the area our 100,000 watt FM covers is around 250,000), writing and producing radio copy; to say that I've dealt with mom-and-pop business owners is a vast understatement. Specifically, I've dealt with them in regards to their marketing...

.

What a fascinating post.

OK, so what will be your next three steps, and why?

Jacqui

[reilly3000]

Originally Posted by MurphSmurf

Thanks for the detailed response, reilly3000.



Yeah, these are all things that have crossed my mind. Now you've pretty much confirmed this. Where I'll be living isn't extremely rural (West Kootenays, for those familiar with the area-- I'm sure Dexx knows where that is ) but it's definitely a "rest/relaxation" type of place. I definitely don't see a lot of cutthroat business competition over there.

One problem I can foresee is the lack of decent search terms to rank for. I've already looked up random terms like "Nelson coffee shop" and "Trail bank", only to be met with "not enough data". How can you convince a business they'll benefit from ranking for these keywords that get probably a combined total of 20 searches / month?



Cool, I'm sure there are businesses like this everywhere if you know where to look.



If you don't mind me asking, how did you start? Did you help out a friend's business and get referrals from that, etc?

By the way, I just checked out the website for a local Chamber of Commerce and it costs an arm and a leg to join. I thought this type of thing was free. Is it just a Canadian thing or is it the same in the US? :confused:

I love the Kootenays! I was up there just over a year ago for a ski trip at Red. Just had got a HUGE dump of snow, but their wouldn't open the mountain (mid november)!! There was at least a metre (I can speak Canadian) on the ground. it was killing me. Anyhow this allowed us to tool around Rossland and Trail for a couple days. Then we went to up White on Sunday to try to catch at least one ski day... called in the morning, confirmed they were open, drove an hour+ up there, then there was some dude at the bottom of the hill saying they "the pipes had frozen" and they were closed for the day. AAAAAAAAA!

Anyhow we had an awesome time in Nelson, Trail, and Rossland. Just stunningly beautiful country. My friend has a membership at the Canadian Legion, so we got ourselves in there for some Saturday night fun- had my first Caesar. When you ask people for one in the states they look at you funny, then you tell them to make a bloody mary with clamato and they ask you kindly to leave their establishment.


To answer your questions, I got my start with a friend of a friend. They were looking for a full time position. I offered them $15K to get what they needed done in 3 months- this saved them a ton and launched my business. To that end, you could look for businesses trying to hire for an internet marketing position and approach them to be their agency instead of doing a hire. Make it financial viable for them and you could have a great contract.

The rest has come through relationships. Do those right and things will fall into place.

In terms of pricing your services, reread this thread- I have several times. Then look at some rate cards for local media. Figure out what it costs to advertise in the yellowpages, radio, newspaper, and TV, then base SEO services off of that- if you just want to offer SEO services. But the moral of this thread is selling SEO rankings isn't enough to make you or your clients rich. Digging into their business and uncovering hidden areas of profit most certainly will.

Cheers!

[jacquic]

I was posting on another thread (War Room:FREE for War Room Members: Amazon.com Marketplace Strategies) and it made me realise there's another place to find clients.

I said: I always thought the £1/$1 books were there as loss leaders, but I bought one a few weeks ago, and still have had nothing from the sellers promoting anything else. Maybe they were happy with profit made from the pastage fees?

Come to that, no-one I've bought from via Amazon (for various products) has contacted me for upsells, cross-sells, or just additional sales. Lost opportunities.

----------------------

To carry on: For instance, I bought a laser printer from Watford Electronics. It is excellent...but they have never emailed or snail-mailed me to see if I would like to buy toner cartridges or any other peripherals.

The same story occurs every time I buy hard goods through businesses selling on Amazon, and I get quite a lot through them.

I'm beginning to think this must be a good way to approach busines owners.

Thoughts?

[Jagged]

Regular programming will resume right after this brief commercial message:

Originally Posted by cocoyrambuyon

Let me post my 2 affordable SEO Service Monthly Packages for
this thread:

[lightcam]

Originally Posted by jacquic

I was posting on another thread (War Room:FREE for War Room Members: Amazon.com Marketplace Strategies) and it made me realise there's another place to find clients.

I said: I always thought the £1/$1 books were there as loss leaders, but I bought one a few weeks ago, and still have had nothing from the sellers promoting anything else. Maybe they were happy with profit made from the pastage fees?

Come to that, no-one I've bought from via Amazon (for various products) has contacted me for upsells, cross-sells, or just additional sales. Lost opportunities.

----------------------

To carry on: For instance, I bought a laser printer from Watford Electronics. It is excellent...but they have never emailed or snail-mailed me to see if I would like to buy toner cartridges or any other peripherals.

The same story occurs every time I buy hard goods through businesses selling on Amazon, and I get quite a lot through them.

I'm beginning to think this must be a good way to approach busines owners.

Thoughts?

Yes, there are thousands of businesses all around the world that need your help (some of them are even struggling).

I belong to a coaching program that teaches all of these offline/online marketing strategies.

I suggest if you want to fast track your marketing career, join a program.
Just make sure it's from someone who is actually making money.

[SteelDanno]

On and off topic.

Someone posted a 20 odd MB PDF of this thread for those who want to study it later should it get wiped by the admins. A great idea to save threads of this caliber so here's another option.

What I do is this:

- I run Evernote (a free small app that lets you "tag and forget" all kinds of digital content)
- This content gets uploaded automatically to the cloud (pros and cons with that)
- I set the page to "Print View" using the Thread Tools at the top of this page. (you don't have too but i prefer the result)
- I click a button which Evernote added to my Firefox which lets me "clip" the entire page to Evernote
- Rinse and repeat as needed, I now have 17 "notes" (one for each page of this thread) in Evernote that I can pull up, search, print, study at will

This technique is no better or worse than the other proposed methods on this thread, I simply prefer it because it's fast and easy enough to do, resides off my computer, is accessible anywhere, is infinitely searchable and preserves the integrity of all the links in the posts. I also prefer it because I use Evernote daily to save, tag and clip stuff to anyways.

The tag and forget process works for me because I hate filing stuff into "relevant" folders and then spending brain cells trying to remember the "clever place I filed away that doc three years ago".

I much prefer (not always, but having the option of) using simple tags that are relevant to me at the time of creating the entry, and being able to trust that more often than not (weeks, months, years) down the road I'll most likely use the same words/tags for retrieving that information.

Cheers.

[sb]

Please forgive me if this has already been mentioned, I did a "Search this Thread" and nothing came up.

I believe that Send Out Cards looks like a great program to implement for our clients. It's like an autoresponder system except that it sends out physical cards, as I'd guess almost everyone here knows.

I'm thinking that I'll just set their system up and run it myself and not even tell them how I do it. Does that make sense or am I off base? I've never used them until today when they gave me the free card for signing up for their service.

[Curleyjohn]

In an attempt to send this thread into orbit I thought that I would put together a case study. I will do the leg work and a majority of the thinking but would love guidance and feedback.

I have a friend that owns a decent sized restaurant in a suburb of my home town. I believe business to be about 75k to 90k a month. Struggling to make money but stays even.

I went to this friend today and set up a meeting with them for Wed. 2:30 EDT to discuss increasing their profits by 25% in the next 60 to 90 days. I have a pretty good idea of the operation but I explained that this was going to be a "dress rehearsal" for my new business and that I had to have them agree to treat me as though they were requesting my services. I explained the importance of them valuing my opinion as if they were paying me. This still may be a issue but I will reiterate it on Wed. (I told them I would be charging referrals and testimonials)

So where to start? (pre-meeting prep.)

1. Keyword research
2. Competition Analysis
3. Website on page analysis
4. Link analysis
5. Customer experience analysis (what I see as a customer)
6. Product or service analysis (my evaluation of former)
7. Price research for product in the area
8. Current advertising

This is what I have come up so far but, I could use some expert advise as to what I may be over looking at this stage.

I would like to keep this step by step if at all possible

I would like to come back after the meeting on Wed. and post the answers to my questionnaire. (Hoping AP has a chance to send his prior to Wed. but I do have the questions already posted here as well as some other sources that I trust.) I will then post my action plan as I see it and will ask again for input and guidance.

[sb]

Originally Posted by Curleyjohn

In an attempt to send this thread into orbit I thought that I would put together a case study. I will do the leg work and a majority of the thinking but would love guidance and feedback.

I have a friend that owns a decent sized restaurant in a suburb of my home town. I believe business to be about 75k to 90k a month. Struggling to make money but stays even.

I went to this friend today and set up a meeting with them for Wed. 2:30 EDT to discuss increasing their profits by 25% in the next 60 to 90 days. I have a pretty good idea of the operation but I explained that this was going to be a "dress rehearsal" for my new business and that I had to have them agree to treat me as though they were requesting my services. I explained the importance of them valuing my opinion as if they were paying me. This still may be a issue but I will reiterate it on Wed. (I told them I would be charging referrals and testimonials)

So where to start? (pre-meeting prep.)

1. Keyword research
2. Competition Analysis
3. Website on page analysis
4. Link analysis
5. Customer experience analysis (what I see as a customer)
6. Product or service analysis (my evaluation of former)
7. Price research for product in the area
8. Current advertising

This is what I have come up so far but, I could use some expert advise as to what I may be over looking at this stage.

I would like to keep this step by step if at all possible

I would like to come back after the meeting on Wed. and post the answers to my questionnaire. (Hoping AP has a chance to send his prior to Wed. but I do have the questions already posted here as well as some other sources that I trust.) I will then post my action plan as I see it and will ask again for input and guidance.

Here's some stuff you might consider:

Email Marketing Essentials for Restaurants

Restaurant Marketing for Success

Restaurant Marketing For Free - by Roy MacNaughton - a knol by Sherman Hu

[Curleyjohn]

Originally Posted by sb

Here's some stuff you might consider:

Email Marketing Essentials for Restaurants

Restaurant Marketing for Success

Restaurant Marketing For Free - by Roy MacNaughton - a knol by Sherman Hu

17yrs restaurant experience but I have a feeling I'm going to get an education.

Thank you SB

[SteelDanno]

Originally Posted by sb

Here's some stuff you might consider:

Email Marketing Essentials for Restaurants

Restaurant Marketing for Success

Restaurant Marketing For Free - by Roy MacNaughton - a knol by Sherman Hu

Wonderful! These are excellent. The Aweber one in particular is so simple and powerful it's like a an easy to follow blueprint that anyone here could pitch to a local restaurant.

[Sebulba]

I have looked into this idea as well, but not with send out cards.

I'm suspicious that they may not be the best option for our consulting biz.

If you Google "Greeting Card Service" there are companies that can do this. I will be exploring it further for my consulting practice too.

Would like to here if anyone else is using a service to send real paper cards out for their clients.

Seb

[slvrsrfr]

I'd just like to remind everyone that there is a "thanks" button in the bottom right hand corner of each post.

It's wonderful that we're thanking each other through posts, but let's use the "thanks" button too. We carry our thanks quota around with us on the forum and it's nice for folks to see that.

Cheers,

Jason

[Sebulba]

Hello Everyone,

Just a thought here. This thread is incredible and very mind expanding, overwhelming in a way.

I am thinking that the quality people her at Warrior and on this thread easily have the collective skills to do everything mentioned in this thread. The problem I am having is the steep learning curve that would be necessary for me to do all of the things in AP's agreement, plus a couple of things that I know and like to do.

I am wondering if there may be a way for us to pool our efforts, and hire each other for our strengths.

Like I said it is just a thought to throw out. Maybe there would be a way for us to gather this information outside of this thread and Warrior to form a coop, of sorts, to maximize all of our skills for each others mutual benefit.

I have some ideas, what do you think?

Seb

[Kevin Perry]

Hey Sebulba,

Let us know what you ARE skilled at and where you need to fill in the gaps. A JV could be an interesting option in this business.

Another way to go would be to find freelancers to take care of the things you're not so good at. Have a look at oDesk...you can get any job done there. The quality is excellent and the price is less than a JV, but do your due diligence in choosing an applicant.

Hope this helps,

Kevin

Originally Posted by Sebulba

Hello Everyone,

Just a thought here. This thread is incredible and very mind expanding, overwhelming in a way.

I am thinking that the quality people her at Warrior and on this thread easily have the collective skills to do everything mentioned in this thread. The problem I am having is the steep learning curve that would be necessary for me to do all of the things in AP's agreement, plus a couple of things that I know and like to do.

I am wondering if there may be a way for us to pool our efforts, and hire each other for our strengths.

Like I said it is just a thought to throw out. Maybe there would be a way for us to gather this information outside of this thread and Warrior to form a coop, of sorts, to maximize all of our skills for each others mutual benefit.

I have some ideas, what do you think?

Seb

[AP]

Please don't try and do what I do. I have 25+ years in the business world.

I don't want to confuse anyone nor stop them from advancing.

Use whatever talents you have TODAY.

• Create a Google/Yahoo! Local Map listing (FREE)
• Get your client listed in the Vertical Directories (FREE)
• Set up AWeber, write a few auto-responders (Client pays)
• Now place a Lightbox or email capture on their website (FREE)
• OnPage SEO (Title tag, Meta tag cleanup will suffice, FREE)
• Free Press Releases (scribble something and post it up, FREE)
• Free Blog
• Free Twitter account
• Write some Free Atricles and post to Ezine (FREE)
• Have the client call his Merchant account and Print email capture on every receipt. Customer can get "Preferred Offerings" Great for any Restaurant and Retail stores (FREE)

Do you realize doing the above will SUBSTANTIALLY increase their sales to the tune of at least 10-20% (Minimum) if worked properly.

These are LOCAL co's, do NOT confuse with National SEO marketing products, info products, etc...

A small company doing $40,000 month/500k year could increase sales in 12 months to $50,000 month/600k doing very simple marketing.

I think that maybe many of you don't realize the Power of Google Maps, Onpage SEO, and AWeber.

I could get a setup fee of $997 and $297 month for the above package in my Sleep. I currently get $5,000 to $10,000 setup and $997 monthly for doing the above EXACT steps. Don't forget I TARGET the right businesses. But a small restaurant/retail shop etc... can afford $997/$297 all day.

They can't afford NOT to.

If you land One account every (2) weeks, 26 over the next year, you will have earned approx $26,000 in set-up fees and a monthly renewal in month 13 of $7,722 or $92,664 year. Not bad for doing little work. God forbid these bus owners give you more work, referrals, etc... then you'll have to hire a good tax accountant and avoid Obama taking it away ;-)

It's that easy, once the Client understands the True power.

You need to believe it first.

~AP

P.S. I dare anyone to debate me that a business can't increase their sales by 10% using an Auto-responder. No website, no onpage seo, no google map, etc... Just an auto-responder.

Originally Posted by Sebulba

Hello Everyone,

The problem I am having is the steep learning curve that would be necessary for me to do all of the things in AP's agreement, plus a couple of things that I know and like to do.

[Sebulba]

Thanks AP, Need to start with what I know

Originally Posted by AP

Please don't try and do what I do. I have 25+ years in the business world.

I don't want to confuse anyone nor stop them from advancing.

Use whatever talents you have TODAY.

• Create a Google/Yahoo! Local Map listing (FREE)
• Get your client listed in the Vertical Directories (FREE)
• Set up AWeber, write a few auto-responders (Client pays)
• Now place a Lightbox or email capture on their website (FREE)
• OnPage SEO (Title tag, Meta tag cleanup will suffice, FREE)
• Free Press Releases (scribble something and post it up, FREE)
• Free Blog
• Free Twitter account
• Write some Free Atricles and post to Ezine (FREE)
• Have the client call his Merchant account and Print email capture on every receipt. Customer can get "Preferred Offerings" Great for any Restaurant and Retail stores (FREE)

Do you realize doing the above will SUBSTANTIALLY increase their sales to the tune of at least 10-20% (Minimum) if worked properly.

These are LOCAL co's, do NOT confuse with National SEO marketing products, info products, etc...

A small company doing $40,000 month/500k year could increase sales in 12 months to $50,000 month/600k doing very simple marketing.

I think that maybe many of you don't realize the Power of Google Maps, Onpage SEO, and AWeber.

I could get a setup fee of $997 and $297 month for the above package in my Sleep. I currently get $5,000 to $10,000 setup and $997 monthly for doing the above EXACT steps. Don't forget I TARGET the right businesses. But a small restaurant/retail shop etc... can afford $997/$297 all day.

They can't afford NOT to.

It's that easy, once the Client understands the True power.

You need to believe it first.

~AP

P.S. I dare anyone to debate me that a business can't increase their sales by 10% using an Auto-responder. No website, no onpage seo, no google map, etc... Just an auto-responder.

[MarketingNinja]

Originally Posted by Spark

Hi Jeff,

Really appreciate your help on this. You mean it's better for us to talk to them regarding the marketing ideas first. After which only when they make the payment upfront. Then we shall write the agreement that we need to during the talk?

Because i was thinking of showing them the marketing map [Ideas / Packages / etc] first and once they agree about it. I will write a agreement and ask them for the upfront before making any process.

Am i right to say that?

Hey Spark,

What I have found works well for me, and it may be different for a lot of others, is I don't hold anything back with a prospect. As I interview them and they give me feedback, I slowly and methodically start letting them in on all my secrets and strategies to grow their business. 99% of the time, they don't take notes (I take pages of notes during the meeting).

At some point, their gears are spinning so fast and they're so excited, they begin to forget a lot of what I told them. I've now positioned myself as the expert. And I've told them a lot about what I do. I then tell them that the first thing you need to do is come up with a plan (a marketing map). A lot of what will be on this map are things we've already discussed, but I purposely leave a lot of blanks too.

At that point, I tell them the next step is to submit them a proposal with my rates. The proposal does not go into all the details of what I will do, rather the "area" I will work in for them. I tell them that in order to move forward, I need to receive the setup fee paid in full, in advance, and once received, I will then draft the agreement for us to sign, and we will get started.

The way my business is structured is I give away all my knowledge and secrets to position myself as the authority, and then I get paid to implement them, because 99% of people are too busy or too lazy to do it themselves.

But yeah, I work my prospect in stages. Each time, they make a commitment to move forward a step, I'll do a little bit more. But I won't draft a proposal unless they're open to working with me, and I won't write an agreement until after I've received the initial payment. Again, I don't know what works for the others, but this works for me.

The only thing I prepare before I go meet with a prospect is reaching into my file to grab a blank questionnaire worksheet and taking some time to look at their website and do some research.

Hope that helps!

Cheers,

Jeff.

[Sean Gipson]

Originally Posted by Dexx

Hey AP,

I'm curious as to what your business cards etc. define you as?

Like I've been using "Website Marketing Specialist" on my business cards, but on further though I think that is putting me in the "I do website stuff" box and enough in the "marketing consultant" box.

Do you just call yourself a marketing consultant? marketing specialist? etc.

What about the rest of you, what do you refer to yourselves as?

~Dexx

AP

I tried to find your response to Dexx's question here sorry if I over looked it, but I would like to know the answer to this question as well.



PS.

AP thanks for all the great contributions that you have made in this thread, the information that you and many other Warriors have shared in this thread are pure gold to me. Some of the info that you point out in this thread and other offline threads has really made me look at the bigger picture concerning my offline business and consulting in general.


Thanks
Sean

[sb]

Per AP - "Have the client call his Merchant account and Print email capture on every receipt. Customer can get "Preferred Offerings" Great for any Restaurant and Retail stores (FREE)"

I started using this technique for a few of my clients about 10 months ago and it works MUCH better than I anticipated! I also have the cashier or person handing them the receipt highlight the verbiage with a yellow highlighter and point it out to their customers.

The shop or restaurant owner can usually change the verbiage on the receipt themselves if they can find their user manual for the register. But like AP says, you can just call the merchant company and have them do it too.

For example you could say something like, "For Preferred Customer Offers and Special Discounts, Join the (Company Name) VIP Club by Going to: companyname dot com

It DOES work.

[Sebulba]

No, those are all very doable, sorry to confuse

Originally Posted by AP

Are you saying you can't perform those tasks? :confused:

That's about as simple as your going to get with Internet Marketing.

If you don't know those tasks you can learn them very Easily, they are fairly simple.

Plus you don't have to do them all. Start with what you do best.

The most important are Google/Yahoo! Maps, Free Vertical Directories (Yellowpages, Yelp, Superpages, etc...) and AWeber.

Those three items will yield tremendous returns for your client.

~AP

[Curleyjohn]

Originally Posted by sb

Here's some stuff you might consider:

Email Marketing Essentials for Restaurants

Restaurant Marketing for Success

Restaurant Marketing For Free - by Roy MacNaughton - a knol by Sherman Hu

Originally Posted by SteelDanno

Wonderful! These are excellent. The Aweber one in particular is so simple and powerful it's like a an easy to follow blueprint that anyone here could pitch to a local restaurant.

You are so right! The restaurant Marketing For Free is also very good.

[Curleyjohn]

Originally Posted by AP

~AP

P.S. I dare anyone to debate me that a business can't increase their sales by 10% using an Auto-responder. No website, no onpage seo, no google map, etc... Just an auto-responder.

OK, for the sake of education, no they can't. (Of course you realize I'm pumping you)

[MarketingNinja]

Originally Posted by jacquic

It helps me too - have wasted time and money before doing upfront work, and then the owner not following through. I think the way you suggest helps position yourslef as the expert and as someone who believes in themselves enough not to 'need' work.

Want to know one of the best strategies I started using last year to really position yourself as an expert?

I started only leaving the office to do client meetings on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Usually I have enough meetings to do that now I book over a week in advance. I'll have a phone call with a prospect on Monday and they suggest meeting and ask when I'm available. You'd be surprised their reaction when I tell them I'm already booking for Thursday the following week. You hear "Wow, you really are busy..." and that's exactly what you want to portray.

If you say, sure, are you free this afternoon? That tells them that you're not busy, and if you're not busy, it's because you don't have any work. So why don't you have work?

Try it, trust me. You'll laugh when you get off the phone. It blows people away.

Cheers,

Jeff

[Dexx]

Originally Posted by sb

Please forgive me if this has already been mentioned, I did a "Search this Thread" and nothing came up.

I believe that Send Out Cards looks like a great program to implement for our clients. It's like an autoresponder system except that it sends out physical cards, as I'd guess almost everyone here knows.

I'm thinking that I'll just set their system up and run it myself and not even tell them how I do it. Does that make sense or am I off base? I've never used them until today when they gave me the free card for signing up for their service.

I just signed up with sendpeppermarketing.com recently and plan to test their services out with following-up on my own prospects and leads first...based on the results of that I'll start using their services for clients.

It's both an email + postcard follow-up capable company, no minimums also =)

~Dexx

[Dexx]

Originally Posted by AP

Please don't try and do what I do. I have 25+ years in the business world.

I don't want to confuse anyone nor stop them from advancing.

Use whatever talents you have TODAY.

• Create a Google/Yahoo! Local Map listing (FREE)
• Get your client listed in the Vertical Directories (FREE)
• Set up AWeber, write a few auto-responders (Client pays)
• Now place a Lightbox or email capture on their website (FREE)
• OnPage SEO (Title tag, Meta tag cleanup will suffice, FREE)
• Free Press Releases (scribble something and post it up, FREE)
• Free Blog
• Free Twitter account
• Write some Free Atricles and post to Ezine (FREE)
• Have the client call his Merchant account and Print email capture on every receipt. Customer can get "Preferred Offerings" Great for any Restaurant and Retail stores (FREE)

Do you realize doing the above will SUBSTANTIALLY increase their sales to the tune of at least 10-20% (Minimum) if worked properly.

These are LOCAL co's, do NOT confuse with National SEO marketing products, info products, etc...

A small company doing $40,000 month/500k year could increase sales in 12 months to $50,000 month/600k doing very simple marketing.

I think that maybe many of you don't realize the Power of Google Maps, Onpage SEO, and AWeber.

I could get a setup fee of $997 and $297 month for the above package in my Sleep. I currently get $5,000 to $10,000 setup and $997 monthly for doing the above EXACT steps. Don't forget I TARGET the right businesses. But a small restaurant/retail shop etc... can afford $997/$297 all day.

They can't afford NOT to.

If you land One account every (2) weeks, 26 over the next year, you will have earned approx $26,000 in set-up fees and a monthly renewal in month 13 of $7,722 or $92,664 year. Not bad for doing little work. God forbid these bus owners give you more work, referrals, etc... then you'll have to hire a good tax accountant and avoid Obama taking it away ;-)

It's that easy, once the Client understands the True power.

You need to believe it first.

~AP

P.S. I dare anyone to debate me that a business can't increase their sales by 10% using an Auto-responder. No website, no onpage seo, no google map, etc... Just an auto-responder.

Another post for the first page! Thanks for clarifying this to everyone AP!

~Dexx

[SteelDanno]

Originally Posted by MarketingNinja

Want to know one of the best strategies I started using last year to really position yourself as an expert?

I started only leaving the office to do client meetings on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Usually I have enough meetings to do that now I book over a week in advance. I'll have a phone call with a prospect on Monday and they suggest meeting and ask when I'm available. You'd be surprised their reaction when I tell them I'm already booking for Thursday the following week. You hear "Wow, you really are busy..." and that's exactly what you want to portray.

If you say, sure, are you free this afternoon? That tells them that you're not busy, and if you're not busy, it's because you don't have any work. So why don't you have work?

Try it, trust me. You'll laugh when you get off the phone. It blows people away.

Cheers,

Jeff

This technique is gold online and off. I believe Frank Kern and the like use this in the online world pre-launch by pitching it as "get on the waiting list". Your premise offline is the same and one I can vouch for works like a charm in generating interest as well as giving you plenty of time to (a) focus on whatever your doing presently and (b) giving you plenty of lead time to prepare if needed.

Love it, great tip.

[SteelDanno]

Originally Posted by AP

Please don't try and do what I do. I have 25+ years in the business world.

I don't want to confuse anyone nor stop them from advancing.

Use whatever talents you have TODAY.

• Create a Google/Yahoo! Local Map listing (FREE)
• Get your client listed in the Vertical Directories (FREE)
• Set up AWeber, write a few auto-responders (Client pays)
• Now place a Lightbox or email capture on their website (FREE)
• OnPage SEO (Title tag, Meta tag cleanup will suffice, FREE)
• Free Press Releases (scribble something and post it up, FREE)
• Free Blog
• Free Twitter account
• Write some Free Atricles and post to Ezine (FREE)
• Have the client call his Merchant account and Print email capture on every receipt. Customer can get "Preferred Offerings" Great for any Restaurant and Retail stores (FREE)

Do you realize doing the above will SUBSTANTIALLY increase their sales to the tune of at least 10-20% (Minimum) if worked properly.

That's one serious condensed gem of goodness right there. My mom could follow most of that blueprint (and that's saying a lot ).

I do have a question on the last bullet though ... can AP or someone please elaborate on that one? Me and my mom are kind of fuzzy on it.

[DaveHughes]

Originally Posted by SteelDanno

That's one serious condensed gem of goodness right there. My mom could follow most of that blueprint (and that's saying a lot ).

I do have a question on the last bullet though ... can AP or someone please elaborate on that one?

A merchant account (credit card processor) card machine (what you swipe your card through at check-out) can be configured to print out a "coupon" for the customer to fill out with their email address, which signs them up for a "special discount" mailing list when they fill it out and hand it back in.

It's the offline credit card version of a squeeze page.

[Sebulba]

Originally Posted by SteelDanno

That's one serious condensed gem of goodness right there. My mom could follow most of that blueprint (and that's saying a lot ).

I do have a question on the last bullet though ... can AP or someone please elaborate on that one?

That is a Golden Gem that I learned about a year ago. Have your client call up their Credit Card Merchant account and have them replace whatever useless rubbish is on the top of their CC receipt, like "Joes Shoe Shop, thanks for walking in" with something like "To Get Special Insider Only Deals sign up at www.JoesShoeshop.com"


This is an extremely easy and powerful way to build an email list for your client.

Seb

[Pat Ordenes]

Just a Quick reply to the original question on the thread.
What services are you offering for monthly fees? None.
I went to a meeting yesterday (first meeting), with a very different mentality to what I had previously. I went in with the intention of NOT selling.
Used Dexx's free question templates (which is a great base btw, get it... like NOW!) and adjusted them to fit my customer. In other words, I personalized them and linked them to what the customer offers.

With the questions i found out invaluable information about the company, including what they make per month, the number of new customers and marketing expenses (thus working out their cost per acquisition), and loads more info.

The point being, I let the customer talk about 80% of the time, and I just asked questions, and sometimes made comments and small suggestions of what could be done, etc... Enough to let him know I have a clue!

Alas, we didn't agree on anything, except that he signed an agreement for me to commence 'work' on his site. We haven't even discussed exact figures, just round numbers, based on what he's currently spending (that's why it's great to know their marketing expenses and CPA, because then you're in a position to propose figures he/she's comfortable with).

I'm meeting him again next week, to finalize the marketing agreement.
The point being, he wasn't even that interested in what I was offering, but rather he was receptive because of the questions I asked. You can position yourself very well just by doing this.

And getting back to the monthly service fees, I didn't even have to discuss them since I offered results, not just a service.

cheers guys, excellent (though terribly long!) thread!

[ShawnC]

There was so much in my head I wanted to reply to but i just kept reading and now I forget and I gotta get back to worky stuff.

So - Everyone - you rock. I really think maybe we SHOULD make a Offline Marketing forum or something.

[Dexx]

Originally Posted by Pat Ordenes

Just a Quick reply to the original question on the thread.
What services are you offering for monthly fees? None.
I went to a meeting yesterday (first meeting), with a very different mentality to what I had previously. I went in with the intention of NOT selling.
Used Dexx's free question templates (which is a great base btw, get it... like NOW!) and adjusted them to fit my customer. In other words, I personalized them and linked them to what the customer offers.

With the questions i found out invaluable information about the company, including what they make per month, the number of new customers and marketing expenses (thus working out their cost per acquisition), and loads more info.

The point being, I let the customer talk about 80% of the time, and I just asked questions, and sometimes made comments and small suggestions of what could be done, etc... Enough to let him know I have a clue!

Alas, we didn't agree on anything, except that he signed an agreement for me to commence 'work' on his site. We haven't even discussed exact figures, just round numbers, based on what he's currently spending (that's why it's great to know their marketing expenses and CPA, because then you're in a position to propose figures he/she's comfortable with).

I'm meeting him again next week, to finalize the marketing agreement.
The point being, he wasn't even that interested in what I was offering, but rather he was receptive because of the questions I asked. You can position yourself very well just by doing this.

And getting back to the monthly service fees, I didn't even have to discuss them since I offered results, not just a service.

cheers guys, excellent (though terribly long!) thread!

Way to go! Like I said, it's all about taking action NOW and learning from any mistakes or problems that arise!

Hope to see more stories like this guys!

And Pat please let us know how everything turns out =)

Cheers,

~Dexx

[Curleyjohn]

I have a friend that owns a decent sized restaurant in a suburb of my home town. I believe business to be about 75k to 90k a month. Struggling to make money but stays even.

I went to this friend today and set up a meeting with them for Wed. 2:30 EDT to discuss increasing their profits by 25% in the next 60 to 90 days.

So where to start? (pre-meeting prep.)

1. Keyword research
2. Competition Analysis
3. Website on page analysis
4. Link analysis
5. Customer experience analysis (what I see as a customer)
6. Product or service analysis (my evaluation of former)
7. Price research for product in the area
8. Current advertising

This is what I have come up so far but, I could use some expert advise as to what I may be over looking at this stage.



Does this pretty much cover it for this stage?

[Dexx]

Originally Posted by Curleyjohn

I have a friend that owns a decent sized restaurant in a suburb of my home town. I believe business to be about 75k to 90k a month. Struggling to make money but stays even.

I went to this friend today and set up a meeting with them for Wed. 2:30 EDT to discuss increasing their profits by 25% in the next 60 to 90 days.

So where to start? (pre-meeting prep.)

1. Keyword research
2. Competition Analysis
3. Website on page analysis
4. Link analysis
5. Customer experience analysis (what I see as a customer)
6. Product or service analysis (my evaluation of former)
7. Price research for product in the area
8. Current advertising

This is what I have come up so far but, I could use some expert advise as to what I may be over looking at this stage.



Does this pretty much cover it for this stage?

You're going to go into this meeting already having planned out what you are going to SELL to this business?

That approach might work, but I'm going to suggest you instead use that first meeting to LEARN about that business and what THEY need help with...then create a solution (using the services above) to meet that need.

That's just my opinion though, take it for what its worth!

~Dexx

[Pat Ordenes]

what Dexx said.
before deciding how you'll help someone, it makes sense to know where they are hurting the most... kinda like a doctor.
A GOOD doc will ask lots of questions: where does it hurt? when did the pain start? does it hurt when i do this?... etc...
He'll the prescribe a solution to the problem.

One of the questions i asked the client i mentioned earlier was: where do you see you best results in your marketing?
Why, because its obviously working, so why not try and improve it? there's always room for improvement.

btw his best results were actually from a FREE editorial, he does once every 6 months on a well-know mag in his industry. He just writes about the latest trends and puts his contact details at the end! No call to action at the end, no tracking system at all... is there room for improvement?

You could offer all the services you suggest, but what if his crowd comes in mainly through print ads? wouldn't it be better to improve/track that?

[JRG]

Originally Posted by AP

I tell my clients upfront it's one company in each category per area.

Ask me what an Area is?

What's an area?

[DogScout]

When it comes to auto-responders. I have two. One is the same price no matter how many contacts with a great referral/affiliate system. (give them 1st month free, then reimburse you if you pay for their 2nd month.) All the emails so far are delivered, and in the in box. Using a carrot to get emails is likely to attract people outside their area of sales and can make an service like Aweber get expensive fast with many signing up that are not even local enough to become a patron just to get the carrot.

I sign them to the inexpensive AR under my affiliate link. Their cost never goes up and after 3 customers my account there is paid by the affiliate program. I also use Aweber, but have yet to run into delivery problems with the inexpensive service. A real small company would tend to freak out when the numbers make his monthly go up when most of the people signing up live 2000 miles away. Geo-tagging only does so much. At least that has been my limited experience. (A doctor had a lady fly from Florida to San Diego to see him after reading his web site! But she is the exception.)

And just sending occasional emails to keep the business name on the top of the clients mind is usually enough. They don't even have to open the email to have it do it's job. Just the right subject line and who its from is usually enough that the next time they want/need that product or service, that business is the 1st one to come to mind!

[Curleyjohn]

Originally Posted by Curleyjohn

In an attempt to send this thread into orbit I thought that I would put together a case study. I will do the leg work and a majority of the thinking but would love guidance and feedback.

I have a friend that owns a decent sized restaurant in a suburb of my home town. I believe business to be about 75k to 90k a month. Struggling to make money but stays even.

I went to this friend today and set up a meeting with them for Wed. 2:30 EDT to discuss increasing their profits by 25% in the next 60 to 90 days. I have a pretty good idea of the operation but I explained that this was going to be a "dress rehearsal" for my new business and that I had to have them agree to treat me as though they were requesting my services. I explained the importance of them valuing my opinion as if they were paying me. This still may be a issue but I will reiterate it on Wed. (I told them I would be charging referrals and testimonials)

So where to start? (pre-meeting prep.)

1. Keyword research
2. Competition Analysis
3. Website on page analysis
4. Link analysis
5. Customer experience analysis (what I see as a customer)
6. Product or service analysis (my evaluation of former)
7. Price research for product in the area
8. Current advertising

This is what I have come up so far but, I could use some expert advise as to what I may be over looking at this stage.

I would like to keep this step by step if at all possible

I would like to come back after the meeting on Wed. and post the answers to my questionnaire. (Hoping AP has a chance to send his prior to Wed. but I do have the questions already posted here as well as some other sources that I trust.) I will then post my action plan as I see it and will ask again for input and guidance.

I screwed the pooch on this one. I attempted to shorten my original post and I didn't effectively get my point across.

Dexx, I just downloaded your WSO and plan to use a combination of those and other questions to peel back the layers of the business.

The points in the post are just my PRE meeting homework. I will use a proposal similar to AP agreement to list my services and performance.

[SteelDanno]

Originally Posted by DaveHughes

A merchant account (credit card processor) card machine (what you swipe your card through at check-out) can be configured to print out a "coupon" for the customer to fill out with their email address, which signs them up for a "special discount" mailing list when they fill it out and hand it back in.

It's the offline credit card version of a squeeze page.

Nice, I can see how that would be very powerful.

[rapidscc]

Originally Posted by DogScout

I sign them to the inexpensive AR under my affiliate link. Their cost never goes up and after 3 customers my account there is paid by the affiliate program. I also use Aweber, but have yet to run into delivery problems with the inexpensive service. A real small company would tend to freak out when the numbers make his monthly go up when most of the people signing up live 2000 miles away. Geo-tagging only does so much. At least that has been my limited experience. (A doctor had a lady fly from Florida to San Diego to see him after reading his web site! But she is the exception.)

Hi DogScout

Mind sharing the inexpensive AR, I have a huge list that is looking for a permanent home ..

If you can't post it here..It will be much appreciated to PM it to me.

thanks man!

All the best,

[JRG]

Just want to give everyone an idea of what businesses deal with and why you should avoid being "that guy" at all costs.

I was at a home show with a client last weekend and this guy walks up and starts asking about the services they provide. After a few minutes of him clearly pretending to be interested in the pitch, he asks about the owners website.

This is a common tactic at these home shows by the way, so don't be "that guy"

Anyway, the owner tells the guy that he is all set with his site and SEO. The guy persists and says he can get him to the top of the search engines. (specifically Google).

The owner informs him that he is already on the top of the search engines for several keywords.

Guy then says "yeah but that's not enough, you also need to have a website that converts into sales."

Owner informs him that most of his business now comes from the site and it is converting very well.
He then informs him that I, who was standing next to him, do all of his marketing and site work.

The guy asks me what I used to make the site, I told him the site is running on Joomla. He shakes his head and tisk tisk tisk's at me.

"Why would you use Joomla?" he asks.
"Well, it is the easiest for the owner to work on himself and search engines love CMS sites like Joomla and Wordpress." I respond

This guy then goes on to tell me how horribly wrong I am and that Google hates CMS sites especially Joomla and Wordpress because they are "free". But a "Dreamweaver" site, Google loves. So because Google sees CMS and realizes it's free, it does not rank it as high as a "Dreamweaver" site because it knows a "Dreamweaver" site is paid for. He insists that if I search Google's blog for Joomla I will find all kinds of nasty things.

Not wanting to get into an argument with a quickly identified moron, I did not press the issue much further and quickly ended the conversation. Although I badly wanted to know what a "Dreamweaver" site was.

This guy is a self proclaimed expert but he is trolling Home Shows for clients!

Businesses are getting pitched by "that guy" every day and then when you come along and tell them you can get them to the top of the search engines you become no different than "that guy".

It has taken me too long to learn this and guys like AP have helped me to make sure I am not "that guy".

Since this thread started I have been slowly working on changing everything about my business. It will take me a bit of time but I am taking action and making sure that I do things right and start working smarter not harder.

[DogScout]

Now, where would I be able to find ALL the modules by Michael Sernoff?

[Curleyjohn]

"This guy is a self proclaimed expert but he is trolling Home Shows for clients!"

That had to be painful to watch and even harder not to be baited into an argument.

[AndrewCavanagh]

Originally Posted by MarketingNinja

Want to know one of the best strategies I started using last year to really position yourself as an expert?

I started only leaving the office to do client meetings on Tuesdays and Thursdays. Usually I have enough meetings to do that now I book over a week in advance. I'll have a phone call with a prospect on Monday and they suggest meeting and ask when I'm available. You'd be surprised their reaction when I tell them I'm already booking for Thursday the following week. You hear "Wow, you really are busy..." and that's exactly what you want to portray.

If you say, sure, are you free this afternoon? That tells them that you're not busy, and if you're not busy, it's because you don't have any work. So why don't you have work?

Try it, trust me. You'll laugh when you get off the phone. It blows people away.

Cheers,

Jeff

Very good advice.

Remember you don't need bookings to make prospects wait to see you.

Acting in ways that are consistent with you being busy and in demand sets the posture you need to get hired by a higher percentage of business owners.

Lines like "my time is limited", "I can see you but on Friday but it will have to be in the afternoon" "if I'm a good fit for you and if you're a good fit for me as a client" etc etc can all help.

You should also think through the reality of this.

You really do have a genuine limit to your time and the number of clients you can work with even if you're starting out and you have no clients.

You do get to choose the clients you work with and you do get to choose the times when you see them.

Kindest regards,
Andrew Cavanagh

[AP]

Originally Posted by JR Griggs

What's an area?

It can vary per category.

I use Microsoft Microsoft MapPoint - Home to determine areas for clients. I tell them overlap will sometimes happen, but I am not intentionally marketing in their area.

I'm sure there is something else for Free, I just happened to have MapPoint.

For Service type contractors, plumbers, hvac, etc... it's a 30 minute drive from their shop for a large metropolitan area like New York, LA, Chicago, etc.. I don't work in the boonies, but if I did it would probably be one hour drive time from their shop. A Big circle.

For Professionals like a Specialist Doctor (plastic surgery) we usually negotiate what he wants and then we determine price. It may be a 45-60 minute drive to his office.

For a local restaurant you can break it down to their Zip Codes and the Zips that Immediately surround their restaurant. Make it Exclusive, Mexican, Italian, American, Indian, BBQ, etc... tell them you will only market one style of restaurant per area.

Wanna see business owners JUMP

I don't chase ANYONE, that would include Bill Gates. Everyone chases ME or I don't get the deal. I must maintain Leverage or I lose. I lose the client, a smaller check, monthly fees, referrals, etc...

I've had Prospects call me 6 months later and say "I was waiting for you to call." I replied "I told you, I don't pester you, you either want what I offer or you don't." They always respond "I'm so used to salespeople bugging me after our meeting I just ASSumed you'd call too."

They will call you. No begging, NO free consultation, etc... and they make the appt when YOU are available, when it's convenient for ME. I'm a night owl so I like to sleep in. I never make appts before 1pm. Normal is 2pm. They always say "your hair looks wet, like you just stepped out of the shower!"

I tell them I use a Special Gel

Send a letter to these businesses listing the Exact names of the restaurants, plumbers, etc... that will be getting your letter. If you are trying to land a Mexican restaurant and there are (6) within a 20-30 minute drive then list the Names of ALL (6) restaurants.

Tell them ONLY one of you will have Exclusive rights to that area, once that area is taken, it's gone Forever.

Trust me, it works. I use it and the #1 response business owners tell me why they called me was because "They wanted my Exclusive area."

People want what they can't have. The "Fear of loss is powerful, use it."

~AP

[Hail-To-The-Redskins]

Originally Posted by JR Griggs

Just want to give everyone an idea of what businesses deal with and why you should avoid being "that guy" at all costs.

I was at a home show with a client last weekend and this guy walks up and starts asking about the services they provide. After a few minutes of him clearly pretending to be interested in the pitch, he asks about the owners website.

This is a common tactic at these home shows by the way, so don't be "that guy"

Anyway, the owner tells the guy that he is all set with his site and SEO. The guy persists and says he can get him to the top of the search engines. (specifically Google).

The owner informs him that he is already on the top of the search engines for several keywords.

Guy then says "yeah but that's not enough, you also need to have a website that converts into sales."

Owner informs him that most of his business now comes from the site and it is converting very well.
He then informs him that I, who was standing next to him, do all of his marketing and site work.

The guy asks me what I used to make the site, I told him the site is running on Joomla. He shakes his head and tisk tisk tisk's at me.

"Why would you use Joomla?" he asks.
"Well, it is the easiest for the owner to work on himself and search engines love CMS sites like Joomla and Wordpress." I respond

This guy then goes on to tell me how horribly wrong I am and that Google hates CMS sites especially Joomla and Wordpress because they are "free". But a "Dreamweaver" site, Google loves. So because Google sees CMS and realizes it's free, it does not rank it as high as a "Dreamweaver" site because it knows a "Dreamweaver" site is paid for. He insists that if I search Google's blog for Joomla I will find all kinds of nasty things.

Not wanting to get into an argument with a quickly identified moron, I did not press the issue much further and quickly ended the conversation. Although I badly wanted to know what a "Dreamweaver" site was.

This guy is a self proclaimed expert but he is trolling Home Shows for clients!

Businesses are getting pitched by "that guy" every day and then when you come along and tell them you can get them to the top of the search engines you become no different than "that guy".

It has taken me too long to learn this and guys like AP have helped me to make sure I am not "that guy".

Since this thread started I have been slowly working on changing everything about my business. It will take me a bit of time but I am taking action and making sure that I do things right and start working smarter not harder.

@ JR Griggs,

Great story by the way and something that I have come across (kind of ... you'll hopefully see why in a minute) on of all things ..... Facebook!

I have a friend (in fact more of an old school friend who I've not seen for 20 years) and he has a web design business, does some SEO etc and he trolls not only Facebook itself, but other people's conversations!

I caught him a while back blatantly posting - regular as clockwork every hour about "I'm doing 50% off my web design services this month ..." - the same identical wording every hour for practically an entire day.

I must add at this point that it wasn't like I was sat there for a whole day glued to Facebook, lol. I was looking in the evening, noticed 3 of his "posts" and then dug a little deeper.

I've also seen him interject conversations - generally ones where there is the most 'tenious' link - and come out with his elevator pitch/deal of the month

Talk about lack of positioning, but thats entirely up to him - just thought I'd share it with you.

And JR Griggs you're bang on with what you've said about AP and his approach/positioning/process - I am also changing my approach etc in order to be able to target bigger fish and therefore help more people and thus be rewarded for that.

Get 2 books launched, videos done (new camcorder ordered), continue to educate myself ( 4 x DK books ordered from Amazon) and create more effective sales funnel.

Oh, and ensure I'm pursued more ... not the other way around (and I have been slightly guilty of this

The contributions on here from a bunch of you - and you all know who you are - has been nothing short of inspirational and could see not only our lives change radically, but the lives of the businesses we help.

The key everyone is to TAKE ACTION though. Whilst its great to keep an eye on this thread and contribute to it - taking action is the only was we'll learn, get better, help businesses and ultimately help ourselves and improve our own lives.

Simon

[ijohnson]

Originally Posted by AP

" . . . . People want what they can't have."

~AP

Hhmmmmph!

AP, you're the man!!!!!!

Keep it coming, baby! Keep it coming!!!!!