The Unfair Business Advantage Report 32 sales and marketing experts share their proven ‘Unfair Business Advantage’ strategies that you can use in your own business to create higher sales and bigger profits with surprisingly little effort...

With the compliments of Graham McGregor www.TheUnfairBusinessAdvantage.com

Copyright Notices Copyright © 2011 by Graham McGregor All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, mechanical or electronic, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. Requests for permission or further information should be addressed to Twomac Consulting Limited 188 Scenic Drive Titirangi Waitakere 0604 New Zealand Published by Twomac Consulting Limited 188 Scenic Drive Titirangi Waitakere 0604 New Zealand Email: [email protected] Website www.The UnfairBusinessAdvantage.com Printed and bound in New Zealand. .

Legal Notices While all attempts have been made to verify information provided in this publication, neither the author nor the Publisher assumes any responsibility for errors, omissions or contrary interpretation of the subject matter. This publication is not intended for use as a source of legal or accounting advice. The Publisher wants to stress that the information contained herein may be subject to varying state and/or local laws or regulations. All users are advised to retain competent counsel to determine what state and/or local laws or regulations may apply to the user's particular business. The purchaser or reader of this publication assumes responsibility for the use of these materials and information. Adherence to all applicable laws and regulations, both federal and state and local, governing professional licensing, business practices, advertising and all other aspects of doing business in New Zealand or any other jurisdiction is the sole responsibility of the purchaser or reader. The author and Publisher assume no responsibility or liability whatsoever on the behalf of any purchaser or reader of these materials. Any perceived slight of specific people or organizations is unintentional.

I want to say a huge ‗Thank You‘ to all the people who helped me to create The Unfair Business Advantage Report...  First of all I‘d to thank the many sales and marketing experts around the world who gave up their precious time as they explained in full their most valuable sales and marketing strategies. Without their generosity and great ideas this programme would never have been created. (One of the most important lessons I‘ve learned from talking to all these experts is how willing successful people are to share the ideas that made them so successful.) So a very big thanks to the following sales and marketing experts...                                

Robert G Allen Jane Applegate Joanne Black Bob Bly Dr Ian Brooks Cindy Cashman Fred Catona Christine K Clifford M J Demarco Mal Emery Jeffrey J Fox Dave Garofalo Chris Gilmour Andrew Griffiths Bill Harrison Justin Herald Dr Michael Hewitt-Gleeson Richard Koch Ivan Levison Chris Lytle Graham McGregor Dr Ivan Misner Bob Negen Tony Parinello Tom Poland Michael Port Neil Raphel Al Ries Bob Serling Tessa Stowe Jamie Tulloch Troy White

www.robertallen.com www.201greatideas.com www.nomorecoldcalling.com www.bly.com www.Ianbrooks.com www.CindyCashman.com www.bulldozerdigital.com www.christineclifford.com www.themillionairefastlane.com www.malemery.com www.foxandcompany.com www.2guyssmokeshop.com www.allpropertiesgroup.com.au www.andrewgriffiths.com.au www.reporterconnection.com www.justinherald.com www.schoolofthinking.org www.superconnector.org www.levison.com www.sparquefuel.com www.theunfairbusinessadvantage.com www.bni.com www.whizbangtraining.com www.sellingtovito.com www.8020center.com www.michaelport.com www.raphel.com www.ries.com www.profitalchemy.com www.salesconversations.com www.e3accountants.co.nz www.troysblog.com

 I‘d also like to give an especially big thank you to my mentor and good friend Bob Serling. I have used Bob‘s marketing services and strategies for many years and they have always worked well. My Unfair Business Advantage Report was inspired by the hugely popular special report that Bob offers his own clients called ‗Ten Minute

Business Success.‘ This report by Bob is outstanding and I highly recommend you get a copy. It‘s is available at no charge by going to http://www.profitalchemy.com  Thanks also to the many readers of the first edition of the ‗Unfair Business Advantage Report‘ that told me how useful they found it. Your positive feedback has inspired me to update the report with brand new interviews and great marketing strategies.  Finally I‘d like to thank Randy Glasbergen for his wonderful cartoons for this updated version of The Unfair Business Advantage Report. I have been a huge fan of Randy‘s cartoons for years and I‘m delighted to have the opportunity to include his cartoons in this report. (I trust they bring a smile to your face as you go through the report.) I think that cartoons and humour can be used by any business person to improve the effectiveness of their own marketing. (So I‘ve written a free guide called ‗Smile Marketing‘ that shows you how to do this.) Here are a few of the helpful strategies you’ll learn in Smile Marketing:       

Why making people feel good is a critical key to getting repeat and referral business. Five ways to use cartoons in your marketing to attract new clients, boost profits and increase sales. How to position yourself as an expert in your industry and why this is so appealing to potential customers. How to get more of your marketing and sales messages read and acted on. (So simple to do, you‘ll kick yourself for not having tried it before!) How to use smile marketing to get a real competitive advantage. How to have your customers delighted they are spending money with your business. And much more

Just go to this link to download your free copy. (No registration required.) http://www.glasbergen.com/smile-marketing/

Reprinted with permission

Introduction: Hello and welcome to The Unfair Business Advantage Report I‘ve been a professional sales and marketing consultant for 34 years. And in this time I‘ve learned a very important lesson. There are some very simple things you can do right now to give yourself an unfair business advantage. The big problem is that most business people are too busy fighting business battles to stop and look for the things they can to create this unfair business advantage. Here’s my favourite cartoon on creating an unfair business advantage. “I haven‟t got time to see a business consultant with a great way to help me get an unfair business advantage. I‟ve got an important business battle to fight so I‟m far too busy to see anybody no matter how good their idea is. Tell the consultant to come back sometime next year.”

And that brings me to the Unfair Business Advantage Report. The way I created this programme was very simple. First of all I approached a number of top sales and marketing experts around the world. Every expert I contacted had proven sales and marketing strategies that have worked well to create remarkable results in either their own business and for many of their clients as well. I then asked each sales and marketing expert if they could share with me just one sales or marketing strategy that has been working particularly well and was creating an Unfair Business Advantage when it was being used. They each had around ten minutes or so to explain their sales or marketing strategy and show how other people could use the same strategy in their own business. The end result is The Unfair Business Advantage Report In the next few pages you will see 32 actual sales and marketing strategies that are being used today to get remarkable business results with surprisingly little effort.

Best of all these same strategies are super simple to use in any business. These sales and marketing experts have all been incredibly generous in the way they shared their valuable ideas and concepts. They held nothing back as they spilled the beans on exactly what they were doing and why it works so well to produce great results in their own business or for their clients. You now have 32 of these proven sales and marketing strategies in your hands. So get yourself a pen and start reading. Take lots of notes and identify the strategies that you are going to use in your own business over the next 12 months Then get stuck in and use these strategies. And when you start to get great results, remember to contact these top sales and marketing experts and let them know how well their strategies have worked for you. I‘ve included their contact details for your convenience in this manual. Life is far too short to try and reinvent the wheel in business: If you want to enjoy massive improvements in your own business the formula is very simple. Just use the same strategies used by many of the top sales and marketing experts in the world. These strategies are super easy to understand and they have already been proven to work. Best wishes for remarkable results as you use the ideas in The Unfair Business Advantage Report

Graham McGregor August, 2011 PS When I look back over my own sales and business career for the last 34 years I can trace the majority of my success to helpful ideas and advice from top sales people and business people. It‘s amazing the impact of just one good piece of advice at the right time. In this manual are proven success strategies from 32 top sales and marketing experts from all around the world. There will definitely be some great ideas you can start using yourself. PPS: I‘d love to hear your feedback on the ideas you personally found most useful. Just email me on [email protected]

Contents:

Page Numbers

How to use this programme

1

1: Robert G Allen

2-17

How to use persuasion in all your marketing 2: Jane Applegate

17-29

The magic of personal relationships 3: Joanne Black

30-41

How to build a referral based business 4: Bob Bly

42-49

Position yourself as an Expert in your field 5: Dr Ian Brooks

50-67

Persuade your clients to pay more 6: Cindy Cashman

68-76

The high value of great questions and follow up 7: Fred Catona

77-97

The Profit Power of Direct Response Radio 8: Christine K Clifford

98-112

Become a master of one thing 9: MJ De Marco

113-121

Customer service that SUCS 10: Mal Emery

121-132

Borrow and use good ideas from everywhere 11: Jeffrey J Fox Dollarize your Value and ‗show them the money‘

132-149

12: Dave Garofalo

144-155

Have an ‗outrageous‘ event 13: Chris Gilmour

155-169

‗Leap Frog‘ your competitors 14: Andrew Griffiths

169-183

Make a Big Bold Statement 15: Bill Harrison

184-197

How to get free media publicity 16: Justin Herald

197-210

Turn your customers into your sales team 17: Dr Michael Hewitt-Gleeson

211-224

WOMBAT Selling: A new strategy for growing your business 18: Richard Koch

225-240

Identify your most valuable core customers 19: Ivan Levison

241-251

How to get appointments with high value prospects 20: Chris Lytle

252-263

The Magic Email 21: Graham McGregor

264-272

The Added Value Dripping Tap 22: Dr Ivan Misner

273-285

The VCP Process ® to make networking work 23: Bob Negen

286-294

Give to Get 24: Tony Parinello Start at the top when selling

295-301

25: Tom Poland

302-312

The Number One Word in Marketing and OPN 26: Michael Port

313-325

Keep it simple 27: Neil Raphel

326-334

Change the way you ‗Play the Game‘ 28: Al Ries

334-349

The Power of Focus 29: Bob Serling

349-358

The Past Forward to the Future Process 30: Tessa Stowe

359-368

Create Customers for Life 31: Jamie Tulloch

369-380

Share valuable information before you sell 32: Troy White

383-394

Humanize your Business Conclusions:

394-395

About Graham McGregor

396-397

1 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________

How to use this programme: In the next few pages you will discover 25 proven sales and marketing strategies you can use to give yourself an Unfair Business Advantage. Each strategy has some helpful comments and examples on how to apply this idea in your business. I recommend you read this manual quickly and identify at least 3-5 strategies that appeal to you and that you could apply easily in your business. Then pick one of these strategies and put it into action in the next 7 days. Then over the next 3-4 weeks implement at least three more Unfair Business Advantage Strategies. Within 30 days you should have put into action at least 3-4 of these strategies in your own business. Take careful note of all the successes both big and small that you are enjoying as a result of using these strategies. Then share one of these strategies with another business person and explain how they could use it. (You will actually find that when you try and teach something to someone else you learn it far better yourself.) Then dig into this manual again and start using a few more of the strategies we cover. The results will both delight and surprise you. So let‘s get started with the first Unfair Business Advantage Strategy.... „That‟s when we decided to use a few of the ideas in the Unfair Business Advantage Report. This was surprisingly easy to do and we are delighted with the results. I suggest you try some of these ideas in your business as well You‟ll be delighted at how well they work.‟

Notes ________

2 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ 1: Robert G Allen How to use persuasion in all your marketing

Reprinted with Permission

Graham McGregor: In this interview for the Unfair Business Advantage Report I am talking with best selling author Robert G Allen. Robert G. Allen is one of America‘s most famous and most influential financial advisors. After graduating with an MBA from Brigham Young University in 1974, Allen began his real estate investment career and turned his successful experiences into the colossal bestselling book, Nothing Down, that spent 58 weeks on the New York Times bestseller list. He followed that success with 4 other major New York Times bestsellers; Creating Wealth, Multiple Streams of Income, The One Minute Millionaire and Cracking the Millionaire Code. His latest book with co-author Mark Victor Hansen is Cash in a Flash: Fast Money in Slow Times. He has appeared on hundreds of programs including Good Morning America, Larry King and Your World with Neil Cavuto. He has also been featured in such national publications as The Wall Street Journal, Newsweek, Barron‘s, Money Magazine, Redbook, and Reader‘s Digest.

Notes ________

3 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ With his business partner, Thomas Painter, Mr. Allen is the co-founder of the Enlightened Wealth Institute. Robert, thanks for being on the call today and what is the sales or marketing strategy you want to share with the readers of The Unfair Business Advantage Report? Robert Allen: Hi Graham, and thanks for the opportunity to share some ideas. Let‘s start by asking the question ‗What is marketing?‘ It is getting people to come your way. It‘s attracting the kind of customers that you want in all kinds of different ways. So in my career we‘ve done all kinds of marketing. We did one of the very first infomercials in history in the early 80‘s to fill our real estate programs. We‘ve done radiomercials and we‘ve done direct mail, email, and online marketing. There are so many ways to market. . What I am going to be talking about today are principles of persuasion that go along with marketing and there are a lot of great books that talk about persuasion when it comes to marketing. The one book that really changed my life frankly is the book called ―Influence‖ by Robert Cialdini. A friend of Tony Robbins gave me a copy of Influence. Up to that point in my life I wasn‘t a good sales person, I didn‘t know how to close and I didn‘t know how to persuade. When I finished reading that book I realised that persuasion is scientific and if you set things up properly people will respond in the way you want. Now originally I was not very persuasive in my marketing. I would hire people to do my public speaking for me because I was not good at closing. I could write books and I would create seminar content but when it got to the end where I‘d have to sell from a

Notes ________

4 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ stage, I would go all mushy and my brain would go blank. I could teach the socks off anybody but when it came to closing I was horrible. So we‘d hire people to do the closing for me. In one year I paid one gentleman 1.3 million dollars to be the closer at my seminars. Another person I paid $750,000. So in one year by not being persuasive myself I ended up paying two people over two million dollars. My partner, the President of our company and my business partner Tom Painter said ‗Bob that‘s a lot of money we are paying other people, couldn‘t you figure out how to do this?‘ Graham: For $2 million dollars I‘m sure you could. Robert: If someone gave you $2 million wouldn‘t you get over your fear of public persuasion? The bottom line is that the Cialdini book really put me over the top. I‘m sure you‘ve read it, it‘s a classic. Graham:

Been updated many times.

Robert: And it talks about the six principles of persuasion. Now since we are keeping things simple today, let me share just three fundamental principles. The letters are U.S.P. Any marketer understands that those letters stand for Unique Selling Proposition. Those letters have been around since the early 60s, U.S.P. means that your products need to stand out somehow. I use the same acronym to stand for the three fundamental principles of persuasion. So that every time I create something to persuade anybody, no matter how it‘s done—whether it‘s on the radio, on the television, in a direct mail piece or in a public speech, I always begin with the U.S.P. of persuasion. The first principle Urgency.

Notes ________

5 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ If there‘s no urgency in my message then people don‘t decide. If they don‘t decide then they don‘t buy and if they don‘t buy then your business starves. The second letter is S which stands for the principle of scarcity. Somehow or other your marketing needs to demonstrate scarcity. And the final letter is P which stands for the principle of popularity. This means you‘ve got to prove that other people want it. You‘ve got to prove that other people have valued your product enough to pay for it—that it‘s popular. Now Cialdini‘s words are a little bit different. He never uses the word urgency. He does use the word scarcity. He doesn‘t use the word popularity. He calls it social proof. So I‘ve changed the words so I can remember them. That‘s why I call the 3 most important principles: Urgency, Scarcity, and Popularity. Using these 3 fundamental principles was really important when I started marketing my seminars. At the end of the free seminar I would try to market a programme that would cost $5,000. Now when you have a group of strangers sitting in front of you for 90 minutes and at the end of 90 minutes you need to convince them to write you a $5,000 cheque, you‘ve got to be pretty persuasive. So the several secrets that I build my presentation around are based upon the U.S.P model. In addition, there is another important persuasion principle which I call the vision model. For example, you‘ll rarely ever hear me speak without me saying something like this: ‗let‘s go out into the future and let‘s imagine how good your life could be if you really were able to achieve your financial dreams‘ in all five senses.‘ Let‘s go out in the future and imagine your dream home. Where do you want to live?

Notes ________

6 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Do you still live in the same city that you are in now? Five years from today, let‘s walk up to your front door, open the door and walk inside. When you walk inside, notice something that causes you to say, ‗WOW!.‘ When you invite people into your home, what makes them go ‗WOW?‘ OK now where‘s your kitchen? Is it to the right or is it to the left? Let‘s walk toward the kitchen. You can smell the chef cooking something special— let‘s imagine that the chef is cooking your favourite hot dish. As your walking down the hallway toward the kitchen you can feel the flooring under your feet. What kind of flooring is it? Is it carpet, is it wood, marble, stone or some mid grade linoleum? I want you to feel it. You arrive at your kitchen and the chef puts on the tip of your tongue a taste of the special meal, your favourite hot dish that the chef has been preparing for you and you absolutely love it, you can taste it. You can smell it, you can taste it, you can feel the floor, you can see the wow, you can hear the sound of people, what‘s happening in your house? Are People talking or are they are laughing? Is there a burning fireplace? Can you hear the ocean? Is there music playing? In other words let‘s not just visualise it. Let‘s virtualise it. Visualisation is just one sense. It‘s just visual. Virtualisation is making sure that your future vision is multi-sensory—smelling, tasting, touching, feeling, hearing. When they virtualise their dream home, guess who is also part of their dream? YOU are part of their dream because you are the one who showed it to them.

Notes ________

7 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ The reason that people don‘t ever achieve their dreams is because their fears are more real than their dreams. Their fears are real, they feel their palms sweat, their brain goes blank, their heart starts to pound, they are afraid of rejection, they are afraid of failure, they are afraid of making a fool of themselves. The five major fears are F.E.A.R.S. This is my acronym for fears and stands for Fear of Failure, the fear of Embarrassment, the fear of Abandonment, the fear of Rejection and the fear of Success. One of those five fears is going to stop you. So if those fears are real and if they are not lessened somehow then their dreams will never happen. So you must make your dream more real than your fear and that‘s why visioning is so important. But visioning is not enough. I bring people back today and make sure that they realise what obstacles stand in their way from achieving their dreams. I help them imagine facing their current real fear and going through those walls of fear that surround every one of us. Everybody‘s got walls of fear. Some of the walls are really thick, some are thin, some of them high, some of them are short. Most people have a very thick, very tall wall, all four walls around them. They are stuck inside, and so the goal of a marketer is to get them on the other side of those walls of fear. I get them to see the dream on the other side of those walls, then, I give them the tools to break through the walls.

Notes ________

8 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ If your program, your product, your service or the information that you are marketing—if you can show your customer that your product will break down their walls of fear and help them achieve their dreams, then they are going to want to say yes. However some customers still have trouble saying yes unless you use the principles of U.S.P. Urgency. Scarcity. Popularity. These principles will get them to make a decision even though they are surrounded by four walls of intense fear. So urgency is one of the principles. How can you present your product with urgency? Scarcity. You must cause your customer to realise that there is only a limited supply and that other people will be competing for your scarce products. For example, when I speak to an audience I have a limited supply of my high-end coaching programs. I‘ll say, ‗Today I‘m only going to select 8 people to work with me.‘ They look around the room and see 300 people and realise that only 8 people will have the privilege of working with me. That makes my program appear to be more valuable...because it is such a scarce commodity. So here‘s how I broke through my fear of inviting and asking people for the money. I realised that I wasn‘t good at closing. It used to be that when I got to the end of my program when I would need to ―close‖ the audience I turned into mush. I was miserable. So I made the decision to get the close out of the way during the first 30 minutes of the 90 minute program. And this is how I did it. At the beginning I would ask the audience, ‗Raise your hand if you want to be financially free.‘

Notes ________

9 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Great. Let me give you a test and find out whether or not you are qualified to succeed. I ask them three questions: One a scale of 1 to 10, how would your rate yourself: Between 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Apathy………………..…..…..……Decisive Desire Fear……..…....…………………...…Intuitive Faith Greed…………….…….…Enlightened Intention Each question is scored from 1 to 10. I have them add up the total from their 3 questions and come with a total number. The maximum they can score is 30. The minimum is 3. Their total score is called their Inner Wealth Score. I‘m trying to find those who have the highest scores-they‘d be passionate, they‘d be driven, they‘d be willing to take action. I ask everyone to raise their hands and leave them up until I say their Inner Wealth score. So we start out with 20. If your number is less than 20, lower your hand, and a few people do. Now I‘ve got every one of their hands up. 21, 22, hands are dropping. 23, 24, 25. We find out that 1/3 to half of the room still have their hands up at 9 and 10. In other words their inner wealth score is high. They want success, they believe they can have it, they believe they are worth it, they are willing to act and now we‘ve proven to everyone in the audience (popularity) that the majority of the people have a high degree of desire for success. In other words, I have a program that everybody wants. Then I come into the scarcity part and I say ‗you notice that I‘ve taped off the front chairs on the front of the room here.

Notes ________

10 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ These chairs have been reserved for those of you who scored the highest, those who are really ready to make a decision today and you know who you are. Most of you are not ready. You came here curious but not ready to decide. But a few of you came here today and you know you are ready. It‘s a spiritual thing, it‘s not a financial thing. You know you are ready to take another step in your life. You know that you came here to make that step and you scored high. Now there‘s one final piece I add to the scoring system. I try to find out who has got the financial wherewithal to qualify to come up to that front seat. I ask them, ―Suppose you found an incredible deal on which you could earn a fast profit of $50,000 today— but it required that you come up with $5,000 to be able to hold the deal. How fast could your raise $5,000? If you are in group 1, it would take you 30 days to come up with that kind of money. If you are in group 2 it would take you between 3 and 30 days to come up with that kind of money. But if you are in group 3, you already have that kind of cash or credit at your disposal. , You could cash in a Government bond or you could go to a friend of yours or you could use your credit card or whatever. If you‘ve got that kind of liquidity then you are in group 3. Now let‘s come up with your Final Score. Take your group score—1, 2 or 3—and multiply it by your Inner Wealth Score. For example, suppose your Inner Wealth score was 25 and your group score was 1. Therefore, your Final Score would be 25 times 1 = 25.

Notes ________

11 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Suppose your Inner Wealth score was 30 and your group score was 2. Then, your Final Score would be 60. Now, suppose your Inner Wealth score was 30 but your group score was 3. In other words, you have a high desire multiplied by the ability to have ready cash. Your Total Score would be 30 times 3...or 90. What is YOUR score? Why do I have my audiences do this? Because I know at anyone with a score over 75 has liquid cash and a high desire for success. In other words, they‘ve got the money and they want to invest it in their success. Then I say, ―I have reserved these few seats up front for those who have a certain score. When I say that number, I‘m going to invite those of you who have that score of higher to take these seats at the front of the room. Don‘t hesitate, because these seats will be filled within just a few seconds. (Can you see how I establish the scarcity and the urgency? I‘ve created scarcity by having only a certain number of seats on the front of the room. I‘ve created popularity by showing how most of the people have the 30 score. I‘ve found the people who can afford it and now I‘ve made it urgent. Then, I say, The score I am looking for today is 75. If your score is 75 you need to take these seats immediately. And I just stand back and watch. It‘s like musical chairs because they just rise up out of the audience and they rush to those front chairs and they fill it up and they always overflow the chairs. People are left standing without a chair.

Notes ________

12 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ I tell them that, ―unfortunately you didn‘t act quickly enough,‖ and I send them back to the audience. Then I tell them that I‘ll give them one more chance at the end of my presentation, but this time they‘ll need to move faster.‖ So now I‘ve discovered the most qualified prospects and have brought them out of the audience to sit in front of me on the front row. Then, for the rest of my time I can do what I‘m best at—teaching. I love to teach but I hate to sell. So I get the selling out of the way up front and now my audience is sitting right in front of me, on the front row and they want it and they are excited and then all I do is teach, teach, teach, teach. I know I have the hungry ones on the front row so I talk to them, I give them a fake million dollar bill, I will talk to them, I‘ll shake their hands, I now create a friendly relationship with these people in the front row. What about the people on the 2nd row and further back. What are they thinking? They‘re asking themselves, How can I get on the front row? So when I‘m done with my presentation, this is how I finish. I say ‗how many of you on the front row want to work with me? Everybody raises their hands. I say stand up, come with me now. We walk out to the next room. I leave them in the next room and tell them that I‘ll be back in a few minutes. Then, I return to the original room where the front row is now empty. I look at the audience and I say, ‗Some of you were really upset that you didn‘t get one of these seats. You have one minute to fill these seats up right now.

Notes ________

13 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ And they rise up out of the audience and they rush to the front row. Then I say,‖How many of you want to work with me? They all raise their hands, and I say, ―Stand up, come with me,‖ and we go into the next room. To the remaining people in the audience I say, ―I love you. Have a great life, I hope life treats you well, I hope what I taught you today has been valuable to you.‖ I‘ve shown them that I didn‘t try to hold anything back. I was trying to teach as much as I possibly could so they realise that I am a giver. I want to be a giver I don‘t want to be a seller. So to summarize: The most powerful principle of persuasion is vision. You‘ve got to get people to see their dream and you‘ve got to get them to realise that your product, service or information is what gets them through the walls of fear to achieve their dreams. The next most powerful principles of persuasion are U.S.P. Urgency to move them through the wall, Scarcity to motivate them to act, and Popularity to prove to them that they‘re not alone. Boom. The walls of fear just drop. Those are the things I think you need vision, urgency, scarcity and popularity as a summary for how to succeed at your marketing. Graham: Fantastic. So if I can summarise this so anyone in business could use it. The message I get from you is that whatever product or service you are selling, particularly when it involves a lot of money, that it would be very helpful rather than just to say this is what we‘ve got and this is how it‘s going to help you, ask them those questions.

Notes ________

14 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Can you just imagine for a moment that you have your ideal holiday or your ideal car you are driving now, or your ideal whatever it is you are selling, what would it be like, what would it feel like, and involve all those senses and then talk about some of the things that stop people from achieving those dreams and then come in with some sort of urgency offer. We have a special opportunity today for people that want to make quick decisions or whatever but the key is you want to get your clients if you like, imagining them enjoying your product or service, having all kinds of wonderful benefits, solving problems, and emotionally feeling it all before you then talk about necessarily what it‘s going to cost and all that. Is that pretty well what you are saying? Robert: Yeah, exactly. Yes, good summary. Graham: I like that because the whole concept of vividly imagining all those senses from having achieved a goal or solved a problem. That in itself will be enough to get a lot of people to take action because they can suddenly see and feel how good it‘s going to be to get rid of that major obstacle or problem or enjoy all the benefits of the goal, whatever the goal happens to be. Robert: Absolutely. You have to get them to go to this destination and experience what it is like and experience is the word. You‘ve got to get them to experience it and frankly the ones who really aren‘t ready for it, they‘ll be resistant to that but most people are kids at heart. They like to dream, they like to daydream, it‘s just most people haven‘t been given the opportunity recently and they‘ve heard of the concept of visualisation before but I call it virtualisation because you need to involve all five senses. Those are the lessons that I always use now and they are simple to do and profound. Graham: Thanks Robert. I know you have a huge range of great resources that people can go to and

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15 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ actually use to help them in their business and their marketing so what is your website they can go to? Robert: www.robertallen.com Graham: What are a couple of the things there that you would encourage them to go and actually download or use or what would really help somebody in business? Robert: Well I do a call every week called ―Breakfast with Bob‖ and the full text of that call is given in a blog every single week so that full text is available there for anybody to read. It‘s an hour long conversation about the principles that I see that success is all about. They can sign up for it if they want to listen to it. There‘s an archive that they can go to, to download some special benefits and this year I am studying 24 books that I believe are classics in the literature of success. So we‘ve been doing a book every two weeks so two weeks for each one of the 24 books it‘s gives us about a year‘s worth of content. This last week we talked about the ―Go Giver‖, and shortly we‘ll study ―Think and Grow Rich‖ and the ―Go Getter‖ which is a classic from 1925, there is the Dr Seuss‘s book ―All the Places you will Go‖ and my two books ―One Minute Millionaire‖ and the ―Cash in a Flash‖ and so on. 24 classic success books. The list is found at www.robertallen.com There is where you go to connect with me and study with me if you want to. Graham: Great so anybody who wants some real proven success principles they should definitely go to your website and sign for your blog. Robert: Yes, they would find that really useful. Graham: Thanks again for sharing such useful ideas today. I know a lot of business people and sales

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16 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ people are going to be delighted with the great results of using your principles of virtualization and the USP of persuasion. Robert: My pleasure Graham and all the best. Action Exercise: I really like what Robert shared in this interview. The book ‗Influence‘ by Robert Cialdini is an excellent resource that explains in great detail how to use persuasion in a scientific way to influence people to do things. So one action step I recommend you take is to get a copy of this book and read it several times. Then look at how you can apply Robert‘s USP persuasion strategy in all your marketing. How can you generate Urgency, Scarcity and Popularity into the products and services you offer? One of the best ways to show popularity is to use positive testimonials about your products and services from happy clients. So collect and use testimonials that talk about how good your products and services are and how they‘ve helped your clients to achieve important goals and solve pressing problems. What a client or customer says about your products or service is ten times more believable than anything you can say yourself about your product and services. Do use positive testimonials in all your marketing. They are an easy way to persuade people that what you offer is valuable and worth buying. Also, look at how you can get people to vividly ‗see and feel‘ themselves enjoying the benefits of using your product or service. This is the vision that Robert talked about. The stronger this positive vision the more likely people are to take action and buy your product or service.

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17 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Especially if you include Urgency, Scarcity and Popularity in your offer at the same. Finally make sure you go to www.robertallen.com and sign up for Robert‘s blog. He shares a ton of useful information in his blog that I know you will enjoy and find helpful.

Jane Applegate: The magic of personal relationships

Reprinted with permission

Graham: Hello it‘s Graham McGregor here and it‘s my great pleasure today for this interview for the Unfair Business Advantage Report to be talking to Jane Applegate. Jane is one of the worlds most respected business journalists and an award winning writer and producer. Jane, look it‘s fantastic to have you on the call today. Jane: Well I‘m happy to be included in your list of experts Graham.

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18 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Graham: Thank you very much Jane. Before we start and we will talk about the strategy you want to share with our readers today, could you just give us a little bit of background for a couple of minutes about what you‘ve done in business and what you‘ve been up to. Jane: Well my training is as an investigative reporter and I spent many years at the Los Angeles Times reporting on business crime. After a few years, I was very discouraged by all the negative attention on criminals, so in the late 80‘s I asked for a transfer. The only position they had open was the small business columnist and I was advised against taking it. I was told that it was a bad career move but I just thought it was an opportunity to really learn a lot about running a business. I‘d never had a business before and when I took on the column I vowed that I would apply my investigative reporting training to figuring out what separated successful business people from people who just worked really hard and never quite made it. So since 1988, I have been writing exclusively about small business management. I ended up leaving the paper in 1991 to set up my own small business which does two things. We provide all kinds of content, journalistic and corporate content for clients, I write for Bloomberg and the New York Times small business site, as well as various corporations that serve small business owners. We have the content production side of the business and then I do very limited amount of consulting with companies to make sure that they‘re providing products and services that really serve small business owners as well. My current clients are Microsoft, Pitney Bowes and Cox Communications.. Graham: Fantastic and what‘s the strategy you‘d like to share with our readers today that they can use to get an unfair business advantage?

Jane: I think that people are starting to suffer from social media fatigue and they are just stressing out and devoting, I believe, way too much time to their social media platforms and ignoring the critical issues that are facing their businesses.

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19 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________

So I‘m becoming a contrarian on this topic. While you obviously need to have a fantastic website and you should have a Linked In page and all these different grown up online networking opportunities, I think that it‘s most important to focus back on the personal relationships that we have because we do business with people, we don‘t do business with companies. Graham: Exactly and what I‘ve read we like to do business with people we know and like and trust and in particular give referrals to those sorts of people as well so what would you say are some of the things that business people can do to develop great personal connections with other people related to their business? Jane: So, here are five strategies that are very simple and basically cost very little to implement. First, reconnect with your best customers and clients. I mean pick up the phone, set up a face-to-face meeting, meet them for breakfast, set up a Skype call, just call them up and find out what they‘re working on, where they are, what challenges they are facing and see where you can be of service. I think that‘s really important because if we start taking our customers and clients for granted they will most definitely drift away. So that‘s the first thing. Graham: So basically what you are saying here, you take your most important clients and actually set up a meeting, make a phone call, and just focus on ‗what can I do to be of value to that person in some way?‘ Jane: Right, so the first step is to really honour and value the people who are providing you with most of your business and your income. Next, reach out to 4 or 5 former clients or customers, people who have drifted away, who you have not been in touch with for 6 months to a year and track them down and find out why they stopped doing business with you. This can be a painful exercise but it‘s really easy to find people obviously with all the online, and you can

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20 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Google them, you can find them on Linked In and track them down. Don‘t get defensive, just asked them why they are not doing business with you anymore. Sometimes it‘s they‘ve changed jobs or they‘ve moved away or there‘s a very legitimate reason if they‘ve gone elsewhere but sometimes you‘ll find out that they had a problem that was not resolved or they were insulted by one of your staff people and it‘s really important to get that information. So I think reaching out to people who used to be good clients and customers and finding out why they are no longer in your business life, is very, very valuable. Graham: I can see that, because I know with a number of companies I used to deal with I‘ve stopped doing business with them. Number one, I think for a couple of them because I changed locations from my home and I really just out of the habit. So, if in fact if they had contacted me and reached out to me I would probably go back and use them again. There was nothing wrong with their service but I just got out of the habit if you like. And I think you said before also that if people have a complaint and they leave for that reason or they were unhappy in some way, often they actually won‘t tell you will they, directly? They will just quietly pack up their bags and go somewhere else. Jane: Right and there‘s the old adage that a happy customer will tell a few people how wonderful you are but an unhappy customer will tell 10 to 20 people how terrible you are. I think it‘s difficult for people to share their negative experience directly with an organisation, so it‘s really up to you as a business owner to reach out and ask people what went wrong or why did you disappear. Even if they don‘t come back and do business with you, you can use that information to make changes and to move in a new direction. Graham: Excellent. So we are reconnecting first of all with some of our best customers, we are not

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21 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ reaching out to 4 or 5 or a small number of our former customers. What would you say the third strategy is? Jane: The next strategy is to join or rejoin or start attending again any sort of local networking or professional group. Meeting attendance is down. People say they are too busy, they are too tired, they can‘t get out to that Chamber of Commerce meeting or Business Association Meeting...I think that‘s a huge mistake. Once a week you need to get out to mix and mingle with likeminded business people. When I go to a business meeting, I‘ve always made some valuable connections. So I think no matter where you are in the world there are organisations and there‘s after work mixers. Graham: There‘s after five functions, there‘s local associations, there‘s people like BNI and many other networking organisations. And from what I‘ve seen, the way to make those events successful is you don‘t go there with the attitude of how can I get business from some of those people. You go there like you were saying before with the attitude of ‗how can I perhaps add value to some of these people?‘ So you are going there more with an adding value approach rather than a taking approach. Is that your experience in terms of getting success out of networking events? Jane: One really fun little strategy that‘s in my book is to always ask somebody for two if not three of their business cards...Why? Because if you think that they are a valuable person you can keep one card and then pass the others along and people are especially flattered. When I meet you and I say wow you‘re terrific, I want to keep in touch, may I have two cards. All of a sudden they just light up because you are going to become their PR person. So that‘s a really fun, easy sort of networking strategy. Graham: And of course we never know who people know. You meet somebody at one of these

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22 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ functions, you just never know who they might be in contact with or in touch with that potentially could be ideal clients for you. Jane: Right. The idea is to figure out how you can be of service to them. Ask them what they are doing, what they need. It‘s just important to get out and look people in the eye and not suffer from the small business isolation that a lot of entrepreneurs suffer from. Graham: Excellent. Often you do that and you get some good ideas. You see what somebody else is doing, you get a bit of inspiration and all it takes is a small amount of your time like an hour or two each week to go out and mix with some other people. Jane: Another strategy is to join or rejoin a national or an international organisation that serves your profession. Then, you can connect with a global group of people who are doing what you are doing. Usually these organisations have terrific newsletters or monthly magazines or ezines. So it‘s really important no matter what industry you are in to connect with the bigger organisations and if possible plan to attend their annual meeting or trade show or conference. A lot of people say ‗oh Jane we can‘t afford to fly off and spend three days in Chicago or London or whatever‘ but you can often contact the Event Management company and ask if they are accepting any volunteer workers. And for a lot of people that‘s a great way to get a path into a conference if you agree to work for part of the day or hand out name tags or register people and then you can attend some of the sessions. Take advantage of all the information that you can collect at a trade show. What better way to check out your competition than walking the isle and actually looking at the products or services that they offer? Graham: And I‘ve also found with that type of thing Jane if you go to trade shows and conferences with

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23 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ people in your industry you often get a chance to rub shoulders with some of the most successful people in that particular field. And if you just ask them a couple of questions about what do you do and how do you do it, in most cases I‘ve found these people are very generous. They are more than happy to share what they‘ve learnt, perhaps over the last 5 or 10 years about being successful and they can tell you in 10 or 15 minutes some ideas that might take you 10 years to learn yourself. So if you don‘t attend you don‘t get a chance to mix with some of these people. I was selling sales training a few decades ago and had a conference I went to. I wasn‘t doing very well however I met the top sales person in the world for that organisation. And in one hour he told me exactly what he was doing. I improved my sales over 500% by going back and doing exactly what he told me. But if I hadn‘t gone to the conference I wouldn‘t have learnt his great ideas. So great ideas are there in terms of helping you improve your results by mixing with people at a national or international level. Jane: Another strategy which sounds so simple but is so critical is to don‘t be afraid to ask people for an introduction or a referral...I have a wonderful example. I met a top executive at a very well known global corporation when I was interviewing him for a client for a project I was working on. We had a nice rapport. We spend an hour together while I conducted the interview on behalf of the client. At the very last minute, I asked ‗may I have your card‘ and he said ‗yes of course. I told him, ‗I have done some work for the company years ago and have been trying to back get in the door... would you consider making an introduction to someone in the small business marketing group?‘ Now, he had nothing to do with small business marketing team, but he said let me think about it and he made a very brief email introduction just saying I

Notes ________

24 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ met Jane, I‘ve checked her credentials, she seems like a reputable person. He told them I asked him to make this introduction. We had some conversations 2½ years ago between my company and this certain corporate marketing group. They called me about three weeks ago and are putting together something that would probably be the largest project my company has ever managed. That came from just one email introduction from one executive to another...without his help, I never would have been able to get in the door at this company. Graham: In this case one little email introduction and also you actually asked the person would you mind introducing me to the appropriate person and of course you asked. I was interviewing Cindy Cashman recently for my Unfair Business advantage Report and she said ‗if you don‘t ask, the answer is always no‘ which I thought was quite a nice phrase. So why not ask and if you don‘t ask the answer is no anyway so you are no worse off. So I think that‘s a great suggestion. Never being afraid to ask somebody for an introduction. Do you know perhaps somebody in this company here or this organisation over here that I can perhaps make contact with? In most cases if people like you and get along well with you, a lot of them are quite happy to make a brief introduction or at least help you along in some way aren‘t they. We just have to ask. Jane: Right. And again this wasn‘t even a recommendation. He was very clear saying I met her in one context, I‘ve looked into her background. I think a lot of small business owners are impatient and feel like if we can‘t make a deal immediately it‘s never going to happen. Well this deal we are about to sign resulted from an email sent in July of 2008. Graham: Wow, three years ago.

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25 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ I like that. So let me summarise what you‘ve talked about. You are saying there are five strategies and in fact they are delightfully simple. Everything you‘ve mentioned so far today is all about developing those great personal relationships with people in and around our business. Because like you said, people do business with people not with organisations or companies. I believe you do speaking from time to time. Is that right? Jane: Yes. Quite a bit. I‘ve probably spoken to 20 business organisations this year so far. Graham: Excellent. First of all, is there anything you‘d like to add about those strategies for developing better personal connections with people? Anything else you wanted to share on that? Jane: Well I would say don‘t be afraid to go a little old school and start using the telephone and writing letters again. I have gotten through to some amazing people who completely ignore email at the moment but if I sent them a personal note or a scheduled a telephone call... we moved forward and made a connection. Graham: That makes perfect sense. Because I know you speak to a lot of different business organisations, what‘s one piece of advice you would give most business people right now that you think would help them be more successful or effective in their business? Jane: I would say to always set your ego aside and ask for help. I have been very fortunate in profiling some of the most successful business people in the world and every single one of them has said you can‘t know everything about everything. And if you hit a bump in the road and you are puzzled by something or you just can‘t figure something out , the most important thing is to admit ‗I can‘t do it all‘ and just reach out. There‘s no excuse not to get help. I mean there‘s endless information on line and again these personal connections, I mean when you ask somebody, when you come to them and say ‗I really respect your opinion or I really need your help on something,‘ most people are really generous with their

Notes ________

26 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ time and information. A lot of business owners are stubborn and just refuse to make enquiries or ask for help and they up going down in flames. I think that‘s really again basic and kind of over simplified but I think it‘s really a true secret of success is to just set your ego aside and ask for help when you need it. Graham: I think you‘ve hit it on the help there Jane because a number of years ago when I was doing sales training, going back 10 or 20 years now, I used to interview some of the top sales people in the country. One of the questions I asked them was ‗how many people from your organisation have asked you for advice in the last year?‘ And you know what Jane; the typical answer was maybe 2 or 3 people had asked them for advice in a whole year from their own company. And then I said well that‘s interesting, how many people have you asked for advice in the last year and invariably they tell me ‗I‘ve got no idea Graham it‘s been so many.‘ So the top people generally in any field they are always out there asking other people for advice and help. It‘s just what they do and I think it‘s a great point you hit on. Let‘s talk now about some of the great resource you have for business owners. I actually picked up a copy of your fantastic book, it really caught my eye, ―201 Great Ideas for your Small Business‖ I see that‘s the 3rd edition now so obviously that‘s been very popular. Do you want to talk about that for a moment and then we will talk about some of the resources you have on your website as well. How did you put that book together?

Jane: Well the first edition of ‗201 Great Ideas‖ was based on a contest that I ran when I was the small business columnist for the LA Times. I was getting all

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27 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ kinds of great ideas coming in and I thought well this would be fun, we should just have a competition and every week I will publish the best idea. I ended up with about 1,500 ideas which just came flooding in. At the time, the column was syndicated and it was very, very popular. When I presented the idea to my literary agent he said well this is a winner so the book, every time it‘s been revised I‘ve added new ones and updated the ideas. This time, I actually rewrote the whole book so this 3rd edition is pretty much from scratch because so much has changed since I last revised the book in 2004. So basically I‘d say 80 to 90% of the book is brand new. Graham: What I like about it is it‘s got lots of different parts to business that somebody can dip into, there‘s everything from being successful with money, some great marketing strategies, some great people strategies, ideas on time management. Going global I think is one of your strategies that shows how you can expand around the world and of course each idea is quite short. They can read it in a couple of minutes and dip into it and just go and try something can‘t they? They don‘t have to spend hours, they can just spend a few minutes and think I‘ll try that, those are good ideas. In fact I am looking at the back of the book now and there‘s a great comment here from Tom Peters the amazing business success expert. He says ‗brilliantly researched brilliantly written, a gem of priceless value on almost every page. Read, inhale, absorb, great stuff .‘ So obviously some of the best people in the world think this is a great book and I can certainly recommend it as well. Now what‘s the website that our readers can check out that has a lot of other great resources on it as well? Jane: Well we built a brand new website actually with support from a really interesting company called Hub Spot. They are an inbound marketing company that works to help small businesses get more business

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28 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ based on their web presence. So they built a really fun website and it‘s just a place to share great ideas. We run an ongoing contest where we ask people to fill out a very short form and write a couple of sentences about their great idea and we give away prizes donated by people who are featured in the book and other businesses. We have a small team of people that very unscientifically pick the best idea of the week or every other week and we give out prizes. Graham: Great and what is that website address please? Jane: It‘s www.201greatideas.com. And there‘s also links to how to purchase the book which is my first ebook, it‘s available for Kindle, Kindle for iPad and also as an Adobe digital edition if people have a PC. Graham: Well I really want to thank you for the great ideas you‘ve shared today. I like this idea of developing personal relationships at a much deeper level with the people in our business. I think you‘ve hit the nail on the head because a lot of people have relied a lot on things like email or social media. I think to a large extent we‘ve lost touch with probably that personal interaction that made a lot of us very successful to start with and we‘ve sort of gone away from it. I recall that one of the most successful real estate people I spoke to recently told me his secret to success was he got on the phone for one day every three months and just rang up the top 20% of his customers just for a quick chat. A good old fashioned phone call. He said that works far better than 100 emails to the same people and it keeps him busy for the next three months in terms of business. So I like this idea of doing simple things on a regular basis to really reconnect with people and develop those personal relationships in businesses. So simple, in most cases it is very inexpensive or even free and I think it‘s something that all of us can do.

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29 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Jane: Right, it really works. In fact, I am working on my 5th book and the working title is actually ―Call-em Up‖ which is my family motto. My children cringe when they ask me something or they need some advice and I am just always saying ‗pick up the phone, reach out, touch someone, call somebody...‘ so they said I should have that tattooed or have it on my tombstone: Call ‗em up. Graham: I love it, what a great motto to have. Callem up and just talk to someone. Thanks again for sharing such great ideas today Jane. Jane: Thank you Graham. I‘m delighted to be of help. Action Exercise: What I love about Jane‘s ideas is that they are so commonsense and obvious. However as the old saying goes ‗common sense is not that common.‘ Jane shared five simple strategies to develop better relationships with the people around you. Because people buy from other people and not organisations. So write down 3-5 action steps you could take in the next week from the ideas that Jane has shared. Then put at least a couple of these into action. Make sure that you also register on Jane‘s website at www.201greatideas.com and I highly recommend you get a copy of her excellent book ‗201 great ideas for your small business‘ It‘s very good.

Notes ________

30 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Joanne Black How to build a referral based business

Reprinted with permission

Graham McGregor: In this interview for the Unfair Business Advantage Report it‘s my great pleasure be talking to international referral expert Joanne Black. Joanne, it is great to have you on the call today. Joanne: Thank you Graham it‘s a treat for me. Graham: Now Joanne before we go into a couple of ideas that I know our readers are going to love on how to get a ton of referral business for their organisation, can you give us a bit of background about how you got involved in this referral selling market? Joanne: In 1996 I founded No More Cold Calling and prior to that I sold and managed sales teams. That‘s all I‘ve ever done. And in the most recent past I worked for two consulting and training firms. When I started my company, my goal was to do sales strategy consulting. But as I began working with clients, I realised that they had these fantastic relationships-- not only with their clients, customers,

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31 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ peers, colleagues, vendors and everybody they came in touch with. Yet they weren‘t leveraging those relationships at all. I reflected on my sales career, and this light bulb went off one day, Graham, and I said ‗Wow, my best business had come from referrals.‘ Then I started asking all the sales people and sales executives I knew about referrals. I said ‗do you like to get referrals?‘ This may seem like a silly question because we all do, but I really wanted them to be specific about why they loved them. And to this day from audiences, when I speak, and companies when I train their sales teams, they tell me the exact same thing. So it‘s a grouping of advantages to referral selling, such as #1 we are presold. The person knows about us. Because a referral means that you have an introduction. It does not mean you have a name. If you just have a name you‘re cold calling, because my definition of a cold call is calling someone who doesn‘t know you and is not expecting your call. So you need to be introduced, and when you are introduced and the other person says ‗sure, that sounds great, I‘d love to talk to Graham, tell him to call me,‘ well then that other person is ready for your call. They know why you are calling, a little bit about you, and are familiar with you. So you are way ahead of the game, and you start the meeting in a very different place. #2 You have trust and credibility, because you‘ve been referred by a trusted source. That‘s why they are taking the meeting in the first place. #3 You shorten your sales process, which all of us want to do, so it actually takes us less time because we don‘t have to go through all those uncomfortable first steps in the process. #4 Most people selling by referral tell me they have no competition, but of course many companies need to

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32 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ talk to at least three different vendors especially if we are dealing with larger companies. But when you‘ve been referred, you have the inside track. You learn who‘s on the committee, who‘s got the power, how the decision is made. You are going to learn things that others don‘t know and never will. #5 There‘s no hard cost to referrals, so you don‘t have a huge marketing budget, there‘s no direct mail budget, no advertising budget, it‘s what I call ―Your Time and Referrals Budget.‖ The last question I ask people is ‗so you‘ve been introduced to the person you want to meet and who wants to meet you, what percent of the time does that prospect actually convert to a new customer?‘ #6 And the minimum people have told me over the years is 50%. But the needle has moved, and now it‘s more in the 70% and 90% range. Graham: In other word referrals are very important. And a lot of the time the average size of the sale you make from a referral is a lot larger than what you might normally make. Which is another great benefit of referral selling. So what you are going to share today for our readers is part of your proven system. This is what people can do to get more referrals? Joanne: Exactly. There are five pieces to the methodology, and it‘s very simple and straight Forward, because I‘m a sales person like everybody else and I don‘t like complicated. #1 The first point is that referral selling must be a priority. We hear so many times people say ‗oh I have so many priorities I don‘t know where to start.‘ Well we can only do one thing first. When referrals are your priority, much of what you‘ve been doing around prospecting and business development activities you might not need to do anymore, because they don‘t support your referral process and your referral strategy. So my number one key is to make referrals a priority.

Notes ________

33 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ #2 Referrals must be part of your sales process--an activity you are engaged in every single day. You don‘t get to the end of the week, the end of the month and say oh darn it, I should have asked for referrals and I didn‘t. No, this is top of mind, you actually have a written plan, you know who you are going to contact every week, so it is a daily activity. I liken it to going to the gym and getting on the treadmill (and collecting referrals is a lot easier than getting on the treadmill.) We all know when we go to the gym and work out how great we feel, and we see the results. Well it‘s the same thing with referrals--when you work it, it works and so referrals are a daily activity. #3 Establish referral metrics. There‘s been a perception that referrals are kind of soft and they are nice but we really can‘t measure them. The metrics are simple, and I can give you some ideas of things that people can measure. My advice to companies is to measure what‘s easy for you to measure, because if it gets too complicated we don‘t do it. Here are some really simple things to measure. One, how many people am I going to contact this week to ask for referrals? Two, how many referral meetings have I actually scheduled? Three, how many referral meetings have I conducted? And the scheduling is equally as important because you might schedule something today but may not be able to meet with someone for two or three weeks. Then once you‘ve met with them you track the conversion, what percent of the time did they become a new customer or client and I use those terms interchangeably. You can also measure other things; you can track the volume of the sale. Typically referred sales are larger in revenue, and you can also track your profitability. Then what some people do which is very interesting, is the time it takes to close the deal. (Because it‘s going to be shorter.) Those are some simple metrics, but you need to set them up even if you just tick three, we need to have those goals, we need to have metrics, otherwise referrals are not going to happen. So that‘s the third key point.

Notes ________

34 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________

The fourth is asking for referrals is a skill, and there‘s a way to position what you do and ask for referrals that will get you the introduction. (Of course some of the work I do is around training sales teams on how to do this) but asking for referrals needs to be integrated into the sales process and the way people work. It needs to be the sales executive, the CEO, depending on the size of the company, who needs to say referrals are how we are going to work. Now those four are pretty straight forward to put in place. Working with someone to say referrals are a priority, it‘s now a part of our sales process, we have metrics and we know how to do it. What surprised me, Graham, is that most people are not comfortable asking for referrals because it‘s so personal. I mean referral selling is a very personal kind of sale because we are putting ourselves on the line. The biggest fear that people have is ‗what if they say no?‘ That means they don‘t like me, I‘ve said something to offend them, whatever, it‘s that fear of rejection. There‘s other discomfort people have shared with me: They say ‗Joanne it feels like I‘m intruding on a relationship or it feels pushy or salesy, or if I have to ask, people are going to think I‘m not really successful.‘ So we run this tape in our heads and what happens is typically at least here in North America is that people will say something like ‗oh give Graham a call, tell him I told you to call, we‘ve known each other forever.‘ We are used to hearing that, and getting a name and then taking a name and giving the person a call or sending an email. Well again going back to the beginning, my definition is that‘s a cold call. The person doesn‘t know you and doesn‘t expect your call. What we need to do to make it a referral is to ask for the introduction, and that‘s where that personal discomfort comes in. So what I like to say to people, what gets us over that is a lot of practice, like anything to get good at, we are changing behaviour.

Notes ________

35 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ What I‘d like all your readers to think about is times that people they knew and liked and trusted, asked them to help them out. Could be personal or it could be for business. We do it all the time. We help people out. Somebody will say ‗hey who do you know?‘ and we offer, even before we are asked a lot of the time, to make that introduction. People are willing to do it, we need to believe that. We need to work under the moniker that people want to introduce us, they just don‘t know what to do. So the minute you say ‗I really appreciate the introduction,‘ they say ‗oh yeah sure, well what would you like me to do?‘ You want me to call them or send an email, whatever. So we are actually training these people on how the referral process works. I t‘s just amazing the stories I hear about people who practice and use the process and the results they get. I just came last week from delivering a keynote in Chicago, and I‘ve worked this Spring with about a dozen of the people at this company. They were so excited to share all the meetings they were getting and the referrals they were receiving. And this is just after 30 days of completing the programme, so it does work. But again. going back to what I said before, when you work it, it works. Graham: And just in terms of that, are there any specific how to‘s you could share with our readers today, like maybe just one or two things they could try that would make them a little bit better right now at referrals? Obviously the five steps are important, they‘ve got to measure, they‘ve got to make it a priority, but is there anything you could say, the first thing you‘ve got to do, you ask for referrals at a particular time. Is it at the end of the meeting or when you‘ve developed a relationships or when they trust you? Or do you ask every person for a referral? Joanne: There are a couple of things. You said you ask everybody, no you don‘t. You have to earn the

Notes ________

36 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ right to ask, and with most people we have this right. We have colleagues, we have clients, we have vendors, we have people we work with all the time who know us and know what we do. What typically happens is we just assume they know the work we do and they‘ll refer us. Well no, they are off running their business. We have to earn the right. What that means is, you don‘t attend a networking event and meet someone for two minutes and ask for referrals. You have not earned the right. I think we know when we‘ve established a relationship. Now, the tip I would give everyone is actually a couple of tips. One, your current customers are your best source of new business--whether it‘s to other areas in their company, so if you are working with large clients, they will refer you internally, and then to companies or to their peers at other organisations. These people all know each other, so whether you are talking to the head of sales, the head of marketing, a CIO, somebody in R & D, wherever you are talking, these guys all know each other so you can ask for referral outside of the organisation. Your current customers know what you do, they know how you work. which is as important, and they really are delighted to refer you but we need to ask them. So I would say start there. That‘s one tip. Two, you must make a list, you must write it down. We can‘t keep this in our heads. What I tell everybody is to make a list of 100 people. And it can be from any walk of your life. Organise the list with the people you know the best at the top of the list. So it‘s not the most high profile person that you want to meet, it‘s who do you know the best because that‘s where you are going to start. And the challenge is, you make a list of 100 people, you won‘t get through the 100 because you are going to start and you are going to ask and they will refer you and then you are going to go more horizontal. One will refer you to the next, the next, the next and maybe you will get through your

Notes ________

37 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ list but it will be a long time, but you add a lot more people because of the referral connections you will be making. So I think those are two very practical ways to start. Graham: Right, so basically you are saying existing customers who have already used your products and services know you do a good job, obviously they are a perfect place to start because they know, like and trust you and know you do a good job. So that makes perfect sense. Again when I think about it even just an example of all the trades people that I‘ve used over the years in all kinds of different houses that I‘ve owned. They‘ve come in, many of them have done a wonderful job, but I never actually even hear from most of these people so how can I give them a referral for a start? Joanne: That‘s it, so that‘s a very important point too that we need to stay in touch. We need to continue to reach out to people, to send them interesting information and certainly today it‘s much, much easier than it ever used to be with the technology we have. It‘s also more distracting because we get so many messages and we are bombarded with them but there are ways to stay in touch, there are ways with our customers to reach out, to find out what they need, how can we help them? Graham: And I presume that the referral system you are talking about could be used for any type of business whether you are a trades person or a professional person, a retailer, anyone that has customers obviously can get referrals from those customers can‘t they. Joanne: Absolutely. Tips to Use Referrals Immediately Here are some questions salespeople ask me. (Your readers may be thinking the same things, so I encourage everyone to read the questions and my answers.)

Notes ________

38 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Question: When you ask for referrals, do you identify companies that you want to get into or do you leave it open? Answer: Be sure to describe your Ideal Client— exactly the person you want to meet. If you have specific companies you want as clients, by all means, ask for people they know in those companies. If your Referral Source doesn‘t know anyone, at least they will now know the kinds of companies you want to work with. You open the conversation, and that is key. Question: What's the language that we should be using to ask, "Would you mind introducing me to....." Answer: When you say ―Do you mind,‖ that shows you are uncomfortable asking outright. A better way to phrase your request is: ―Who are one or two people I should meet?‖ Or ―Who are one or two people you can introduce me to?‖ Question: Would the best place to start on a referral program be with your current clients, after you have set your goals? Answer: Yes, current clients are your best source of new business. They are your ―low-hanging fruit‖ and will be glad to refer you, but you must ask. We often assume our clients will refer us. Sometimes they do, and that is great, but consider enrolling them as part of your sales team. 4. Question: What kind of introduction is best? Answer: It depends how your Referral Source wishes to introduce you. He can make a phone call, arrange an in-person meeting, or send an email. However, if your Referral Source makes an email introduction, he needs to speak to the other person first. Then, when you receive an email, the person who has been referred already knows about you. I usually put ―Mutual Introduction‖ in the subject line. Question: At what stage if the sales process should you ask? Answer: You can ask at any point when you‘ve delivered value. How will you know? Most likely your prospect will thank you. You may have given him a

Notes ________

39 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ great idea, shared relevant research, or connected him to someone he needs to meet. Don‘t fall into the trap of waiting until you have a signed contract, then waiting until you‘ve implemented, and then waiting until you can demonstrate results. By then you‘re probably far away from your initial contact. Here‘s the beauty of the referral process—when you are referred to a prospect, that person is very likely to offer to help you—even before you‘ve done anything for him. Graham: You talk to a lot of business groups every year so what‘s one more piece of advice or helpful tip about doing better in business? What do you often tell them in your talks? Joanne: I tell them a lot of things Graham. So here‘s one that I shared last week is that we need to move quickly. We will never have all the facts. We have so much thrown at us every day but we cannot stop. We have to keep building. I think one of the good things that have come out of our global recession is that people are talking to each other differently. They are looking for ways to collaborate that they were never doing before. When business is booming, everybody was very much laserfocused on what they were doing. Now you have a very collaborative, creative, innovative business environment. You also have an environment where businesses are starting, hundreds a day. I don‘t know if it‘s the same where you are, and I am located in the San Francisco Bay area, very close to Silicon Valley. I read in our business times and in the San Francisco papers there must be 3 or 4 a day that are highlighted about oh this one left this company and they are starting up this new company because here‘s a trend that they picked up on and they believed in. So you have to keep moving, you have to be innovative, you have to be resourceful. You put things together quickly, knowing it‘s never going to be perfect. You are going to fix it as you go along, and that‘s the way the world is. Graham: I have a similar philosophy; I call it the 70% rule in marketing. If you‘ve got something that you think is going to work quite well in terms of

Notes ________

40 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ marketing, whether it‘s a sales letter you want to send or a sales presentation you want to try, if it‘s 70% right go and try it a few times. Because if you wait until it‘s 100% right you might wait six months to get it perfect and in that time you could have actually tried 50 things. So I say go and try a bunch of things even if they are only 70% right. Back to referral selling, what are a couple of useful resources that you could perhaps recommend to our readers right now? What‘s your website again? Joanne: www.nomorecoldcalling.com. Graham: And what are a couple of useful resources that our readers would find of value on that site? Joanne: Well the first resource I would encourage everyone to sign up to my newsletter. Why? Because it only comes out monthly and when you sign up for the newsletter you receive my referral IQ Quiz which basically is your referral checklist. These are the things you need to do to build a referral business. So that is a very, very cool resource. Then if you drop down on the Products Tab, you will see Free Resources. Go to that page, and I have an E Book there for you on social media. I also have an mp3 download that is all about referral selling. Graham: Fantastic. I want to thank you for sharing some useful ideas. What I like about referrals is that first of all they are actually free. If we get very good at asking for them, we can get a ton of highly profitable business without having to spend a single dollar of our hard earned money. Compared to some of the other things that we can do, we could spend a fortune on newspaper advertising or radio advertising or even social media advertising and referrals are actually free or very low cost, so I like that. You‘ve hit it on the head in that people don‘t know how to do it properly. It‘s like not being able to type

Notes ________

41 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ properly so you are a one fingered typist. But with a bit of training you can type very quickly if you train and practise and learn. So if you train and practise and learn now to get referrals it‘s like suddenly you are a multi speed typist rather than a one finger ‗hunt and peck‘ typist if you like. You can be so much more productive with a little bit of training and I think it‘s a skill, once you learn it I assume for one business, you could then use it in any business or sales career that you have anywhere in the world? Joanne: That‘s correct, absolutely. It‘s very exciting and so much fun. Imagine just talking to people who want to talk to you. Isn‘t that fabulous? Graham: Exactly, it‘s a great way to do business, talking to high quality clients that want to actually talk to you rather than trying to get appointments with people that don‘t want to talk to you. Thank you very much for that and I certainly ncourage all my readers to come along and check out your website. Once again that is www.nomorecoldcalling.com. Action Exercise: One of the things I was reminded of when talking with Joanne is the amazing power of getting referrals once you get good at the process. And it does take practice like anything in life that is worthwhile. So sign up for Joanne‘s newsletter and check out some of the referral programmes she offers. Referrals could be a very useful key for your business and are definitely an area that I know most of us (myself included) could do a lot better at.

2: Bob Bly

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42 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Position yourself as an expert in your field

Reprinted with permission

Graham McGregor: It‘s my great pleasure to be talking with direct marketing legend Bob Bly. With a 30-year track record as a top freelance copywriter, Bob Bly -- dubbed "America's top copywriter" by McGraw-Hill and praised by legendary ad man David Ogilvy - offers his clients a combination of proven direct response copywriting skills and Internet marketing expertise unduplicated in the industry. Bob, what‘s the one sales or marketing strategy that you have found has worked extremely well to give yourself or some of your clients an unfair business advantage? Bob Bly: What we‘ve been doing is taking our clients and positioning themselves as the top expert, the top authority the, if you will, guru in their field. And the reason we would do this is that logically we will find that whoever is the top person in the field has the easiest time in business. They get more opportunities, they charge more money, they are busier, they are more in demand, again they can charge a premium price, name their shots when it comes to scheduling work. People will wait for them where they might not wait for another vendor because they want that specific expert and the interesting thing is the person who is usually perceived as the top guru in a field isn‘t necessarily

Notes ________

43 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ the person who‘s best at the skill; it‘s the person who‘s best at marketing or promoting himself. So all the people who are known as celebrities here in the United States for example, Donald Trump, is the top guru in real estate, Anthony Robins is the top guru in personal development, Peter Drucker is the top guru in management. All of these people have taken more or less the same process, become known as the top guru and we teach our clients this process and help them do it because it is very replicable and anyone following these steps can become if not the top guru in their niche, they can certainly get near the top. Graham: Fantastic. So Bob, let‘s get underway. What are the steps to positioning yourself as a top expert or guru in your field? Bob: Well the basic process, I will give you the basic process and then the steps. The basic process is to establish yourself as an expert, to build your reputation as an expert through selective dissemination of information about your topic. Now that sounds complicated but what I really mean is by writing, speaking and publishing information and giving it away on your topic, whether its productivity management or air pollution control, whatever you‘re an expert in, by giving away information on that you create a reputation where people view you as the expert. Because if someone is writing something and people see it in print they assume oh that person must know a lot about this topic even though you may in fact know no more than your competitor. But you are the one who is writing the column or writing the article or publishing the white paper or publishing the book and those people who do those activities build their reputation as experts so it‘s basically getting information or content out there and there are a number of steps involved in it. One of the basic steps is to write articles.

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44 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________

Very simply identify the publication. Now you can do this online but first I am talking about offline. Identify the publication, the newspapers, the newsletters, the trade publications, the trade journals that your prospects are reading and offer to write articles on your subject, on your area of expertise for those publications. That‘s a very quick way of really building your own reputation as an expert in your field. If you can convince one of those editors who likes your articles to let you do it on a regular basis, talk your way into getting a regular column and that will really build your reputation even at a more accelerated rate if you have a column appearing in the industry monthly journal. You are going to get really noticed. Graham: In terms of writing an article or a column like that I guess the process is similar to perhaps giving a short talk on the topic. You might just give people some useful tips or ideas that would help them get better results in that field, is that the sort of thing you recommend? Bob: There are different formats for articles and you certainly if you are going to approach a magazine about writing for them you should get an issue of that magazine. If you‘ve never read it before or never studied it, and look and see what type of articles that they publish. For example if they don‘t publish any case study articles it would be foolish to propose one to that publication but yes generally these articles are information of a how to variety, content, tips. Let me give you an example. I work for a company that sold a product called a motionless mixer. It‘s a device that mixes fluids in a chemical plant without the device itself moving. What happens is that the fluid moves within the device and we put out a white paper called “Ten Things to look for when selecting a Motionless Mixer”.

Notes ________

45 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Very simple, very basic but the publication of that article in a chemical magazine positioned us as the experts in motionless mixing technology. Now that‘s an esoteric example but you can do that with anything. I don‘t know if you know Joe Polish the marketer but he started out as a carpet cleaner in life which is a very low tech business and he noticed that there were a lot of rip-offs in the carpet cleaning industry so he put together a pamphlet that was basically a consumer‘s guide to avoiding rip-offs in carpet cleaning and he gave it away for free. Not only did that help him build a very successful carpet cleaning business but it actually also made him a success as a marketing expert because people were so enamoured with the way he did that technique and they wanted to learn it. Graham: So in terms of articles do you have any recommendations on the number of articles that a person should write or propose writing on a regular basis as part of the steps to becoming involved as an expert? Bob: Well first I would say this. Start with just one. A lot of people listening to this won‘t do any. They won‘t do any of the things that you and I recommend because most people don‘t do most things. So start with one and get one article published and then it will go from there. However in terms of what you are asking it‘s not so much how many articles but our plan has a number of different things you can do, articles is one of them. Another one you touched on is speech writing and what we say is it‘s the rule of 7. You should do 7 of these promotions within an 18 month period minimum. That‘s what you need to be noticed and have a spotlight shining on your in your niche. Graham: Ok so we could also call that the 7/18 rule if you like.

Notes ________

46 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________

Bob: Rule of 7, 7/18 rule at least 7 touch points with the market in 18 months. Graham: Excellent so it‘s either 7 articles or a combination of articles. Bob: Seven articles or three articles and two emails and two ads in the industry, the trade publication. Graham: Terrific. So the whole idea here is you want to position yourself as the expert because obviously people want to deal with experts because it saves them money, saves them time. They are far more likely to get a better result and the thing is that if it‘s in print or somebody is actually standing up and speaking on a topic the automatically assume that that person that wrote that article or is giving the talk is an expert because they are speaking or writing. That‘s pretty well the concept isn‘t it? Bob: Yes there was a fellow, Edward Owen who ran a vanity press called Exposition Press and he observed once that simply because someone has written a book on a topic people automatically assume he knows something about it. Graham: Excellent and it‘s so simple. I recall myself many years ago I was selling websites. I knew nothing about websites but I persuaded the owners of the company to let me give a short seminar on how to create a profitable website and people came along and attended. I kept it very simple, plain English and we created tens of thousands of dollars of new business from this very simple talk. And people assumed I was an expert even though it was the very first time I had ever talked about the topic. So you can do this obviously if you are starting off or are very new in business in your field. You don‘t have to be in the business for a long time do you? Bob: No you don‘t have to know more than everyone else in the world about your topic. You just have to know more about it than let‘s say 90% of the people in the world and that 90% is your target market.

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47 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________

There will always be people who are more expert than you are and guess what, they are not your market. Graham: Excellent. Any other thoughts Bob or any other comments on just how to get started, perhaps even with that very first article? Bob: When I started I wanted to establish myself as an expert in business to business copyrighting which is what I did for many years and so I said to myself what magazine is the big magazine in that field? There was one called Business Marketing so I wrote the editor a letter proposing an article and I waited and didn‘t hear anything and figured he wasn‘t interested but I didn‘t give up. I picked up the phone, this is pre email. I picked up the phone and called him and when I got him on the phone he said well I wouldn‘t be interested in that article it‘s not the kind of thing we do at all. Now instead of giving up I said well what kind of article would you be interested in doing and he immediately told me the stuff he was looking for. And I said well I can do that, what length would you like? And he told me and that‘s how I started getting published in that magazine so persistence goes a long way. Graham: Fantastic and you‘ve just got to make sure that the articles you publish from what you said earlier are consistent with the type of articles they are already publishing in that magazine or newsletter or whatever. Bob: Yes exactly. You know, don‘t propose an interview with a leading industry expert if they do no interviews. Graham: Great Bob. Well that‘s been very helpful. I love this idea of positioning yourself as an expert and it‘s actually surprisingly simple to do. I recall that one of my very first marketing clients many years ago was a personal trainer at a local health centre. He was only making $19,000 a year so I persuaded him to write a simple two page tip sheet called ―Seven Secrets to a Great Looking Body‖. Of

Notes ________

48 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ course secret No. 7 was use a personal trainer like him to keep motivated and on track. The article itself was very, very basic, 7 tips on what you can do to stay in shape and get looking good fast. He ran off 1,000 photocopies of this article on a friend‘s photocopier and then he hand delivered these articles, these two page articles into the letter boxes of expensive homes in neighbourhoods close to his fitness centre. In this article he offered a free consultation and suddenly dozens of people picked up the phone and rang him and said look I‘ve been thinking about getting in shape, and of course they saw his article, thought he was an expert. A year and a half later the same personal trainer, using a few other ideas as well, was making over $190,000 income a year. It all started with positioning himself as an expert which is why it‘s such a powerful technique. Bob: What I like about your example is you don‘t have to create complex material to do this, you can literally write some tips on two sides of an 8.5 x 11 sheet of paper. We call this what you describe a tip sheet and that may be all you need. Graham: Excellent. Bob, you‘ve also got some fantastic marketing resources for business people yourself in your ezine and in many of your publications. So what‘s the best way for people to actually make contact with you and get access to some of these resources? Bob: The best way is to go to my website which is my last name www.bly.com. Graham:

Ok so www.bly.com.

You have a wonderful ezine that comes out several times a month. In fact I‘ve been a subscriber myself for a number of years. It‘s one of the very few ezines that I read and keep reading for many years in a row. I‘ve got some fantastic ideas from you over the years and I certainly know that many of my clients will as well.

Notes ________

49 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ So thank you very much Bob for those great ideas that you‘ve shared with me today. I really like it and the principle of positioning yourself as an expert is one of the best ways to actually give yourself a real unfair business advantage. Bob: Well I appreciate you taking the time to discuss it with me. Action Exercise: This strategy on positioning yourself as an expert that Bob Bly shared is one of the single most effective things you can do in any business to get an instant Unfair Advantage. It‘s also very simple to do. Write a short article or tip sheet that gives potential clients for your product or service some useful information to help them solve a potential problem or reach an important goal. Give this article or tip sheet to at least 5 potential clients to read. Also send it to some publications that may find it useful to share with their readers. A simple way to write an article is to start with a catchy headline that has a number in it. My personal trainer did his tip sheet with the title of ―7 Secrets to a great looking body.‖ Your title could be as simple as ―The five most important things you need to know about XYZ‖ or ―Four surprising ways to ......‖ or Six keys to ....‖ etc. As Bob explained, the important thing is to start with one article or tip sheet and go from there.

Notes ________

50 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ 5: Dr Ian Brookes Persuade your customers to pay more

Reprinted with permission

Graham: It‘s my great pleasure today to be talking to New Zealand‘s most successful business author, Ian Brooks. I believe you‘ve now authored 16 books Ian or is that 17? Ian: 16 books Graham and I‘m working on the 17th. Graham: Thanks for being on the call today Ian, great to have you here. What‘s the topic you want to talk about today with our readers? Ian: Well I think we should talk about how to persuade your customers to pay more. We live in an environment where people think that the best way to compete is to discount so many people think that‘s the only way they can compete. And since the object of being in business is to make a profit unless you use discounting and specials for tactical reasons, than it just doesn‘t make a lot of sense to make it your main strategy. Graham: That certainly makes sense. In fact I‘ve read news articles that some of the big retailers they‘ve tried discounting strategies and of course they are ending up with lower profit margins and having to rethink what they are doing so it is a terrible way to make money isn‘t it?

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51 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Ian: Well it is. Yesterday in the Herald, the Business Section there was a story about how Telecom has increased the number of customers but its profits are down and the two were linked in the article. I mean it‘s crazy. People need to understand that it‘s about the bottom line; it‘s not about the top line. Graham: I guess when we look at persuading our customers to pay more, there‘s a couple of steps we need to take. From the business people I‘ve spoken to many of them say well you can‘t increase prices in a tough environment or people only buy on price. What are you comments on that? Ian: People hardly ever buy on price and I prove that to my audiences by doing this. I say put your hand up if your money matters to you and every hand in the room goes up. Then I say put your hand up if you shopped at the corner store or a store associated with a petrol station in the last couple of weeks and most hands go up. And then I say to people ‗what do you know about the prices there‘ and they say well they‘re more expensive. And I say ‗so what were you dropped on your head as a baby? I mean here you are telling me that your money matters to you and you knowingly go out and spend more than you have to.‘ Of course people respond ‗oh well it‘s much more convenient.‘ Well exactly. There‘s always something that people will pay more for and our job in business is to find out just exactly what that is. Business is a game of two halves and in the first half you create superior customer value and in the second half you sell that value. Many of the people who think that they have to compete on price have to compete on price because they haven‘t created any significant value in the customer‘s eyes in the first place.

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52 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ The second group who compete on price are those who have created value but don‘t know how to sell that value. But business is the activity of creating value and if you think about it our customers don‘t want our products and services, they want the value that they can extract from those products and services. So then we need to ask ourselves ‗what is value?‘ Aand for me value is not what people want or desire, dream about but value is what people are prepared to pay for. Now most companies do a tremendous amount of market research and find out what customer want and would like and dream out but they don‘t find out what people are prepared to pay for. If you don‘t have that information then it makes setting what a customer would consider to be a fair price a very difficult thing to do. So for me the whole exercise starts by making sure that you are creating value in the eyes of your customer and you know what that is worth to your customers, what they would be prepared to pay for it. Then we move on to how do you sell that value? But I think before we go into that, people need to understand that although it looks very tempting to compete by discounting it‘s a very dangerous thing to do. Not only does it obviously ruin or weaken the profitability of the company, it can drag an entire industry down as they get involved in pricing matching and price wars. More significantly it destroys your brand because most people when I ask them which words they would like to have spring to a customer‘s mind when they think about their company‘s brand, rarely does the word ‗cheap‘ come up. Yet if you compete on price then that‘s really the message you are sending the customer that we think we are professional and offer good service and high quality and great range and product knowledge. But at

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53 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ the end of the day we know you are only going to buy with us if we are the cheapest and so we compete on price. But the most worrying thing is that because the aim of business had to be to have profitable customers who stay with you for a long time, then really we should be making sure that we build trust between ourselves and our customers. That‘s the essence of any long term relationship, personal or commercial is to have trust and when you start discounting your destroy that trust because people think well hang on a minute it was $5 yesterday and now it‘s only $3.50 today. Or I paid $12 and my mate just paid $8 and so there‘s some real significant dangers competing on price and as we‘ve just been discussing the good news is you don‘t need to compete on price because it‘s not the main thing. If God forbid you were diagnosed tomorrow with a brain tumour Graham and you were looking through the Yellow Pages for a brain surgeon I doubt that your finger would stop at Bob‘s Budget Brain Surgery. We just don‘t think that way. So now people are probably thinking well if that‘s the case why do customers always question the price and why is the first thing that they ask about? And the answer quite simply is because that‘s what we‘ve told people to do. For 30 years we‘ve been competing on the basis of price and so we‘ve training customers to ask the price, check the price, challenge the price. Personally in my own life I almost always challenge the price even if I think it‘s reasonable because what I‘ve learned is that 9 times out of 10 the person will fall over and drop their price. Graham: So let‘s take it back to some practical applications. What‘s the first thing we can do to help our customers or persuade our customers to pay more?

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54 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Ian: The first thing is to build trust and people talk about building relationships and the importance of building relationships but we don‘t do it. Let‘s take that retail environment. I am customer care advisor to six retail brands in Australia, two of them are in New Zealand and I‘ve been teaching people that business is a social activity between human beings. The first thing you need to do is engage the human being so when somebody walks into a store the first thing you need to do is to greet them and the second thing you need to do is to engage them in conversation and build a relationship that‘s got nothing to do with a commercial thing. The third thing to do is to start talking about what brought them into the store and what the problems are, what they are trying to achieve and then to start laying out the options that you‘ve got for solving that problem. If you do all of that, by the time you get to the price it now becomes quite an insignificant thing. I mean it‘s not irrelevant. You can‘t be twice as much as the store next door but certainly within 10% to 15% it‘s not going to be an issue if you have demonstrated to the person that you are interested in them. Research in New Zealand shows that the number one thing we want to see is a willingness to help. If we show them that we are taking the time to truly listen and understand, that‘s a 2nd thing research shows in New Zealand that people want. But what happens when you go into most stores? People say are you right mate? And then they follow that up with can I help you? And there‘s really been no engagement and so the answer is ‗well no you can‘t help me, I‘m just looking thank you.‘ Or if we do find something then we take it up, it‘s very much going to be around the price because there‘s really nothing else going on to interest us. Graham: So something simple here, I know my wife was commenting the other day, she was trying to buy a particular brand of computer. She went into five retail stores and she said not a single person asked her a question about who she

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55 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ was and what she was doing and why she was buying it and where she would use it and so forth. And she actually found it quite hard to buy a computer and it was a couple of thousand dollars, it wasn‘t cheap and it took her at least six visits and she didn‘t feel trust with anyone and I think you‘ve hit it on the head here. There was just no trust or rapport building in any of those situations so my wife, all she could do was compare on price. Ian: Exactly and by contrast one of my clients in Australia called Dusk, a chain of stores across Australia that sell candles and lighting and things like that for ambience in the home. They operate totally around what we‘ve just been talking about and they‘ve just had their best Christmas ever. And in a business that has typically done most of its sales in profits generated around the Christmas person, they are now finding actually to their surprise how much business they are getting between major events like Christmas, Mother‘s Day and so forth. Because they‘ve just started creating this rapport and this great shopping experience and people want to come in. They like being there and they like the people they deal with and they understand the value of the products and then they buy and price isn‘t the issue. Graham: A good example of that is one of the columns you wrote for the New Zealand Business a while ago where you walked into a bed store in Auckland‘s North Shore. Perhaps you want to comment on that for a moment and then we will get into a couple more strategies. Ian: Well yeah the brilliant thing about that Graham was that the woman practised something that I call, ‗it‘s important to make your customers successful.‘ That‘s the point I try to drive home to people. Don‘t think about servicing your customers, satisfying your customers. Instead make your customers successful and the story you are talking about, my wife and I walked into a store and we asked to see a particular kind of bed. And this woman said to me ‗so what‘s the concept?‘

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56 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ I said what? She said ‗what‘s the concept?‘ And right away my ears pricked up when I said to her ‗well you don‘t need to know that. I‘ve just told you the kind of bed I am looking for, can you show it to me please?‘ She said ‗no, I do need to know that because if I understand what you are trying to do, then I may have a better solution for you than this bed.‘ Brilliant, absolutely brilliant and as it turned out she did have a better solution and yes it cost me more money and two years later I‘m still delighted that I paid more. Graham: So first of all we‘ve got to build trust. So ok we‘ve built trust with somebody, we‘ve asked questions, we‘ve engaged them if you like. We‘ve shown we have a genuine interest in finding out what their need is, what problems they have and now we are in a position to give them solutions. So how do we then sell our price perhaps against some of our competitors when our price is going to be higher? Ian: The first step is to understand that the customer is going to ask how much something is and so we should be prepared for that. We should not be put off by that, not surprised by that, not embarrassed by that, we just say exactly what it is. Now what we need to understand though is what that price represents and that price represents the cost of the solution. We all know we are selling solutions to customer‘s problems so that price of the product is in fact the cost of the solution. Now the trick to selling that to the customer is to help them to see that the problem is costing them more money than the solution. Because the trouble with human beings is we start to think that there are free lunches so I think well do I want to spend $150 having my car serviced this week or don‘t I? That‘s not the choice I have. The choice is do I want to spend $150 or run the risk of spending $500 or $1,000

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57 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ in a few weeks or month‘s time or spending 10% more on fuel which is going to add up pretty quickly because I‘m running an engine that‘s inefficient? So we should help the person to understand not just that they have a problem, they‘ve told us that, but we should have been working with them to find out what the cost of that problem is. So for example to give you a true life story, a friend of mine sells pumps and things and he was dealing with a former client of mine who owns the freezing works in a small provincial town in New Zealand. He phoned me up one day and he said I‘ve just been talking to your friend and I knew what was going to happen because this guy who owns a freezing works has the reputation for being a very innovative business man but a very cheap bastard. And he said I‘ve just been talking to your friend and I said oh yeah how he is doing. Oh he‘s as cheap and stingy as ever. I said what‘s the problem? He said well I went up there the other day and they need a new pump, it‘s worth $15,000 and he‘s too cheap to spend the money. I said how do you know he needs a new pump and the guy said well because I was talking to other people on the shop floor and the water pressure is down and so I traced it back and there was this pump that‘s not working properly and it needs to be replaced and it‘s only $15,000. I said ‗well who cares that the water pressure is down?‘ And he said ‗well the guys on the shop floor do because it takes them longer to clean up.‘ So I said ‗and how many times a day have they got to clean up‘ and he said ‗three times a day‘ and I said how ‗much longer do you reckon it‘s taking you each time‘ and he said about 20 minutes. So I said well that‘s an hour. Now this guy happens to have a tolling operation, he doesn‘t own the animals he processes he just gets paid per head and this happened to be a venison plant. So I said ‗what‘s he getting paid a deer these days?‘ and he said about $225. I said ‗and how many can he process in an hour?‘ and the guy says about 7

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58 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ So I said well this guy‘s choice then is he pays $15,000 for a new pump or he pays $1,500 a day on lost productivity, is that what you are telling me? And my friend said well I think I know the conversation I need to have with him. He phoned the fellow up the next day and said ‗look I want to talk to you about this pump‘ and the guy said ‗I told you I‘m not interested in buying any.‘ He said ‗yeah that‘s all right just want to make sure you understand that your choice is $15,000 for a new pump or $1,500 a day in lost productivity.‘ The guy said well ‗how do you figure that? And he told him and the guy bought the pump because he‘s cheap but he ain‘t stupid. This is what we need to help people to understand. Here are your choices. One of my clients has a chain of stores around New Zealand and it‘s a very competitive market and they say to me ‗what do you do when somebody comes into our store, we‘ve got all the product knowledge and they pick our brains and then they walk across the mall and go into a store where people don‘t know anything and they are just product flogging but their TVs are 10% or 15% cheaper?‘ I said what you is that while you are showing the person this particular TV and telling them about it you just say to them ‗by the way you know you could buy this same TV across the mall don‘t you for probably 10% or 15% less?‘ And the fact you raised it people are going to start thinking well hang on why is he telling me this? Then you say ‗I don‘t know if they do home setups or whatever but I can tell you that if you buy this TV we won‘t send it home in a box, we will come and do this and there may be a charge to it, for $30 we will come and install it in and do this etc.‖ Now I don‘t know if they do this but we do and you are just planting the seeds of doubt about what the other people might do or might not do and so basically you are saying to the customer you have a choice.

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59 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ You can pay 10% or 15% more and get xy and z from us or you can take your chance across the mall, save yourself 15% but you don‘t get x, y and z and if it turns out that you need them, you are going to end up spending a lot more money or being inconvenienced because you are at home and you‘ve got this TV you want to watch and you can‘t get it to work. That‘s the way we‘ve got to approach things so we are getting people to see that the cost of the solution is actually less than the cost of the problem or the potential problem they could have if they don‘t buy or they buy an inferior product or service from another supplier. But we also need to show people that our product is probably not going to just solve one problem. It will solve some other problems and therefore there‘s some additional value. We have wonderful products today that contain a lot of value but we don‘t teach customers how to extract that value. So the customer sees it‘s there or they know it‘s there but they can‘t use it so therefore it may as well not be there as far as the customer is concerned. I was working with a company in New Zealand, and they sell automotive paint and they came out with an innovative primer for small repair jobs that panel beaters could use. It was in a spray can and you sprayed it on the job and under UV lights it cured in about 2 to 3 minutes. Well most primers take around 1 to 2 hours to cure so right away you can see that the cost saving by having a fast-curing primer but this primer also solved some other problems. If you sprayed it onto a part of car that didn‘t need to be repairs it would just wipe off whereas other primers stick and then you‘ve got a major problem. So now you could have the 15 year old apprentice at $15 an hour doing the work rather than the expensive tradesman at $35 an hour. Also why do young apprentices join the panel beater because they want to paint and what don‘t you let them do for 2 or 3 years? Paint. So they get fed up and leave but now with this kind of primer you can get

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60 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ them involved in the painting much earlier and that motivates them and keeps them longer. So you see that one little tin solves a number of problems and every time you are solving a problem you are saving a customer money and we start adding those up and then all you need the customer to see is that what they are saving is far greater than what they are spending. Graham: Excellent. I like the way you‘ve done that because in this case that example, you‘ve saved them the problem of staff turnover, having to hire new staff, having unmotivated staff because they are not doing what they want to do and a whole host of other problems all with this one little new product they have. Ian: Exactly, and then if the company understands that it‘s all about the customer experience and that what matters to customers are things like time and reduced effort. In other words the faster we can do things and the easier we can make it for our customers, then the more value we are creating for them. So if you build a company that will do that then you can also turn around to the customer and say and there‘s one more thing that because you are doing business with us then we are faster and we are easier to do business with and we are more reliable and that‘s going to save you money because you are not dealing with some inefficient organisation that‘s going to give you the run around. If we come back to the notion of value and price, one of the traps that people fall into is that they don‘t understand the value is created in three areas not just one. So for example I get people say to me ‗look mate we sell this glass and we sell it for $3.00 and customers come in and say I can get exactly the same glass, same manufacturer, same design, same quality next door for 50 cents less and then they say to me well what are you going to say when that happens?‘ Obviously you‘ve got to match the price and I say ‗no‘ only some of the value is in the glass, some of the value comes because they are buying it from your

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61 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ store, not their store and are you more efficient? Do you have better stock? Do you have better product knowledge? Do you offer a better guarantee? A no questions asked refund. So if you are adding in value, extra value over the guy next door, then you don‘t need to be matching his price but there‘s a third area of value and that is they are buying it from you personally. So you should be saying to the customer you are buying the same glass but you are buying it from this store not that store and you are buying it from me and I care about you and I will look after you and I will make sure that there are not problems with that glass and you want a dozen by the weekend, I‘ll make sure you‘ve got them by Friday and if necessary I‘ll bring them out or whatever. And I say to people if between your company and you, you are not adding another 50 cents worth of value, that‘s where the problem is, not that the guy next door is charging 50 cents less. The fact is you haven‘t created any additional value so therefore you have no competitive advantage. I mean I‘ve said the price isn‘t the main issue but I was not completely honest. There is one situation where price is the issue and that is when a customer looks at two offerings and says they are identical. So there‘s a same amount of about this product whether it‘s from Company A or B and in that case if they say their product is identical or the company is identical, the level of service from the people I deal with is identical then obviously they are going to pay less. So that‘s why I said right at the beginning business is an activity of two halves, a game of two halves. First of all you‘ve got to create the value and then sell it and as long as you have created more value than the person next door and you know how to sell it then you don‘t have to match the price.

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62 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Graham: Right, and I think I was reading in your book ―Persuade Customers to Pay More‖ that even just something like a 1% increase in price, talking about increasing prices now, has a huge difference to the bottom line of any organisation doesn‘t it, particularly some of the major ones. Ian: Well it does and the scary thing is if you look at it the other way around, that if you are working on a profit margin of something like 18% and you drop your price by say 10%, you‘ve got to sell something like 5 or 6 times as much to make the same amount of money. I say to people what do you reckon your chances are next month of doing 5 times the sales you did this month? Well not at all. And so people don‘t understand that you can‘t afford to discount. It really does dent the business very, very significantly. Graham: Excellent. Well I have to say you‘ve covered some excellent ideas so far. What I‘ve learnt so far is that it‘s not about the price, it‘s about the value but first of all we have to sell the value to our clients. So we have to build trust, we have to show them that we understand about helping them solve their problems or identify what the things are they are actually looking for, and also we can build value in a variety of different areas. It‘s not just in the area of price or what the one thing is a product or service does, often a product or service can actually solve a lot of different problems for a potential client and we need to actually explain what those are and really build the value because if the value is high enough it‘s very easy to persuade customers to pay a lot more. Ian: Well exactly and if you get people to think about who they do business with in their own personal lives, we have on our fridge two little fridge magnets, one of a plumber and one of an electrician. And if anything goes wrong in the house then that‘s where we turn. Those magnets are there because we have learned over the years that these are people who will come when you need them, they will turn up when they say

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63 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ they are going to turn up, they will do a good job and they will clean up after themselves. Now I couldn‘t tell you what they charge compared to what anybody else charges and I don‘t want to know. What I know is that over the years I‘ve had a lot of people who didn‘t come when I wanted them to or they said they‘d come and didn‘t show up or they came and didn‘t a very good job or they created a hell of a mess behind them so all of us in our private lives we have certain people that we rely on. We go to the same garage. We might buy petrol from the same petrol station and we might go to the same hairdresser because they know us and we know them and we probably don‘t know what we are paying in those places compared to somewhere else. Well that‘s exactly the situation you want to create with your customers and that comes from creating value in the product, it comes from creating value from the company and creating value from yourself as a person that people can trust and do business with. Underneath it all there has to be a fundamental understanding that the aim in business is to have profitable customers who stay for a long time not just customers who stay for a long time. So there are some people that we just don‘t want to do business with. There are some people who don‘t want to pay the price that we need to charge and that‘s fine. I have people ring me up all the time and say we‘d like you to come and speak at a conference, are you available and yes I am, and what do you get paid? And I tell them and ‗oh that‘s about twice what we had budgeted.‘ I say well look there are a lots of people who will speak at that price but I‘m not one of them. Let me give you some names. Because that‘s just not the market that I‘m in. And I know full well that as soon as I drop down to meet that price then I have eroded my price elsewhere and next thing you know I will be busy but not very profitable.

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64 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________

Graham: So what‘s the best resource to start with in terms of where should people go to find out more of this information? What‘s your website? Ian:

www.ianbrooks.com

As you say Graham there‘s a lot of free information there, free tools that I‘ve created or collected over the years. I‘ve written 16 books and there are books on creating customer value, in building a company that can deliver that value, and the book you‘ve mentioned persuades your customers to pay more so there is a range of stuff there. It‘s interesting two of my books, one of ―Creating Customer Value‖ and one ―Persuade your Customers to Pay More‘, have also been translated to Portuguese and sold in Brazil. ―Persuade your Customers to Pay More‖ is one of the top five best selling sales books ever in Brazil and that‘s because you‘ve got markets of people who are really hungry to know how to do it better. The danger in New Zealand is that we are just not hungry enough or we are just too scared to tackle, to learn how to sell the value and we fail to do that at our peril really. It‘s costing us big dollars. Graham: Excellent and I do know that a lot of the time the fear of putting up our prices, we think people will leave but it‘s actually not true is it. I have a very good friend who actually took over as the CEO of one of the largest freight companies in the country a number of years ago. They did an excellent job, but they were losing money every month. He said ‗we have to put our prices up by 10%‘ and every single person in the company said ‗you can‘t do that, freight is extremely competitive, customers will leave.‘ He said no, no, no, you hired me as CEO that‘s what we are going to do. So the next week he put up every single price in the company by 10% overnight and out of 3,000 customers three complained, one left and suddenly they started making 2 million dollars a year profit.

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65 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Ian: It‘s amazing isn‘t it? I once gave a speech and then afterwards interacted in a social environment with some of the audience and I got cornered by a couple who owned a small grocery store on the edge of Christchurch. They said to me look we‘ve got this problem that we are busy but we are not earning enough money. We are barely breaking even. So I said tell me something about your customers. And she said well most of them come between 4.00 and 6.00 at night and I said ok well then you‘ve got people who are convenience shopping. Price isn‘t going to be the issue. What does matter is that you‘ve got a good range, and that you are well stocked so people don‘t go home empty handed and have no dinner but the price isn‘t going to be the issue. So what I suggest you do is you put your prices up by 5% to 10%. Well they were horrified. And they had every reason in the world why you couldn‘t do that and just like the people at your friend‘s company I mean it‘s a competitive industry and the people could shop here and they could go there and they could do something else. Anyway I must have spent 2 hours trying to convince them and at the end of it I said look I am sorry I can‘t think of anything else I can say. And I left them to it. Well about 3 months later I happened to be walking down the street in the community where they lived and I happened to run into that woman and she said listen we thought about it and we decided that we had no alternative. So she said on a Friday night we sent all the staff home and we just had family come in and we re-priced everything by increasing it by 5%. We didn‘t tell anybody and we didn‘t want anybody to know, didn‘t want staff or customer to know we just put the prices up 5%. She said to this day nobody has noticed. So not only do people not care, they didn‘t even notice and there‘s a lot of research that shows that if you go to somebody and say excuse me why did you buy this? Oh because it was the best price. How much

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66 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ was it? Oh I‘m not sure, was it $5.95 or $4.95. Anyway what would it have cost you if you‘d gone across the street? Oh it would have been more expensive. How much more? Oh I don‘t know but I am pretty sure it... people don‘t know. They just don‘t know. Rarely do people go around and do that comparative shopping. Let‘s make a list of the prices in this store and the price in that. Where that does happen is where somebody like your wife was looking for a particular computer, they have one thing in mind, they go to a number of places but as soon as they are engaged and they build a relationship and they think hey I like this person, they know their stuff, I am going to get the solution I want right away, price becomes a secondary issue. Graham: Excellent. One last thing Ian, this will be most helpful just to finish up on. You are speaking to 100, 150 or more business audiences every year, what‘s one more thing that would help them be more effective in business in any area? Ian: I would tell them that it‘s about the customer always and that most of the problems that we suffer from, that we have we have because we have neglected the customer. We think it‘s about location. We think it‘s about our premises. We think it‘s about us and our policies. We think it‘s about our product and our services and it‘s not. It‘s about the customer and the organisations that I work with that put the customer first find that they then don‘t have problems with price or competing on any level. It‘s all about creating such a fantastic customer experience that you turn your customers into believers and if they are sold on you personally and they are sold on your business and they are sold on that product then price isn‘t going to be the issue. They won‘t go anywhere else, they‘ll buy, they‘ll buy more, they‘ll come back and they‘ll tell others about

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67 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ you and all of a sudden you‘ve got what‘s known as the unfair advantage. Graham: Fantastic. Ian, thank you very much for sharing such great ideas today. Ian: It‘s been my pleasure Graham. Action Exercise: I love the ideas that Ian has shared here today on how to persuade your customers to pay more. I suggest you do three things right now. 1: Go to Ian‘s site at www.Ianbrooks.com and order a copy of his outstanding book ‗Persuade your customers to pay more. It is one of the best books I have ever read on how to get customers keen to pay higher prices for products and services. It will be one of the best investments you ever make. 2: Make a list of all the value you offer your customers and identify the value of the problems that you solve for them. 3: Spend more time building trust and rapport with people and less time talking about price. Remember that customers only focus on price because that‘s how we have trained them to think. We need to show them that the value we offer is worth far more than the extra money we are asking them to spend.

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68 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ 6: Cindy Cashman The high value of great questions and follow up

Reprinted with permission

Graham McGregor: In this interview for the Unfair Business Advantage Report it‘s my great pleasure to be talking to one of the most creative business people I know, Cindy Cashman. Cindy it‘s great to have you on the call today. Cindy: Thank you. Graham: Cindy just before we get started, could you give our readers some quick background about some of the things you‘ve done in business over the years? Cindy: Sure, Graham. I‘ve always been very creative and it‘s probably something to do with the fact that I didn‘t learn to read until I was 21. However I was always very good at things like gymnastics and sports. I started working when I was 13. At that time I was coaching gymnastics and I was making close to $40 an hour. Which was a wonderful income for someone who was only 13. People would ask me ‗Would you teach my four- or five- or six year old how to do a cartwheel, handspring, forward roll?‘ I said ‗Sure‘. I then asked the question ‗What should I charge for this? And where can I get a free place to teach this?

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69 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ So I just asked the school if I could use the gym, and since I was 13 they never charged me rent! Fast forward quite a few years and it‘s now the mid 80‘s (1986, 1987.) I was selling real estate in Southern California and absolutely hated it. So my partner and I put together a publishing company and started selling our first book called ―Everything men know about women.‖ It was written under a pseudonym, Dr Alan Frances and it is 128 blank pages. We started our company with only $3,000 and everybody said I was crazy, even my own mother said ‗You are going quit real estate to sell a blank book?‘ And the thing is Graham I loved this blank book idea. I thought if I feel this way I know there are a lot of other women that could also feel this way. So what I want to share with your readers is the first question I ask myself in any business project is ‗who is my market?‘ And I think a lot of people don‘t even take the simple time out just to ask some basic simple questions like this. ‗Who is my market?‘ Well my answer was real easy, Women. And then my second question was ‗where do they go? Well women go shopping in places like clothing stores. Now with my book ‗Everything Men Know About Women‘ I did not want to try and sell it through the bookstores for a very simple reason. Bookstores will have thousands of different titles and my book would be competing with all these titles. Instead I started calling clothing stores and mailing them a sample of my book. And then followed up with a phone call and tell them how well it‘s been selling in other stores. The catchy title of the book would make ladies pick it up. They would laugh when they saw the book was blank and then buy a number of copies to give as gifts to their girl friends. I initially just sold to places like ladies clothing stores, I think I sold ¼ million copies within a very short time. I

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70 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ ended up selling 1.3 million copies in less than 3 years. Graham: So the key here is you keep things simple by asking those two basic questions. What is my market or who is my market and where do they go? That opens up all sorts of interesting possibilities as to how you can market to possibly new people you haven‘t thought of before or even if you like through new marketing channels you might not have thought of before. Is that pretty well what you‘ve done? Cindy: Absolutely and I live my life based on intuition. I speak on intuition in business and I often ask another question, ‗what creative way can I sell my products? Is there a way out there that nobody else is doing? Is there somebody I can piggy back ride on?‘ There‘s a series of questions you can be asking and then you pay attention to the thoughts or flashes of genius as I call it, that pop into your mind out of nowhere. Graham: Have you got any other creative ways that people have either sold their products after hearing you speak or even some ways you‘ve sold some of your own products that are creative, a little different from normal if you like? Cindy: Yes. I sent a copy of my blank book to a party plan company and I followed up. This is another huge key to success in business. Follow up, follow up, follow up. I kept calling her back and calling her back. I‘d call her back every 2 to 4 weeks and finally (after six months) I asked her. ‗Anne-Marie, I can handle a yes and believe it or not I can handle a no. It‘s the ‗I don‘t know‘ that I‘m having a hard time with because she kept saying to me I don‘t know. Is your company ready to take my book, and she kept saying I don‘t know. What do I need to do in order to sell to your company? And by being real direct she said to me oh well we like books custom made just for our company. We don‘t want your name anywhere on it. We don‘t want your

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71 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ company name anywhere on it. We want something specialized just for us. I said ‗awesome, thank you.‘ I said I will put something together for you today and Fed Ex it to you. And I did. I actually got out my son‘s colour crayons and I came up with a title just for their company and it was along the same lines. It was still a blank book, like my ‗Everything Men know about Women.‘ I named this book for their company and I Fed Exed this one sheet of paper with their President‘s name on it and their company address. I called her the very next day and I said ‗Anne-Marie did you get what I sent you?‘ and she said ‗yes we love it.‘ We will take 25,000 copies to start with. Graham: Wow. Cindy: Now it is a big wow because how many people number one would have given up after the 2nd or 3rd phone call. Number two, how many would have been brave enough to come back and ask a direct question, what do I need to do in order to sell to your company? In other words I am saying ‗hey teach me how to sell to your company.‘ I‘ve got to tell you that was really, really a lot of fun because I could have easily given up. Something else I do that really helps is this. Every morning I‘d get up and jump on my trampoline and get myself psyched up and I would literally ‗say who can I have fun selling to today?‘ Because selling as we know is a transfer of energy and I do love to sell. Selling is fun especially on the products I believe in strongly. I can sell things I believe in and I believed in my blank book because I knew‘ Everything Men know about Women‘ is a profound message in its simplest form. It brings lots of smiles, lots of laughter to people literally all over the world. I‘ve sold the rights I believe to lots of different countries now on my book Everything Men know about Women. So one day I‘m jumping up and I‘m asking ‗who can I have fun selling to today?‘

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72 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________

I mention intuition and all of a sudden out of nowhere the thought pops in ‗the United States Marines.‘ So I get off my trampoline and I go to the phone book and again we are talking around 1989 or 1990 something like that, and I call Camp Pempleton. (Which is a place in Southern California.) , I was living in Southern California at the time and I just said ‗who can I talk to that‘s in charge of buying books for the PX‘s?‘ The guy asked me questions and he said ‗listen lady you are wasting your time. You are a one book publisher, we do not buy from one book publishers.‘ I said I‘m willing to take my chance and so I got an appointment with him and when I showed him the blank book Graham he looked at it and he literally said to me ‗I don‘t get it.‘ I couldn‘t believe it. This is the first time anyone had ever said to me, I don‘t get it. I had to think really quick on my feet and all I said was well please show it to your boss, not knowing what to expect. Well I went home and a few days later I get a call and he said to me ‗I cannot believe it, we are buying your book for our PX‘s, my boss is a woman. ‗ Graham: I love it. So one of the things you would advise business people to do in any business first of all just ask a couple of very simple questions each day in their business. Like for example something you‘ve done which has worked remarkably well, who can I have fun selling to, today? It‘s a pretty simple question but obviously it‘s generated all sorts of interesting answers. What are some other questions that business owners would find helpful to ask to help them improve their results? Cindy: Well I do have a book the Million Dollar Question Handbook that I sell via my website at www.CindyCashman.com A lot of my questions again are real simple and I think I said the most important ones here are ‗who can I have fun selling to, who‘s my market, where do they go to? What unique places do they go to? Is there

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73 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ somebody already reaching my market place that I can team up with? Are there other products I can come out with?‘ In fact I just had the one book and then within 5 years I think I had about 10 books because my buyers were asking me ‗what else do you have?‘ And I said ‗well what else do you want?‘ And they said‘ well we want more books for women‘ and so I came out with this series of books for women. Life Lessons for Women, Life Lessons for Mothers and Life Lessons for Couples and others. These are at www.CindyCashman.com and again it call came down to asking questions, not being afraid to follow up and asking for the sale. Graham: One of the things I think I‘ve picked up on what you‘ve said so far and also the other articles I‘ve read about you is that you get into action very quickly. So if you come up with an idea ‗let‘s check out clothing stores or let‘s check out the military or let‘s do this, you will actually take action generally that same day or immediately. Cindy: Yeah normally when a thought pops in mind sometimes I‘ll take action within minutes. In fact some friends will say that I have a PhD in Action. I am very quick at taking action. Graham: And the thing about taking action of course is that sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn‘t. But because you‘ve got your PhD in Action you can try 50 things in a month when the average person is still thinking about trying one. They haven‘t actually made a decision. You‘ve gone and tried 50 and you‘ve probably found 5 or 10 that work fantastically. Because not everything you do works quite so well. I think it would be quite useful just to talk about one of the interesting learning lessons you had about an idea you thought would make you a fortune and that was the Hawaiian tea plant wasn‘t it? Cindy: It‘s so funny Graham, because a lot of people say I‘m an overnight success or whatever and I actually tried 22 different business ventures that did not make me money before I got rich.

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74 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________

And one of them was that Hawaiian tea plant. When I had my son I was determined to find a way to make money staying at home. So I bought all these Hawaiian tea plants and I was supposed to make all this money. However they all ended up rotting in my closet and it didn‘t matter because I only sold about 3 of them. I have got lots of those stories on things I have tried that didn‘t work. I think it‘s important for people to know you just say ‗hey next.‘ And the thing about taking action it‘s real important is that ‗if you don‘t ask you automatically have a no. So why not ask?‘ Graham: That‘s fantastic. Are you still doing a lot of speaking right now to business groups and other organizations? Is that part of what you do around the world? Cindy: Yes. I love speaking and I love inspiring people and my number one key note is intuition in business and I do share a lot of motivational stories. In fact one lady when I spoke in Philadelphia she had paid this guy $15,000 to be a coach and she came up to me after my one hour key note and said I have to tell you I learnt more from your one hour key note than paying $15,000 to this guy. That‘s really powerful. Graham: Let‘s say you are talking to a business group or even a single business owner right now. A lot of business people today are finding it possibly a little bit more challenging than it was 5 or 10 years ago. So what‘s one little message that you would like to share with business owners or sales people right now that you think could help them a lot? Cindy: Well in 1991 we were going through a recession here in the United States and when I would call up the clothing stores they would say ‗well we got a recession going on.‘ And I would say ‗I know and people still like to buy so they are going to buy more of the inexpensive items and my book was inexpensive.‘ And it was so interesting they go ‗oh yeah you are right.‘ I mean I would sell $15,000 of books here, $25,000 here. I mean I literally sold the books by the thousands. I didn‘t argue with them, I agreed with them. ‗I know there is a recession going on and at the

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75 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ same time people still like to spend and give gifts. They will cut down, they maybe not buy the $20 gift but they are going to buy that $5 gift or whatever‘ and it was true and still is true. I mean we‘ve got a recession going on here in the United States today, people have cut back quite a bit but they still want to buy. They are still going to buy some gifts and so they are going to be more selective with what they buy. So I would say it goes back to how much do you believe in what you are selling? If you don‘t believe in what you are selling, then I suggest they find something else. You‘ve got to believe in what you are selling and if you are passionate about what you are selling, your energy is going to come through and then of course the people, there‘s got to be a need out there or a desire to buy what you have. I mean it‘s been since 1988 so what are we looking at, 23 years, my book Everything Man know about Women is still selling today. Graham: That‘s amazing, 23 years later and it‘s still a blank book that is selling well. I think you came out with you 20th anniversary edition which is available still right now through Amazon and also through your own website on www.CindyCashman.com I remember in one of your other interviews you were saying if you had a choice of 2 or 3 different things to do in terms of activities you could get involved with, you always ask yourself ‗which one is going to be the most fun?‘ And that‘s the one you go with regardless if the other one potentially could make more money. You say ‗which one is more fun?‘ And invariably the one you have more fun you actually end up making more money anyway. Cindy: Yes, fun and laughter is a huge part of my life. One of the ways that I sold my book was a company

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76 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ called me and they used it as their number one door opener for salesmen to get in the door simply because it made people laugh. Graham: Thanks for sharing such useful ideas today Cindy I really appreciate it. Cindy: You are very welcome and it‘s been great to talk with you. Action Exercise: One of the things I love about what Cindy shared is how simple her ideas are. You start by asking great questions like ‗Who can I have fun selling to today?‘ Or ‗Who is my market?‘ Sometimes by asking a question like this you can unlock hidden markets for what you sell. I discovered a ‗hidden market‘ many years ago when I was selling a motivational seminar to improve performance and productivity. I was chatting to a client who had sent one of his top performing salespeople on this motivational seminar. He did this because he thought it would be a nice way to express his appreciation for the great work this sales person had done. (It wasn‘t to improve the performance of this person.) I quickly realized there was a huge ‗hidden market‘ for our motivational seminar. The market was business people with staff they wanted to show appreciation to. (This was a very large market.) So I began explaining how our seminar could help business people say 'thanks' to some of their key staff. The end result was brand new sales every month from a previously 'hidden market.' A huge key to Cindy‘s success is follow up with people. You can do this in a low key and very friendly way and it‘s amazing how often that will result in new business. Read my own interview in the Unfair Business Advantage Report on how to do this using what I call the ‗Added Value Dripping Tap.‘

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77 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Remember that with follow up you want to stay in touch with three important groups of people. Existing clients and customers. Potential clients and customers. Centres of influence who can recommend large numbers of new clients or large amounts of ne w business to you. And finally, get into action. Cindy has a PHD in action and that‘s one of the biggest reasons for her success. I love her comment that if you don‘t ask you automatically get a no. So why not ask? In other words, try a few things. So ask some great questions that could help you improve your business results. Then take action on some of the answers you get. And always pay close attention to how you feel about something. If you are excited and positive about an idea there is an excellent chance that this is a great idea to take action on. I highly recommend you visit Cindy‘s website on www.CindyCashman.com as well.

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78 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ 7: Fred Catona The Profit Power of Direct Response Radio

Reprinted with permission

Graham McGregor: In this interview for the Unfair Business Advantage Report it‘s my great pleasure to be talking to advertising and direct response legend Fred Catona. Fred is the Founder and Chief Marketing Strategist for Bulldozer Digital www.Bulldozerdigital.com Fred developed and pioneered Direct Response Radio, an extremely effective method to generate sales and sales leads that is easily manageable, measurable and cost effective. Fred used this methodology to help launch Priceline.com whose valuation grew to $20 billion in just 24 months. Fred has been featured in the Wall Street Journal, USA Today, Philadelphia Inquirer, Entrepreneur Magazine and over 100 TV, radio, magazine and online media outlets. Fred, it‘s great to have you on the call today. Fred Catona: Well thank you it‘s a pleasure speaking with you Graham. Graham: Before we get started can you just tell our readers a bit about your background and how you got

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79 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ into some of the things that we are going to talk about in a moment? Fred: Sure. I‘m a direct response marketer and my expertise lies in radio. I founded the first ever advertising company that use uses radio to sell products so that was back in the mid 90‘s and we were marginally successful. And then the dot com thing hit and we became a little bit more than marginally successful. We launched www.priceline.com from start up to a billion in sales in 18 months and 20 billion in valuation in 24 months. Just using direct response radio. A lot of people have never heard those two words together ‗direct response‘ and ‗radio‘. It‘s just like any type of direct response, it‘s just like an article except in a radio commercial it‘s 60 seconds long, has about 150 to 160 words and you do everything that you would do in a direct response sales letter. You have an opening which is your grabber, you have a unique selling proposition and we always put in a free offer in order to drive tremendous leads and you have testimonials and all that ends up with a very compelling offer to drive you to either to a phone centre or to a URL. That‘s how it works and I‘ve been doing it for 15 years. By now we have it down to a science and our advertising agency, Bulldozer Digital, that‘s all we do. All we do all day long is create the creative for radio spots and then we place that creative all over the United States and Canada. That‘s our business. Graham: Fantastic. I‘m intrigued if you can take a company from start up to doing literally a billion dollars in sales in 18 months and 20 billion dollars in valuation in the same time. You are obviously doing something pretty right at the end of the day to say the least.

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80 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Fred: When I started off I didn‘t have any money at all. I was a school teacher. I was making $17,000 and I asked my wife whether she thought our kids, I said do you think our kids are smart enough to go to college? And she said ‗no, but they are going to want to go anyway‘ so I needed another way to make a living so I went into the advertising field. So I started with no money and even wrote a product on how to do it and how to get free radio advertising. I started with free radio advertising and then once I learned the ropes then I started buying my radio advertising and then I started buying national radio advertising and that‘s where the big hit is. Graham: Obviously we‘ve got a lot of business people from all around the world that are going to reading this so first of all what are a couple of recommendations you will give business owners reading this right now on how they can use direct response radio in their business? Why should they use it? Fred: Well I have a broad background in direct response marketing and marketing in general. I‘d say the biggest mistake people make is they take their budget no matter how big or small it is and they start doing radio, TV, the internet, print, direct mail, they are advertising on the back of bathroom doors and so on. Effectively they‘ve taken their budget and they‘ve diluted it so much that they are everywhere but at the same time they are not anywhere because they are just too thin in the market. With radio if you take a budget you can buy a lot of radio for a little bit of money. So what I always recommend to entrepreneurs, break through on radio first. It‘s inexpensive, it‘s fast, doesn‘t cost much to produce and you can find the right message fast because you

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81 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ can change your message almost every day without a great amount of effort. You don‘t have to go into lights, camera, action like you have to do with TV. Once you find your message and you get a response then you can start going into other channels of distribution. But I always recommend radio first because it‘s inexpensive and it‘s fast and it‘s easy. Graham: And also you work out very quickly what works and what doesn‘t work. If it gets a response it obviously works, if it doesn‘t, it doesn‘t so you try something else. Fred: Exactly. Well I would say a great percentage of our clients come to us and they say ‗you know we really want to do radio but we‘ve tried it before and it didn‘t work‘ and I say to them ‗where did you try it?‘ and they say ‗oh we tried it in Chicago.‘ I say ‗and what did you pay for a 60 second commercial?‘ ‗We paid $125‘ and I ask ‗Did it pay off?‘ ‗No‘ or ‗almost‘ is what they often say. I say ‗well for what you paid $125 for I could probably buy for $7.‘ Now local radio is the most expensive radio you can buy. When you package it in a national package it becomes 5, 6, 7,10 times less money so the trick is that it‘s very hard to make something pay off just going locally. You can test it locally to see you get a response in your conversion but when you go to national all you do is have to extrapolate, just take your results and multiply times 5 or 10. That‘s how you make big money in direct response radio. Graham: I‘ve never ever heard of figures like that before. It‘s quite an eye opener to me and I‘ve been in business for a few decades now.

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82 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ So tell me, I know that you also combine direct response radio with the internet. How does that work? Fred: We created a system called Digital Convergence Marketing™ where all marketing efforts funnel to a single entity which is the sale and here‘s the way we do it. Radio is pervasive. That means it can get anywhere all the time. In the United States there are 10,000 radio stations. We can reach the whole population of the United States, 300 million people in about 5 days so it‘s pervasive. Once a person hears our commercial we drive them to a micro website (or a squeeze page as some people call it.) And on that squeeze page we deliver to them the free offer that we made on the radio commercial. That free offer is usually an eBook, special report, an analysis, something that doesn‘t cost money but is important and valuable. We exchange that freebie in exchange for their email. We are trying to give them something more valuable than they are giving us. So they are giving us their email and we are giving them this very valuable report. At that point in time when they go to that micro site a small percentage of the people buy your core product, say 5%. What happens to the other 95%? The other 95% you send emails to on an auto responder system but the emails are not just ‗buy now‘ messages, they are more great information. So the person is getting to know you, like you and trust you and eventually these people become customers as well. In addition to that if you are really cool, and you really know what you are talking about, and you are a nice person these same people want to join your social circle so they will read your blogs, they will get on your

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83 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Facebook account, they will get on your Twitter account. Again what they are getting to do, they are getting to know, like and trust you and these people also in your social circle eventually become customers as well. So for the $1 that you spent on radio advertising you now are sending them emails, you now have them in your social circle and that will take your lead cost really low and it will take your conversion rate very high. So it starts off on the radio but it ends up on the internet and in social media. So radio is pervasive and the internet is persuasive. That‘s how we work it. Graham: I like that. This is very clever actually because again a lot of the time I think a lot of people make the mistake of trying to make a sale the very first time they contact people. The figures I‘ve read show that maybe only one person in a hundred is thinking of buying any particular product right now like today. Whether it‘s a house or a car or beauty therapy or whatever, but maybe 30 or 40% are thinking about buying that product in the near to medium future. So obviously if you can capture all those names at the same time and stay in touch in a low key way you will make a lot more sales? Fred: You are exactly correct Graham. Just because we are ready to sell to them, doesn‘t mean that they are ready to buy. So we have to stay with them. We have to keep reminding them who we are, what we are doing, and why what we are selling is so great and that‘s the power of the internet. It‘s the power of social media. It keeps you in front of them. As a matter of fact here‘s a statistic for you that a lot of people will love.

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84 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ When we have a customer that doesn‘t purchase our core product we send them 15 more emails over let‘s say the next 30 days. Between the 8th and the 12th email 80% of all the people that are going to purchase, actually do purchase. Graham: Wow, so that‘s 8 to 12 times you‘ve got to contact them. And obviously if you only contact them once you are going to miss out on the majority of those sales. Fred: Contacting them just once is ridiculous. You have just wasted your money and you are being naive. Look how busy the average person is. They need to be convinced, they need to be reminded, in a nice way. I don‘t mean in your face type marketing. I am talking about valuable information they can use and that they see as being valuable. Then they will get to trust you and a person needs to trust you before they are going to purchase from you. Graham: Exactly right. Take me through a couple of interesting case studies that people could relate to for different businesses that you‘ve worked with. Fred: Sure. I will try to give a brick and mortar example first because a lot of the people listening are not internet marketers, they might be bricks and mortar company and they need to drive sales to themselves. So let me give you an example of a doctor we are working with. He was advertising in the newspaper and it cost him $125 for a lead. Graham: So when you say doctor you are talking about a chiropractic doctor or a normal doctor or a medical doctor or what? Fred: He was a specialist. He specialised in one thing and when a customer went to him they ended up spending an average of $1,000.

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85 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ So it was a pretty good sale and to make it even better about 50 to 60% of all the leads he got converted into a sale. So he came to us and he says ‗I am using print and my leads are costing me $125 and they burn out after 3 or 4 months. What do you suggest?‘ I said ‗well I‘m not magic and I don‘t have a crystal ball but I think I can beat your print results.‘ So we started doing radio ads and we used a trust element in the marketing. He wasn‘t using himself as the spokesperson and I said we are going to use the doctor as the spokesperson. So we had the doctor introduce himself. We had the doctor tell everybody what he did and we had testimonials from satisfied customers. We drove his lead cost down to around $33. This is from $125 down to $33. Because there‘s a principle in radio the more they hear you, the more they trust you. Now here’s another writer downer... Advertise between Tuesday and Thursday. Put all your commercials Tuesday through Thursday from 9.00 to about 4.00 in the afternoon. 9 to 4. Midday we call it. Midday cost is a lot less than drive times. Drive times, mornings and drive times afternoons are your most expensive. Don‘t buy overnights, don‘t buy weekends, don‘t buy evenings. Buy midday‘s Tuesday through to Thursday and you will have high frequency. I would suggest you put in anywhere from 15 commercials in that Tuesday through Thursday slot. You will get a lot of response because they are hearing your message a lot. And then refresh that message about once every 3 or 4 weeks. And you can keep it going for years.

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86 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Graham: Wow, simple as that and this strategy would obviously work anywhere in the world. It doesn‘t just have to work in the United States or Canada. Fred: Any place in the world that would work. Any type of professional can use that same thing whether you are a doctor, a lawyer, a dentist. Once your customer becomes your customer, if you are a dentist that customer is going to spent many, many thousands of dollars with you over their lifetime. So a lead is extremely valuable to a professional whether it be a lawyer or a doctor or a dentist or something like that. Graham: So the keys are; first of all you want to give people on the radio something valuable. You say, ‗look here‘s a common problem that people have‘. Let‘s say we‘ve got a lawyer, maybe a common problem might be protecting your assets in the case of a law suit or a business going bust or a marriage split up. Now I‘ve got a free report which shows you the 7 things you can do to protect your assets in the case of unexpected events or something like that and you can get it by going to this website or phoning this number. And if they go to the website they will give their email address for that particular free report which is targeted towards solving a problem that they might have. Then some of those people once they get the report will probably use that lawyer‘s services. The vast majority will not buy right now, but you will then stay in touch with those people with added value information, again from the lawyer, coming out on a regular basis. Here‘s something else you can do, here‘s something else that‘s useful etc. And a large number of those people are eventually going to convert into paying clients because they

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87 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ know, like and trust this person who is following up in a low key added value way. Is that pretty well the strategy behind what you are doing? Fred: Well I think you should come to work for us Graham. You got this thing down perfectly. It‘s exactly correct. That‘s the methodology. Now let‘s talk about people who have products, whether they be information products or whether they be hard products like if they sell CDs on how to get fit or how to diet or something like that. When we first started, remember I‘m called the father of direct response radio because I was the first person ever to start an advertising company that just focused on it. But in the beginning we didn‘t know how much products should sell for on the radio. We never mentioned a price but still we didn‘t know what we should be selling that could make radio pay out. So we started at $9.95 and $19,95, $29 $39, $59, $69... I can now give you the magic number. If you sell a product from a website and use direct response radio to promote it, your product has to sell for at least $150.00 or more and your mark up has to be at least 8 times. Here is how the figures actually look. • A response you need is 60 calls / visits for each $1,000 spent on media • 20% will convert to a sale so that‘s 12 sales. (To get 20% of responses converting into sales you need a good follow up and closing system using auto responders and added value messages over a period of time.) • 12 x 150 = $1800 • Your cost of goods was 150/8 = $18.75 (total $225 for 12 products)

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88 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ •

Your credit card charge was 3% of sales ($54)

•

5% of the people returned your product ($90)

• If you used a phone shop figure $2.50 per call (60 x 2.50 = $150)/ a website order has no cost – except the cost to build the website which is spread over years •

Your cost of media was $1,000

Here‘s what the profit numbers look like: 1. Media cost $1,000 2. Cost of goods: $225 3. Credit card fees: $54 4. Returned product: $90 5. Your phone bill was $150 6. Your total expense was: $1519 7. Your income was: $1800 8. You made $319 / 18% 9. Envision spending millions and you see how once an offer is tested people get rich in Direct response – just one phone call to your ad agency and its done So as long as you have an 8 times mark-up and your product was priced at least $150 you will have profit at the end. At least 8 times. So there‘s a metric, because a lot of people come to me and they say I‘m selling something for $19.95. I say ‗it‘s not going to work.‘ And they say well I could sell higher volume. I say I‘ve tried everything you can imagine for $19.95. In order to make radio payout, unless you have deep pockets, that product has to be $150 or more. Graham: With an 8 times market that means that the traditional clothing retailer or someone in a normal store it‘s not going to work for them really what you are suggesting? Or not. Fred: No, it will not. It will not work out unless they come into their store and when they go into their store they are spending $150 or more or $300 or $500.

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89 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Let‘s take a hypothetical offer for a suit store where the average sale is $700 and they have a profit margin of 50%. A successful direct response radio campaign looks like this. You spend $1,000 on radio advertising • You get 60 people come into your store to redeem your free offer (leads) •

Your cost of a lead is 1,000 / 60 = $16.66

•

20% of them buy a suit (conversion rate) 12

•

12 people buy a suit

•

Each suit has a profit margin of $350 (50%)

•

12 x 350 = $4,200

•

You made $3,200 gross profit

Plus the customer could easily come back over the next 5 years to buy a suit a year (which is even more profit) So when you analyse your numbers like this you can tell whether or not you can afford Direct Response Radio or not. Radio is very simple. The people that are reading this right now, they could be a 60 second commercial away from being greatly wealthy. However you often need to test things to find the formula that will work for your product or service or offer. Here’s a good example: There‘s a company called FreeCreditReport.com. It‘s now a billion dollar enterprise. I tested the first radio offer four times and four times it didn‘t work. The fifth time I did a little change on the radio headline which we call a ‗grabber‘ and the response went through the roof.

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90 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ So when I tell somebody, when I say listen you could be a 60 second commercial away from being wealthy, I mean it. I mean if you have something that‘s a great idea, a hot idea and you can translate that idea into a mass marketable message, and then you take that message and you put it on the radio and reach 50, 100 million people, you could be wealthy overnight almost. Graham: So what you encourage people to do in terms of marketing their products and services is this. You are getting them to think a lot bigger than what they traditionally do and probably even outside their normal local area if it‘s possible. Fred: Absolutely. Matter-of-fact your most expensive radio is locally. Once you go nationally then the price as I say goes down ten times what it was. If you are spending $100 for a local radio spot here in Philadelphia, that same spot if I package it in a national deal will cost me $7. So it‘s easier to make a profit when you go national with it. Graham: Could you tell me what‘s a good amount of money to spend doing this type of thing? Do you spend $5,000, $10,000, $20,000? Obviously if it‘s paying off and making you a profit you can spend whatever you want but what do typically people spend or is that not a fair question to ask? Fred: No, I think it‘s a great question to ask. A testing budget is probably $3,000 to $6,000. Graham: Ok, that‘s pretty doable for most businesses. Fred: Yeah, you are going to test at $3,000 to $6,000. Let‘s say your test works. You are getting the response you need and you are getting a good conversion but now you want to test nationally. You want to see if it holds up nationally. So what our company does is we try to replicate what we did locally nationally, we test them on the same type of radio format and that costs about $15,000.

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91 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ If that works you are rich because you can roll that out in 48 hours to the whole of the United States of America and you are going to get exactly the same results. So here‘s a question that I always get. I always get this question. They said ok we test locally it works. I say great. We test nationally and it works. I say great. They say now where are we going to get the money to spend anywhere, like I‘ve had the highest amount of money ever spent on radio was 2 million a week. Let‘s say a medium to large size company will spend with us $400,000 a week. So listen to this, they ask this question ‗How can we afford that? We don‘t have that type of money.‘ And my answer is this. If you have results from your local test and you have results from your national test, then people will line up to give you that money. They will line up to finance all your national advertising. So if you get that far with good test results then money is the least of your problems. Graham: So you can show them the proven results. You can say if we spend $100,000 here we are going to make $200,000 in profit or whatever the figure is, they are going to be quite happy to finance you to do that. Fred: Absolutely, because what happens is this. I will give you a ratio that people look at. For every dollar you spend on radio you should be bringing in $3 in sales. So if you spend a dollar you get $3 so if you spend a million you bring in $3 million so you just made $2 million gross profit.

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92 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Take out your cost of goods and returns, bad debt, credit card discounts, and you‘ve probably made yourself a million dollars. Graham: Wow, that‘s pretty profitable in anyone‘s viewpoint. Fred: I try to get people to think bigger so here‘s what I try to do. I am not successful all the time in doing this but this is what I try to get people to do. I try to push them out of small business mentality into larger business mentality. I mean it‘s the same amount of hours every week you are going to put in. Rather than just sell a product or service locally why not sell it nationally and make 100 times the income for the same amount of effort? Graham: That makes perfect sense Fred. I know you‘ve got a number of great resources on how to help people do this in their business. I think one of the things you do is you actually have a free analysis or a free consultation. How do they go about getting that? What‘s involved there? Fred: Well first of all we have a free white paper. If they go to www.Bulldozerdigital.com there‘s a free white paper there. Graham: And this shows them specifically some ideas on how to use the internet and direct response radio. I‘ve read this whitepaper myself and it‘s a great overview on why your systems work so well. Fred: I also have two very affordable information products on our website. One shows people how to use ‗Free Radio‘ to increase their sales and profits and the other goes into a lot more detail on how to make big money with direct response radio combined with the Internet.

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93 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Graham: You‘ve got two potential types of clients here that I see that are going to be reading this. Some of them are going to be located in the United States and Canada. I think a large number of them will be reading this located in those areas and I think for those people you also have a free consultation or a free analysis that will perhaps help them work out whether direct response radio and the internet is something they should consider for their business? Is that correct? Fred: We do give a free 20 minute consultation for those people that are serious about what they want to do. Regardless of where they live in the world. It doesn‘t matter where they are located, because the principles that we are discussing and I outline can be used anywhere by any advertising company. (Of course they may not be as good as us but they can still be used, they can still be done.) Graham: Basically anyone can take advantage of this consultation if they are serious about really getting great results in their business a lot bigger and better than they are getting right now. That‘s fantastic. Ok, a couple more things. I know you do give a lot of talks and you speak with a lot of business groups. What are some positive words of encouragement you can give any business people right now that are reading this? I know a lot of business people out there are saying that business is possibly a lot more difficult or tougher than it used to be. So what are your comments on that? Fred: Well entrepreneurs, bless their soles are people that are always pushing forward. They are always looking for an opportunity. The only way you can ever lose in business is if you quit because each time, I will tell you I mean we are only talking about my successes here.

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94 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ I‘ve made people billions of dollars. We could spend the next 3 or 4 hours on the phone talking about my failures. But I will tell you if you fail at something, you‘ve learned something and you‘ve learned a dear lesson. Just take that information that took place in that failure and eliminate it and augment your next marketing effort and you will be a success. Pretty soon you are an expert because you‘ve been around the block. To think that you are going to hit the ball out of the park the very first time you do something is naive. It‘s not the way it works. You stay in there, you join a marketing club, read Graham‘s stuff, read all you can and you will end up successful. Graham: Yeah, I think that‘s great advice. You‘ve got to remember that all these super successful entrepreneurs they had a lot of learning lessons along the way and we‘ve all had them and some of them cost us time and some of them cost us money and a lot of other things as well. And again if we learn from them we can certainly move ahead and get the results we finally want. I really like this idea of what you are doing Fred because it seems to be it‘s so simple in terms of getting it underway. I mean obviously there are finer points that you‘ve learned that make it super successful but anyone could actually do a direct response radio ad, get people coming to a website and then follow up with all the respondents. That doesn‘t sound that difficult to me to do or am I missing something? Fred: No. There are very few moving parts.

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95 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ I mean sometimes when we write things down on paper it seems simple but then when you go to execute it it‘s almost overwhelming. I mean if you want to literally to do marketing on radio, you could start on Monday and you can have a spot on the air by Wednesday and you could be making money by Friday. I mean that‘s how fast you can do it. See, as human beings you know what we do? We tend to over complicate things. Life isn‘t complicated. We make it complicated. Sometimes we make business too complicated. I don‘t know why. I think maybe we are afraid to face the music so we try to put a lot of detail in place instead of actually executing on it. Write a 60 second radio commercial with the right formula, put it on the air and collect money. It‘s that simple. One week from starting. Graham: That sounds very encouraging and that‘s one of the things I‘ve learned about business. If you just go out and do something, anything, it‘s amazing what you will either learn or amazing the results you will get. You‘ve actually just got to do something rather than think about doing something. So that‘s fantastic advice. Thank you very much for sharing some great ideas today. I know that people that read this will be encouraged to try something. I certainly suggest they do read and visit your website, take advantage of some of those resources that on your site at www.Bulldozerdigital.com and again thanks for sharing your expertise, that‘s been fantastic. Fred: It was my pleasure Graham, good luck to you my friend.

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96 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Action Exercise: I really like what Fred and his team are doing at Bulldozer Digital. And the concept is pretty simple. Test an interesting 60 second radio commercial to get potential customers contacting you and requesting something valuable that you are giving away for free. The valuable thing you could give away could be a free report, a helpful consultation and so on. Ideally it has high value to your potential client and low cost to you. This report you are reading right now is a perfect example of high value to you to read, but low cost in my case to give you, because you downloaded it digitally. (And as you can imagine, thousands of people all around the world have now downloaded this report themselves and many have also recommended it to their friends to get as well.) Once you have the name and email address of your potential client, send out another 15 or more follow up email messages over the next month or so. Keep each message short, positive and helpful. The good news from Fred‘s research is that by the time you send out between the 8th and 12th follow up email around 80% of the people who are going to buy, will now have purchased. So the first thing you need to do is get the white paper on the www.Bulldozerdigital.com site. If you are really serious and think you have a product or service that will work really well with direct response radio, you may want to request a no obligation consultation with Fred. You can also invest in one or both of his helpful information products which explain more detail on how to use his system.

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97 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Then, give it a go using Fred‘s guidelines. Start small, test carefully and as Fred says ―you could be one sixty second radio commercial away from being wealthy.‘

8: Christine K Clifford Become a ‘Master of One Thing’

Reprinted with permission

Graham McGregor: I am delighted to be interviewing Christine Clifford CSP. As the top salesperson in the multi-billion dollar retail services industry for over eight years, Christine was responsible for accounts with Kmart, Toys 'R' Us, WalMart, AT&T, Mattel Toys, and Revlon, among others. Taking her company from a million dollar per year loss to over $54 million in sales, Christine signed the largest contract in the history of her industry with Procter & Gamble, doubling the size of her company overnight.

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98 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Christine is also the co-author of one of my favourite little books on business and success called ―You-Inc the fine art of selling yourself‖. I loved everything you‘ve written in that book Christine it really made a big difference to my thinking in business. So great to have you on the call today. Christine Clifford: Thank you Graham, I am delighted to be with you. Graham: As you know I am interviewing a wide range of very interesting sales and marketing experts from all around the world. I‘ve now talked to people I think in five different countries about what they are doing and I am asking them all one question. What‘s the one sales or marketing strategy that‘s working fantastically well either for you and your clients that you‘d like to share with our readers today? Christine: Well, my favourite and the one that has brought the most profitability to me is: instead of being a ―Jack of All Trades‖, I have focused on becoming a Master of One. It‘s very easy for corporations and individuals to want to be all things to all people. But with the limited amount of resources that we all have in business: our time, our money and our people, we need to focus. So by choosing one area of expertise and putting all of our resources into that area, you can truly watch your business flourish. Graham: That makes perfect sense to me, Christine. So just before we get into that, do you want to just give us a very quick idea of your background in business? Christine: Well sure. For 20 years, Graham, I was Senior Executive Vice President with an international marketing company called The Spar Group out of New York City.

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99 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ I helped packaged goods manufacturers find a way to get their products into retail distribution. About 14 years ago, I left that position to launch the first of the five companies that I have created and that company is called The Cancer Club. It started as a result of being diagnosed with cancer 16 years ago. I‘ve gone on to start five different companies, and I primarily make my living as a Professional Speaker and author. Graham: Excellent. So tell us about how we can apply this concept of ‗Become the master of one thing‘ to make a business more successful? Christine: I‘m going to actually start with an example of my brother because I think he‘s a crystal clear example of what happens when you are trying to be all things to all people. My brother is actually a carpenter in Montana in the United States. It‘s a very rustic, rural area that attracts a lot of skiers, fishermen and outdoors people. Several years ago when the economy was booming, my brother was busy working on multimillion dollar houses. When the housing market in the United States came to a screeching halt, so did my brother‘s work. The builders that had been contracting him to come in and work on these homes stopped calling. So I went out to visit my brother and we were driving around his community looking at these houses that he had helped to work on. I quickly realised that he was lovingly pointing out the woodwork that he had done on these homes: shutters, decks, stair rails. Then he was talking about how on the inside, his speciality was hardwood floors and internal pieces of fine woodwork. So I said to him, ―You know, Greg, what you really are, is you are a master of fine woodwork.‘ ―You‘ve been positioning yourself out there as a carpenter, and they are a dime a dozen.‘

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100 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ ―So let‘s go home and create a simple one page flyer for you that just says, ‗Greg, Master of fine woodwork‘ and see what happens.‘ Well, you can guess what happened. People started calling up my brother to come and do the woodwork in their home. And since he is also a carpenter they would ask him, ―By the way, now that you are in my house, I‘ve got these doors that are broken, and the deck needs to be fixed. Can you help?‖ Of course he was able to do all that work, but he was putting his resources-- his time, his money, and his people—into getting the message out there that he was a master of fine woodwork. What happened to my brother is his business became so successful, he had to hire people to work for him! That‘s a great example of how spreading yourself too thin, not only do you have a lot of competition, but no one looks at you as an expert in your field. And once you position yourself as an expert in your field, you really become a master of that trade. Graham: That makes perfect sense. So this idea of becoming a Master of One rather than a Jack of all Trades, I think you applied the same thing to your speaking career as well? How did that work out? Christine: As you can imagine after 20 years with one company, I learned just about everything there was to know about running that company. Not only was I a sales person, I was a marketer for the company; I helped with human resources; I did leadership conferences; I wrote trade manuals. I had a thousand different skills, and so when I decided to leave the corporate world and become self employed and go out on my own, I initially positioned myself as the Jack of all Trades. As a speaker, I can speak about motivation and inspiration, but I can speak about sales and marketing, and I can speak about teamwork, and I can speak about leadership and many other topics. However, what happens when you start throwing all those things at your client is that they don‘t even know

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101 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ how to react. Because they are thinking, ―Well, if you‘re out there in all those different specialities, how can you possibly know enough about any one of those subjects to teach to my employees?‖ So I sat back and looked at first of all, what my passion was because I knew that if I was going to create a career around it, it had to be something that I loved. I realised that it was primarily sales with a side arm of marketing. That‘s what I focused on for the past 14 years, and I‘ve had extreme success with that.. Graham: So you are focusing all your speaking activities on passing on ideas and information and techniques and knowledge that will help people improve in sales and marketing, that one area, you are very focused on? You are very good at it, you love it, and it‘s one of the reasons you‘ve been so successful as a speaker by focusing on that one area. Is that right? Christine: That‘s correct. But you know the other piece of that, Graham, is you look at your resource of time. I spend a great deal of my time working on things that can position me as an expert in sales. So I will write articles and submit them to magazines. I will contact reporters and get interviewed on that topic so that my name is out there as an expert in that field. If I were trying to write articles and contact reporters about all of those topics I talked about in the first place, you don‘t have enough time in the day to do that. And you don‘t have enough time in the day to research all those topics enough to be knowledgeable about them. So you really have to take the thing that you are best at and the thing that you are passionate about because I think those two things have to go hand in

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102 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ hand, and say ‗I‘m going to put all my eggs in this basket.‘ Graham: Ok, so just imagine you are addressing a business audience right now. There‘s a whole range of different business people in here, we might have professional people like dentists and doctors and lawyers and accountants. We could have a number of trade‘s people. We might have retailers. We might have manufacturers and so on. What are some tips you would give them so they can start using this idea of becoming a master of one thing? Christine: Well first of all, they have to start looking at where their sales are coming from in the first place. Let‘s imagine you owned a retail shop that sold luggage, for example, and a large percentage of your business was coming from selling certain types of suitcases. At the same time, you were getting very little business from a lot of extra things that are sold in your store. You have to start asking yourself, is it worth my time, is it worth my investment, should I just start focusing on the one thing that‘s making me money? Now there is some danger to putting all your eggs in one basket. That‘s why one of the things that I also believe in, in terms of being a Master of one Trade, is to try to create what I call ―spin off business‖ from that same passion. So for example, if you owned that luggage store and you were having extreme success with luggage on wheels, then maybe you might open a kiosk in a mall just selling that type of luggage. But what all of us do is, we go ―Gee, I want to be a Master of all Trades so not only am I going to sell luggage, but I‘m going to sell this other stuff in my store, too‖. And you know it ends up being clutter, it isn‘t making you money, it‘s tied up some of your dollars of inventory and it isn‘t working.

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103 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ We have to be able to ―release the monkey,‖ I would say. Get rid of the things that are on our back that we believe in and thought might be good, but others don‘t feel the same way about it that we do. And so it‘s a little bit like letting go of some of your kids and saying, ―Ok, they‘ve gone off into the world and they are on their own now.‖ Graham: Ok, so you start by identifying possibly where the majority or a large percentage of your sales are coming from. That‘s one good key, and another good key is finding something that you are really passionate about in terms of maybe a product or a service that you offer or maybe even a particular market that you service. Is that a good clue as well? Christine: Absolutely. Let me use my company The Cancer Club as a great example. I started The Cancer Club in 1994 to market humorous and helpful products for people with cancer. Well, I was one of the very early pioneers to ever even explore the topic of using humour to describe a cancer experience. As you can imagine, if cancer has touched your life at all, it‘s a horrible experience and very sad and devastating to a lot of families. Now as a cancer patient diagnosed with breast cancer 16 years ago, I realised that no one ever gave me anything that made me laugh. For a full year while I was going through cancer treatments, I was given flowers, and meals were dropped off at my house. People sent cards, and it was wonderful. But I realised as the months dragged on and on, that no one was ever doing anything to make me laugh. And I needed that in my life. I really felt like there was a void, so I decided to launch this company to market humorous and helpful products for people with cancer. That company has been in business for 16 years, and the only thing that we do focus on is our mission statement of: humorous and helpful products for people with cancer.

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104 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ That company has sustained itself for 16 years because we didn‘t try to be a Jack of all Trades. When I first created www.cancerclub.com, I was given a lot of advice that I should create this resource centre where every cancer centre in America could be looked up on this site. Or every study and clinical trial that was going on around the world could be accessed through my site. Well, I tried to get started on a couple of those things 15 years ago, but they bogged me down. First of all I wasn‘t passionate about them. I was more passionate about what I had created in the first place. I wrote a couple of humorous books about my cancer experience and they got a lot of attention, lot of media attention, great sales. My first book was called Not Now... I‟m Having a No Hair Day! and so I kept to my core. I kept to ‗This is what I want to do, this is what I am passionate about, this is what I know.‘ I don‘t know anything about clinical trials. I‘m not a doctor. There are a hundred other places on the internet that people can go and access different cancer centres, so I don‘t want to bog down my time and my resources by having to keep that list current. And so that‘s the kind of thing that I‘m talking about. Finding that one thing you are good at and really sticking with it. Graham: That makes perfect sense. So a couple more hints for our business audience again? You‘ve got your sales you‘ve identified, or perhaps the market you want to work with and you want to focus on that, that one thing. So what do you tell them to do in terms of taking action on the strategy? How do they actually start getting things going? Christine: First of all, you have to ask yourself some key questions.

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105 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ What I‘m really talking about here in its simplest terms, Graham, is creating a niche for yourself. And you have to ask yourself some questions like, ―Do I have much competition in this niche that I am trying to create?‖ When I decided to go out and create humorous and helpful products for people with cancer, I didn‘t have a single competitor. Now 15 years later, other people have copied what I did and some of them have done it to even greater success. So you have to ask yourself, ―Do I have much competition?‖ ‗Is this a product or service that‘s going to appeal to a broad range of people‘ Well, in my case, there‘s literally millions and millions of cancer survivors and their families, so I knew I had a large enough audience. Then you have to ask yourself, ―Am I doing something unique that hasn‘t been offered out there in the world before?‖ One of my other companies that I just started last April is called ―Divorcing Divas‖. With this business, we hold all day educational conferences for people going through the divorce process. I literally line up full access of resources for people for a full day: attorneys, mediators, financial planners, psychologists, social workers, fitness experts, and put them all in a conference centre for a day. And when I started that company, people were saying, ―Oh, you should start linking to all the attorneys across the world‖, and doing all these things that would have taken me out of my focus, and what was unique. No one else was doing what I‘ve been doing here in the United States and it is unique.

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106 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ I think what happens when a lot of us are creating ideas-- creating companies-- is we haven‘t really done an analysis of the market place to say, ―Is this a viable product?‖ ―Is this something people are going to be interested in?‖ Are they going to be interested in it because it‘s new and it‘s unique, or is a ‗Me, too‘ something that somebody‘s been doing for a long period of time? Graham: That makes sense. The good news is that you can still take a normal business-- whether you are a tradesperson; whether you are a professional person or whether you are a retailer or whatever-- and you can give it little bit of twist so that you are unique. Not necessarily in what you sell, but maybe how you sell it, or maybe the market you go to, or maybe how you service that market, or maybe how you even stay in touch with that market. I know that one of my best examples for dentists, for example, is a gentleman you‘ve probably heard of called Paddi Lund in Australia. He‘s famous for becoming a dentist that only takes patients by referral. That‘s the only way you can get into see him. He has a confidential or unlisted phone number. There is no signage on his building at all. You can only get to meet him if you are introduced by one of his existing clients. So there‘s someone doing a normal thing like dentistry, and he‘s positioned himself as being different by the way he takes on new clients and the way he treats those clients. So I think the same principle of focusing just on one thing can be used in any business can‘t it, if you use your creative thinking a bit? Christine: Absolutely. In fact, there‘s a doctor here in Minneapolis where I live who does not take health insurance. He will only take patients who are willing to pay cash, and you can‘t get in to see him.

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107 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ He‘s so popular, and he has such a fabulous reputation whereas most people who are sick, think ―Where can I go to see a doctor who‘s going to take my insurance policy?‖ Well, he doesn‘t want to be tied up with all the paperwork. He just wants to treat someone and get them on their way. So he‘s found a unique way to position himself as a general practitioner. Graham: Great example. So the more you focus on one thing or becoming the master of one particular trade or how you do business, or the target market that you go after or the products and services that you sell, the more in demand you become. A lot of the time you can actually charge higher fees or higher prices because people value that expertise in a particular field, and you have a lot more fun. You can even have less clients and customers and actually make more money and the dentist Paddi Lund found that. He actually got rid of most of his patients, but he‘s actually making a lot more money than the average dentist because the ones that he does have really appreciate how he treats them and looks after them. Christine: You‘ve hit the nail on the head, Graham, which is: in the end you will make more money by having a focus-- a niche-- and being a Master of one Trade. When people call up to ask me to come and speak, just by virtue of my fee and what I charge they know they are going to get someone who knows more than their sales people. Where, if they go to a Jack of all Trades, somebody who‘s just a ‗run of the mill‘ speaker but speaks on lots of different topics, you have to ask the question, ―Will that person know more than my own employees know because this person is spread so thin, what is their expertise here?‘ When you do thing like in my case as a speaker--write books, write articles, get interviewed by the media--

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108 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ you position yourself as an expert in your field and as a result of that, you get to charge more. Graham: Which makes perfect sense. Now I know you‘ve got some great resources that can help some of our readers improve their results in business, and you can tap into a lot of these resources I think, at no charge, just by going to your website so that‘s www.christineclifford.com is that right? Christine: That‘s correct. Graham: And on that site I can see a wealth of things that people can do. So what would be a good place for them to start in terms of getting some helpful tips and hints? Christine: I encourage people to email me. My email address is [email protected] and people can email me their questions. I will always get people pointed in the right direction. Then if they decide they like what they hear, I‘m also available as a consultant. Graham: So they might email you and say, ‗I‘ve got a particular business that does this, this and this, these are some of the challenges I face etc...‖. You‘ll come back and say, ‗Well, look: here‘s a couple of things you can do right now: you might try this or go here or read this, or do that‘ and that‘s obviously with your compliments. Christine: Absolutely. Graham: That‘s very generous. And sometimes what I‘ve noticed talking to a lot of people, that sometimes just a tiny bit of advice or being pointed in the right direction from somebody who has already spent decades literally learning all about that field-- in your case, it‘s sales and marketing-- can be almost priceless even though they get it for free. Christine: And you know the other thing that I think will surprise a lot of people Graham is this.

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109 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ So many people think they‘ve read a book by a certain author and ―Oh my gosh, if I write that author, I‘ll never hear from them or I‘ll never get a response.‖ I don‘t believe that to be true. I think those of us who are out there sharing our thoughts and ideas through our books and our work, we are out there to help others. We are out there to be examples. We are out there to show people that if you believe in yourself or your product or your company, your service, your cause, anything is possible. I trademarked the words, ―Don‘t forget to ask!‖ and Graham, you did a very nice job of that. You contacted me after reading YOU, Inc. and asked me if I would participate in this interview with you, and I was delighted to do. So as a final piece of advice to people, that‘s something I really believe in is: ―Don‘t be afraid to ask people for help.‖ Graham: I back you up 100% on that. I used to have a sales training company many years ago and I would interview a lot of the top sales people in the country in different fields. The one thing I always asked them was, ―How many people even in your own company or from other similar companies have ever asked you for advice about what you are doing?‖ You are the most successful person in the country, everyone knows you are good, how many people ask you? And the answer is usually, ‗look it‘s just a handful-- maybe 2 or 3 people in a whole year ever bother to ask me for advice.‘ I always say to them, ―Well, that‘s interesting. How many people do you ask for advice?‖ And it‘s always dozens and dozens and dozens because that‘s how you become successful. And in most cases my experience has been exactly what you‘ve said, Christine: the most successful people in any field nine times out of ten are delighted

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110 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ and thrilled when people ask them for some help or advice. They would love to give it to them, freely. I‘ve had the privilege and pleasure of interviewing some of the most successful sales and marketing experts around the world like yourself, and I was actually quite surprised at how generous and willing they were to do exactly what you are doing right now. Christine: Because we want to keep our names out there. We get something in return. Graham: Ok Christine, one more thing I‘d like to ask you about. I first came in contact with you when I read your fantastic book called YOU, Inc. The Art of Selling Yourself. Tell me what inspired you to put that book together? Christine: Well, what really inspired me, Graham, was the fact that my children were going to be graduating or heading into college, and I thought, ―Boy, I have learned so many things in the business world, how can I pass on to them the mistakes that I made so that they might not make the same mistakes, but also how can I help position them in such a way that people will want to do business with them?‖ They will want to have job interviews. They will want to hire them. So I really wrote the book with the 20‘s generation, the 20 year olds in mind. I didn‘t realise that the economy was going to be changing so drastically and that there would be millions of adults, some of them in their 60‘s and almost even into their 70‘s out there looking for work as well. So this book is really all about ‗How do I position myself in such a way that people will want to be around me; people will want to do business with me; people will want to be my friend.‘ And I think that advice covers almost everybody. Graham: What I love about this book is that it‘s really easy to read. There are dozens and dozens of very short chapters often just 2 or 3 or 4 pages long.

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111 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ It‘s chock full of fantastic examples and stories and there‘s like a little nugget of information you can use almost on every page. YOU. Inc. The Art of Selling Yourself definitely is a book you want to put on your reading list in the very near future. Christine, you‘ve shared some fantastic ideas today. What I really like about what you‘ve covered here is that it‘s so simple. The main strategy again, if you just can summarise it in a nutshell is, what? Christine: Don‘t be a Jack of all Trades: Become a Master of One. Graham: That makes perfect sense, thank you so much. Christine: You are so welcome, Graham. Action Exercise: I love Christine‘s strategy of becoming a master of one thing instead of being a jack of all trades. The starting point is to look at what you have a passion for. What are you already excited about in your business? It could be a certain type of customer you love to meet and talk with. Perhaps like Christine‘s brother you love some part of the work you do. In his case it was working on fine hardwood. Then how can you make what you do, or how you do it unique and special and valuable to other people? You can start this process of becoming a master of one thing by just spending a few minutes each day reading helpful information about your field. I was speaking to the team of a travel insurance company a few years ago and I explained the importance of becoming an expert at what you do.

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112 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ The manager (whose name was Bob) made an interesting observation. Bob told me that a few years earlier he had become fascinated about the commercial zoning regulations in his city. What type of business activity could you do in some areas and not others? What the different zoning regulations were and what they meant. Now Commercial zoning regulations had no connection with the job Bob had at the time. He just became interested in how these zoning regulations really worked. Bob explained he used to spend about ten minutes most work days reading about these commercial zoning regulations and what they meant. He also read many of the actual zoning regulations himself and took notes as he read. Bob told me that within six months he had become an expert on commercial zoning regulations. He was regularly being contacted by several of the local radio stations and newspapers for his comments on commercial zoning regulations in his area. (All from ten minutes a day of regular reading about commercial zoning regulations and taking notes.) So make it your own goal to become a master of one thing in your business. It will make a big difference to your results.

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113 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ 9: M.J. DE MARCO Customers service that ‘SUCS’

Reprinted with permission

Graham McGregor: It‘s my great pleasure to be interviewing MJ De Marco the author of one of my favourite business books ‗The Millionaire Fastlane.‘ MJ, thanks for speaking for me and what is the Unfair Business Advantage strategy that you would like to share today? MJ De Marco: I call it superior unexpected customer service which is actually an acronym for SUCS. (This is pronounced like ‗sucks‘.) Basically what we are doing here is you try and figure out what your customer‘s expectation profile is when doing business with your company. I don‘t know how it is in New Zealand but here in America it is pretty bad so it doesn‘t take a lot to shock or wow the customer nowadays. So the SUCS strategy is based on figuring out what your expectation profile of your customer is and then violating it so they have a fabulous customer service experience. You do this to the point where they start telling other people.

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114 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________

That‘s what I think is really responsible for creating an exponential growth situation with a company is if you have customers who become disciples of your company, they start telling other people. And of course if they start telling other people that means your marketing budget can be slashed and if you slash your budget your profitability goes up. So it‘s just a win/win situation. Graham: How did you apply this SUCS strategy to your last business? MJ: I had a ground transportation website called www.limos.com so if you needed a ground transportation service to or from the airport, maybe a night on the town you can leverage that site to find a particular company that matched your needs. It was started as a directory type service a long time ago but it evolved into a lead generation service for ground transportation operators. After a couple of years in business my marketing budget for finding new actually went to zero. I didn‘t have to pay for anything because ground transport operators were telling other people, they were saying hey we are getting business from this website, you should check it out. So in that respect my marketing budget on the business to business end was pretty much zero. On the customer end we would always answer our email not within a day but usually within 30 minutes and this would totally shock the customers. This is for an internet company. You email an internet company nowadays and it goes into a vortex. You don‘t hear from that company for days if not weeks if at all so it became to a point we actually had customers emailing us just to mess with us just to see that we would respond within minutes. Other times a customer or even a limo client would say ‗hey you know it would be great if your website did this.‘ It was a particular function and within hours we have it programmed and done. The feedback would

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115 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ just be like ‗wow!‘ It‘s great when a company listens to you and actually does something and I think that fast is again the environment when a company can grow exponentially versus just linear. Graham: So if you were just talking to a group of business people, give them perhaps a couple of examples or a couple of tips they could use. MJ: Well again it all depends on how customer service is expected in a particular industry that you are involved in and again whatever that is you need to violate that in the affirmative. A great example is my car needs service and it‘s a Lamborghini and there are not many places here in Phoenix that service a Lamborghini. And the ones that do are far away and they don‘t even offer a loaner car. So if I drop it off I have to get a taxi, have to get a friend to drive you back or whatever and I was telling them you know if you just provide a car or a ride back that is a violation of what I‘m expecting to have to do so that‘s again setting yourself out from the pack. I think superior customer service is a branding item as well because if all the customers, and the businesses in a particular arena, are providing average service and you provide superior service you have a branding element to your company which is like a defence mechanism to commoditisation. (Which is when you have to sell your soul for the cheapest price.) So to answer your questions at all, it all basically depends on what is expected in that particular industry so you go to a couple of customers, see what happens or a couple of companies and see what happens when you engage them into that service. Graham: That means for example let‘s say you were a trades person so what do you expect when a tradesperson comes to your house? When he comes out he gives you a quote or she gives you a quote and they go away and whatever they do so you‘ve got to find a way to make that a much different experience.

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116 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ One that they are going to say ‗wow I had this tradesperson come today and they did x y and z which is quite different from the norm.‘ Is that pretty well what you are saying? MJ: Sure, absolutely. I mean here in America the cable companies they always say we‘ll be there sometime from 12 midday to 5pm. Graham: That‘s terrible. MJ: I mean that‘s expected so you have to sit there all day and wait so ok people are expecting 12 to 5. What if you said I will be there at 12.30. Wow that‘s like ‗oh that‘s nice to hear‘ so that‘s an example of violating the expectation. Graham: Right and you can do that in any type of business. You find out first of all what they‘re already expecting which is I assume quite easy to work out. You just ring up 3 or 4 or 5 people in the same industry and find out what they would do and then just make it better in a way that people can talk about it in a positive way. It‘s quite a simple concept really when you think about it. MJ: Yes it is. Graham: And that‘s one of the reasons that your website first of all became incredibly popular with your customers looking for the limo advice or guidance on where to get a limo, and then also you started to get some very good quality leads which means you were able to sell it for a large sum of money as well. MJ: Absolutely and it wasn‘t just with the customers that were looking for service, it was with my business owners were limousine companies. We tried to violate on every aspect. We actually expelled companies because their service was poor and did not meet our expectations so we would remove companies whenever we had a chance. We‘d always implement new features; email was always answered within minutes if not hours so it was an all across the board operational procedure with the service. Graham: And that‘s something that anybody can

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117 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ really implement in any business. They just need to say what‘s normal in this type of business in terms of customer service and how can we take like a leap ahead of that so people start talking about our business to other people that they are communicating with and that‘s in most cases I would assume to be done almost for free couldn‘t it, or very low cost. MJ: Well I think the additional cost involved in that is negligible compared to the return. A great example is Zappos, which has just phenomenal customer service and they haven‘t grown lineally, they‘ve grown exponentially. It‘s because I believe in part by the amazing customer service that they provide. (Zappos is a shoe, clothing distributor, retailer.) Graham: One of the big things I think you‘ve hit on the head and you‘ve certainly done it yourself and that is answering emails quickly. I find for example that half the business people I email, even people that know me or are clients of mine, they don‘t respond at all. This is quite normal, this is the normal and only very rarely does someone personally respond within a day. To have someone personally respond within an hour is almost unheard of anywhere in the world from my experience. I recall emailing the director of a very large furniture manufacturer in I think it was Denmark or Norway, they were one of the largest manufacturers of a particular luxury type of chair. I had an enquiry about a marketing idea for them and they didn‘t know me, I had no connection and a major senior director in that company who I emailed came back to me within half an hour with a comment on my email. I was just blown away, I couldn‘t believe it. MJ: That‘s great. Another example, since I released my book in January 2011 I‘m getting emails daily saying hey I love your book, it‘s great. And I make a point to answer every single one of those emails.

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118 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Well the expectation for a book author who is talking about money or finances, when a customer or reader emails him most of them never respond. They don‘t bother. I make a point of responding and letting them know I‘ve read your letter and thank you and leaving a kind note, if someone took the time to do that, I‘m going to take the time to write back and that again is a violation of expectations. I can guarantee you 90% of people that email me do not expect me to write back. Graham: Which is such a simple thing to do so it could be something as simple as a hand written thank you note if someone buys from you. I recommend thank you cards to all my clients but it‘s very rare, virtually nobody does it, thanks for your business, we appreciate it. Just a thank you card in the mail going out. I‘ve done that for decades and it‘s worked amazingly well because most people only get one or two if that, handwritten thank you notes a year from anybody so it‘s quite rare, it totally violates the normal expected customer service if you like. So I guess the good news is from what you are saying today is that it‘s extremely to provide superior unexpected customer service by doing some really simple things like you‘ve been sharing. MJ: Absolutely. It‘s not that difficult and what it really boils down to is, stop treating your customers like customers and start treating them like humans. Graham: Which makes sense. Now I know you‘ve got some excellent resources that I‘ve come across. You‘ve got a couple of websites, you‘ve got an excellent book. Could you tell us just a bit about those for a moment? This book ―The Millionaire Fast Lane‖ which I see has had well over 100 Star Reviews on Amazon so far. So what‘s the book about? MJ: ―The Millionaire Fast Lane‖ is about teaching control over your financial plan to the path of entrepreneurship and I believe that if it is done correctly entrepreneurs stand to make a lot of money in a very short time.

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119 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ And the fast lane kind of outlines the processes that make that happen. I like to actually say get rich quick actually exists and I know that might scare some people away but the truth of the matter it does exist. I mean Mark Zuckerberg is the youngest billionaire on the planet so obviously he got rich quick, I mean I retired 30 years early so it happened to me and it happens all around the world, you see these stories all the time. ‗The Millionaire Fastlane‘ explains how those processes come to reality. In the book there‘s a framework which would help entrepreneurs increase their probability for such things happening and again it‘s on Amazon. The reviews have far exceeded my expectations. I think there‘s over 100 reviews, they are all 5 star. If you need more information on the book go to http://www.themillionairefastlane.com/ I also blog about fast lane topics at www.fastlaneentrepreneurs.com And I run a business forum at www.fastlaneforum.com Graham: One more thing, this is a question I ask a lot of people. You are speaking to a lot of business people today I guess in groups and presentations and a lot of business people think, well their business today is quite different from what it was a few years ago. There‘s been obviously a major recession with lots of people losing their jobs and so forth and people are a little bit negative so what‘s a bit of a positive message if you like, that you would like to pass on to any general business person reading this right now?

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120 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ What would you tell them about their business and what they can do that is positive in some way? MJ: Well I think a business owner needs to have a look at what they are doing and determine are they filling a fundamental need in the market place. A lot of business owners will get engaged into the market place based on it‘s something they know or it‘s something they like to do and these are what I call false premises to engage the market place. Because the market place also doesn‘t care, the market place wants to know what can you do for me, what‘s in it for me? So my advice to entrepreneurs is if they are struggling, take a look at their business and what you are providing and see if they can make sure that that‘s actually filling a need in the market place. And if it‘s filling a need that everyone else is filling they are going to have to figure out how to do it better or how to brand themselves above the rest and this topic we‘ve talked about customer service it‘s one of those methods. So I believe there‘s opportunity in any market, recession or otherwise and it‘s basically determined on what the market place needs so if the entrepreneurs can fill up those needs or fill a need and do it better, because there are a lot of companies out there that just aren‘t doing it very well so that exposes a need. So I think entrepreneurs need to stand back, look at what they are doing, and see how they can set themselves apart from the rest. Graham: That is great advice MJ. Thank you for your time today. MJ: It was my pleasure. Action Exercise: I recommend two simple actions steps from this interview. 1: Get a copy of The Millionaire Fastlane book. I have

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121 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ personally read over 1,373 business books over the last 34 years and this book is in my top 20 list of all time favourites. You can get it on Kindle and in hard copy as well. (I have it in both formats.) 2: Sign up to the Fastlane Entrepreneur forum at www.fastlaneentrepreneurs.com and get some great articles and videos from MJ on financial and business success. I love what MJ has to say because it often flies in the face of conventional wisdom yet is very true when you analyse it carefully.

10: Mal Emery Borrow and use good ideas from everywhere

Reprinted with permission

Graham McGregor: In this interview for the Unfair Business Advantage Report it‘s my privilege to be talking to business, sales and marketing expert Mal Emery.

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122 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ In Australia, Mal Emery has been dubbed the ―Millionaire Maker‖ for his uncanny ability to show ordinary everyday people where the money is. In this interview you get the same advice that‘s made millions of dollars for Mal and his clients who pay for it! With one exception..., it‘s absolutely FREE. What‘s one of the most important things you get your clients to do Mal to get quick results in their business? Mal Emery: I think one of the smartest ways to quickly improve your sales and profits is to borrow and use good ideas from many different sources. Here’s a good example. As part of my background I have bought, started and sold over 21 different businesses. I would often buy a business that was not doing that well and then introduce one or more good ideas that were already working well somewhere else. And more often than not this would produce instant improvements in sales and profits. I recall purchasing a restaurant in Perth that was in a bad way. The owner had spent a small fortune setting it and was losing money every month. I had been looking around at interesting ideas to use in a restaurant and in my travels I visited a few food halls in the United States to see what was working well. I still vividly remember an Italian lady who had developed a potato wedges concept that she put spices on and they were running out the door they were so popular. I introduced this same idea in my restaurant business and I called them ‗Hot Lips.‘ I found that if you can give products and services a catchy name they can be very popular. People walked from one end of Perth to the other to try out ‗Hot Lips‘ I didn‘t invent the idea of this food item. However I saw it was already working well in another location so I decided to use it in my business as well.

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123 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Graham: That‘s a great example Mal. Tell me, can you get good ideas from businesses that are not in the same industry as you? Mal: Absolutely. And some of the biggest marketing breakthroughs I‘ve had for my own business and for my clients came from doing exactly that. We find one or more good ideas that are working well in one type of business and then use them in a totally different type of business. A helpful thing to look for in any good idea is to see if you can identify the underlying reason it works so well. Let‘s take a huge market for many business people. And that‘s the Baby Boomer market. This is people born between 1945 and 1965. One thing most of these people really appreciate is something called ‗added value‘. One of the businesses I owned was a coffee shop, so I used this principle of added value with all our clients. What I did for this coffee shop is when you bought a coffee I gave clients a glass of iced soda water at no extra charge. Now why would you do that? Well because it cleanses your pallet and Perth has got a hot climate and it‘s a lovely thing if you like to have a sip of coffee in with a nice glass of soda water. Now of course the clients‘ reaction was ‗I didn‘t order that, why am I getting that?‘ I trained my staff to tell the story. ‗That‘s there to cleanse your pallet so every single time you take a sip of your coffee you get to taste that beautiful coffee again and again and again‘. I also put a little chocolate on the side of the coffee cup and it was called Hasty Tasty and it had the name of the company, the coffee shop on the chocolate so all added value. Now the perceived value of that coffee back in those days well it was $1.50 to have a coffee in those days

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124 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ and when you added the soda water and a chocolate it was worth about $3.50. So someone paid me $1.50 and thought they got $3.50‘s worth or $3.00 worth. So who do you think they told? They told all their friends. ‗You‘ve got to come here, they give you a glass of iced soda water and a Hasty Tasty chocolate on the side‘ so my sales exploded. I went from zero to $10,000 a week in five months and was able to sell this business for $230,000 by applying the principle of added value. The great thing about principles like ‗added value‘ is they work well in virtually any business. Added Value is a good idea you can borrow and use anywhere. The reason it works so well is simple. Everyone still likes a bargain; everyone wants a cocktail story to tell their friends of a great discovery they‘ve made if you like. Graham: So what are some steps that a business person could take to use this strategy of borrowing good ideas and then using them in their own business? Say you are a tradesperson, just as an example. Mal: Well you know from a tradesperson‘s perspective you need to look at, the fears and frustrations, wants and desires and needs of your market. It‘s not what you‘ve got that is important; it‘s what customers really want that matters. Now the fears and frustrations from the users of trades people, is that the tradesmen never turn up on time. When they do turn up they leave a mess, they charge too much and a lot of the time they are not that well presented in their appearance. So in reality the trade industry have a poor reputation. So the good idea here is of course doing the opposite of that.

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125 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ So as a tradesperson you might be in saying ‗we guarantee that we‘ll turn up on time. If we say we will be there at a certain time and we don‘t, we will pay you $100 for being late.‘ You might turn up in a uniform with epaulettes on their shirt and the name of the company and a van or truck that‘s painted up accordingly. When you turn up at the door, when the person opens the door you might put on slippers on your shoes in order that they don‘t carry the dirt through the house. You might put a drop sheet down where you are working let‘s say to install a security system and while you‘re there you might check the light globes in the house, adjust the VCRs, oil the doors, and while on their roof you might add some value by cleaning the gutters. (You do all these extra little things at no charge.) Who do you think those folk are going to tell about that experience? Graham: Obviously they will tell a lot of people because of the remarkable experience that was quite different from normal. The tradesperson came in, they did a good job, they were tidy and clean and they did all this extra stuff at no charge. Boy they were amazing, they are the best I‘ve used in my whole life and let me tell five friends about them. Mal: Well in fact a statistic is somewhere around 13 odd people they will tell when they have what‘s called an outrageous ‗wow‘ experience when dealing with you. What would you say it cost them to check the VCR, carry a few light globes around with them, oil the doors, and a few other maintenance jobs that people don‘t get done? What do you think it actually costs in terms of dollars? Graham: I couldn‘t see it costing more than $5 or $10 at the most? Mal: Probably less, a bit of time and the perceived value? Absolutely massive.

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126 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ So where previously you had to buy a new client and it‘s 6 to 10 times dearer to get one than it is to keep someone to refer you or get them coming back, as you can see that formula would work brilliantly for that tradesman. He‘d never had to beg for work again, he could charge what he liked because people wouldn‘t be thinking about price, they‘d be thinking about all the added value that he contributed. Graham: This is the key thing that I am getting from you so far Mal is that the more you can put added value into the shopping experience or buying experience so people want to tell other people about how good it was, and also if you can give some of these products or services or businesses that you have catchy names to make it even easier to explain what you do, that just explodes the business and makes them instantly more profitable with virtually very little money. Mal: Well you know it‘s perceived added value; it doesn‘t necessarily have to cost you a great deal to deliver it. The things I described there don‘t cost much but little things count for a lot. When you consider the number one prerequisite that the buying public has today is you need to treat them as an audience and entertain and involve them. The more of that you can do the better. Added value is absolutely massive. Graham: So what could someone like a lawyer or an accountant or a valuer or an architect, how could they make it an added value experience dealing with them? Mal: Well you know an example comes to mind of a dentist who was working ridiculous hours and not enjoying what he was doing. He actually decided to do the opposite of everybody else in his industry so he locked the doors of his dental practice. The only way you could get in was to have a golden apple business card that was handed to you by a friend who would give you that referral to come to that dentist and no other dentist.

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127 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ He‘d have a polite sign on the door that says ‗I am sorry if you‘ve got a toothache, the closest dentist is so and so I don‘t deal with toothaches.‘ What he did do is he had a range of added value that he provided to people who used his dental services. For example he put in a coffee machine. When you walked in you had your name on a door ready waiting for you as well. You had a car park marked out for you so when you came along, you were sent a map and reminder as to how to get to the surgery for your appointment. He guaranteed you would experience ‗no pain‘ so there‘s your promise when you are at his surgery. He also had a couple of other things. He guaranteed to do a number of things but before he‘d take you on as a client you had to guarantee that you would pay your bill on time, that‘s straight away. And you also guarantee that you would pass on the golden apple if you like to potential clients just like you who appreciated added value to the point that you did. Graham: That is an excellent example of how to add great value in a very common business. And as a result do amazingly well. Again all you are doing is taking a good idea, in this case ‗added value‘ and applying it to another type of business. Can you give me another example of a good idea that virtually anyone can use in their business to quickly improve their results? Mal: I‘ve got a ton of good ideas and here‘s one my clients really love. Let me give you the background first. If I had 100 people in a room right now Graham and I said to them how many of you are thinking of buying a car this week? How many of you are thinking of buying a house this week, how many of you are going on a holiday this week, how many of you are buying furniture this week, how many of you are having a haircut this week?

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128 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ The average will be about 3% are ready to buy what I call the ‗buying now‘ group. So if you look at most marketing and most advertising out there, they are only promoting to the buy now people if you like. Do you get where I am coming from here Graham? Graham: Yes, and this group is only a tiny percentage of the market right now. Mal: That‘s correct but that‘s how everyone markets Graham. So to continue with that conversation about 6% of that 100 are very interested and are thinking about buying a car or a piece of real estate or whatever your product or service is. Another 30 odd percent could be tipped over, could be influenced, could put their hand up and say ‗well I‘m interested in finding out more‘ but they are not ready to buy, they are not in the buy now situation. And the other 60 odd percent they fall into two categories but by and large you are wasting your time. The vast percentage of marketing and advertising only ever tries to attract the 3%. So for example a beauty therapy business will run an ad and it will say ‗come to my beauty salon‘. Well only three people who happen to find the ad out of 100 will actually do that. Now here’s the good idea you can use: Do educational advertising that will attract the 3% of buy now people, the 6% of people who could be turned into clients quite quickly and the 30% of people who could become clients if you nurture them over a period of time. And do this for the same amount of money as it would cost to get only the 3% of buy now people. Can you see what a good idea this is? Graham: It sounds so obvious when you explain it like this. Spend the same amount of money on marketing

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129 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ or advertising and you can actually get well over ten times as many potential customers to then talk to. So how can business people do this? Mal: It‘s very simple. Instead of running standard ‗buy now‘ type ads you offer education and free information that a potential client would find valuable. So we would say something like ‗Amazing treatment from France, seems to melt cellulite and fat away for almost anyone that uses it‘ get your free report or a free DVD or CD or a combination of these things that tells you all about it. Now I get 200 to 300 women who are thinking about it or could be influenced to change their mind. At the same time the 3% book immediately so I get the 3% that the normal advertiser gets, I pay the same amount of money but I‘ve just built the list of my clients to 200 to 300. Now that‘s an actual example that ran for years. I wrote the ad and the headline was ‗Embarrassed by Ugly Cellulite?‘ It caused a stampede of 200 to 300 every fortnight. That business, once that ad was run, filled up and remained filled up while they used that ad and they turned the ad off and on whenever they wanted to fill their business up. The major premise is that you across as an educator and not a seller. And you also position yourself as an expert or authority in your field. The way you position yourself as an authority is by never selling and always educating and of course I advocate that the folks write a short report on a subject. A Chiropractor might write a book on ―Seven Ways to Eradicate Back Pain in 20 Minutes a Day‖. He is not selling chiropractic but basically the book is a sales letter which leads to chiropractic services he offers. It‘s the book that positions that person as the authority so again this is education. Graham: I‘ve been a big fan of that type of marketing for years where you give educational material.

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130 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Whether it‘s a seminar, or it‘s the special report, some people call it a White Paper or a DVD or a CD. And in that information you give them helpful tips and strategies related to the product or service that you are selling. So if you are a personal trainer in a fitness centre you tell people how to get a sexy looking body in seven easy steps. If you are landscape gardener you talk about the five secrets to having a fantastic looking lawn. This is what you are saying isn‘t it? You actually give them some helpful tips that they can use to achieve the goal they want or solve the problem they have? Mal: Well that‘s right because people want problems solved for them. The definition of an entrepreneur is someone that solves people‘s problems at a profit otherwise you‘d be a nurse or a fireman or something like that. There has to be a profit attached. Graham: I love what you have said today about borrowing good ideas from many sources. And I believe you‘ve got some great free gifts with a truckload of good ideas you want to give away at no charge to the people reading this interview. Can you tell me about these? Mal: Well there are a number of gifts I‘ve got organised. If readers go to www.malemery.com there‘s a free report there that is crammed with good ideas you can use immediately in your business to make higher sales and bigger profits. There‘s another site it‘s called www.sevenwealthsecrets.com And there I reveal seven wealth secrets that any business owner if they applied them the way I‘ve described them there would catapult their business. And there‘s one more site that they might find useful it‘s called www.themarketingtriangle.com and here

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131 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ again there‘s an audio of me, probably three separate audios, they probably go for an hour and a half each. It‘s where I presented a particular presentation to my clients that I‘ve made available for free for people like the folks that are reading this. Graham: Thank Mal, so readers can go to any of these sites and get a wealth of good ideas at no charge. I know they will find these immensely helpful so thank you very much for sharing such useful ideas today. Mal: It‘s all good Graham. Action Step: I love the reminder from Mal that good ideas are all around us. And there are an unlimited number of these ideas that you can put to work in your own business. I highly recommend you make a note of anything that any business does that you really like. How could you borrow this idea for your business? Look at where you have spent money in the last few months. Did any of these businesses do something that worked well to help you choose them over perhaps a lower priced competitor? How could you apply that idea to your business? Make it a goal to write down at least 5-10 good ideas a day that could help your business to improve your results. Then put at least one of these good ideas into action. And take advantage of the great ideas and valuable information that Mal is giving away at no charge on his sites. I‘ve found that sometimes just one good idea that you get from someone like Mal can transform your business overnight. So look for and find good ideas.

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132 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Then borrow and use them in your business. It‘s a great way to get excellent results and an unfair business advantage.

11: Jeffrey J Fox Dollarize your value and ‘show them the money’

Reprinted with permission

Graham: In this interview for the Unfair Business Advantage Report it‘s my pleasure to be talking to one of my favourite business authors Jeffrey J. Fox. For over 25 years, Jeffrey Fox has been helping clients grow revenues and increase gross margins. Jeffrey is founder of Fox&Co, a management consulting firm that shows clients how to dollarize their value proposition to overcome the price objection and shorten the sales cycle. Jeffrey has written eleven best selling business books that have been translated into over thirty languages. Jeff is the author of ―How to Become a CEO‖, which

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133 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ was on the New York Times, Business Week, Wall Street Journal and Amazon best seller lists. His books have been best sellers in France, Germany, Singapore, Hong Kong and Russia. His book ―How to Become a Rainmaker,‖ was selected as one of the 100 best business books ever written. His ‗Dollarization Discipline‘ was selected as one of the top thirty business books in 2006. Jeff is a popular speaker, appearing regularly before senior management groups and sales forces. Jeff is a graduate of Harvard Business School. Fox&Co is in Chester, Connecticut. www.foxandcompany.com Jeff can be reached at [email protected] Jeffrey, I‘ve read your business books for years, I‘ve really enjoyed your ideas so what‘s the one sales or marketing strategy that you would like to share today that‘s making a huge difference for you and your clients? Jeffrey: It is the understanding that customers do not buy products or services. They do not buy features or benefits. They do not buy technology. What customers buy is what they get from the product. Customers buy outcomes. The great marketing companies price their products to value, price their services to value, to the value the customer gets and not to some target gross margin percentage or to recapture manufacturing costs. This marketing and sales strategy is ―Dollarization.‖ To illustrate: If a company makes a motor for example that lasts 50% longer than the competitor‘s motor then they should be able to charge a premium price. And the sales and marketing executions, literature, advertising etc and the sales force must show the customer the numbers; the dollarized value the customers gets from the product. They must show that the dollarized value is greater than the price.

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134 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Dollarization helps salespeople overcome the pricing objection. Great clients of mine around the world practice dollarization. When the sales people learn how to sell the dollarized value of the product they become rainmakers. And when marketing people start to price their products to value then companies make a lot more money, a lot more. (A 1% increase in price for most business to business companies will improve their net operating profits by about 11%.) Graham: I think you mentioned your clients who are using this principle at the moment are just killing it in terms of competition around the world. Jeffrey: Here‘s an example; one of our clients had a product on test, and the competitor had a product on test at a large chip manufacturer in Asia. The competitor product was one million dollars and our client‘s product was 2.8 million dollars. Our client‘s sales people and marketing people were kind of blue because they didn‘t think they‘d have a chance because their product was priced so much higher. That was until they dollarized the value and they discovered, and they were completely conservative on this and completely positive, that their product versus the competitor‘s could save this chip manufacturer scrap and could increase their yield by 1% minimum per month. The customer makes 30,000 chips a month with a value of $30,000 each. Our guy‘s microscope detects flaws easily in the manufacturing process. Saving 1% of 30,000 chips x 30,000 dollars per chip x 12 months is the money our guy‘s device could deliver to this customer. When they discovered this economic value in a session in a session with me they strategized new ways to close the sale. came up with a different way to strategise the sale. They called that customer and

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135 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ suggested a meeting with higher level executives. This was never done before, yet the meeting was granted. They went to the meeting and instead of selling one unit for 2.8 million, versus the other guy at 1 million, they sold three units for 2.8 million dollars each. Graham: Wow that is a fantastic example. That just shows the power of dollarization and the power of demonstrating value. By the way those numbers you gave me a moment ago, what do they work out to in annual saving for the customer? Jeffrey: It‘s like 9 million dollars a month! Graham: 9 million dollars a month saving. That is incredible. Makes the decision of buying those things very easy doesn‘t it? Jeffrey: Yeah it does and before these numbers they were on their hands and knees begging the customer to look at it. I‘ve got hundreds of examples literally hundreds of examples. I‘ll give you one right now. Going over to see my client in Malta, this one is having difficulty selling a device that is used in the pharmaceutical industry for predicting in pre-clinical trials the toxicity of a particular drug. This is very important because if a drug gets released even in FDA trials and there‘s any toxicity, it‘s rejected and they have to start all over. Our guy‘s device can save a pharmaceutical company, like Pfizer for example, up to two weeks time in these pre-clinical toxicity testing. This is something they can measure and prove. They can save their customer two weeks of lab time. The average cost per day of some of these pharmaceutical companies in is one million dollars a day. They save their customers two weeks. Graham: That‘s 10 million dollars. Jeffrey: Yeah 10 million dollars. That he can demonstrate. I said look its real simple. You can

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136 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ demonstrate you can save them just one day and if the price of your device is $350,000 you‘ve just saved them $650,000. Graham: Wow, and at 10 days it‘s a no brainer. Jeffrey: It is a no brainer if the benefits are dollarized. This opened their eyes because all they hear about is ―your price is $350,000, $350,000.‖ They‘ve got to realise the customer gives you $350,000 you give them back $650,000 a day, the first day and every other day after that is a million dollars you save them. Now they are so confident in their dollarized value proposition that they taking their forecast from 10 machines to 35 in the year 2011. So if we now take the value of my services to help them achieve these sales, and Dollarize it, this is how it would look. The dollarization formula for them will be worth 25 new machines x $350,000. That‘s how I would Dollarize myself. Graham: That‘s pretty impressive as it comes to just under nine million dollars in new sales that you will help them to achieve. Jeffrey: I tell my customers right up front; I say ―look we are in the same boat. If I can help you dollarize your products, help you sell more and make more money, the chances are you will invite me back.‖ Graham: Whatever fee you charge is irrelevant. Jeffrey: Exactly. It‘s totally irrelevant, I‘m free. Graham: In fact you make them money. Jeffrey: Oh yeah. For one client I did a project that in four months had me in 20 different cities for two days each location in Europe, Asia and the United States. They generated 40 million dollars in incremental sales that they attribute to using and executing dollarization techniques.

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137 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ They are inviting me back now to do several more cities this year. Why? Because when I leave they are going to make 20 times what they paid me that day. Graham: Ok Jeffrey the principle itself is wonderful so let‘s talk about the nuts and bolts, can you give me some of the steps involved in how a typical business could dollarize some of their value when they are selling their products and services to clients? Perhaps just a couple of steps so people reading this can say ‗that‘s how I can use it.‘ Jeffrey: All right. The first thing you do is take a look at your sales literature you have today and it will claim the product is more reliable, faster, quicker, more robust ,cleaner, safer or whatever. That is an advertising description. What the real marketers do, the marketing superstars, is to turn ‗more reliable‘ into a number. For examples instead of claiming the product ‗lasts longer,‘ give the customer some facts! The product lasts 25% longer. If you only claim ‗lasts longer,‘ the customer doesn‘t know anything. If you say ‗ the product lasts 25% longer,‘ at least, the customer knows something. If the other guy‘s machine lasts 24 months, and you last 25% longer, then you last for 30 months. In a 60 month period the customer would have to buy three of the competitor‘s products versus two of the more robust product. Let me give you a specific illustration. Our client has a motor that sells for $6,000. The competitor sells for $5,000. Every year the customer tells our client ―You know we really like your product.‖ Then they buy the lower priced product. I asked my client ―Why should they do business with you?‖

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138 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ These motors are used in the lumber industry, cutting down trees. It‘s a rugged, tough environment. The answer is that due to a special bearing our clients motor is tougher, better tolerates the application and lasts 20% longer. What happens is that in two years the customer has to buy two of the competitor‘s motors versus one of ours. The competitors motor is priced at $5,000 but in this lumber application the true price was $10,000. In the same time period the customer has to buy two of the competitor‘s motors for a total of $10,000 plus incur the cost of labour expense and the downtime of having to install the extra motor. When our client showed the customer the dollarized value of the longer lasting motor they got the contract, a contract they had lost every year for 12 years. Marketers, sellers: first state the benefit such as ‗faster‘. Then take that benefit, quantify it and put the benefit into numbers, facts. The customer can decide. I use the example in one of my books where a football scout goes up to the coach and says, ―You ought to hire this kid.‖ And the coach says, ―why?‖ The scout says ―Because he‘s big and fast. The coach says ―How big and how fast?‖ The scout answers ―really big, really fast!‖ The rainmaker says ―Coach you ought to hire this kid.‖ The coach asks ―Why?‖ ―Because he‘s 6 ft 3, he can bench-press 400 lbs, he can run a 40 yard dash in 4 seconds and he‘ll help you win the super bowl and give you a $100,000 bonus.‖ That‘s what the rainmaker does. The rainmaker turns ‗big and fast‘ into a $100,000 bonus. Rainmakers dollarize. The ordinary sales people only say ‗fast and big.‘

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139 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________

What all the marketing people who will read your book should know is that customers only want they dollarized value for what they invest. No company wants to buy anything. No one gets up in the morning and says, ―I‘ve got $10,000 let‘s go buy some drills or some hammers or some advertising or some anything.‖ Customers get up in the morning and try to figure out how they can reduce their investment in drills, hammers, gaskets and ball bearings, and anything else that you are selling. Selling to consumers is very similar. When home owners are buying a product to solve a problem for example, a security camera or something for their house, what they are really buying or investing in eliminating a burglary or more than one burglary. If the cost of one burglary exceeds the price of the security camera, then they save money. Simple. You go from the advertising words to a quantification number. Then dollarize the value of the numbers, the facts. Graham: Right and that can be applied from what you are saying here to virtually any product or service. I think you did mention in one of your books that people buy everything for two reasons. One they buy things to feel good and secondly they buy things to solve problems so this really is applicable any time that somebody is buying a product or service that can solve a potential problem, that‘s what you use isn‘t it? Jeffrey: That‘s right. That‘s exactly right. That‘s what you have to do. If you are the seller, the marketing person you have to help the customer calculate the value of the problem solved. Some values are self obvious. The value of the solution is instantly obvious. For example the value of life saving medication is instantly obvious. Whether or not the customer has the money to invest in the solution is a different issue.

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140 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Graham: I do recall reading about a cleaning company in the States and they decided that instead of just selling a clean home where someone will come in and clean their home, they would sell the value of extra leisure time for the busy professional people that they clean their homes for. And they just killed the competition by selling that benefit which people could dollarize easily, extra five hours of free time each week to go and do more fun things than clean your home rather than just selling a clean home. Jeffrey: Totally. Graham: And I guess that‘s the sort of thing you are talking about isn‘t it? You‘ve got to dollarize . Jeffrey: That‘s exactly right. That‘s smart marketing. They aren‘t selling a cleaning service, ―they are selling five hours of time. Five hours is high value. ― I mean that‘s how Pampers started, Graham. A million years ago, babies had cloth diapers. When Pampers first came out they didn‘t have all the stuff they have today. They didn‘t have little plastic strips. You actually had to pin them on the kid. Pampers were way higher priced than cloth diapers. What was not apparent, at first, is that Pampers were a lower cost. When Pampers showed all the moms in the world that they no longer had to wash diapers, no longer did they have to spend money on detergent, electricity for drying and all the time for folding them. That they could just throw them away. Then Pampers became an affordable offset to diapers because it eliminated all those things. It eliminated buying and washing and drying and folding and that‘s how Pampers became successful. Graham: I love this idea because with a little bit of thought it could be applied to any product or service that solves a potential problem for a client, whether it‘s a consumer, whether it‘s a business to business application and it‘s very simple to do.

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141 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ You‘ve got to basically first of all quantify, have a specific number or numbers that shows the customer ‗This saves you two hours of time. This is 50% faster etc‘ and then you take it out a few steps further and put a dollar value on that time saved or that extra productivity or whatever and by the time they can see that extra dollar value in most cases it justifies a much high value for most products or services. Jeffrey: That‘s right, that‘s exactly right and that‘s what the marketing superstars do. That‘s what the rainmakers do and they are only 5% of the folks out there. The rest are trying to come up with clever advertising instead of dollarization. Let the facts and the data prove the claim. The customer gets it. Graham: Yeah and I think I recall the example you gave in your book ―How to Become a Rainmaker‖ you talked about a wine salesperson who was selling wine to a restaurant. He used exactly the same principle. He explained the economic value of selling the wines. He didn‘t talk about how good the wine was, he talked about the dollar value, the profit that the restaurant owner would make, rather than the quality of the wine and how fantastic it was and how people like it. He said ―this is the value you are going to make‖. This is what your customers will buy. He made a huge sales very quickly on that basis. , Jeffrey: That‘s right, that‘s exactly right. It‘s all about the money. And by the way, that great, true story is in ―How to Become a Rainmaker.‖ You have a great memory. And if I may brag, ―How to Become a Rainmaker‖ was just selected as one of the 100 best business books ever written. Graham: That‘s fantastic. It comes back to that wonderful expression from Tom Cruise, ―Show me the Money‖, from the great movie Jerry Maguire. Jeffrey: Right, that‘s what rainmakers do. As a matter of fact, I think I used the line ―Show them the money‖ before the Tom Cruise movie. Graham: In terms of dollarization and your other marketing strategies Jeffrey you‘ve got some great

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142 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ ideas that you share with people in terms of articles and resources that are on your website. One is a comprehensive mini booklet, I‘ve got it in front of me right now, it‘s about 15 pages long and it‘s called ―An introduction to Dollarization‖. This gives people lots of examples of how they can actually dollarize their own product or service and that‘s available right on your website. So if you can give us that website address? Jeffrey: Our website address is www.foxandcompany.com My email address is [email protected] And I‘ve got tons of valuable stuff that is on the website and completely free. Graham: Yes I‘ve looked through your site and it‘s a treasure trove of great information. I see you‘ve also got a brand new book out now which I‘m hoping to get my hands on shortly, ―How to Be a Fierce Competitor‖. Can you talk about that just for a minute or so just before we wrap up the interview? I haven‘t read it yet but the title looks great. Jeffrey: I think it is one of my better books. It is about what these companies do. It‘s how to be a serious competitor, what winning companies and great managers do in tough times because there are always tough times. When you are riding the rising tide of a wonderful economy anybody is smart but it is when times are tough, when markets collapse, things like that , you really have to know what to do. And the tough competitors always do it. There are some terrific stories in that book about people who are fierce competitors when things get tough. Graham: Jeffrey you‘ve shared an amazing strategy today. I think this one idea of not just selling the

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143 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ benefits and features of what you have but actually putting down the specific dollarized value of your product or services to a client is terrific. In most cases that can justify a much higher price than your competitors, the sales are actually easier to make if you use this process and you can make a lot more money and obviously have a lot more fun doing it. Jeffrey: That‘s correct. Giving money to a customer is always easier than asking a customer for money. Graham: Thank you again that has been a fantastic concept and I know our readers are really going to enjoy it. Jeffrey: Thank you very much, I really appreciate it. Action Exercise: This strategy of Dollarizing the specific value of your product or service compared to your competitor is one of the most powerful things you can do to give your business a completely unfair business advantage. I suggest you do two things right now. First of all go to www.foxandcompany.com and download the 15 page booklet on Dollarization that Jeffrey has written. There are some excellent examples in this booklet of how you can Dollarize a number of different types of products and services. Secondly, put down some numbers or quantities about how your product or service is superior to your competitors in a way that is meaningful to a client. So rather than say our XYZ product lasts longer you say ‗Our XYZ product last on average 27% longer than our competitors ABC product. Then put a dollar value on what this means to a customer if they buy your product or service compared to your competitors. When you do this well you can charge premium prices, make your sales a lot easier, make more money and have a lot of fun.

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144 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ It will take practice and time to master the skill of Dollarization however I believe it‘s one of the most important things you will ever do in your business.

12: Dave Garofalo Have an ‘outrageous’ event

Reprinted with permission

Graham McGregor: In this interview for the Unfair Business Advantage it‘s my pleasure to have on the call today Dave Garofalo. Dave, as you know, in the series of interviews I am talking to sales and marketing experts all around the world. I am asking them to each share one sales or marketing strategy that has worked amazingly well. You‘ve got a wonderful marketing strategy you‘ve been using in your business now for 17 years and we will get into that in just a moment. Before we do that could you tell us about what your business is and what you sell?

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145 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Dave Garofalo: Sure Graham. I‘ve been in the cigar business, premium cigar business for 25 years. We opened it in 1985 and it was just two guys, me and a friend of mine. We called it the Two Guys Smoke Shop and we deal with premium cigars. We have a product, we have a passion for and we‘ve tried to take our business to a higher level than the competition and we‘ve done a pretty good job. Right now, I think we are the highest volume cigar retailer in the United States. Graham: Wow, that is fantastic and I believe a major part of you achieving that level of sales and volume of success is something you do and it‘s your wonderful marketing strategy. How did it all start? Dave: What was happening in the cigar world there was a boom going around in the early 1990‘s and there would be cigar dinners. Guys would get together for gentleman cigar dinners and smoke and taste premium cigars along with fine scotches and wines and things like that. So we decided if we were going to throw a party that we would throw a better party than our competitors would do. And we would turn it into an anniversary party and it would be held on the anniversary of our retail store. So we would bring in celebrities for it. We would hire the celebrities to actually attend our events and we would pay them to be there. There would be sports celebrities and movie celebrities and things like that. And the buzz of them coming would help the sale of the tickets for the event. So we‘d fill that up and the event itself would be overthe-top and of great value to the customer for the future which would be the talk after it. The value was everybody that was there telling other people ‗you should have been there. It was unbelievable.‘

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146 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ And the person that wasn‘t there would ask ‗how could I get there next time. I want to be part of it?‘ Well the way to be part of it is to be a customer of our retail store and you will be the first one to find out. So we would build from that. Graham: Talk us through these actual anniversary dinners. I believe you actually charge an admission fee which offsets part of the cost of doing this. So your customers pay for a ticket to attend? Dave: Yes we normally nowadays charge about $200 a ticket. Now that seems like an expensive ticket but they get way more value that what the ticket costs and they know this. That‘s why our typical event which is up to about 500 people, sells out in a matter of a few days. For $200 they get admission into that night which will include a handful of cigars, maybe up to as many as last year being our 25th anniversary, 25 cigars. It includes the celebrities in the cigar business the ‗who‘s who‘ in the world of cigars will be attending and do attend every single year. And it would be a chance for these cigar aficionados to meet the celebrity cigar people in the business. (Much like meeting the wine makers, they meet the cigar makers because they will all attend also.) Also with that is an elaborate five course sit down meal along with live entertainment, such as a 12 piece show band, comedians and more. It‘s a full on glorious night of entertainment as opposed to just a rubber chicken dinner type of thing. This is the finest things in life that you will experience that night and the door prizes are unbelievable. The prize of the night, there will be maybe many prizes, but the top prize of the night will be highlighted for months in advance.

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147 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ At last year‘s event for our 25th anniversary we gave away a Rolls Royce Silver Spur which was to commemorate the 25th Silver Anniversary of Two Guys Smoke Shop. And with the Rolls Royce automobile in the trunk we included 250 silver bars, minted just for that occasion. Each bar was 4 oz of solid silver. Nowadays with the economy being tough, the safest bet people believe is gold and silver. This was our silver anniversary so we had minted Two Guys Smoke Shop silver bars. And for the 25 cigar who were part of our event that helped us it, each one of their logos was on each silver bar. And they got a silver bar themselves for participating as a thank you. They were at the event to see it and watch somebody drive away with a trunkful of silver bars along with the Rolls Royce. And as the night goes on it‘s an elimination much like a game show that happens. It‘s not just the pulling a name out of a hat, it‘s an all night elimination through groups. Each cigar manufacturer has a group of people that are on their team and groups are eliminated as the night goes on. Each person that‘s eliminated early still stays on all night long to watch the fun because the excitement goes not only all night but actually carries on for days and weeks and years afterwards. Graham: Wow, tell me about some of the amazing other prizes you‘ve given away over the years. I think these are unbelievable. Dave: To select a prize we look at what is going on at the time. One year when the gas crisis was going on and the high price of gasoline was going on, we decided to give away a tanker truck full of gasoline.

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148 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ A full 18 wheel tanker truck filled with gasoline was the prize for that night. We have three retail stores and a tanker truck visited each store for many, many days with its big banner on it saying ‗Win Me‘ and we are giving away 10,000 gallons of gasoline and it will be the door prize at our anniversary event and it certainly got the attention of the media. Not only to the cigar world of media but anybody driving by, any local cities and towns and actually people in other States that took notice of this. And this became pretty much a media driven attention to an event like this. As the night went on, as the game show went on we, much like Let‘s Make a Deal, we offer the remaining people money if they want to get out. Graham: One of the big things you are doing here Dave first of all is you are actually thinking a lot bigger than just a typical business anniversary dinner. The average business if they do an anniversary dinner might invite a few customers along, put on a very average dinner, give them maybe a couple of opportunities to buy a thing at a good price and that‘s pretty well it. You on the other hand, are making your anniversary dinner, the hottest ticket in town by making it such an outrageous event. I have a question about the cost of doing something like this. There are only a limited number of tickets by the sound of it. About 500 at $200 each so that‘s about $100,000 in revenue. You are giving away prizes a lot more valuable than that so are you getting your suppliers, the cigar manufacturers and other people to contribute to the cost? Dave: Yes, we do ask our supplier to contribute to this event. However this event is not designed to make money, it‘s designed to make friends. That sounds the craziest thing in retail. We are all here to make money but money follows.

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149 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ We are here to make friends on this type of day and it certainly works because we‘ve done it so many times. Some of the events have at the end of it cost us as much as $50,000 as a loss but I never look at it as a loss, it becomes part of our promotional budget and it all works out in the end. As I said we‘ve been doing it for about 17 years now and we win some and we lose some. But I think we‘ve actually won every single one when it comes down to the value of the promotion itself. Graham: This is a marketing strategy that any person could use in their own business. They just have to say ‗ok we are going to have an anniversary dinner‘ and that‘s a pretty easy date to work out, it‘s close to or on the day they actually started in business. ‗Now let‘s make this anniversary dinner a really hot event. Let‘s charge admission, let‘s get some people to defray the costs like our suppliers and manufacturers‘. For an event like this I think you‘ve found that your manufacturers and suppliers are happy to contribute to your promotional costs aren‘t they? Dave: They are. We send a letter out towards the beginning of the year when their budgets have just begun again. Early on, so usually in January or February we send a letter out to them explaining what this year‘s event will be about. We tell them we are taking the first of say 20 manufacturers that would like to participate in our event. We invite them to give us a call and a verbal ok that they agree upon the terms that we are providing for the event. They will not be contacted again or bothered. Whether they participate or don‘t participate this will not hurt them in any way as far as doing business with us.

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150 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ We feel that it is a win/win situation and that it is a good value for them and that it‘s something good and if they believe that it‘s good for them, we would love them to participate. Every year we sell out of that in a matter of a week or two and we have all the suppliers that we need to help us financially. Usually the ones that were a little late we get calls from them and say ‗they were away and they weren‘t able to be able to call us is there any way they can get to fit in?‘ And the answer is ‗no‘, and for them to jump on it next year and that‘s usually what happens. The first calls we get wanting to participate are form the suppliers and people that didn‘t participate last year Graham: Fantastic and of course from the sound of it, if you are giving away a silver Rolls Royce jam packed in the trunk with silver bars you must have had literally hundreds of thousands of dollars of free media exposure over an event like that? You must have been on local radio stations or TV stations or on the newspapers, free publicity telling people what you are doing. Is that what‘s happened? Dave: Absolutely. Now we are in a very niche business. I sell premium cigars and only one out of 1,000 people will ever purchase premium cigars. I have a very niche market. This type of outrageous anniversary dinner event will probably work much better for any other type of business over us because we are in such a niche business. Yet every year it ends up working for us and I‘m waiting for my competition to jump on board because they see how well this works. And they haven‘t done it. Is it work and effort to put an event like this together? Yes it is, it‘s like putting a giant wedding together and there is effort and time and energy put into it. But I‘ll tell you, I love it, and so do my employees that help me with it. We look forward to it and we have

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151 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ these sessions where we brainstorm and try to come up with a next great idea. And they are all part of it and they can‘t wait until next year. We have our customers that are leaving that day, looking at us and saying ‗I can‘t wait until next year, what are you going to come up with?‘ This year in 2011, our next promotion that‘s coming up is we purchased a 1936 Cadillac Fleetwood limousine. There‘s only three left in the world, there was only 900 every made. There are three left in the world, we feel we have the finest one that‘s available. 55,000 original miles. The inboard, dashboard radio is the first one ever produced for an automobile. It was put into the 1936 Cadillac. Well coincidentally in 1936 the board game Monopoly was put together so we are having a somewhat of a Monopoly game type of promotion that will stem down to the last person winning the 1936 Cadillac. And as each customer is eliminated from the event each customer will win a Monopoly game made especially for that night. All the manufacturers who participate will have a piece. One of the real estate pieces on all the Monopoly board games will be made with their company‘s logo on one of the properties. We are making only 1,000 games, it‘s the only way you‘ll ever be able to get the game is to be part of the event, and we feel like now there‘s a souvenir that will go with it where there will be no other way to get that souvenir. Graham: That sounds exciting. When is your anniversary by the way? What date of the year is it? Dave: It is September 21st. And that‘s around when we try to have it each year. Graham: And it sounds like this time you want to get 1,000 people to the event rather than just 500 so that‘s your next goal? Dave: Right.

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152 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Graham: So each year you think bigger and better. What sort of advice would you give people that are thinking about planning their first anniversary event like this? What would be three or four things you would advise them to do just to make sure the first one is a good success? Dave: Well you have to go ‗over the top.‘ You cannot count your pennies and you can‘t look at it as a profit centre at all. The whole idea going in is try to have a balance sheet and try to say here‘s the expenses and here‘s what‘s going to come in and try to spend every dime of it.‘ You have to let everybody walk out of it feeling like it was a win for them and that goes for the manufacturer or supplier or people that help you to put it on. You have to do everything right, the follow through before, during and after, the thank you cards to the manufacturers for being part of it afterwards, the upfront invitations to them to be part of the event. The grand part is letting them know when these tickets are going to be available. We have told the world of our event probably about five months before we even put the tickets on sale so we milk this thing as much as we can. These tickets they sell out in about a week and then there‘s a few months before the event even takes place. And then it‘s the talk about it for the rest of the year. Then we start all over again and this is each and every single year. Graham: Wow and it‘s actually quite a simple idea in theory. Have an anniversary dinner, make it over-thetop, make it a ‗wow event‘ that people are going to remember forever and tell all their friends and their friends will actually be jealous they weren‘t there. Dave: That‘s right. Graham: It‘s like you said, ‗the hottest ticket in town‘ and just by doing this, this has been your most successful by far, by the sound of it, promotional or

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153 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ sales and marketing strategy you‘ve even done in your business. And by a strange coincidence you are now the highest volume retailer of cigars in the United States. I think there‘s quite a good close correlation between you doing that and the great result that you are doing. What do you think? Dave: I would think it has a big part of it. Graham: Fantastic and of course the only way that people can participate is they have to be a customer. Dave: Right. Graham: So unless you are a customer, you won‘t be able to get an invite or get the opportunity to come along on that basis there so a very good strategy there. I love what you are doing here Dave. What I really like about is that you are ‗thinking big‘ no matter what the economy is doing. You are saying ‗look to heck with it, the economy might be a bit tough and it certainly is a bit tougher than it has been for a few years but there‘s no reason not to do really well in business‘, which you are doing. So congratulations. I love this strategy and I think anyone in business could do it. So tell me, in terms of your contact details the best way for anyone to have a look at your business and check it out, what‘s the website address again? Dave: It‘s www.2guyssmokeshop.com Graham: Dave it‘s been fantastic talking to you today, I love this idea of an anniversary dinner. It‘s not just a normal anniversary dinner, it‘s over-the-top, it‘s outrageous if you like, it‘s something that people are going to talk about for months if not years to come.

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154 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ I think that‘s something that anybody in business could do and it would make an amazing difference to their business within a very short period of time. So thanks for sharing such a great strategy today. Dave: Thank you Graham. Action Exercise: The marketing strategy that Dave uses here in his business is to do an ‗outrageous promotion‘. Dave has turned this outrageous promotion into an annual event that creates millions of dollars of publicity for his business and amazing good will and support from all his customers and suppliers. The way he does this is take something that is quite ordinary like the anniversary date of his business and then turned it into an outrageous ‗over the top‘ experience. Everyone who attends the event tells everyone they know how unbelievable the experience was. By promoting this event for months before and after it happens, Dave gets a huge amount of exposure and publicity for it. His customers and suppliers love it and the media go crazy at the same time. The interesting thing is that a lot of the time Dave actually manages to break even on the cost of doing an outrageous promotion. And when it does cost him money he treats this as part of the promotional budget for his business. The key word in this strategy is ‗outrageous.‘ It needs to be something that will provide people with a ‗wow‘ experience that will have people talking for months or even years later about how amazing it was. So brainstorm with the people in your own business about how you could do an ‗outrageous promotion‘ that would have your customers and suppliers queuing up to a part of.

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155 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Then tell your customers what you are planning to do and why you want to make it such a wonderful experience for them. Make your promotion a truly ‗wow‘ experience and something that you can only get an invitation to by being a customer of your business. It doesn‘t just have to be an anniversary dinner. Ideally it should be an outrageous promotion that you can repeat every year from then on.

13: Chris Gilmour Leap Frog your competition

Reprinted with permission

Graham McGregor: It‘s my great pleasure to have on the line today a remarkable young real estate sales professional from Brisbane, Australia. Welcome Chris Gilmour. Great to have you on the call today. Chris Gilmour: Thanks Graham. Graham: Chris, tell me just before we get into exactly how you are achieving your remarkable results in real estate, let‘s give the listeners a quick idea of how well you are actually doing.

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You started in real estate I believe it was in May 2008 for the very first time didn‘t you? Chris: Yes that‘s correct. Graham: And what did you earn in your first full year working in real estate? It‘s obviously a financial year there in Australia so that was from July 1 through to June 30th the following year? Is that pretty well your financial year? Chris: Yes that‘s correct. Graham: So what did you earn in that period of time Chris? Chris: My first year I made an income of $135,000. Graham: But that‘s not the reason we are talking today Chris, what did you do in your second full year in real estate in terms of earning? Chris: I turned my first year of $135,000 into my second year of $880,000. Graham: $880,000 and now you are half way through, in fact just over half way through your third year. What are you well on target to achieve in this third year? Chris: I‘m on target now to hit over a million dollars. Graham: Wow, a million dollars in personal income. How does that break down in terms of numbers of sales you normally do each month? Just give us a quick feel for that. Chris: Look that would range anywhere from minimum of 10 sales in a month up to 24 sales in a month. Graham: So probably average around about 15 a month is a pretty typical month? Chris: Yeah 15. Graham: How many listings do you carry at a time? Chris: Currently running with 45 exclusive listings at the moment.

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Graham: Tell me in terms of your actual sales results, typically when you get a listing what‘s your average time on market and roughly how many of your listings do you sell? Chris: Ok, my list to sell ratio I run at 91% and I average days on market for 18 days. Graham: What‘s the typical days on the market in your local area? Chris: The area that I work it‘s 53 days from my competition. Graham: So you‘ve got quite an advantage there in terms of how fast you turn this around. Chris, what‘s your market share, you are working in South Brisbane aren‘t you? Chris: Yeah, south side of Brisbane which is about 15, 20 minutes from the CBD. I run at 82% marketing share for 2010. Graham: 82% market share so you‘ve definitely sown up that area pretty So how about a quick background on your sales career Chris. How old are you right now. You‘ve just turned 30, 31? Chris: Just turned 30. Graham: So your first sales job, how old were you when you did that? I think you‘d just got out of school is that right? Chris: Yeah, when I finished high school I got into selling home security systems which was a door to door service and commission only. So basically whatever I sold on the day is what I‘d get paid for and that was just from knocking on doors all day long. Graham: Wow that gave you a really good insight into the world of direct selling. You must have had a few rejections in that time? Chris: Yeah you get to learn how to handle a ‗no‘ or a door slammed in your face very quickly.

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158 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Graham: Fantastic, and then you made quite a change from that, you went into the retail field I believe. Chris: I did, I settled down with my partner and we wanted to get a mortgage and build a home so we thought get a good platform with a nice stable job. So I spent five years working at Retrovision selling TVs and washing machines and stuff like that. Graham: And then you decided well you can‘t really make enough money doing this, not to achieve your income targets so you thought well let‘s try real estate. That was pretty well your next job wasn‘t it? Chris: It certainly was yes. Graham: Great and that‘s when as I say things took off. That first year $135,000, second year $880,000 and the third year well on target to do over a million. So Chris, let‘s look at some of the things that you did to make that fantastic change from $135,000 in your first year of real estate to well over $880,000 the second year. What are some of the things you even started doing for the very first year that started giving you a bit of success? Chris: The first thing that I probably took on board was thank you cards. I had heard that very early in my training of real estate and basically just implemented that into my strategy. I was always about looking for a future seller not a now seller. So for your first year it‘s always tough to crack it so you‘ve got to work extra hard compared to the agents that have already got their name and are established out there in the market place so I just started sending out thank you cards. And look if you send ten thank you cards a day, it‘s 2,400 a year. Graham: And that‘s 2,400 people a year that in most cases have never ever in their life had a hand written thank you card from anybody in business.

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Chris: That‘s exactly right and it‘s just a very personal touch and I just found that no one else was doing it. Graham: And it‘s so simple and it‘s makes a real difference because people often they can remember you even six months or a year or two years later just because you took the time just to spend two minutes and send them a hand written thank you card. Chris: That‘s exactly right yeah. Graham: Fantastic, now talk about some of the strategies that you are using now in your area. What size area do you actually work in? What‘s your patch or your farm if you like? Chris: My farm area consists of 1,100 homes. Graham: About 1,100 homes and out of that you are doing around about 150 sales a year or something? Chris: I don‘t know off the top of my head. I‘d have to look at the stats but it would be over the 100 yeah. Graham: And obviously you are getting a lot of referrals. What percentage of your business would you say is referrals as well? Chris: I would say 50%. Graham: Fantastic, so if you are doing a great job for one person they definitely want to refer you to somebody else and I assume you get the odd referral outside your patch as well. Chris: Yeah, to be honest I‘ve probably got more referrals outside of my patch than what I do in my farm area. Graham: Again referrals are so much easier because when someone refers you they are saying ‗look Chris did a fantastic job for me, you‘ve got to use him‘ so the person is pretty well sold on you before they even get to talk to you, don‘t they? Chris: Referrals are the easiest listing going.

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160 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Graham: Excellent. So tell me about some of the things you do to position yourself, as radically different and better than all the other sales people in your area. I understand that one of the things you do which really blows people away is when they make an enquiry about your services for the first time. They will often ring up and if I was ringing up say from your local area and saying ‗Chris, I am interested in possibly selling my home‘, what‘s the first question you would ask me? Chris: The first question I would ask you Graham is your address, where you actually live and then as soon as they would tell me where they lived then I would be able to tell them what house they were actually living in. Graham: So let‘s say I‘ve just rung up said Chris look I am interested in your listing, you say Graham where do you live, I say I live at 23 Smith Street. Chris, what would you say? Chris: ‗23 Smith Street, ok you are the low set on the left hand side, next to that two storey property and you‘ve just put that amazing fence up out the front.‘ Graham: Wow and I would say Chris how the heck did you know that? Chris: And then I‘d always answer that with ‗look I live in the area, I work in the area and I sell the most properties in the area, it is my job to know exactly what goes on in our area.‘ Graham: And that sort of response it demonstrates instant credibility and you have amazing product knowledge to be able to off the top of your head like that, comment quickly on any one of roughly 1,000 homes in the area. Chris: That‘s correct. Graham: Let‘s talk about some of the things you do to market in your area. I understand you go out to your local farm area once a week and you‘ve got a four week cycle that you go through.

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161 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ The first three weeks when you go out to your farming area you send out one message and one message only and what‘s that all about? Chris: The one message I put out is ‗Just Sold.‘ Graham: So in other words you are saying to your farm, you have information that goes out, and it says I‘ve just sold this and this and this in the area in the last week. And that‘s basically what the message they see. Chris: That‘s correct because there‘s a lot of hype out there in the media that the market is terrible. They might be seeing other properties on the market with other real estate agents with the sign still being up there for months and months. And as the same time they consistently see every week another property just sold by me. So I‘m just getting rid of all that sort of media hype that the market is terrible and they just keep saying ‗well Chris is still selling homes‘ Graham: So you must be doing something right. Chris: That‘s correct yeah. Graham: And in the fourth week you send out your newsletter which I believe is probably one of your most effective marketing tools. I think it‘s a two page A4 that you put out and tell us a little bit about some of the things that are in that newsletter. It‘s the fourth week it goes out isn‘t it? Chris: That‘s correct. Look I‘ve sort of built the newsletter up to a real community spirit within my area and I know that a lot of the people, they look forward to getting that newsletter every month just to see what‘s happening. So the first mistake that I found that a lot of people were doing, the ones that did do newsletters, was they were talking about how the market is in the whole area for the State.

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162 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ And they would put in some finance stuff but not relative information about what was physically actually happening in their own suburb. So that‘s one thing that I do, everything that I put in my newsletter is only about the suburb that they are living in. Graham: Excellent and that‘s obviously very relevant to people that live in that suburb. Chris: Exactly right. Graham: And it‘s a positive newsletter you put out isn‘t it. Chris: Yes that‘s correct. Graham: So you have your ‗just sold this, just sold this, just sold this‘ going out once a week for three weeks then you have your newsletter, then you repeat the cycle all over again. Is that how you do it? Chris: That‘s exactly what I do and that‘s what I have done for the 2 ½ years. Graham: Wow, that‘s so simple and one of the things I find so fascinating because I‘ve actually had the opportunity to talk to a huge number of top sales people all around the world is this. In most cases they are doing really simple things consistently, just like you are. Chris: That‘s exactly right, just going back to basics. Graham: Let‘s talk about some more things that you do to position yourself as being different from all your competitors. I know one of your most effective tools is what we call the pre-listing kit. In your case you call it the Black Box. Talk us through that a little bit if you could. Chris: We‘ve come up with this pre-listing kid that we do called The Black Box. Now what The Black Box is all about is when we get that initial phone call for the appraisal.

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Firstly I will never book an appraisal call for that day, I will always make it the next day. Graham: What‘s the reason for that? Chris: Generally I am always too busy to do it that day but real estate is all about perception. Now they want to know that they are talking to an expert and they are talking to someone that everyone else wants to be talking to. So I always made that mistake when I first started and a lot of new agents do this is they get so excited when they get that appraisal call, yeah I will be there in half an hour. Now that perception is what were you doing? Sitting on your computer playing solitaire? You mustn‘t be very busy to be able to come and see me within half an hour. So I‘ll always make that perception that I‘m completely booked for the day, I‘ll book it for the next day. But that then allows me to get that edge if they are talking to other agents. So I then send out my prelisting kit that should secure the business before I get there for the next day anyway. Graham: Wow, fantastic, great strategy. And you‘ve got a couple of things that you put in this pre-listing kit that I really love. You actually keep it quite simple, I think you‘ve mentioned that a lot of real estate agents that use a pre-listing kit, the ones they use, they are too complicated. Chris: That‘s correct. I‘ve found with the ones that I‘ve always taken away from other competitors when going into the appraisal is this. I‘ve looked through them and there is just too much information. The people haven‘t got the time to sit there and read everything, there would be pages and pages.

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164 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ So the pre-listing kit that I‘ve worked on and pretty much just got perfect within the last three years is keep it simple, keep it very basic, easy to read, and quick information that we can always revert back to it. One of the main things that I will have in my pre-listing kit is I have four testimonials. Each testimonial is used to strategically position myself if any objection comes up that we normally come across in real estate. So the first one is an open listing testimonial. So this is from a buyer that was on the market previously with an open listing or multi listing, they had no success, they have come on board with us and I‘ve sold the property within one or two weeks. So I‘ve received the testimonial from them saying how bad it was going multi and this is why you should just sell with Chris. The second testimonial I would have is about using a discount agency. These sellers have tried selling with a discount agency, had no success, then again come on board with us, we‘ve sold the property in under seven days, we have great communication, feedback and service that they generally don‘t get with a discount agency. The third one I will have is from a buyer and this one has actually got a photo taken with me handing the keys over in front of the sold sign with the buyer. So as a seller they can actually read from the buyer‘s point of view how I dealt with them. How I made that transaction so easy for them so they can feel safe and secure if they list their property with me that I am going to handle my buyers with a lot of respect and treat them the way that they‘ve always wanted to be treated. The fourth one I have, and I think is probably my key one that will probably stand me out from anyone else of my competition. I have a testimonial, now this testimonial that I use is from a past seller who is also a buyer.

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165 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ So they actually sold with me and purchased off me at the same one time. Now what I do is I‘ve got the testimonial written from them and then on the end of it I actually had their mobile number which I‘ve been authorised to use. So I then give this testimonial to a potential seller to say ‗here is a past client as a seller and a buyer that has given me authority to pass on their mobile number so you can call them personally‘. Graham: Yeah and that‘s instant credibility and do many people actually call him, this particular person? Chris: No. Graham: But the thing is people can see that you‘ve got the confidence of someone who‘s been delighted with your services and you can call them if necessary. But not that many people do actually do that. Chris: No. Graham: So it‘s not like they are going to get dozens and dozens of calls a week, because they don‘t. Chris: No, that‘s exactly right but it just positions you different to say ‗that‘s how confident I am that I‘m going to be the best real estate agent that you need to do the job but if you don‘t believe me, ring a past client and they will tell you‘ Graham: Let summarise this strategy and why it can be used by anyone is business. You‘ve taken the three most common objections that you normally get, so for example why should I give you sole agency or exclusive agency compared to like a general agency, why should I go for you when you charge a higher commission that perhaps some of these discount agencies out there? How do you treat our buyers because in real estate there‘s both buyers and sellers and also who can I effectively talk to that I can actually see what you are really like? And by having testimonials like that, so what you‘ve really done, you‘ve just identified or collected

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166 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ testimonials that pretty well answer your most common or biggest objections you are likely to get in your particular field haven‘t you. Chris: That‘s correct yes. Graham: Any anyone can use the same strategy in any business, so you could be a professional services person, you could be an accountant or a lawyer, you could be a tradesperson. And your testimonial might say ‗well look someone might have used a cheap tradesperson before, you are more expensive but I used the cheap tradesperson before, shoddy job, never showed up, decided to go with Chris Gilmour Tradesperson, if you were a tradesperson, fantastic job, loved it, on time, wonderful, well worth paying that extra bit of money.‘ And then another testimonial of course we had the name of the client they could actually ring as well and so forth, so really testimonials, we call it social proof, they are proof if you like that you are good. The last thing I want you to quiz you on for a second before we finish this interview, this is really clever. Every single piece of information that you give your clients, is presented in a certain way. It only costs a little bit more money than just doing it in an average way, but has a very big impact on the potential customers. For example the pre-listing kit I know that you give all your potential clients, I think costs you about $6 per person to actually hand out. And on that you have a bit of information about yourself and a bit of information on a couple of other things, but how was it actually presented? Just tell me about that one more time. Chris: Ok it‘s presented to them in what we call a Black Box but every single piece of material that I have in there is graphically designed from a designer and then professional printed through a printer on around 300 gsm so it‘s not paper it‘s just a little bit thicker.

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167 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Bit like cardboard so it doesn‘t get scrunched up, it‘s doesn‘t get thrown away. We are charging a high commission so they want to know that they are dealing with a professional company and this is one way to bring it across that. Every single piece of marketing that you are seeing here is just an example of how we are going to market your property when we go to the market. Graham: And one of the other things, I know you are a bit fan, you communicate with the marketing area, because you work in an area of about 1,100 homes in Brisbane, every message, once a week for three weeks you put out just one message to all those 1,100 homes and what‘s that message? What do they actually get from you once a week for three weeks? Chris: They just get a Sold message. Graham: In other words I‘ve just sold this home here or those three homes here in two days or three days or four days, here‘s something else, I‘ve just sold this home, I‘ve just sold this home, I‘ve just sold this home. So pretty well they get that three weeks out of every four, what do you think is probably going through these people‘s minds? Chris: The only thing I do is sell properties. Graham: That‘s what Chris does. Every time I hear from this guy, he‘s sold more properties. You are reinforcing, reinforcing, reinforcing if you like that you are the expert, you are the person that can sell their homes. Chris: That‘s it. Graham: And one last thing Chris, just as we finish now, imagine you are talking to a business audience, and you went from earning $135,000 in real estate in one year to $880,000 in the second year. The big thing I take away from that is that amazing things are possible when you do put some systems and ideas in place.

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168 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ So what would be a message of encouragement you‘d give to anyone in business right now in terms of people that want to improve their results, what would you tell them? Chris: The first thing I would tell them is forget your competition, just concentrate solely on yourself, don‘t get wound up or caught up with talk from anyone else. Just focus purely on yourself, get systems in place, consistency, hard work, dedication and drive and you will always be successful. Graham: It‘s been a fantastic interview today Chris and I‘ve really enjoyed this chat. Thanks again. Chris: Not a worry, thanks Graham. Action Exercise: Even though most people reading this interview will not be real estate sales professionals I have included it here for a very important reason. Chris Gilmour is a perfect example of someone who is working in a very common industry with a huge amount of competitors who are offering the same service and often at a lower price than Chris. So what does Chris do? He leapfrogs over his competitors and plays the game at a much higher level. And in his first two years he has an astonishing 82% market share and is earning nearly a million dollars a year. How do you apply the same approach to your own business? First of all you have to stop focusing on what your competitors are doing and focus instead on what you will do differently. What about the simple things Chris does with his printed material so it looks like a million dollars when people see it? This only costs him a tiny amount of money yet creates the perception he is high class and the right person to deal with. And how about the way he handles the first phone call

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169 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ and can describe your house just from your address? Chris told me he did that by personally delivering his ‗just sold‘ flyers to his local neighbourhood and taking notes of the homes in each street. If he just learned details about 20 houses a week that was around 1,000 homes he knew a lot of info on within his first 12 months. And I love his idea of using four testimonials that are carefully picked to answer his most common objections and position him as the person to use. How can you use some of these simple ideas in your own business this month?

14: Andrew Griffiths Make a Big Bold Statement

Reprinted with permission Graham McGregor: In this interview for the Unfair Business Advantage Report it‘s my great pleasure to be talking to best selling business author and marketing expert Andrew Griffiths in Australia.

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170 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Andrew is passionate about helping people to achieve their dreams, no matter how big or bold they may be. Widely acknowledged as Australia's #1 Business Author, Andrew has ten books that are now sold in over fifty countries around the world (eight of these books are bestsellers). Andrew provides profoundly simple insights that are changing the way tens of thousands of people think about their business and their life. Andrew, you‘ve been speaking to business audiences for years. What‘s one of the most useful sales and marketing strategy that you recommend to all your clients to get some fantastic results and give them if you like a totally unfair business advantage? Andrew: Well today for me and something that I‘m very, very passionate about is the need to really make a big, bold statement about your business, whatever it might be. There are so many businesses; it‘s so competitive if we don‘t stand out in some shape or form than we just get lost amongst the masses. We become a gray business I tend to call it. So we‘ve got to be a shining star amongst our competitors and one of the best ways to do that is to make a big, bold statement about what your business is. Graham: Sounds good, in fact you were telling me a moment ago before our call, about the image or graphic you often show at the start of your live presentations. This graphic really illustrates the idea of making a big, bold statement. What is this graphic you show? Andrew: It‘s a goldfish bowl and there‘s one solitary goldfish swimming around in there and he‘s got a little dorsal fin strapped to his back. Graham: So a goldfish thinking he‘s Jaws if you like?

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171 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Andrew: That‘s right and for some reason it just resonates so perfectly with that key message that I try to get across of making a big, bold, statement. Graham: I love the concept Andrew so let‘s get into some nuts and bolts. How could the average business person reading this actually use the idea of making a big bold statement to really stand out in their market place? Andrew: I think the interesting part about it first of all is the fact that when you are trying to make a bit bold statement a lot of people they struggle to embrace that concept. When you ask people ‗what do you do?‘ in their own small business they do what I call the two toe shuffle. It‘s kind of a bit of a look down and a bit of a mutter under their breath. They are not that proud to beat their chest about what it is they actually do. So I find that that‘s the beginning of this process. You need to have a big, bold statement about your business. So when someone asks ‗what do you do, what is your business?‘ you can be excited and proud to tell them all about it. Finding that statement is often the hardest part for most people of course, that the challenge that we all face. Here’s a good example of what I mean. I was contracted by the Government to go out to regional Australia a while back and help small businesses that were in areas that were struggling. One particular business that I came across was a general store in the middle of nowhere in Queensland. It was a typical old general store that is dusty and it‘s on a road, it‘s a through road so everyone kind of drives by. This old store had been there for 100 years and it was an old lady that ran it and she was hard as nails and bitter and twisted because no one would stop at her general store. People just kept driving past and not

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172 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ stopping. All she got in her store from the tourists was dust she reckoned. And so I am sitting at the front going ‗oh my god how on earth do I help this lady?‘ We are sitting around and having a bit of a chat and so ok we‘ve got to find this big, bold statement for her. And I really am kind of looking deep here Graham, looking very deep. The store itself was interesting because it was in two parts. One half of it got so full of junk about 30 years ago, old mining and farming equipment that they literally closed the doors. It was full of all this stuff still and they just moved the general store next door. So my strategy here was we are looking at all of these things, I am talking to the old lady running the store and asking can you tell us how long has it been a general store for? And she said ‗oh well over 100 years‘. And I said ‗Is it the oldest general store in Queensland?‘ Now her comment was ‗well it could be.‘ I‘m a marketing guy, so ‗could be‘ was close enough for me. So my big bold statement was we made this business... ‗The oldest general store in Queensland.‘ Now I rang up friends in Cairns close by, 800 miles away and I said to them right we need some signage done up, we need it to say ‗the oldest general store in Queensland‘ on these new signs. Then what we also thought about, adding to the next part of the story was ‗ok we need a bit more of a hook here. Half of the shop that‘s filled with junk, if you have a look at it, it‘s actually very interesting. If we kind of open that door we could have people walk on in, we could actually call this a museum. And the door, the path through all that stuff leads into the

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173 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ new general store. So we could have a museum and why don‘t we make it free entry for this museum as a great hook? So all of a sudden we‘ve gone from this non descript general store with dust on the side to the oldest general store in Queensland with a museum that has free entry. And bizarrely this whole thing literally turned the business around overnight. We got some very cheap signage done, put them up and before we knew it there‘s film crews from around the world filming this general store. Busloads of tourists are stopping and getting out the front and getting their photo taken with the oldest general store in Queensland. They are buying ice creams and doing all these kinds of crazy things. Now it is actually the oldest general store in Queensland, so I did kind of do a little bit of homework to make sure that we weren‘t telling a fib. But that is exactly the point that I‘m trying to make. We turned a non descript typical, there‘s 10,000 little general stores like that in outback Queensland, into something significant that stood out and all we did was change the words. Graham: So obviously by doing this it sounds like the turnover has increased dramatically, all kinds of people coming in and spending money so obviously she‘s a very happy old lady now running that store? Andrew: I‘m not sure if she‘s ever really happy to be honest but she was happier. It got featured on Japanese television shows, German television shows, it‘s in Lonely Planet travel guide books, this is the place you have stop to have a look at. Now nothing changed there apart from some signage. Graham: And that big bold statement that you came up with. Andrew: That‘s right the Big bold statement.

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174 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Here’s another example: I was contacted by a restaurant about 10 years ago. It was called Mango Jam. This restaurant was interesting because it was a real challenge for the people who had just bought it. This restaurant had gone through a number of different changes in its history. It has been a bar, nightclub, it had been a restaurant, it had been a gay bar at some time, all these different kinds of incarnations and it had really lost its identity. So it had just become a kind of a faceless restaurant on this street in a tourist town. The owners were pulling out their hair because they said ‗we don‘t actually know what we are‘. People are coming here and the family comes in and then they go running out and the local biker gang pulls in and we don‘t know whether to make them Daiquiris or give them bacon and eggs. We had a real lack of identity and the business was really, really struggling. So they contacted us and said ok what can your company do? So we suggested that we create a big, bold statement for them. The first thing we did though is we had to figure out what is this business or what should it be? So we went around the local town, this was in a place called Port Douglas which is a great little area. We surveyed every hotel in Port Douglas and said ‗tell us what kind of restaurants are lacking in Port Douglas. What isn‘t here?‘ And then we surveyed I think it was about 1,000 tourists on the streets same thing ‗what do you like about Port Douglas, what didn‘t you like, what restaurants were there? What was missing?‘ Overwhelmingly all of the feedback that came back to us was that there were no family restaurants in Port Douglas.

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175 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ So we said to my client, ‗this is what you need to become, you need to become a family restaurant.‘ Now we don‘t know what the heck that means but that‘s what you‘ve got to become and even more importantly you‘ve got to become the number one family restaurant in Port Douglas. I would have said Queensland but let‘s stick with Port Douglas at this stage of the game. So we transformed the restaurant. We got some people to come in and teach the staff how to interact with families and children, we made this fantastic colouring books, we got all these kind of things that were doing around kids, the staff dressed much more colourfully, we had little kids visors made up with the menu was underneath the visor so the kids could look down at the menu. All of these amazing things and it literally transformed the business overnight and in many different ways. First of all everyone knew what they were and the local hotels could recommend Mango Jam to families. If there was a family, mum and dad and two kids standing at reception and they say ‗where should we eat tonight?‘ the response from the staff was simple. ‗Oh the best family restaurant in town is Mango Jam.‘ Now Mango Jam didn‘t really change a lot of stuff. The cosmetics were the colouring books and the staff and the attitude, and a few more kid‘s items on the menu. So really not a lot changed. But there became a clarity of what the business was and you‘d hear the guys on the phone when they are talking to customers. Oh what are you, oh ‗well are the number one family restaurant in Port Douglas.‘ That was the big, bold statement that they promoted. Now interestingly enough about a year after we transformed this and they started to win awards as the best family restaurant in North Queensland I got a phone call from the head of McDonalds in Australia at the time.

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176 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ He was ringing up to tell me he hated me and the reason he hated me was because he goes to Port Douglas regularly with his family. And his kids insisted that they eat at Mango Jam for lunch and for dinner every day. He said it was just driving him crazy, (he said this very tongue in cheek) but he really rang to congratulate us on what we had done with the restaurant. The two key points that I think are just so powerful in this story are grabbing an identity and making it as big and bold as you can and let everything else in your business start to fall into place. Graham: Actually it‘s interesting you‘ve just talked about this idea of a big bold statement because I was talking with a sign writing company here in New Zealand a year or two ago now. The owner was telling me about one of his customers who was laid off from a job, I think he was repairing windows and he decided he wanted to go into business for himself. So he had the sign writer paint his van and the sign writer said ‗what do you do, how do you do it?‘ This guy had come up with this idea of a big, bold statement, a bit along the lines you are talking about. He decided he was going to become ‗The Window Doctor‘ and he actually dressed in a white medical coat and with a stethoscope. He will come in and fix your windows in his white coat and he actually put a cartoon of himself in a white medical suit on the side of his van. Funnily enough it was really interesting because everyone knew when the Window Doctor made house calls. They‘d see this big sign on the van. He would wear his white medical coat and stethoscope and so on. It was a big, bold statement and within twelve months I think he had something like two or three different vans on the road, he had just bought himself a really nice expensive luxury car. He‘s done no advertising at all apart from this window doctor message on his van and how he dresses.

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177 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ I guess in some ways it‘s a bit along the lines of what you are talking about. It‘s a big, bold statement. ‗I‘m The Window Doctor‘ Andrew: It is and realistically, I guess in the modern landscape Graham the reality is that I think traditional advertising is really struggling. I think that there are so many advertising mediums that make it very difficult for people to determine where to advertise, how to advertise etc. But I think that if you can make a big, bold statement and you can back it up, I think that‘s another important element of this, what happens is your advertising, marketing, word of mouth, the whole caboodle, actually happens automatically. That‘s just a beautiful thing at very little cost that people are just driven to what is different, what stands out from the crowd. I‘ve got another client of mine her business, along the signage kind of thing, she runs a business called ―Right Brain Genius‖ and what it is, it‘s a process that she uses to unlock your creative potential by using the right hand side of your brain. It helps people improve their golf score, all these other types of things so people kind of like it. She‘s got one of those VW‘s, the new VW Beetle I guess and she‘s had it completely sign written as a brain. And it‘s actually the right shape but this is like the ‗Brain Mobile‘ that goes around town and it‘s just hilarious. There are tourists lined up taking photos next to the ‗Brain Mobile‘ and it is the greatest form of advertising she‘s ever done. You look at it and go ‗wow that‘s a very, very clever thing.‘ Just like a name, the name of a business is so important these days. Again, anything you can that‘s going to make you stand out from the pack I think is a key element in success.

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178 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ I think it‘s only going to become more and more important as time goes on because I think the number of businesses in the world are set to triple over the next 10 to 15 years because there‘s so many opportunities for people to start up their own businesses for next to nothing. Graham: Wow, that‘s interesting. Now people are going to be reading this and think this is fantastic, these are great examples you have given so far. So what are two or three steps that you would advise people along the way, obviously the hardest bit is coming up with that big, bold statement? I‘m an electrician, I‘m an accountant, I run this type of business, so how do I make a big, bold statement? What are a couple of helpful hints you get people, just say if you are consulting with someone, what are some of the things you get them to do to help them come up with this big, bold statement they want to make? Andrew: Yeah, and that is an important part of it. I the process that we follow is we need to really try and identify is what is that point of difference, what makes this business unique? And most of the time it is tough when you say ‗well we are the biggest‘ or ‗we are the oldest established‘ or ‗we are this or that‘. But sometimes even that is enough. So you really do need to be able to define what it is I guess that makes you different. So try and put some words around it. Just write them on a bit of paper, write them up on a wall, what do we do different, what do people say about us? I actually would even suggest a second step would be to ask some of your customers, assuming you are already in business and perhaps you are looking to try and make that statement.

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179 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Ask 10, 15, 20 of your top customers. What do you like about us? Why do you deal with us? Why do you keep coming back? All those kinds of things to try and narrow that kind of message down a little bit from there. So again we start to hone it in. A third point I would make Graham is that I spend a lot time researching online and I think that one of the best things to do is to research online about businesses in other industries, outside your own. You will come up with some really interesting idea and observations about business names and industries. So research it outside of your own industry, is kind of the point that I would make there. I think the last part, or two more things is then you need to determine what that bold statement is for you. And you‘ve really got to make sure that there is an alignment there. Iif you are going to make that statement that you are actually going to be prepared to live it and kind of yell it out from the street tops. Like for that restaurant, like the general store, like the Right Brain Genius VW car. These are people who are all in their own way, very, very passionate about their businesses and very proud of their businesses. They demonstrate it in different ways but like the Right Brain Genius VW brain car, she goes to fairs, to markets, to sporting events. And she sticks a whole pile of brochures all over the car so her car is constantly advertising and promoting her business. She loves it from that point of view so you need to make sure that there is an alignment and an integrity between what your bold statement is and what you are actually delivering and that leads onto that passionate part of it as well. Then, be prepared to use that bold statement everywhere.

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180 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ People ask ‗what do you do?‘ Well I‘m making the world more creative, I‘m the oldest general store in Queensland, I‘m with the number one award winning family restaurant in Port Douglas, whatever it might be. I see it time and time again Graham where once people have that clarity of a big, bold statement and purpose, that is a turning point in their business. Here is another very interesting example of a big bold statement. I came across another chap, third hand recently. You know that in mine sites they have those big giant trucks, haul pack trucks? Well this person is apparently the number one world expert in changing haul pack tyres. And you kind of go ‗really?‘ He must have one job every year but he‘s actually incredibly busy. Now this guy makes between 3 and 5 million dollars a year in what he does because he goes through a mine site and he identifies problems. Now his advertising pitch is a short video which is of a tyre coming off of a haul pack truck somewhere in Central America and destroying the entire mining camp. So that is all he does. He shows this video, and says ‗if you want to use my services my job, what I do is I prevent that from happening‘.‘ He travels around to these remote places, teaches, trains, whatever it may be, highlights their weaknesses and just determines ways to do things better. And again he‘s the world‘s number one haul pack tyre changing specialist. And you go, that‘s just beautiful. Graham: Great example. Now Andrew I know that you‘ve got a huge range of resources that will certainly help business people reading this not only identify their big, bold statement but also a whole range of

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181 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ other marketing resources that will help them increase their sales and profits, after all I guess your big, bold statement is you are Australia‘s number one business author aren‘t you. Andrew: That‘s it. Graham: Ten books in 50 countries, isn‘t that your big, bold statement? Andrew: It is, the only problem is its 11 books now. And 11 doesn‘t feel quite as good as 10 did so my next bold statement has to be updated. I‘ve got to improve my own big, bold statement. Graham: So where do people go to access some of these great resources? Andrew: The easiest thing to do is to go to my main website which is www.andrewgriffiths.com.au and I have a range of small business resources that any of your readers will find useful. My books are available through most of the bookshops as well. Graham: Fantastic. So on your website there‘s a number of articles that you‘ve written as well that people can read. Andrew:

Lot of blogs. Lot of blog postings.

I have a weekly business bullet as well and again for me I‘m a big believer in business success happens in the head. If you have the right attitude and the right ideas and the right creative spaces that‘s where businesses succeed again. Get that right and everything else will fall into place. So I focus a lot on that kind of information. I‘ve got a lot of how to information but also a lot about thinking better, being more creative, coming up with better solutions or finding better problems that you can solve, whatever it might be but working around those kind of things is my space that I feel particularly comfortable and work in.

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182 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Graham: One last thing Andrew before we finish the call today. A lot of business people today are saying business is a lot tougher than it used to be. So what‘s just one closing bit of advice that you would give business people in general about how to be more successful? Just something that you probably share with a lot of your business audiences. Andrew: I think the most important thing that we can do is we have to over promise and we have to over deliver. I think that that means we‘ve got to be really prepared to give our customers incredible value and state that up front. And we will go above and beyond the call of duty and your expectations in every way and then we will over promise and we will over deliver on that over promise as well. I know that most people are used to the old under promise and over deliver concept, my view on it is we should be over promising and over delivering every step of the way. Because that‘s a real key to again being different. There‘s a ton of businesses out there most of them are fairly mediocre. If you really want to succeed and be truly successful you‘ve just got to be better than the rest. It‘s as simple as that in reality and I know it sounds a bit flippant but I actually don‘t think it‘s that hard to be better than the competitors. So do whatever you can to outshine your competitors and be prepared to go the extra mile, do what others won‘t be prepared to do. You can charge accordingly, people are prepared to pay for quality and someone‘s got to be the most expensive so it may as well be you. Bu if you are going to do that you have to deliver on it and you do have to be the best. Graham: Great advice Andrew. Thank you very much for talking to us today.

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183 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ I love your idea of a big, bold promise and I love that idea of over promising and over delivering as well so have a great day, thanks for your time. Andrew: You are most welcome Graham. Action Exercise: I love Andrew‘s idea of a big, bold statement and it‘s something that any business can do with a bit of thought and creativity. So do what Andrew suggests. Ask 10-20 clients what they really like about you and your business. What are you well known for? What would you like to be well known for? What is your big, bold, statement? Take the great example of Brisbane Dentist Paddi Lund. He became known as the dentist who only took on new clients who had been referred to him by existing clients. He has a confidential or unlisted phone number and if you have to personally referred to be considered as one of his new clients. Paddi also transformed the whole dental experience for all his clients. He made it such a ‗wow‘ experience that people can‘t wait to tell other people about his dental services.

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184 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ 15: Bill Harrison How to get Free Media Publicity:

Reprinted with permission

Graham: It‘s my fantastic pleasure today to be talking to Bill Harrison from Reporter Connection. Bill, just before we get into the strategy you want to share today, can you just give our readers a quick background on what you‘ve been up to and your experience in PR and publicity and so on? Bill: Sure. My brother Steve and I are the principals in a company called Bradley Communications Corp outside Philadelphia and we‘ve actually been in business since 1985. Business has taken different twists and turns over the years but the common thread has always been helping authors and entrepreneurs get free publicity on radio and TV shows as well as magazines, newspapers and online. At the end of 2009 we launched www.reporterconnection.com This is a free service that tells you about what given journalists are working on. The absolute best time, easiest time to get publicity is when a journalist has already decided they are writing a story about your particular topic and now they are eagerly seeking out sources to help them with that story. Years ago we landed on the front page of Investor‘s

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185 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Business Daily which is big newspaper here in the US because the reporter had already decided he was going to do a story about TV publicity. So he sought us out and interviewed us because we‘ve helped thousands of people get on radio and TV shows. He ended up mentioning one of our products on the front page of Investor‘s Business Daily and we got a ton of business from it so that was a lesson that we always remembered. Be there when the media is looking for you. Graham: Fantastic and I can certainly speak from experience myself that your Reporter Connection ezine is great. I‘ve got radio interviews myself, I‘ve got articles, I‘ve got leads, I‘ve got all kinds of good things. In fact one of my clients actually received over 100 good sources to help them with a new project they were doing just by advertising in Reporter Connection which is actually free., So let‘s get into the strategy today Bill. In terms of advising a business person or a business owner or perhaps a self employed professional. If you want to get free publicity for your business, perhaps on TV or radio or in print, how do you do it? What‘s the strategy? Give me a couple of things I could get started with... Bill: First of all I would say remember that the media is always looking for good stories and a lot of people kind of take what they do in their normal business for granted. Invariably there are interesting things that they are doing which would be novel to a newcomer and what I find is most people tend to under estimate the news appeal of what they are doing. The second thing I would tell you is to start local because typically the bar to get publicity locally is much lower than it is on a national level. The next thing I would tell you is the second easiest time to get PR is when the reporter is looking for you.

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186 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ They‘ve already decided that they are doing a story on your particular topic so one of the ways you can do that is to use our free service at www.reporterconnection.com to alert you to what given journalists are working on. But another thing you can think about is when does your topic come up in the news? So for instance let‘s say that you are based here in the US and you‘re a public speaking expert. Well here in the US the President of the United States gives a State of Union address once a year. I believe it‘s every January and invariably the media is always doing post State of the Union critiques where they are interviewing people who are experts about public speaking and they are asking for feedback. Was the President good or bad? What could he have done better to be a clearer communicator? So if you are a public speaking expert the State of the Union is a good publicity opportunity for you. Let‘s say you are a wedding planner. Well here in the US the peak wedding season is April through June. Predictably every year newspapers, magazines are doing stories about all aspects of planning a wedding so if you want to pitch either local or national media that‘s a good time to do it. Another example would be maybe you are an expert at helping people eat healthier. The media is always doing stories around the holiday season about what tips for eating healthier. They certainly do a lot of stories in early January on dieting because early January is the peak dieting season so think about when your particular topic will be in the news and be prepared to pitch the media accordingly. Now another thing you do have to remember is different media has different deadlines. National magazines here in the US typically work at least 6 months in advance.

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187 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ A newspaper for a non news driven story is probably going to work at least a week to 2 weeks in advance. Same thing would be true of local TV and national TV you are probably looking at a month or 2 months out minimum. The third thing to think about how you could tie in with the news. So let‘s say a client of mine is an expert at dog training and unfortunately fairly regularly some kid gets bitten by a dog and there‘s a news story about it. Graham: This happens at least once a month here in NZ, unfortunately often to a child and they get quite badly bitten. It‘s very sad and there are pictures and it‘s always in the news. At least once a month. Bill: Exactly. Unfortunately I think it‘s a worldwide phenomenon. But my client has gotten a steady stream of publicity by setting up Google alerts to let him know about when these type of stories hit the media all around the country here in the US and when he hears about an incident like this that‘s been reported in the media, he gets in touch with the reporter and says to them ‗hey would you like to do a follow up story on what people can do to avoid these type of tragedies?‘ What can they do to protect their kids. And he‘s gotten a steady stream of publicity that way. Another thing to do is just think about how you can tie in with whatever is in the news. Graham: Could be the budget for example if the government is presenting a budget and this is what we are going to be doing. Taxes and everything else at the moment and you know that comes up at a certain time every year so you could very easily tie in with that couldn‘t you? Anything to do with money or taxes or investments, because you know it‘s coming up? Bill: Absolutely. Think about things that definitely come up regularly but also keep your eyes open to things that are one time occurrences because riding the news cycle is a very good way to get publicity. When your topic is in the news your chance of getting publicity has probably gone up 50 fold.

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188 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Graham: So you could tie in with something like the royal wedding that happened in England a little while ago, you could probably have all kinds of things you could have tied in with that if you have anything to do with weddings or looking good or photography, you would certainly be able to ride that wave quite well. Bill: Absolutely that‘s a terrific example. The other thing is when you get publicity try to leverage it because remember the two big benefits of getting publicity are number one the immediate leads, immediate business you get from the exposure, the free advertising if you will. It‘s also the bragging rights that you get. The ability to get reprints of that article and include it with your sales literature, perhaps to mention it on your website or even just in your biography when clients are looking at your credentials. I know people who make money every day from publicity they got 20 years ago. Graham: That sounds like a good way to do business. You are providing the media with some sort of information for a story, basically you want them to write a story about some aspect of what you are doing, tied in with an event or tied in with something that‘s happening. I assume that what you would recommend your clients do is have them provide helpful tips and helpful information of some sort on the story so people can read that and get something useful from reading the story. Is that what you‘d recommend or do you take a different approach? Bill: I would if that‘s a media that likes to include helpful tips. Two more things. One is you are making a broader point that is that the media really is not interested in giving your business free publicity. What the media want, the media cares about providing high quality content and entertainment to their audiences to keep their ad rates high typically.

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189 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Having said that though every journalist has a different formula for what they like to write about. Some journalists would love to run a story with a lot of helpful tips, other journalists like to run what are called trend pieces where they will do a story where they will interview 3 or 4 companies in a given industry and will talk about how these companies embodied a trend. Other journalists like to write standalone pieces focusing on one company so whenever you can I would highly recommend that you do some research and figure out for the given media that you want to get coverage in, what is their formula. I say that to get publicity you have to be a kind of a publicity chameleon. You have to change your colours depending on the environment that you are in and ideally you would pitch different types of stories to different types of media. Graham: That makes sense. I know in my own case I had the opportunity a short time ago to present a particular article on marketing to the largest newspaper in the country for their online edition. I did this with the help of someone who had already been published by this newspaper. We put it to them, they decided to run with it and I‘ve had 12 articles published almost one a week since then. I‘ve had all kinds of people registering for my Unfair Business Advantage Report. I‘ve also got speaking engagements and all kinds of other things out of it just from being in the newspaper so publicity can certainly be a useful way to really promote any business can‘t it. Bill: Absolutely and your story really embodies that definitely. Graham: A couple more things. When you approach some of the media, like maybe a local reporter, what are a couple of things that you would do just to make them take interest or pay attention to what you are offering them? Do you email them, do you phone them, do you send a normal mail letter to them? What are the best ways to make contact?

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190 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Bill: We‘ve actually interviewed over 600 journalists in recent years because we do an event in New York twice a year called the National Publicity Summit. This is where people get to meet face-to-face with top national TV producers from shows like The Today‘s Show, and Good Morning America and also leading print journalists from Time News Week, People Magazine and other large media. I can tell you that the number one pet peeve of journalists is people don‘t do their homework. They don‘t know what those writers and producers cover so the first thing I would say is, there‘s two ways of getting publicity. There‘s what I call the mass approach and the targeted approach. The targeted approach is where you say to yourself ‗Who are the 100 or 200 media outlets that would really do the most for me?‘ If I could get coverage in one of these outlets, my business could really benefit. And then for each of those I would figure which writers or producers cover your particular topic. Generally you don‘t want to be pitching editors for magazines, you want to be pitching writers who cover particular beats and then in an ideal world you would read 5 or 6 articles that each of those writers has written. You may want to have an intern or a freelancer put together folders for you. And then you want to read any commentary about what they like to cover so the answer to your question is that I would do my research, I would have a clear idea of what that journalist covers and I would typically send them an email that showed that I‘d read their previous work and I would pitch them something which was in alignment with what they covered. If they like to write about helpful tips, I would talk about how I have these helpful tips. If they like to write about trends I would mention that I notice they like to write trend stories and here are 3 or 4 trends story ideas. Most journalists would tell you they prefer to be approached by email. I think to a certain extent it

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191 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ depends on your personality. If you are very good on the phone then you may just want to pick up the phone and call them. Graham : That makes sense. I like what you are saying because very magazine and every newspaper and every radio station or TV station they all have a different format. Some like a certain number of words, some like a certain type of presentation and obviously you‘ve got to make sure that you tailor that exactly to their normal type of presentation. It makes it very easy for them doesn‘t it? You are making their life easier by doing something like that. Bill: Absolutely. At the same time, keep in mind that you are also looking to build a relationship with them because a lot of them will not be in a position to give you coverage the first time you contact them. So ideally that‘s what you want but your drop down position is that you want to develop a relationship with them so you want to include commentary something like ‗hey even if you are not interested in this, no worries, I know a lot of people in this industry and I‘m happy to connect you. Let me know if you are ever in need of a source for this particular industry because I am happy to connect you with people I know.‘ Graham: In other words you are positioning yourself as being helpful. I am here to help, give you some stuff, make your life easier. Even if you don‘t write about me, I‘d like to be of help is basically your approach there. Bill: Absolutely and you will find that inevitably with a lot of them you just get a call from out of the blue when you least expect it. Saying that either they are finally writing a story about your particular topic, or maybe they are hurting for content like it‘s a dead time of year and they thought of you. Here they are and they are finally ready to do something with you. Graham: Can you give me an example of one or two clients, that have got free PR, perhaps an article in a newspaper or magazine or something on a TV

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192 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ show or radio show and tell me what it‘s done for their business? Bill: Sure. We work with a lot of authors. Some of our most famous clients are the guys that did ―Chicken Soup for the Soul‖. They‘ve sold over 500 million copies worldwide now and PR was integral to what they did. Those guys, one of their mantras was they wanted to do a minimum of one radio interview every day and we call it the daily promotional habit and we encourage all our clients to do it. But year in year out they just grind it out, steady stream of publicity and over time the effects was just fantastic. Another example is a former client of ours, Robert Kyosaki who wrote the famous book ―Rich Dad, Poor Dad‖. Publicity is very integral to Robert‘s success. One thing that people can learn from Robert is that he‘s not afraid to be controversial. For instance one of his points is your house is not an asset. That was a pretty novel idea to people before the housing crisis here in the US but he was getting a lot of publicity because we was saying ‗hey your house doesn‘t produce cash, you house will eat you if you lose your source of income so be careful about buying a house that‘s a lot more than you can afford.‘ Another thing he‘ll do is he‘ll talk about why he things 401k‘s and mutual funds are bad investments and again that‘s contrary to the conventional wisdom and he‘s gotten a ton of publicity as a result of making these contrarian type statements. Graham: That‘s two great stories. Have you got also perhaps just a local business, someone that you might have worked with? It could be a professional person or a retail person or a trades person. Bill: Absolutely. We have a client who‘s a mortgage broker and in the mortgage industry he found that he would be getting call after call from people whose first question is ‗what is your rate?‘ He was really kind of locked into being a commodity, so what he did

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193 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ was a couple of things. First he became the host of a local TV show I think it was on real estate issues or how to buy houses and then he also wrote a book called ―Yes you can get a Mortgage‖. And these two tools changed his positioning so now when he gets phone calls from people the first question wasn‘t hey what‘s your rate they were so honoured to get through to him on the phone because he was somewhat of a celebrity. Graham: They saw him on TV or had read his book or heard about his book and he was positioned as an expert in their mind and could they please talk to him? Bill: That‘s exactly right and people are much more willing to pay you premium prices if they perceive you to be an expert. Graham: Very true. Now what are some of the resources that you‘d recommend our readers go to in terms of learning about how to get publicity for their business? You‘ve got the Reporter Connection ezine which is at www.reporterconnection.com This is a fantastic free resource. Do you have any other helpful resources that you‘d recommend people check out? Bill: Yes, if you want to get radio and TV publicity here in the US you can check out our magazine and our online ezine called Radio TV Internet Report and that‘s at www.rtir.com Lastly we do a conference in the United States twice a year called the National Publicity Summit where it‘s limited to 100 people. It‘s held in New York and you get face-to-face meetings with top national media, producers and journalists from most influential TV shows in the US. Good Morning America, Today Show. We‘ve had, CNBC, MSNBC, Fox News, as well

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194 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ as major print magazines. That‘s at www.nationalpublicitysummit.com Graham: I would assume that sometimes just one mention in an influential media outlet like that could transform a business overnight? Bill: Absolutely. And not only, remember it‘s the addition to the immediate leads that you also get. It‘s the bragging rights that can hopefully boost your conversion rates for years to come. Graham: I remember one person told me they‘d had a PR story done on them about their business. They were in the planning business for events and conventions and that type of thing. They got one front page story, I think it was in the LA Times, and that produced enough business for the next 10 years. They never advertised, they just had one PR story and they‘d made a fortune. So again PR can work amazingly well. I have one last question. You speak to a lot of business people or business audiences on a regular basis, what‘s one other message you would just give them right now in terms of like ‗here‘s something else you should keep in mind to help you do better?‘ It doesn‘t have to do with publicity but just some encouraging words of any sort. Bill: I would tell people to have a written marketing calendar and a schedule of when they are going to do what promos. I would encourage them to hire a staff person to manage that calendar for them and to have at least a weekly meeting to go over it. I think we are all entrepreneurs and we are all going in a million directions and I find that that this system creates a very good structure to help you get more marketing out the door and in most businesses the more marketing you do the more money you make. Graham: That‘s actually a very good point because there are very few people do that.

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195 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ I know that the top retail companies do this and they often plan their marketing six months or 12 months ahead. But other businesses don‘t do this. So you say like in January this is your plan for January, we are going to do this and this and this, in February we are going to do these 5 things and in March we are going to do these 6 things. And it‘s all scheduled out in terms of marketing activities that you are going to be doing because if you don‘t plan them, a lot of the time they won‘t happen. That‘s pretty well what you are saying isn‘t it? Bill: Exactly. I think every entrepreneur should have a marketing co-ordinator. An administrative person who, even if they are part time, even if they are one day a week, just somebody who again they run that calendar, that schedule. They force you to have a meeting at least once a week and then they just remind you of the things that you said you wanted to do and they help you with any details that are necessary to get those things done. Graham: Excellent. Well look you‘ve shared some fantastic ideas today. I really appreciate your time. I know our readers are going to get some great value from what you‘ve just covered and I know the resources you recommended are very useful as well so thank you very much for that. Bill:

My pleasure.

Action Exercise: I really like what Bill Harrison has shared today on how to get free publicity for your business. One of the biggest advantages of free publicity is that it up to ten times more effective than paid advertising. If you write an article, appear on a radio or TV show or just have a media story about your business you instantly appear as an expert on your topic. I know that personally I have had the opportunity to write some short articles on marketing for a major newspaper in my own country. Here‘s one of my newspaper articles on added value in business.

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Added value And here‘s another one on ‗What is your unfair advantage? What is your unfair advantage? These types of articles have created brand new business, helpful contacts and best of all I have the ‗bragging rights‘ that Bill was talking about. In other words I can tell someone, I wrote an interesting article on XYZ topic for such and such well known publication. You can read it at this link.... This means that the one article or story can be leveraged many different ways. Here are some things you can do right now to get free publicity for your business. 1: Sign up to the reporter connection ezine. www.reporterconnection.com This is free of charge and it comes out five times a week. Each issue not only lists media outlets looking for experts for articles and stories, it also contains a helpful PR tip as well. 2: Start doing research on local media outlets that could potentially do a story on your business if you presented it to them in the right way. Then prepare material on hand to give to the right person in each media outlet when it is relevant. 3: If you want great media exposure in the United States check out two more great resources that Bill and Steve offer. www.nationalpublicitysummit.com www.rtir.com Positive publicity is one of the most powerful ways to promote any business and the only shame is that I didn‘t talk to Bill Harrison years ago and learn how simple it can be to get.

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Bill and his brother Steve have helped over 12,000 business owners, authors and entrepreneurs get amazing publicity for their business. So I recommend you follow carefully anything they recommend.

16: Justin Herald Turn your customers into your sales team

Reprinted with permission

Graham McGregor: In this interview for the Unfair Business Advantage Report it‘s my delightful pleasure to be talking to Justin Herald from Sydney, Australia. Justin Herald has fast become one of the rising stars in the fields of business and personal development. At the age of 25 with only $50 to his name, Justin Herald set about changing the course of his life. Justin created Attitude Inc, a clothing brand that became an international licensing success that turned over in excess of $20 million per year.

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198 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ He has had his own column in numerous magazines and in papers nationally in Australia and overseas. His articles have a weekly readership of over 5.5 Million people. He also is the author of 8 international best selling books. Justin is regarded as one of Australia‘s most sought after speakers with engagements book all over the country and overseas speaking in front of 150,000 people each year. Justin it‘s really good to have you on the call today. Justin Herald: Thanks mate. Graham: As you know I am interviewing a whole range of sales and marketing experts like yourself. I am asking them the one question, what‘s the one sales or marketing strategy that is working really well right now for you and your clients that you‘d like to share with our readers today? Justin: For me it‘s about utilising the value that you‘ve got in your business and around your business to the best of its ability. For me a lot of people sell to their customers but never look at using their customers as sales people at the same time. I did this when I started off in a market stall out here in a place called Parlkea Markets. Like so many people I couldn‘t get my brand into surf or sports stores at the time because it wasn‘t a surf brand, and it wasn‘t seen as a sports brand. But the amount of people that would come into the market stall every single weekend saying‘ I love your product but I can‘t find it anywhere‘. These people would have bought a $5 sticker or $10 hat or a $20 T-shirt. So what I said to them is ‗look could you take some of my business cards and the next time you are in a sports, surf or whatever store that you think that my brand would suit and fit that store, can you give my

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199 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ card to the owner of that store and say listen I do a bit of work for this brand which you‘ve never heard of called ―Attitude‖ but it would be perfect for your store. I‘ve got nothing on me right now because all the other reps have got the stock so if you ring our head office they‘ll send another rep out to show you because they‘ve got all the stock.‘ Now if I had a store ring up, then I was the guy they were ringing, I was the guy going to go and see them, I was going to come back and pack the box and I was going to ring them up in an American accent from the accounts department etc. So it was a one man band but on average I‘d pick up between 15 to 25 stores every single week, purely based upon the consumer getting behind my brand. Now the reason they did that is two things. Number one they liked the product, and people won‘t go and endorse anything unless the like it. But secondly and probably more importantly they liked the bloke behind the product and that‘s where as business owners and people wanting to start a business you‘ve got to actually be likeable. It might sound very simplistic but that‘s about as hard at it gets because people will then go in endorse anything they want purely based upon the fact that they like the person. That was now 15 years ago that I started that process. I‘ve got a new brand called ―Intimidate Industries‖ which is a sunglasses and soon to be clothing brand. What I am doing now is using the 21st version of turning my customers into my sales people which is called Facebook. I just go on Facebook and ask if anyone goes into a store and if they think that my sunglass or clothing brand would suit that store, could they please ask them to stock it and become my sales people for free.

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200 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Now I have over 3,000 odd followers on Facebook, so I only need 10% of those people to go into 300 stores which dramatically enhances my reach. That‘s just one store a week that they need to do that to. That‘s how I am picking up stores that way and it‘s funny as we go on in business we try to outsmart ourselves. Instead of looking at the simplicity of things and it‘s getting back to basics. For me that‘s the way that I‘ve done that and when you‘ve got no money you‘ve got to use whatever resources that are at your hands. I saw the people giving me money were a great resource to make more money for me. Graham: So if we could summarise what you are saying so far, the key strategy you are really talking about today is you want to turn your customers into your sales force. Justin: Absolutely and they are willing to do that and the reason they don‘t is you don‘t ask. It‘s about as simple as that really. And people love having ownership and taking ownership as well over success so that‘s the thing that people love. There would be many people out there that would have been one of those people that did that for me that would actually sit there and go ‗man I was part of that growth as well‘ and I am all for that. It‘s not about me being the legend at everything it‘s about having people around you that just love to be part of it so instead of paying them they will pay me for the privilege. Graham: Fantastic and I know you speak to a lot of different business audiences around the world on this idea and other ideas as well. So if you are advising some business people right now who are reading this and say ‗I want to turn my

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201 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ customers into my sales force, what are some steps I can take?‘ How could I implement that into my retail business or into my professional services business? Or I am a tradesperson or I am a manufacturer, what are some things I can do? Give me some examples of people that have used this concept. Justin: Yeah will you can do it in different formats. I‘ve got one client who has a beauty salon and so what we did there is whenever a customer comes in and they have a great experience what they gave them was a 50% discount voucher to give as a gift to someone else. Because then that way people will take ownership because they feel great that they are now giving someone something which looks like they are giving them the gift. But it‘s also then growing the business and whilst the beauty salon only gets 50% they‘ve still got a client they would never have had before. So I‘d rather have 50% of something instead of 100% of nothing. I‘ve got another client who owns a pest control business and what they do is they give away a bottle of wine every time you recommend someone else to use their services. And it‘s not a cheap wine it‘s a really good wine. What we did is we got them to have a nice cut-out of a bottle of wine that had a magnet on it so it sits on their fridge and that‘s what they give the person that they suggest to ring their company. We do all the phone numbers and stuff on it. They ring up and they have to say I‘ve got a bottle of wine cut out here that I was given by such and such, they reckon that you are the best pest company so I‘d like to use you. They get a nice discount straight away, and then the company sends the original person an actual bottle of wine to thank them for the referral.

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202 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ As simple as it sounds a bottle of wine is the thing that‘s growing their business. Graham: Wow, so obvious and so simple. You want to find ways to reward people for recommending you. In this case it could be with a bottle of wine, you‘ve got the example of the beauty therapist they are giving away a gift certificate that entitles them to a 50% discount. That makes their friend they give it to feel important but also makes the person giving it feel, I am handing over a valuable gift for a company that I really like. Justin: I don‘t know if ego is the right word but it‘s about brushing people‘s ego. Everyone loves to be appreciated and it‘s just about putting that aspect into a business aspect and into part of your business growth. Now none of that costs you any money to do that. People might be reading this going well I must be going to be losing some money. Well the first time you won‘t be making as much money as you did in the first place but if your margins are where they should be, that wouldn‘t be a fact anyway. However you are picking up a new customer which will hopefully, if it‘s done correctly, be a longer customer than just a once off sale. There are just too many funky things done in business these days but none of the basic stuff. None of the foundational things and I think the one thing if you look after your customers they will look after you type thing is a very basic thing. But not many people do it these days. Graham: Tell me Justin, in terms of looking after your customers, if you were advising or mentoring a typical business owner right now what would you get them to do each day? Would you get them to contact two customers, five customers a day, 10 customers a week? Would they send stuff in the mail? Would they phone them? What could they actually do?

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203 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Justin: I don‘t get too deep into having a set strategy or that sort of stuff. First and foremost the customers that are coming in that you are having contact with face-to-face are the ones that you need to work on the most, because they are there. Then you need to work on past customers and older customers because they‘ve at least had an experience with your business so they would have an understanding of how you operate and what you offer. So I am not a fan of going to get new customers and advertising if you can‘t treat the current ones correctly. It‘s about utilising who you‘ve currently got and also in a way, I am not a big fan of it overly but also asking your customers how you could do things a little bit better. I‘ve always been very much 100% into my customers. Whilst that might sound bizarre because that‘s what we all should be, I had a rule when I started ―Attitude‖ that no matter who ordered by product I would always go and visit their store on the first order and take the order with me. Which was a great theory at the time when I was only dealing with Sydney but when I was getting orders from Broome in Perth which is a six hour flight it sort presented a bit of a problem. But me going out there and saying ‗thank you‘ in person, that‘s why I had so many customers, because no one else does that. Most people in business don‘t even say ‗thank you‘ to their customers when they are in the store which is bizarre so for me. I want to show people that I actually do appreciate them and without them this brand would not be growing. Simple stuff again but a little thank you now and again goes a long way.

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204 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Graham: Excellent, what are some other things that any business person can do or you‘ve seen business people do, to turn their customers into a sales force? Justin: Well another way is utilising, doing the same thing we‘ve done before but then utilising your staff to be able to do that as well. So the staff that actually you are paying, get them to understand that this is what we are trying to do. If you‘ve got sales staff, say to the sales staff‘ listen it‘s good to go out there and see one person. But why don‘t you ask the simple stuff, like asking the store owner do you have any friends that are working in these same sorts of stores?‘ Because they all do, and just getting a referral or recommendation from those existing customers, yet again. Now they won‘t tell you their next door store‘s name, they compete against that, but there will be other people that they do know of and what you‘ve got to do is create a talking point for these people. Because when they are on their own time often they are sitting around the barbeque or whatever they are doing with their friends on the weekend, and they say and how‘s your business going, and they say ―I‘m getting so many customers in from ―Intimidate‖ for Intimidate stuff.‖ Why? Are they advertising? No, no what they are doing, and they then start telling their friends about it so they then become a good sales person for the brand that‘s in their own store. But then what happens then, they‘ve got mates or friends or whatever that actually own the same type of store, they go I wouldn‘t mind that as well and the unfortunate thing and I am being very generalist here but there‘s a lot of people in retail especially that have never been in retail before so they don‘t actually know what they are doing . People want to make money in business so if you can provide not only a product that‘s going to make money for them but give them an avenue that can them give them more business at the same time, there‘s an

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205 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ advantage over them taking another brand that doesn‘t do that. So it‘s got to be more of a win/win than just a once off sale. This is what we‘ve got to utilise not only the consumer but also the retailer or if you are in business that offers a service the same principle applies. So in coaching and as a speaker I would say 80% of my business comes through recommendation and referral based on what I‘ve done for other people. I don‘t advertise, I never have. I‘ve never spent a single cent on advertising in any business that I own so it works for me. I‘m not a fan of advertising. I never have been but I‘d rather be able to spend money on, or invest money into my customers more so than into an ad in the newspaper. I think what we‘ve got to start doing is understanding that every outcome that we are after can be achieved with every sale that we do. It‘s not just a once off sale we are after. I don‘t see any of my customers as a once off sale, I won‘t sell to anyone if they go well look we will give it a shot once but we are not going to order it again. What we‘ve got to start doing as business owners is be more in tune with that and with our results on a daily basis and not wait for six months and go darn that didn‘t work. We‘ve got to understand where it‘s going every day and if your customers aren‘t willing to go and promote your business for you, you‘ve got to ask why? The issue is not so much the customer doesn‘t know what they are talking about, maybe they don‘t actually appreciate the business for what it is or they don‘t see the value in it as much you think they do. I got a couple of emails last week from people saying look when you are going to bring our your clothing range for the ―Intimidate‖ because I want to get out there and start telling shops about it.

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206 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Now I haven‘t asked them to do that yet so that‘s now becoming one of those things that people know that I love to do and they want to be involved. When your customers or potential customers are coming to you saying I really want to help you grow your business, that‘s a pretty good position to be in. Graham: So you‘ve really turned them into your sales force by doing that and I think one of the messages that has come through here is that you‘ve really made customers feel good every time they interact with you in some way. Whether you are in their store or whether you send them something or they deal with you or hear from you, you‘ve made them feel good so it‘s very easy for them to start recommending you to other people that they know. Justin: Yeah well the unfortunate thing is, those who have read my books or seen me speak, I am a car nut. I love cars, always have. Now it was a particular brand that I‘ve bought a lot of and it just shocks and surprises me these days how car dealerships don‘t get this principle at all. They see their customers as a one off which is quite sad and stupid to be totally honest. I got to the point where I just won‘t buy that brand anymore at all because I know that I am going to get treated really badly or not even appreciated for the loyalty that I am showing. This is a very simple process to look at this one and how big companies don‘t do what I am talking about. You look at banks, you look at airline companies that you‘ve been loyal to for a long time, there‘s nothing coming back and if you need them to do you a little bit of a favour or help you out or upgrade you to a seat whatever it is, there‘s a bit no, flat no coming back. The problem is they‘ve got so many customers coming through the door they don‘t really care if they have to retain any of them.

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207 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ I‘d rather run my business like a small business as opposed to running it like as big business because the way that the big businesses work these days is the customer is not even included in the whole theory of how they get to the next level any more. They forget where they started from and the thing for me I will never forget where I came from. And the people that took a punt on my brand in the first place and the consumer that went out and got behind my product in the markets, they are the reason why I am here. So I am not going to go and forget those people along the way so that to me is just a common sense thing. Graham: That sounds fantastic. I know you‘ve got a tremendous range of helpful resources that business people can access from you. I think some of them are free, some of them you can pay for if you want but you‘ve got some great ideas and resources and what‘s the best website for people to go to? Justin: Just go to www.justinherald.com Graham: What are some of the things that they should particularly take notice of, on that site? What would be a good place to start, where should they go and look first? Justin: Just go to the products page. There is something that‘s not on the products page but I‘ve got all of my business products all on now, I only sell this when I am in front of people‘s faces, but on a USB stick. So there‘s 18 hours worth of how to grow a business without spending any money and how to turn an idea into a business. If people are interested in that, just contact me through the website and you will save around about $3,500 by doing it that way. So for me my plan for 2011 and on is to ensure that I am assisting as many people to get their business to the next level.

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208 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Because you are not successful until you are helping other people reach that level of success as far as I am concerned. So the more people that are successful, the more problems we can solve on the planet. Graham: I reckon that‘s fantastic and one final thing Justin. Just imagine you‘ve finished a talk to 100 or 1,000 business people and you say ‗guys look you want to turn your customers into your sales force, here‘s one or two things I suggest that you go and do in the next 24 hours when you get back to your business‘. What are a couple of things you‘d suggest they do? Justin: Number one is to go through the list of customers who haven‘t been into your business or part of your business for a long time and contact them. Not to sell to them. Just say ‗I just wanted to thank you for all the custom or the help or the business that you gave me a long time ago, I‘ve probably never done this and I‘ve been going through how I got to where I got to and you were a part of it so I just wanted to say thank you.‘ That‘s enough for people to really remember you because no one ever does that. The other thing, anyone that‘s in front of your face on a daily basis that is actually on the phone or whatever, you‘ve got to try and harvest that to be more than a once off sale. So I want to make sure that there‘s a meaningful relationship or conversation is going to come out of everything other than just a t-shirt sale because I can sell a t-shirt to anyone. That‘s not what I am after, I want to be able to create a lifestyle and create a passive way of income at some point in time that‘s going to be by me putting time and effort into people whilst they are there not too far down the path. The other thing, if you don‘t look after your customers, someone else well so it‘s pretty simple.

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209 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Graham: That sounds great. Look you‘ve shared some great ideas today for this interview. I know that this whole concept of turning your customers into your sales force, it‘s so simple and so obvious but often we overlook it because I think the majority of businesses that I see out there, they are always focused on trying to get new customers. Rather than turning their existing customers into their sales force, that would be so much more profitable, so much more fun and so much easier to do really when you think about it. Justin: Yeah, well just to start doing stuff you aren‘t doing and see if that works. If it doesn‘t stop doing it. Simple stuff. Graham: Thanks for sharing all your ideas today. Justin: My pleasure Graham. Action Exercise: According to Ron Reck in his book ―Turn your customers into your sales force‖ 25% of our success in business is getting a sale from a customer. Another 25% comes from getting repeat sales from a customer. A whopping 50% of our business success comes from getting existing customers to recommend and promote us to their friends, associates and colleagues. This is exactly the message that Justin is reminding us about. We all want customers that are delighted with our products and service, come back regularly and recommend us to their friends. A good way to turn your customers into your sales force is to use the principle of "Added Value". Here are a couple of examples of how easy it is to use this principle. The Car Dealer and the movie tickets: I brought a new car a few years ago. Three weeks after the purchase I received 2 free movie passes in

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210 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ the mail; along with a note thanking me for my business. At the time I brought this car; I was regularly speaking to several hundred business people a month at live seminars. I told all these people about my delightful little added value bonus from this car firm. I also went back 2 years later and bought another car from the same firm. The Dentist and the phone call: I was on holiday in another town a few years ago and had a tooth ache. I went to a local dentist who fixed my problem. What was unusual was this same dentist phoned me that night in my hotel to make sure I was okay. They also phoned me a few days later when I was back home just to make sure I was fine. I was very impressed with this great follow up service. And I‘ve recommended this firm to a lot of people. It‘s often the little things that make the difference in business. Especially when it comes to turning your customers into your sales force. Write down at least 5 ways you could use ―Added Value‖ in your business. Then use at least one of these ideas consistently for at least a month. You will be very pleasantly surprised at the results you get.

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211 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ 17: Dr Michael Hewitt-Gleeson WOMBAT Selling: A new strategy for growing your business

Reprinted with permission

Graham McGregor: In this interview for the Unfair Business Advantage Report it‘s my fantastic privilege and pleasure to be talking to Dr Michael HewittGleeson one of my favourite authors of all time. Michael was awarded one of the world's first PhDs in selling in New York in 1980. His examiner was Professor George Gallup who invented market research and founded The Gallup Poll at Princeton. For more than 20 years Michael's sales and marketing strategies have been successfully implemented by his clients such as IBM, General Electric, Coca-Cola Amatil, Telstra and ANZ Bank. He is the best-selling author of NewSell, Software for Your Brain. Michael I first read your book, NewSell probably 20 years ago now, it made a huge impact on my sales results and I know you‘ve helped literally tens of thousands, probably hundreds of thousands or millions of people around the world with your great ideas. Great to have you on the call today. Michael Hewitt-Gleeson: Thanks Graham, it‘s good to be here.

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212 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Graham: As you know I am talking to a wide range of sales and marketing experts around the world, like yourself and I am really asking them one question. The question is this. What‟s one sales or marketing strategy that is working fantastically well for you or your clients, producing immediate effects, higher sales, higher profits and it‟s giving them a real unfair business advantage? What‘s the strategy you‘d like to share today in our interview? Michael: The one that I would use is what I call ―Wombat Selling‖. It‘s the title of my recent book and the reason that it‘s a new strategy for selling is that it changes the goal or the objective of the sales person or the business person in a situation. I will give you an example. If you take say 100 sales people and in order to do a split test you divide them randomly into two groups. One group you give the traditional sales strategy which is closing the sale or acquiring a customer. It could even be a relationship, a long term customer, or a one off, but it‘s still focusing on the customer. To the other group you give them a different goal and this is the new strategy I am suggesting. To that group the goal is not to acquire a customer but to acquire a WOMBAT. Now a wombat of course is an Australian marsupial but in this case W.O.M.B.A.T. stands for ‗Word Of Mouth Buy And Tell.‘ So a WOMBAT is a satisfied customer who replicates another customer. For one group of salespeople the goal is looking for a customer, for the other group the goal is looking for a customer that replicates another customer. Which group do you think will grow the business?

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213 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Two quite different goals and therefore two quite different strategies. Graham: Excellent, so the strategy you are going to suggest is actually WOMBAT, creating customers that are not only going to be delighted with what you have, but they are going to help you get more customers as well. Rather than just getting a one-off sale. Michael: Yes and the reason for that, of course, is if you focus on the WOMBAT strategy you not only accomplish the first strategy of acquiring a customer but also of satisfying a customer because in order for the wombat to replicate and get a new customer, they have to already be a satisfied customer. So the beauty of this strategy is it not only accomplishes the traditional strategy of getting a satisfied customer but it makes you focus on behaving in such a way that you don‘t just get a customer you get a customer so satisfied that they go out and they replicate and bring you another customer. Graham: Probably our readers and listeners will obviously want to know what are some of the things that we can then do to create wombats. How do we get them? Michael: Well one of the first things we can do is to be aware of the dramatic change in the environment that‘s happened in business. Instead of now operating our business in a 9 to 5 universe, perhaps 5, 6 days a week we now operate in a universe of 24/7 … and globally. Today we find ourselves operating in a global market so an individual like me and yourself can have customers not just in Middle Park or Melbourne but in Zaire, in Uzbekistan, in Paris and Rome as I do. So we need a marketing or a business strategy that‘s in tune with this changed environment and not something that‘s still operating in the pre internet environment.

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214 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Graham: That makes sense. What are some of the things that we could do to create new WOMBAT clients for our business? Michael: Because of the way management style operates today and the way decision-making operates today, businesspeople don‘t tend to make decisions themselves. Even CEO‘s tend not to make decisions themselves, they tend to discuss their decisions with their peers or with their colleagues, with the legal department and with other parts of the organisation. So if we make a presentation to individual A, to the purchasing manager or the marketing manager and so on, we are unlikely to get a decision straight from them. They may well themselves have to go off and discuss our proposal, our offer with other people. So the kind of presentation you would have done to someone who is going to make the decision is not the same kind of presentation we need to make to someone who‘s going to have to go off and make the presentation to someone else. So I need to equip you in such a way that you can talk to the next person and I call this Pass On Value or POV for short. The nature of your offer should have a very strong Pass On Value that makes it very easy for you to go on and pass it on to someone else. Obviously if something is very complex, difficult to understand, badly written, badly presented then it‘s not going to have much Pass On Value. However an offer that is simple and elegant and viral will have powerful POV. Graham: So when you are talking to potential customers, prospects, often when there is more than one person involved in the decision.

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215 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ This is quite often the case in business to business selling but also a lot with consumer selling particularly when there is a bit of money involved. You want to make sure that what you give people in all your material has high pass on value. This allows them to quickly and easily pass it on to someone else and presumably it has value. It‘s simple, it‘s elegant, and it‘s easy to understand. Can you give me some examples of Pass on Value so we can see how to use it in our own business when selling? Michael: Let me give you two examples. One I‘ve used myself and one I‘ve seen recently that someone else has used. The first example of Pass on Value is the story of how I got my first Mercedes sports car... In one of my first jobs many years ago I was involved in selling sales training programmes. It was actually an American training programme by one of my gurus, Fred Herman, who developed a programme called KISS – Keep it Simple Salesman. It was a cassette tape programme and this is around 30 years ago. Now I used to sell this to various sales organisations and groups of sales people. It might be a local insurance branch in a suburb, or a real estate branch or a car dealer. In those days just the typical local businesses that had groups of sales people who if they could improve their selling then it would be good for the growth of the business. At that time, I wanted to buy myself a Mercedes sports car, in those days it was the 280SL with the pagoda roof and I‘d fallen in love with it like a lot of young sales people who want a trophy car. I found that I was getting three Yes‘s out of five presentations after my numbers stabilised. So for every five presentations I‘d make to the local sales managers, three of them would take my offer.

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216 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ And, I could do about three appointments a day by the time I made appointments and got in the car and travelled to the appointment. I didn‘t like cold calling so I made appointments and would go to visit them. When that stabilised out I realised I had a good income but it wasn‘t enough to get me the sports car. I actually needed to do at least ten sales presentations a day to get my sales target and buy my roadster. To do that I‘d have to start at the end of a high street in a suburb and literally go down and visit the businesses and do cold calling. But I didn‘t like cold calling so this was the idea I came up with. Well, I tried a number of ideas but this is the one that ended up working. I printed a little book called How to Sell without Working Graham: I like the title. Michael: That was the reaction I‘d always get. I‘d walk into the sales manager and before he could say to me ‗do you have an appointment?‘ I‘d just introduce myself and say ‗Look my name is Michael and I‘ve brought you a little gift to add to your sales library, it‘s a book called How to Sell without Working‟ and I‘d hand him the book. Now I‘d usually get one of two reactions. Either he‘d say, just like you did Graham, he‘d say ‗gee that‘s good I wish I had that, we could really use that‘ or, the other reaction was ‗what a ridiculous thing, I tell my men they‘ve got to work, work, work, there‘s no such thing as selling without work‘ and he‘d go off into a tirade. (That reaction was a lot less common.) Anyway when he‘d open the book the pages in the book are all blank. There‘s no printing because there‘s no such thing as selling without working. It was a joke book and it didn‘t cost me very much to produce. What had already happened by now, of course, is that it had already gone from a cold call into a warm call because they were laughing, we‘re having a chat and

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217 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ very often he‘d pick up the phone and say ‗hey Jack come and have a look at this‘ … and now I‘ve got a WOMBAT! Now I‘ve already got the WOMBAT effect right at the beginning of the sales call!. He‘s picking up the phone, he‘s calling other people and he asks me ‗could you give me some more of these, I want to give one to each of my sales people at the next sales meeting‘ or something like that and now we are having a whole discussion about selling. So now we‘ve gone past the issue of whether it was a cold call. He says ‗so what‘s this all about?‘ Well then I would then begin my sales presentation. Now the use of that little POV idea enabled me to get my Mercedes 280 SL sports cars. Royal blue with tan trim leather. Graham: Wow, I like it. Michael: In other words if you‘ve got a joke that you know every time you tell it, you are going to get a fantastic reaction, then you don‘t mind telling that joke. But if you‘ve got a joke that the last three times you told it, you got an unwelcome response, you are going to think twice about telling that joke again. Once I realised I‘d found something that every time I knocked on the door and I handed over that book I got a terrific reaction I couldn‘t make enough calls in a day. You couldn‘t stop me because I‘d just go from one to the other because I was full of energy and excitement. Every call re-energised me instead of having me being kicked out and rejected. It took me a while to come up with that idea but I‘ve lived off that idea for 30 years and variations of it. So if we take the effort to design something that really does have POV or Pass on Value, and the response

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218 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ of the people we talk to is ‗hey Jack, come take a look at this‘, it‘s a terrific boon for our selling. Word of mouth is a powerful selling tool. Can you see how that works? Graham: That‘s fantastic and I assume you could take the same concept and change it so that you don‘t actually give them something but perhaps if you do cold call somebody or you send them something to start with, it‘s got that same impact. You are looking for that same impact, ‗this is great, tell me more‘. You want someone to immediately say this or tell someone else about it so what‘s the other example you‘ve got here, using this pass on value where you saw someone else do something similar? Michael: You made me just think of an important point here Graham which a lot of sales people or business people don‘t understand and I guess as a scientist I can bring this to the table. My examiner for my PhD in selling was Professor George Gallup who invented market research and the Gallup Poll at Princeton. He said, ―Every sales call is an experiment‖. In other words it‘s a chance to try something different. Obviously what happens with experiments in science, some of them work out the way we hoped they would but most of them don‘t. But, of course, we always learn something from every experiment. So if you don‘t just do one experiment but say you do ten experiments, by the time you get to the 8th or the 9th experiment, you‘ve really learned a lot. However, many salespeople are too frightened of losing a sale. Many sales people narrow their repertoire of behaviour because they only do the things that they think will work and they won‘t try anything that might not work.

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219 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ As you‘d expect, they don‘t learn or evolve their strategies by trying different things. For me to get that particular idea I told you about I had to try a number of experiments to get there. I didn‘t wake up one day and just come up with a good idea. I experiment. But once you get that thing that works, you can use it many times. I just wanted to make the point for your readers that if you do anything repetitively such as make sales calls be prepared to do experiments. Be prepared to do split testing. Try new things; don‘t just do the same old thing again and again and again. You walk into a retail store and what do they say ‗can I help you‖ and you say ‗no thanks just looking‘ and you leave. Now why would that person say that same thing again, and again and again? Wouldn‘t you think if you‘ve got ten people walking into the store every day you‘d try ten different opening one liners in order to see which ones work, but what do they do? No, the keep doing the same thing. Can I help you? No thanks just looking and they drive hundreds of people out the store. So being willing to experiment and split test if you are doing something repetitive is an important point. The second example of POV I saw recently is Blendtec I read this in the Harvard Business Review. It‘s about a guy who‘s got a company called Blendtec which you can Google or YouTube. He‘s a businessman in Utah in America. He‘s got a company and he just makes blenders. We all know blenders and he obviously thinks his are the best blenders and they look pretty good. Actually, I can tell you they look pretty good because I‘ve seen his demos and I am obviously WOMBATING to you right now and your readers

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220 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Mr Blendtec is very clever, he makes little 1 to 2 to 3 minute videos which are all up on YouTube. And to see one of these is to sit there and watch ten of them . if your readers watch one of these short videos his tag line is ‗will it blend?‘ In each one of these short and powerful demo videos he puts something shocking like golf balls, or an iPad or a broom into his Blendtec blender. He puts this mask on, he‘s a funny kind of nerdy guy, with respect, and he says ‗will it blend?‘ and he flicks the switch. Well after watching four of them, I totted up that over 15 million people had already seen these videos. It‘s a very clever idea, in fact I am telling several of my clients about it. Check out Blendtec and you‘ll probably watch several of them because they are highly addictive. (If you go this link on Michael‘s site you can see the blend the iPad video.) http://www.schoolofthinking.org/why/newsell-coaching/ These short demos have huge POV and the numbers are there. Five million have watched one video, three million have watched another video. He‘s put them together quite well and it‘s cost him a certain amount of money but for the results that he‘s got in terms of WOMBAT selling compared to say a TV advertising campaign or a printed campaign, I‘d say would be 10 to 1. So that‘s just a very recent example out of the latest issue of Harvard Business Review. This is a classic example of WOMBAT selling by creating a communication that‘s designed not just for the person who watches it but also designed to make them to want to pass it on to others in their network. Do you see the difference? Graham: I see a huge difference. I like this idea of pass-on value, I like the idea of approaching brand new customers if you like with something they want to

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221 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ tell other people about in relation to my product or service. Are there any two or three quick hints you could pass on, on how they could start designing something like that for their business? Michael: Well tip number one is think WOMBAT! Think ‗word of mouth buy and tell‘. Tip number two is experiment and split test. You won‘t get it first go. Try again and again until you do. If you say, ‗I am really going to do this wombat thing, I am really going to try and make my idea viral, I am going to try and make my handout viral, I am going to try and invest the things that I use with POV then find out, ‗is it working‘? How do I know? Well I will try it, I will try one, try the other, follow up and see if it works. And then the third tip. Sometimes, when we want to encourage people to pass on our ideas, you might say ‗please send this to all your friends‘ and of course they don‘t because that‘s too much homework. That‘s too hard. But I‘ve found if you just say ‗if you could send this to just one person who would you send it to?‘ Most people choose the centre of influence in their network … the one WOMBAT who is most likely to send it on. Of course you have to be fairly proud or sure or confident of the POV of what you are offering if you‘re going to ask someone to pass it on. Again the discipline of creating pass-on value is very often simplicity. As Fred Herman used to say ‗keep it simple, salesperson!‖ So think wombat, test and evolve your ideas so that they have pass-on value, and then ask your client if you would pass this on to one person, who would that be and that would be the three tips that can get you going with WOMBAT selling. Graham: Thank you. That brings to mind I used to be involved in investment property many years ago and I

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222 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ was talking to one particular gentleman about the concept. He was very excited but he couldn‘t convince his wife that it was a good idea to go ahead. So he thought about it for a few days. He was keen, I was keen but he just couldn‘t convince his wife. He lived next door to a farmer. He was looking out one day and he saw all these sheep, and he said I‘ve got it! He said ‗look dear, look out over there what do you see?‘ She said ‗sheep‘. He said ‗you know what; our farmer next door is making money with his sheep while he is sleeping. The sheep are growing bigger, they are making him money from the wool and when they go to the factory. You know what Graham is suggesting with an investment property is a way for us to make money while we are sleeping.‘ So would it be fair to say that whatever product or service you offer, you want to get it down to a really simple, easy to explain idea that they can easily pass on, something like that? Is that a good example of pass-on value? Michael: Perfect example, because couldn‘t you just imagine the wife in that story talking to her friends later that day and what would be the one line she would use? ‗We are going to make money while we are sleeping.‘ So that‘s a classic example of the POV kind of thing. Sometimes these POV things come to mind easily and sometimes they take quite a bit of effort, design effort and thinking effort and experimentation before you get it. But it‘s really worth the effort that you put into the WOMBAT strategy because once you get it, you get multiple effects of it and you get a spread effect or a viral effect. Once you get that viral thing going, it really pays off 10 to 1 compared to having to wake up every morning and start all over again. One last idea that I use regularly with my clients is this one. I have to at some point in my business present a

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223 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ proposal to a client to spend money on my consulting services. One of the things that I do to give my proposals great WOMBAT pass-on value is a concept developed by one of the other people you‘ve interviewed, Jeffery Fox, and it‘s his principle of dollarization. Graham: Great concept. Michael: So I use the principle of dollarization always in my proposals. In my case I teach the organisation thinking, increase the quality of the decision making of the organisation. In theory that sounds great but sometimes it‘s difficult for people to get their heads around it. But if they can look at the dollarization value that they are going to get, the return on investment, which is often higher than 10 to 1, it makes it easier for them to make the decision than if I was just talking about my products and my services. Graham: Well Michael it‘s been fantastic talking to you today. I‘ve really enjoyed catching up with you after all those years of reading your books. I know our readers are going to really enjoy what you‘ve said today so let‘s summarise what we are suggesting they do. First of all is focus on creating WOMBATS and once again a WOMBAT stands for... Michael: Word Of Mouth Buy And Tell. In other words I don‘t just buy something. If I‘m a WOMBAT I buy something and I tell other people about it and I do that by word of mouth. So if I buy I tell other people about my buying experience. That‘s buy and tell and of course the medium is word of mouth and we may use the internet or face-to-face or telephone or Facebook or Twitter or all sorts of things.

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224 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Word of mouth Buy and Tell. So when we are dealing with a customer that‘s what we are trying to create. WOMBAT‘S not just customers. I think this exercise I am involved in with you right now is a really nice example of WOMBAT selling. It‘s creating such value in your Unfair Business Advantage Report that people are not passing it on because you asked them to pass it on, but because the value is so great that they will want to pass it on. That‘s a classic example of WOMBAT selling. Graham: Thank you very much. I have read WOMBAT Selling myself, it is an outstanding book. You are very generously offering it for them to read at no charge even though it has been a best seller in the book shops. Michael: My pleasure Graham. No charge at all, just read it and enjoy it and use it. Graham: Michael, delightful to catch up with you today. Thank you for such great ideas. Action Exercise: I love Michael‘s strategy of WOMBAT selling and creating massive Pass on Value or POV. Here‘s what I recommend you do right now. Go to this link on Michael‘s website http://www.schoolofthinking.org/why/newsell-coaching/ Here you can request a free copy of his excellent book WOMBAT selling: How to Sell by Word of Mouth. You can also see the link to the Blendtec example that Michael talks about in his interview. You‘ll see some other great resources as well. And make sure you start thinking about creating WOMBAT‘S and creating great Pass on Value (POV) in all your sales and marketing communications.

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225 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ 18: Robert Koch Identify your most valuable core customers

Reprinted with permission

Graham McGregor: In this interview for the Unfair Business Advantage Report it‘s my great pleasure to be talking to one of my favourite business consultants and one of my favourite business authors, Richard Koch. Richard has written or co-written 20 books on ideas, business strategy and society. Chief amongst them is The 80/20 Principle, which has sold three quarters of a million copies and been published in 31 languages. He is also a highly successful entrepreneur and investor, whose ventures have included Filofax, Plymouth Gin, Belgo, and Betfair. He was formerly a partner of Bain & Company and co-founder of LEK Consulting. He is British and lives in Gibraltar. Richard you‘ve made a career and a big success in a variety of businesses by focusing on the good old fashioned 80/20 rule or what is called the Pareto Principle. So what is the one sales or marketing strategy that you suggest that business owners today use to increase sales, increase profits and get a real unfair business advantage? Richard Koch: Graham, good day to you.

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226 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ My idea will strike your listeners perhaps as stunningly unoriginal and also stunningly old fashioned but there‘s nothing wrong with either of those. Graham: If they work and make you money, they are fine. Richard: Absolutely. The idea is to identify rigorously who your core customers are. And who are the customers who actually may comprise a relatively small number of the total customers but actually produce a very large percentage of your profits. The core customers are people who really, really love you. They are customers who for some reason or other your firm is actually ideally suited to actually provide products or services for. In many, many cases companies go after growth and they believe that all revenue is good revenue. In searching after growth very often what one is doing is going after diminishing returns. Because you are going from a group of customers who in many cases have actually found you rather than you found them. So in a sense they do the sales and marketing themselves and then you spend a lot of sales and marketing effort going after people who are not ideally suited to you. You know they are not ideally suited to you because you have to put a lot of effort into marketing to them and they don‘t gravitate towards you naturally. There‘s one particular case which I‘ve just finished doing and I can‘t identify the company but it‘s very well known. This particular company has been very, very successful and it‘s grown and expanded and it‘s got no problems. Yet when one looked at their strategy it was evident that in fact the strategy being followed was the wrong one. I use two tools to identify the most profitable core customers for a business.

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227 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ One is good old fashioned profitability analysis. The profitability analysis is where you look in great detail at different groups of customers and you look at the profitability of the customers, and you identify the marketing effort that‘s spent on them, the technology effort that‘s spent on them, the administration effort that‘s spent on them and all the other operating costs. You do that on an activity basis and you insist on allocating all of the costs. You even allocate all of the overhead costs as well. I don‘t think I‘ve ever come across a case where we didn‘t discover that there was some kind of 80/20 principle involved here. Obviously the classic benchmark would be 20% of customers account for 80% of your profits. But in the case I‘ve just finished 18% of customers accounted for 169% of profits and obviously all of the others were loss making. So how can that possibly be true? Well in this case they started with a group of customers who were ideally made for them. In fact the company innovated a new way of doing what it does and it particularly approved to a group of customers who were generally quite large and generally also quite price sensitive. So what the company did was provide a way of transacting which was about ten times cheaper in terms of transaction costs. And what the company did was to say ‗oh we‘ve got this very nice little business of ours, why don‘t we broaden it, why don‘t we make it a bigger business, why don‘t we actually expand the number of people that we are marketing to?‘ We can afford to do it because we are extremely profitable and we will spend a lot of money going further down the sales pyramid to other people in the market place. They discovered that they could attract another specialist group of people.

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228 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ The very, very top end of this new group might be profitable but the vast bulk of it was actually hugely unprofitable. However we only discovered this by doing the profitability analysis and carefully allocating all the costs involved in selling to both groups of customers. We discovered that this second group of customers required an enormous amount of support and back up and in many cases did not stay around for a long period of time. So even though on the surface they generated sizable revenue, it was actually not profitable revenue when we looked closer at the numbers. Now the second took I use to identify the most profitable core customers in a business is something which was developed by Fred Reichheld and Bain and Company. It‘s called the Net Promoter Score and it‘s a very simple system which anyone can use. This concept was first popularized in the book ‗The Ultimate Question‘ by Fred Reichheld, and has since been embraced by leading companies worldwide as the standard for measuring and improving customer loyalty. The idea is to ask the customers on a scale of 0 to 10, ―how likely is it that you would recommend this company or its products to a friend?‖ And the people who give a 9 or a 10 they are called net promoters. They found these people who are again around about 10% of 20% at the most of total customers are the people who are likely to do the following.  They‘ll recommend the product or service to their friends  They will give valuable feedback about the product

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229 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________  If you ask them, they‘ll tell you what new products they want and you can design those new products for them.  They will also basically increase the morale of the employees that you have because they are enthusiastic about the company, they like the company, they have a smile on their face when they are actually in contact with the company employees, frontline employees, and so on. The other 80 or 90% of customers give a score which is 7 to 8 or below. 7 to 8 they call ‗passive‘ meaning that they are people who are moderately satisfied with the product but they will never recommend it to anyone. They will never bother to give you valuable information in terms of feedback and if a glitzy offer comes along from somebody else who‘s marketing to try and capture that group of people or there‘s a sales promotion offering two for one or just a lower price, then they‘ll defect. The other group of people, the third group of people are the people who are basically not satisfied with the company. They are called ‗detractors‘. These people cause no end of trouble. They are always ringing customer service, they are always complaining, they are always trying to get their money back, they are always trying to say that the company is in the wrong and they are in the right. These people are just a complete waste of time because they cost far more to deal with than the revenue that they bring in. Graham: So let‘s look at what you‘ve talked about here so far. What you are saying is that for every business, no matter what type of business you have, there‘s a small group of customers that are producing in most cases the great bulk of your profits.

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230 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ The ratio could be 10/90, it could be 20/80 or something else. If it‘s 10/90 this means that 10% of your customers produce 90% of your profits. And with these people, if you did a very simple exercise like you‘ve just talked about where you‘ve asked them, on a score of 0 to 10 how likely are you to recommend our products and services and our company to some of the people you know?, if they are scoring 9 or 10, most of those people in that group would actually fit into that highly profitable group as well? Richard: Absolutely. So by applying two tests, the profitability test and the net promoter score test you can actually say ‗These are my core customers.‘ We define core customers as the people who pass both tests, they have to be extraordinarily profitable and they also have to be net promoters. Once you are sure that those people are core customers you identify the demographic and other characteristics of those people. Then you say ‗We need some more of these people.‘ The other thing which you do of course is you treasure and nurture the existing core customers and you try and sell more to them. You try and make them even happier than they are. You do a lot of interviews with them and say ‗what‘s stopping you buying more of this particular product or service?‘ Sometimes they will say ‗well it‘s a budget constraint, you‘ve got 100% of my business‘ but other times they‘ll say ‗well actually about 20%, 30% of my business goes to another similar company and I use them for this particular application.‘ And in some cases you might be able to go into that application and do it as well or better and at lower cost than the other company. In some cases you can‘t so again you are very selective in terms of what you do for them. But you try and work out how to sell more to your existing customers, how to get more referrals out of

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231 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ them, how to get more feedback, how to profit more new products for them and you find other people who are like them. Then for the other people in the marketplace you have a choice. You either decide that you really, really don‘t want them in which case you stop marketing to them. And this could instantly save you a lot of money because marketing costs are usually a very large proportion of the total for that group of people. Or you decide they could be profitable but only under these circumstances. So you increase price and you decrease the level of service to them and some of those people will go away which is fine, and others will become profitable so you win again from that point of view. You also have to take into account, and this is the final point that I‘d like to make, whether the unprofitable customers affect the profitable customers at all. It‘s very often the case that some customers are toxic, they are not only unprofitable but they are also detracting from your focus on the key customers that you‘ve got and they may be doing something which the key customers are offended by so again its worth checking. So what are your tools? Your tools are elementary market research using the net promoter score and also asking other questions such as ‗what would make you spend more, and is there anything which you would like us to do for you?‘ Combined with very, very detailed and rigorous profitability analysis. Those two tools can completely change your view about your business. I‘d have to say I‘ve never had a case where someone has come and said we want to verify our strategy or we want an audit of our strategy, we want to know what marketing sales strategy to follow, who haven‘t actually had their view of the business fundamentally changed by those two very simple things that anyone can do.

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232 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ You don‘t need to hire a consultant to do that, anyone can do it and it‘s borne about by realising that core customers are the key thing and the company exists for the core customers. The company would not exist without the core customers and the company‘s mission is to find as many and create as many of those core customers as possible. And keep them absolutely deliriously happy with the company. Graham: What a great idea and I think from a lot of the work that I‘ve seen that you‘ve done and other people have done on price profitability you can actually often increase your prices by 5 or 10 or 15 or 20%, lose a number of your customers and actually end up making more money with less effort. If you tie that in with your strategy of getting rid of the customers that take a lot of unnecessary time, that would make life easier for everyone too at the same time wouldn‘t it? Richard: Yes. You find the people who automatically can provide you with a high profit. My view is that business should be very, very profitable. If it‘s not very, very profitable it‘s not very, very appreciated. And if a business is not very, very appreciated it shouldn‘t exist because there are lots of people in the world who are willing to do things for very thin margins. Look at the most successful companies, Apple for example. Apple has operating margins of over 40% and it keeps building up a huge cash pile and it doesn‘t make acquisitions. It just keeps providing more interesting products and it does that because it‘s got the ability to fund the R & D and it‘s got this vision of itself as improving the world through higher tech products. The fact that they are very expensive doesn‘t matter because the people who love that type of thing are more than happy to pay for them.

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233 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Because they are something that you couldn‘t get before but Apple designed and Apple provides to a tremendously high degree of quality and design, and therefore they make a lot of money. Graham: So when a business person goes through this exercise, no matter what type of business they have, they will identify their core customers using those two ideas you gave us. First of all very detailed, financial breakdowns of the profitability of each group of customers and the products and services they buy. Then do things like the net promoter test to see if on a score of 1 to 10 they are at least 9 or 10 in terms of wanting to recommend your company or products or services to other people, and also willing to give you lots of feedback on how you can improve. Then when you find those people that are in that category, you gradually weed out the other ones that aren‘t profitable that you don‘t want. You focus on getting a lot more of the core clients you do want and also selling more to the ones that are your ideal customers. What sort of results from using these two strategies? I know you used them very successfully with a business you bought called Filofax. Richard: In terms of Filofax it went from making a loss on sales of about 30%, to a profit on sales of about 20%. And the shares multiplied seven times within the space of three years just from focusing on the profitable point. In that particular case the customer profitability analysis was not so extreme; it was product profitability which was the key thing. The products that they made a lot of money on were the products where they were differentiated from the competition but which were high volume products. I should have said also that customer profitability usually is the answer but product line profitability is

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234 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ sometimes the answer more than the customer profitability. Then of course you work out who the customers are, who are the core customers within those product categories. Graham: I have a humorous example of focusing on your core customers. I recall hearing about a franchise company in the States one year and 20% of their franchisees were producing around 80% of their franchise fees if you like. One of the things that many of these super successful franchisees had in common was they had very short haircuts. This is quite an unusual characteristic and when they checked this out a bit further they discovered that a lot of these successful franchisees actually came from a military background. They came from organisations like the Army, the Navy, and the Air force. Many of these organisations have people with short haircuts but the thing about those sorts of people going into a franchise they were very used to following orders. So when they were given a franchise manual and told ‗this is how you run the business, this is what you do‘ in most cases they did exactly what they were told. And if you‘ve got a successful franchise model and you follow it, you generally get very good results. They said ‗well this is great, let‘s market more to these people coming out of the armed forces‘ and they made a fortune because they focused in this case on their ideal customer. Richard: Key employees are also very interesting. Presumably those people who came from the Military or the Police or whatever were also quite good at giving orders as well and making sure that the whole system was followed by their employees as well. That reminds me of a company in the US which I‘ve come across which is called Edward Jones. This is a

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235 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ brokerage company based in St Louis and what they do is they provide a financial advisor service. They focus very much on their core customer who is a very conservative investor who will basically invest for the long term and who will follow the instructions. They will basically follow the advice; they are not going to take an independent decision. They will put it all in the hands of a financial advisor that they trust. The thing that differentiates Edward Jones from any other brokerage company such as Merrill Lynch is that they have a lot of offices which are very conveniently located in suburban malls and so forth. They are not in the big financial centres, they are not in big cities, they are in local towns, local suburbia. They have far more offices than Merrill Lynch – about ten thousand versus one thousand for Merrill Lynch – but they can do that because they have only one financial advisor per office. In other words it‘s a one person show in that particular case. Now what kind of person do you want for a one person show where they have to interact with clients and they have to behave spontaneously and so on and so forth? It is someone who is the very opposite of a franchisee. It‘s someone who‘s an entrepreneur and they found that they couldn‘t find people who were entrepreneurial enough, who had been trained in financial services. So what they did was take people from other walks of life and spent a lot of time and effort training those people rigorously. So that they really understood what they were doing but they didn‘t lose the entrepreneurial characteristics that they had of running their own show. So the key thing which is different about this company is the focus on a particular type of customer which is someone who wants a local service but is very conservative financially.

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236 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ They actually then have a different type of person providing that service and the type of person who is able to be entrepreneurial and yet also able to have the expertise that‘s required. And they have a unique formula in doing that and the company has been extremely successful and has very high margins and is growing at about 20% a year and has been doing for the last 15 years. That is the kind of uniqueness that you get where you focus on core customers and also in some cases the core employees as well that are providing a service. Graham: Excellent. That‘s a fantastic strategy and that‘s one that any business person could do in any type of business, just by doing a couple of key things. Focusing on the profitability of different types of customers and perhaps in some cases different types of products or services they are offering. Working out which ones are highly profitable, work out which ones are not, working out which are the best customers, which are not the best customers, and then focusing on those core customers. How obvious, how simple. Look I know you‘ve got a number of other great books and services that you do offer business people to help them improve their results in business, so what‘s the best way to get in contact with you Richard? Richard: The best way to get in touch with me is actually by email and I‘ll provide that to you, its [email protected]. If you want to look at my latest book then go to www.superconnect.org and otherwise www.the8020principle.com Graham: Tell me about Superconnect, that‘s the title of your new book is it? Richard: Yes it‘s a new book which has been published in separate editions in America and Canada and the UK.

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237 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ The idea behind Superconnect is to use the power of networks in your own personal life or your business life. The fundamental research behind it is all the stuff about networks which say you‘ve got to find a network where you have more links in the system than anybody else. You can think about Facebook or Google or eBay as examples. The more people that there are in the system, the greater the amount of choice for a buyer or a seller or whatever. The other idea which is fundamental to the book is an old idea from sociology, dating from the 1970s. That is ‗the strength of weak links‘. What it says is that in terms of success in life, in business, in terms of finding fulfilling work and so forth, we are very often helped by contacts who are people that we don‟t know very well; they are not particularly important to us. They may be acquaintances, they may be people from a former life, for example work mates that we had a decade or two decades ago, they may be a former college mate or whatever, they are people who pop up in our lives and just give us some information which is very, very useful. And then we maybe even forget that the person existed but they may have had a pivotal effect at a turning point in our life. The characteristic of these people that makes them valuable is that they move in a different world from us. So if you divide the world into your friends and your family on the one hand and your more casual friends, your acquaintances, the people that you just meet on the street, people that you used to work with or whatever, and you call those people acquaintances, the sociology behind it relates to looking at how people got jobs, how people got their breaks in their life. Did that come from friends and family who would have the incentive to actually help you or did that come from the more casual type of acquaintances? The results were quite amazing – the people who weren‘t very important in your life were the most important in your life.

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238 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ The acquaintances outscored the friends and family on a comparative basis by something like 5 to 1. So the thing was that you really ought to maintain a very large, loose network of people that you see very occasionally. You might have lunch with them once a year or something like that, but you keep in touch with them. And the characteristic is that they move in a different world. The reason of course why the friends and family, although they want to help you, often can‘t, is that they only have access to pretty much the same information that you have anyway. So if you want to go beyond that, you need to find people who are in other networks and have access to all kinds of information because they are in a different world. Graham: Excellent, that sounds like a fantastic book; I am looking forward to reading it myself. Can you just make one last comment before we finish up Richard? Probably my favourite book of yours is the one called ‗Living the 80/20 Way‖ which applies this whole 80/20 principle to personal success. You have some wonderful ideas in this book on the value of being lazy and looking for ways to get better results with less effort. Could you just summarise in a couple of sentences your own personal philosophy about business and success as it relates to things like laziness and getting great results with little effort? Richard: When you see the numerical forces through the 80/20 principle you realise that there are some things you do which are something like a 16 times better use of your time than everything else. Therefore I think that the people that are likely to be successful are the people who somehow manage to find the thing which they are outstandingly good at doing which there‘s a market for.

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239 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ And if you can be outstandingly good at doing stiltwalking or something like that which is not necessarily a big market, but you need to find something where you‘re totally absorbed and you are creating something which is unique. So again this ties in with an awful lot of self help advice. For example all the stuff about flow and being in the zone and all the rest of it, it‘s really verified by the 80/20 principle when you look at it that way. So it‘s just finding something where you have a unique skill which is highly marketable and to do that you very often have to experiment and you have to be daring. You have to try lots of different things but when you realise that the vast majority of your time is spent on trivial things which will never make much of a difference to you or to anybody else, and you start to focus on the few things, the few uses of your time which are hugely more productive than everything else, not necessarily in a work context but also you can think of in terms of personal happiness. What are the few times of the day or the year or the month, where you are extraordinarily happy? Just do more of those things. And what are the things that actually make you unhappy? Well, find a way of doing less of those things and very often it comes down to something as simple as who you spend your time with. You can do an analysis on that, a very simple test and quizzes that people can do in the book which enable them to discover what really is pretty obvious in most cases. We need to think seriously about our time. People think we are short of time, I don‘t believe that. I think we‘ve got masses and masses of time and we just squander it on low value applications. If we concentrate on the few particles of time where we make a big impact and we help other people a lot and we are happy as a result of that, then you can change your life very easily.

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240 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ That‘s the philosophy behind it. Graham: Thank you very much. Action Exercise: I love Richard‘s strategy of focusing on your most valuable core customers. When you find these customers and focus on getting more like them your business life becomes a lot easier and far more profitable. This reminds me of a wonderful customer I had years ago when I was marketing motivational seminars. This customer not only attended the seminar himself a number of times, he actually paid for a number of his friends, family members and work colleagues to attend as well. This core customer was also tremendously influential in introducing these seminars to other business people as well. Core customers are also fun to deal with as Richard pointed out so well. They can actually raise the morale of all your frontline staff because they are a pleasure to do business with. So look at your own business. Start with turnover figures and see if there is some sort of relationship where a relatively small number of your clients actually produce a large amount of your profits. It could also be a small number of your products and services actually produce the bulk of your profits. Once you‘ve identified this group of clients who produce a large part of your profits, apply the net promoter score to them. How willing would they be to recommend your products or services to other people they know on a score of 0-10? If they score 9 or 10 and are in the small group that produces the bulk of your profits you have just identified your most valuable core clients. Your goal is to find more people like this, and nurture and make these clients even more valuable. At the same time, you can start to scale back on the amount of time and money you invest in marketing to people who are not your ideal core clients.

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241 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ 19: Ivan Levison How to get appointments with high value prospects

Reprinted with permission

Graham: It‘s my pleasure to be talking to one of the smartest and nicest copyrighters in the world, Ivan Levison. Ivan, great to have you on the call today. Ivan: Well it‘s wonderful to be with you. Graham: Ivan I‘ve been very impressed with what you‘ve done over the years. Before we start the interview could you perhaps just give our readers a little bit of background about your experience in the advertising field. Just for a couple of minutes so we can get a feel for what you‘ve been up to. Ivan: Sure. I broke into the advertising business 32 years ago. Earlier in my life for a brief period I was a teacher and read an article by Jerry Della Femina in a book in London where I was living at the time and it was talking about getting into advertising. I thought this is something that I can do so when I came back with my family to San Francisco I sent a direct mailer to all the creative directors and agencies in the San Francisco area. I was able through the success of this mailing to get two jobs on the same day as a matter of fact, and I‘ve never looked back.

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242 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ After a couple of years or working as a copyrighter in the advertising agency, Botsford Ketchum, I went off on my own freelancing and I‘ve been doing it now for many years. Graham: I was just looking through some of the testimonials on your website. I‘m so impressed, with well known names like Seth Godin and Jay Conrad Levison who are raving about what you do. I see there are so many people saying look Ivan has helped me sell 20 million dollars worth of software or he‘s helped me build a 30 million dollar a year business so obviously you are getting some fantastic results for people. Well done. What‘s the one great sales or marketing strategy that you want to share with our readers today? Ivan: Often in direct marketing we talk about mailing to huge lists or at least large lists. So I thought that I might talk about the time when it‘s appropriate to mail to a tiny list. There are times when you don‘t want to do a mass mailing but instead get a personal interview, physically, to go into the office of someone, sit down across the table from them and sell them on your product or service. I felt we could talk about when that might be appropriate. And if I may Graham, let me start off by saying that this is appropriate only if you have a relatively high priced product or service. If you have a $1.99 product you are not going to fly to another city and sit down with somebody in their office and sell them. But if you have something that costs a good deal, where it‘s worth your time and you really want to see that person in person, then you might consider a very special kind of letter. And this is what I thought we might be able to discuss in more detail today. Graham: That sounds fantastic because a lot of people do have what we call a big ticket or an expensive product or service and often it‘s really important to get a face to face meeting to sell

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243 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ something like that to a key decision maker in a company or just a key prospect. So what is the strategy that we could use in a sales letter to get a face to face meeting with an important prospect for an expensive product or service? What‘s the first thing you do? Ivan: Well that I‘d like to suggest is rather than talk in general terms, to give some practical ideas that your readers can actually use. The first is to consider paying more for a mailing of a special letter like this. In other words the cost per mailing can and should go up over what you do when you are doing a mass mailing. So with a mass mailing that‘s for lead generation or that‘s to do what we call selling off the page, actually have people send money in response to your package, there you want to minimise costs. Make it as effective as you can and not go bankrupt on tremendous printing costs and so forth. When you are only trying to contact let‘s say 60 people of a certain key job title in your city or in another city, or even 5 people that are your key prospects, you can spend more money on each package. So one of the things I would definitely suggest is to use an overnight delivery service like FedEx for example to send your letter. I can guarantee you that FedEx packages get opened and read and it absolutely makes sense to spend money on it rather than just putting a postage stamp on it and having it be considered just another piece of junk mail. Graham: I love that suggestion. In fact it‘s something that I‘ve done a couple of times myself. I wanted to meet the key person in charge of the country for a major bank here in New Zealand. He didn‘t know me but I wanted to meet with him. So I sent him by courier an interesting letter and a couple of attachments. Then I followed up with another courier package a few days later. In a few days time I got a call from his personal assistant saying ‗look I

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244 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ must apologise this particular person has been overseas for a week, he hasn‘t been able to respond, he‘s just got back he would love to meet you, when can you come and see him?‘ So certainly sending something by courier definitely gets attention doesn‘t it because it‘s very rare that someone would send you a letter by courier. Ivan: Yes. There‘s another thing your readers can do that I think would be very worth considering and that‘s to send not just overnight but make it into what we call a dimensional package. Now a dimensional package or dimensional mailing means that there is literally something in the package that might bulge out of the package, be a kind of insert into the package or a custom made package. I‘d like to give you three examples if I may of dimensional packages that I‘ve done that have been very successful. One of these three was very expensive, one was a medium cost and one was very inexpensive. On the inexpensive side I used to work with a graphic designer by the name of Chris Parsons and he was down in Silicon Valley which is our high tech centre here in California. Chris wanted to have me write and get an appointment letter for him to say to the technology companies around where he worked that he was really just a stone‘s throw away from them and that they should use his services. So what we did was along with the letter that I wrote, we literally put in a pebble or a small rock. It got opened but also tied into the letter because at the top of the letter I put the headline ‗Profit Building Art Direction and Designer just a stone‘s throw away‘. By the way if your readers want to see the letter itself that went along with the rock they can find it at www.levison.com/cris Now if anybody is groaning and thinks that this is a bit corny let me say I agree 100% and that is why I love it. It is kind of corny but at the same time it works and as

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245 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ we know all we were after is results and it worked wonderfully for him. He got dozens of appointments. Another dimensional package that we sent was for Intel. They were working on a chip years ago called the I860 and it was a new chip, a graphics chip very fast and they wanted to have all of the local technical press to come to a special press event. So what we did is we bought some socks, pair of socks and there‘s a wrapper as you know around socks and on the wrapper it was printed, just had the words join us on February 14th at 8.00 pm and Intel will knock yours off. (Knock your socks off.) Well again it‘s a little corny but I say so with great pride that the event was jam packed. And in fact the San Francisco Chronicle (which is the local paper for the area) actually said in a column that Intel sent a pair of socks that said and they repeated the promotion so it got a little extra publicity that way. And finally for American President Lines which is the giant international shipping company they wanted people to know that their produce could be sent and be kept absolutely fresh. So what we did, and this was rather expensive for them, to each of the few people who would be receiving this, we got a very, very delicate orchid. It was put in a little glass vase with water in it. Talk about a dimensional package, it was wrapped along with a letter that said something on the order of when something has to be delivered fresh, American President Lines can get the job done. And it was hand delivered to the person in their office by a courier and again of course a courier shows up with a package and these days one might be concerned that it would explode. In those days there was no such concern, they opened up the package and there‘s this fresh orchid that makes the point and of course they then follow it up with a phone call and there was a letter that went with it. But that‘s the example of three dimensional packages and how if you let your imagination go you can really have some fun and get the most important prospects to pay attention and be keen to meet with you when

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246 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ you follow up. Graham: I know these simple strategies work. In fact I just saw an example a couple of weeks ago of a letter that was sent out to the people in charge of local schools. I think the letter went to five schools in a particular city here in New Zealand and it was sent by a plumber. It was written by a copyrighter for this plumber and what they included with the letter was a single roll of toilet paper along with a small spanner and the letter was talking about his plumbing services and how he could help them the school. It was sent by courier, and I know that it produced something like $50,000 worth of plumbing work for that plumber within 60 days. Obviously the key to that promotion was the great letter that went with it which is why they need a good copyrighter like yourself to write a great sales letter. Ivan: I couldn‘t agree with you more. Let me tell you another point that I think might be important. The letter itself has its core purpose to set up a personal meeting. So it should not be boring. So you don‘t want to send a letter that says, allow me to introduce myself. I‘m so and so from so and so. No it has to outline the specific benefits that the meeting will provide for the prospect. So what I always do in these letters is tell them that when we get together for a personal short meeting here‘s exactly what you will learn and then there can be bullets that outline where you can include the various things that the prospect will learn. Often I position the meeting as a kind of an industry overview. I tell them we are not going to be there for a standard sales presentation instead we are contacting people like yourself to bring them up to date on trends in the industry that they should be aware of. It‘s a way of introducing ourselves but mostly it‘s to provide you with information you just can‘t get any place else. That kind of thing. So numerating the benefits of the meeting itself I think is very important.

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247 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ The final point is that how you handle the actual setting up the meeting and the phone call. This is important. Your letter should never say, and this is a mistake a lot of people make, ‗so therefore give me a call and let‘s set something up.‘ Absolutely not. You have to give them the option of their calling but you also have to make it clear that you are going to be calling them, you can mention a specific day of the week and tell them that as well they should let their gatekeeper know they should take the call and make sure the two of you connect. The bottom line as in any selling situation is benefits to the reader and that‘s what has to be hammered home. The prospect has to know that there‘s something valuable for them in the meeting, that has to be made clear after you get their attention and then setting up the exact time and date of the meeting is something that can be facilitated. In American football we talk about what‘s called the down field blocker. That means that one of the men on the offensive team who‘s going to be blocking, bumping into an opponent down the pitch is trying to eliminate resistance ahead of the runner with the ball. That‘s how I see this letter. It‘s a down field blocker. It‘s running out ahead of you to do some heavy lifting, some heavy weights, some heavy hitting that facilities the call and the appointment which is of course the purpose of the entire enterprise. Graham: Let me just summarise some of the things you talked about so I‘ve got it exactly clear. What you are saying is that when you are selling an expensive product or service occasionally you want to get appointments with a certain number of people and often that‘s a very small number of people. In this case it‘s quite appropriate to do a sales letter that‘s different from the normal sales letter that‘s going to a mass market. That‘s the first thing. Secondly, if you are going to a small group of select prospects that you definitely want to get a face to face meeting for something you want to show them, that‘s potentially very expensive and obviously well worth

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248 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ your time to go and see them, it‘s worthwhile sending the letter out, not just by normal mail but by sending it out by overnight courier, or having it personally delivered. That makes a big difference; it should also have something with the letter that makes it stand out. I think there‘s term for that called lumpy mail or something like that? It‘s got a bit of a feel to it so it comes along and they think oh what‘s this, it‘s a bit different. It‘s not a normal letter. What‘s inside it, it looks interesting and so you have all kinds of interesting things that tie in with your letter and then you are saying in the letter itself it should get straight to the point about the benefits to the client. I think you‘ve got a couple of examples I am looking at here right now. One letter starts off here like Dear Steve I want to ask you for something extremely precious, 45 minutes of your time and obviously that ties in with something that‘s been included with the letter. Ivan: And Graham, that‘s something I think, would be very useful to include. That‘s a good lead in. Graham: Good lead in and what I‘d like to show is something that‘s going to help you benefit, benefit, benefit and obviously some compelling benefits there or going to show them how to solve a major problem that you have or how to get a competitive advantage. And I want to show you this and your letter goes on to tie in these benefits obviously with the attachment that you‘ve included. You are then saying something along the lines, look I want to show you this information in a very interesting meeting, I know your time is precious, I think it would be well worthwhile, I will phone you on such and such a day, perhaps Thursday.... Ivan:

Or feel free to call me at any time.

Graham: I will call you in a couple of days and obviously feel free to contact me in the meantime if you want to contact me sooner and set up that meeting. And then do you usually include a PS in this letter as well? Ivan: Ok, this is an interesting point. Everybody in direct response knows that you use a PS

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249 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ it‘s high readership and so forth and it‘s possible but at the same time these letters are so individual that I don‘t like to make it look like a clichéd junk mail letter so it‘s very possible I might leave the PS off. Graham:

That makes sense.

Ivan: That‘s a good example of breaking the rule appropriately. Graham: And what you would do with this type of letter (and I assume this worked the same for your graphic designer example that you talked about before) he would then phone each of the people that the letter went to when he said he would. So you might only send out a small number of letters at a time so you can follow up with a phone call. Obviously if you sent out 100 you can‘t follow up 100 phone calls in a certain period of time so you might send out 5 a day or 2 a day. Ivan:

Exactly.

Graham: Then you just follow up, make 2, 3, 4, 5 follow up phone calls, leave a message obviously if they are not available. Have you found with this type of approach that a number of people will actually respond before you even phone them? Ivan: That‘s very possible but as in all things it depends so much on the situation and it‘s hard to know. But yes you can get calls directly from the person. But as I said in the analogy about the football player, the letter really is doing some of the heavy lifting before you call them. I mean if you didn‘t send the letter and put all the thought into this and just call them, then you are into the death valley of cold calling. With this letter first they actually know you and hopefully have a sense of intelligence and aggressiveness and they are much more receptive to taking the call and that‘s really the function of the letter. Graham: I love this strategy because I can see exactly how it can work in certain situations

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250 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ particularly with an expensive product or service. And you are a little bit different too because it‘s quite rare to have people go to the time and expense to do something like this. In my experience in business, very few people get a letter sent like this with something interesting inside, that‘s sent by courier, then followed up. It‘s something again they will probably show a few people I would suspect as well because it is different. Ivan: Yeah, hey look what I got, I got an orchid. They sent me an orchid. You know, they give it to their executive assistant to put on her desk and yeah this is the kind of thing that with a little imagination and just a little money, you can really make an impression. And you can‘t do that in a mass mailing so it‘s a terrific opportunity. It‘s the right match of the medium and the message. Graham: And it‘s a great strategy to use in conjunction with all the other normal ways that most of us market which is whether it‘s by email or normal sales letter or other forms of marketing. And on that note I know that you have a huge range of free resources that will help anybody in business to improve their marketing results. So tell us about some of your resources you‘ve got on your website. What is your website again? Ivan: My website is www.levison.com and on it they will find back issues of at least 75 articles, back issues of my newsletter The Levison Letter which your readers are invited to subscribe to at no cost and they can do that right on my website. I think they would find the information very practical and I encourage them to subscribe. Graham: Fantastic and I notice that you‘ve got an excellent special report, free of charge called ‗101 ways to double your response rate.‘ Ivan: On my home page when they log in at the bottom they will find the chance to subscribe to the

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251 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Levison Letter. When they do this they will also be be able to get (I think it‘s 27 pages long) ‗101 ideas for doubling their direct response rates This is totally free and I hope people find it of interest. Graham: Excellent, thank you very much for taking the time to share these great ideas today. Ivan: Thanks so much for the chance to participate. Action Exercise: Wow, Ivan shared some great ideas in his interview that are perfect if you want to get appointments with high value prospects. I love the way that Ivan explained how it pays to be creative and spend a little bit more money to make contact with these people. I highly recommend you go straight to Ivan‘s website on www.levison.com and sign up for his excellent ezine ‗The Levison Letter‘. Get his report with ‗101 great ideas to double your response rate‘ and look over the back issues of his ezine. Each one is jam packed full of helpful ideas to improve your marketing results. One of the best things about Ivan is that you always deal directly with him. He personally answers every email and is a delight to do business with.

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252 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ 20: Chris Lytle The Magic Email

Reprinted with permission

Graham McGregor: In this interview today it‘s my great pleasure to be talking with one of my favourite authors and sales trainers Chris Lytle. Chris had a lucrative, but increasingly frustrating career as a professional speaker. He was frustrated with the start-and-stop nature of training seminars and the limited results that an occasional learning event creates. He decided to partner with sales managers who train their own people. His website contains knowledge bites (digestible ideas) that can be consumed in five minutes and discussed for 25 more minutes in a meeting. Chris coined the phrase ―The Honors Class in Selling Instant Sales Meeting‖ and has clients in English speaking countries all over the world. His training has translated into immediate, bottom-line impact for tens of thousands of salespeople at every level of their careers. Chris, I first read your book ―The Accidental Sales Person‖, must be nearly ten years ago. It made a huge

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253 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ impact on my sales career, because you had some really simple strategies that basically showed sales people how to add a lot more value to their clients and make a lot more sales in far less time. It‘s great to have you on the call today. Chris Lytle: Thank you Graham it‘s great to be here. And ―The Accidental Sales Manager‖ is going to be out this spring, published by John Wiley. Graham: I‘m looking forward to reading that as well. If it‘s anything like you first book, it will be a runaway success, no doubt about it. As you know I am talking to a wide range of sales and marketing experts like yourself around the world. I am asking all of them one question. ‗What is one sales or marketing strategy that you are using either in your business or with your clients, it‘s getting remarkable results, improving sales, improving profits and it‘s giving those people that are using it an unfair business advantage?‘ I think today you‘ve got a fantastic strategy, in fact two strategies we are going to talk about. Chris: Thanks Graham. The two strategies are ‗The magic question‘ and ‗the magic email.‘ We are going to talk about the magic question first. A big problem that is facing sales people around the world is they get hooked on ‗hopium‘. So they find a customer who says ‗I‘m interested‘ and they think that‘s a buying signal. When in fact it‘s often just a way to politely get rid of the sales person. I‘m interested, call me next week, I‘m interested but we can‘t do anything until the next quarter but call me, I‘m interested ...‘ So they take this interested customer back and put him or her into their sales projections.

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254 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ And they blow this smoke of ‗hopium‘ up the ladder to their sales manager who then sends it onto the CFO and these projections are just wrong. What I‘ve been telling my clients is that sales pipelines are clogged with dead and dying deals which never were deals at all, but they are in the projection because somebody said ‗I‘m interested.‘ One of the things that has worked so well for so many people is ‗the magic question.‘ When someone says ‗I‘m interested, call me next Tuesday,‘ you simply say ‗I will be happy to. Are you willing to work with me on a calendar basis?‘ In some countries it‘s called a diary so ‗can you put me on the calendar and I‘ll call you at 9.15 and we can move this project forward, move this sale forward.‘ And you can get one or two answers. ‗Sure, let‘s get it on the calendar‘, which means this is an engaged prospect who actually is going to be advocating within his or her company and having meetings after the meeting to move this project forward. The other person is the information seeker who says ‗no just give me a call, I will be around‘. And of course when you call a week later that person often isn‘t around or doesn‘t take your call or is not as interested as they were during the initial meeting. Graham: So this magic question is the perfect way to quickly gauge whether that person is somebody that you can take the next step with who is potentially a serious prospect for your business or whether it‘s just an information seeker. So it‘s a very quick way to work out with the magic question who is possibly worth following up on and who is not. Chris: And that doesn‘t mean that information seekers will never become prospects. But they are not at a stage in the sales process or their buying process in their case where you should put them in your

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255 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ projections and count on them as a sale in the next month or the next quarter. Graham: I think you did mentioned there‘s some quite shocking figures was it from Sales Insight magazine or somebody similar about how accurate projections are for sales people saying this is the number of people I expect to buy in the next period of time. What were those figures again? Chris: It‘s called ―Chief Sales Officer Insights‖ and it‘s Jim Dickey and Barry Trainer‘s company. They survey Chief Sales Officers all over the world in small, medium to large companies and one survey they surveyed 1,347 Chief Sales Officers about the accuracy of their projections. 90% of the deals that were projected to close did not close when they were projected to close. 54% of projected deals never closed at all, 34% of those went to a competitor. Now these were deals that the sales person had rated in the projections, in the CRM system as 75% sure or higher. 54% didn‘t close, 34% went to a competitor and 20% went to the dreaded ‗no decision.‘ So sales pipelines are clogged with dead and dying deals that are languishing in the pipelines and the trouble with those things is they drag on and on and you hold out hope, ‗hopium‘, but rarely do you get a sale from them. Graham: Makes perfect sense. I can relate to many times I‘ve been hooked on ‗hopium‘ myself. I guess we all have. Chris: And I have too. I‘m a sales trainer and I sell seminars and I sell sales training. I invented ―the magic e-mail‖ to help me close a sale. Since then, I‘ve taught this on three continents now, and it‘s created millions of dollars worth of new business because whenever people try this somebody comes out of the woodwork and buys but here‘s the story and this happened to me.

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256 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ There was a guy named Cliff and he worked at a plastics molding company and he had retained my services for some other training. He was talking about having an additional seminar on closing sales and we were working on dates and working on bringing the sales people in to the conference. I emailed him and I called him and he didn‘t return my email, he didn‘t return my call and this went on for three weeks. He just sort of disappeared on me. I think we can all identify with the disappearing customer. I am sitting at my desk one day and I just said I‘ve got to email this guy one more time. I came up with a subject line ―Quick Question‖ and that subject line has worked for everyone that‘s tried it. The Quick Question is one of those subject lines where a very busy person can say I can handle a quick question. At least you didn‘t send me a 52 page pdf proposal. I will answer a quick question. And then I wrote the body of the e-mail: ―Cliff I have you on my ‗waiting for‘ list of people I am waiting to hear back from. Am I still on your radar?‖ That two sentence e-mail is the magic e-mail. ‖Am I still on your radar‖ is the quick question. Within 45 minutes he had emailed me and said you are good. I am in Seattle, please call me on my cell phone. Within an hour he‘s called me back and we‘d scheduled a breakfast and at that breakfast we closed the deal and got this thing moving through the pipeline again. So the magic email is designed for those people who have disengaged with you, to get them back and at least get a decision so you either can move it forward or get it out of your pipeline and quit worrying about it, and either one of those things is good.

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257 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ I get emails week after week from all over the world where people say ―I tried it and I made a sale or at least I got a decision.‖ Graham: That‘s a fantastic example and I think you mentioned that you‘ve had sales people, or anyone in sales, on three different continents that have used this exact same magic email and it has actually made sales every time. Because you could go to potentially 5 or 10 people or more that you just haven‘t heard from, you are not sure where you are up to, send them the email and often you just get someone comes out of the woodwork and say ‗yes look I am ready to do something.‘ Chris: The other day I heard this story about a guy who, he‘s just retained my services to do some training and he said I hadn‘t heard about you but I was working for this company and this guy said I‘m going to send out ten magic emails this afternoon. This guy went over and said ‗what‘s that‘ and he said ‗Chris Lytle came up with this magic email thing and every time I get people stuck, I just go back to the magic email‘.‘ All of a sudden everyone in our cubical, in our sales area knew about this because we were teaching each other about your magic email. Haven‘t even met me before. Graham: And he basically used that as a way to make contact with you and sold your services just from that one contact before you‘d even met him. How about that. What you‘ve also found is that a huge number of people around the world have used that magic email and they‘ve actually closed a huge amount of sales as a result haven‘t they? Chris: Right and I‘ve spoken in Sydney, I‘ve spoken in Auckland, I‘ve spoken in Wellington and every time I do a seminar I hear back from people that said it works! Germany it works, England it works and of course all over the United States and Canada.

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258 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Graham: That‘s fantastic, that‘s such a simple strategy. So we are really if you like recommending the magic email and the magic question here. First of all if you want to identify quickly if somebody is a person that you can move forward, can consider putting into your prospecting pipeline, you ask them that magic question about the calendar. Can you give us that question one more time? Chris: Are you willing to work with me on a calendar basis? Graham: Or if people aren‘t familiar with the term ‗calendar‘ which again here in New Zealand we often would use the word ‗diary‘ instead, so you‘d say something along the lines of ―Are you willing to put me in your diary?‖ You could rephrase it slightly differently if you wanted. Chris: ―Let‘s get this in our diary so we make it happen.‖ Graham: So grab your diary and let‘s schedule in the next step, phone meeting, whatever it happens to be or face-to-face meeting or presentation or proposal or whatever. That makes sense and the thing being, if they are scheduled into your diary or your calendar for a specific action step on a specific date, they are then in your pipeline. Chris: And I call it an engagement metric. It is how many people have you on their calendars for a next step and not just how many people you have on your list that you are going to call. Graham: Big difference. Chris: How many people, that‘s the leading indicator of how many people you are going to close, the people that have you on their calendars for the next step. Not the number of people on your To Do list that you are going to give a shout out to.

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259 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Graham: I think you‘ve made an excellent point that the sale for a lot of companies that are actually going to close in the next 90 days or the next quarter are based on the people they have in their pipeline that have you in their calendar or diary for the next step for the last 90 days. That‘s a very good indication. It gives you a much higher accuracy, I think you were saying it improve the accuracy of your forecasting in terms of closed sales by how much if you do this process? Chris: At least 50%. Graham: One last thing Chris. We could almost call this the second magic question if you like, but it‘s a very good question that you could ask early on in a first meeting with a potential prospect to make sure that it‘s going to be a very productive meeting both for you and for them. If you like it helps them and it helps you learn how best to sell to those people. What‘s that question and what‘s the reasoning behind that? Chris: I want to talk about this. Let me preface this by saying a lot of sales people will come back and say it was a great meeting and unless they close the deal, I don‘t call it a great meeting. To me it‘s not a great meeting unless the client thinks it‘s a great meeting. So I want to say at the beginning of the meeting ‗what would have to happen during this meeting for you to say at the end of it this was a great meeting and it really added value to my day?‘ Graham: What a great question. And when you ask that question what are some of the things that people tell you? Chris: Like today, I asked that question and the person said I want to revisit some of the things that we had in our proposal that we haven‘t implemented yet. And I want to make sure I‘m up to speed on what you are trying to accomplish.

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260 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ This is a call I had just an hour ago. The client said, ―I want to make sure that we don‘t miss anything in our training initiative this year.‖ Or it could be I want to make sure I have an understanding of how your solution is different than the one I am using now. So whatever they say is the right answer because it‘s their answer. Graham: That gives you feedback in terms of this is what you should talk about, or this is how you present that‘s going to add most value to them in that meeting. And the meeting could be face-to-face, the meeting could also be on the phone like the one you‘ve just had. Chris: Absolutely. And now I want to do one other thing. I am going to tell you a story that has helped me more than anything that I do in my sales career. Graham: Sounds good. Chris: I am in Bermuda a few years back with my wife Sarah and her brother and sister-in-law, Bob and Kathy and we have a condo at one of the far ends of the island. One morning we got up and we rode double on two motor scooter to breakfast, then we went to Hamilton, the big city in Bermuda to lunch and shopping. Then we scootered back to the condo and we played golf from 2.00 until about 6.00. And as the sun was setting we were having a cocktail on the deck and watching the sun set over the ocean. Now one of my rituals on vacation has always been to say so what was the highlight of your day? I do it when I am alone with Sarah and I do it when I am with a group and so we did this. We went around the table and Kathy said I was reading the guide book about the pink sand beaches of Bermuda but when we turned that corner on the North Beach Road and saw that pink sand beach she said it was stunning, it was amazing.

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261 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ I said well Bob, what about you? Oh he said when went by the airport and there was that cargo plane and coming out of the cargo plane was that fighter plane with the wings folded up, he says I‘m not sure that civilians are supposed to see planes like that, those are supposed to be secret. It was amazing to see that plane, that close at the airport. Wow. Sarah, what about you? Oh the lunch in Hamilton. Got to be the highlight of the day. The breeze coming off the harbour, I love that little patio restaurant above the department store, it was just perfect. And they said what about you Chris? I said didn‘t anybody see me save par from the 17th hole, from the sand trap on the 17th hole? We‘d been to the same restaurants, the same town, the same golf course, but everybody has processed the day differently. So today when I end my seminar, and if you are a sales manager, when you end your sales meeting, you might think you‘ve imparted all this wisdom. but believe me the people in the audience didn‘t hear exactly what you said. So you might go around and say ‗what was the highlight of the meeting for you? And your team can review the whole meeting and tell each other what they think they learned. And you‘ve actually brought the meeting back and summarised it and you know what people are taking from it. But then take it a step further, at the end of the meeting you have with a prospect or customer simply say ‗so what was the highlight of this meeting for you?‘ So then when you go back instead of saying it was a great meeting, you will know exactly what the customer thought. Graham: He told you ‗the highlight of the meeting was..., this is what they told me.‘ Chris: Exactly.

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262 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________

Graham: I love that question. Chris: And if that‘s not the highlight you wanted to have you still have some time to try to make sure that they got the thing you wanted them to. Graham: That was excellent and one of the things I love about all your material Chris is that everything you teach is very simple to understand, very easy to use, like real world, and it produces amazing results in a short period of time. So where‘s the best place for people to go to, to get access to some of your resources? Chris: There‘s a website called Fuel and it‘s www.sparquefuel.com . Graham: Excellent and on that site what are some of the things they will see? Chris: What they are going to see is they can sign up for a free trial edition and they will be able to get two to five minutes knowledge bytes, just like this interview with immediately applicable information on prospecting, getting the appointment, qualifying, closing, negotiating, and follow up strategies. Graham: Excellent and that‘s free, they can try it out and see what they think? Chris: Try it out and obviously there‘s more they can buy and get a lot more but we are certainly willing to give quite a bit of it away just to get people some results. Graham: Thank you Chris, that‘s been an excellent session today, the two magic questions, the magic email, you gave our readers more than they expected which is certainly true of the way you operate. You always give people more value than they expect. I know that everyone that uses these ideas will get immediate results and I thank you very much for sharing them with us. Chris: My pleasure, thank you Graham.

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263 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________

Action Exercise: Chris has recommended some great strategies here that are dead easy to implement. Make sure you ask each potential client who is interested in your products or services if they would be willing to schedule a next step in their calendar or diary. If they agree, that is a positive sign. If not, they may be an information seeker who is not such a well qualified prospect right now. (This simple strategy can immediately improve the accuracy of any sales forecasts you may be doing right now.) Use the magic email if you want to clarify whether stalled prospects are still prospects or not. The magic email has a great subject line and it immediately lets you know where you stand. If they don‘t reply, it shows you they are not really interested at this stage. If they do reply, it can often lead to new business. Use the magic question near the beginning of each meeting with a potential client. And the second magic question at the end. This helps your client to focus on what they ideally want to get out of the meeting first of all. And also it reminds them of what the highlights were from the meetings as well. One last thing: Get a copy of Chris‘s great book ‗The Accidental Salesperson‘. It is chock full of simple strategies to increase sales and will add tremendous value to everything you do.

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264 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ 21: Graham McGregor The Added Value Dripping Tap:

Reprinted with permission

Tom Poland: Hello folks and a very warm welcome. My name is Tom Poland and welcome to this interview for the Unfair Business Advantage Report. The person I am interviewing today is none other than Graham McGregor the creator of the Unfair Business Advantage Report. I‘ve known Graham now for close on 20 years and the reason it‘s a pleasure and a privilege for me to be interviewing him is that Graham has helped me make a lot of money. I actually recall one conversation over lunch a couple of years ago that added many thousands of dollars into my bank account for quite a number of months thereafter so Graham thank you for that sir and welcome. Graham McGregor: My pleasure Tom. It‘s great to be able to share some ideas today. Tom: Well let‘s get straight to it. You are about to reveal I believe one of your favourite sales and marketing strategies that helps business owners and others create an unfair business advantage. What is it all about?

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265 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Graham: A lot of the people you are in contact with right now would love to buy your products or services. However, often the timing may just not be right for many of these people to make a buying decision right now. The big mistake that many people make in business is that we think that if a person does not buy right now, it means they will never buy. So we don‟t follow up and stay in touch. When we have this short sighted attitude to selling we usually end up throwing away a small fortune in easy sales. (I can speak with great authority on this mistake in selling because I have personally made it many times!) And that brings me to one of my favourite ways to get an unfair business advantage right now. It‘s something that is working particularly well both for me and my clients and best of all virtually no one does it. I call it the Added Value Dripping Tap The concept of the dripping tap is very simple: A dripping tap goes ‗drip, drip, drip‘ continuously over a period of time. Each individual drip does not seem to have much of an effect. However, over time these continual drips can fill a container and can even wear a hole in something hard like stone. Now think of each drip as being a communication from you to a customer or potential customer where you add value in some way. There may be no apparent result or impact from each individual communication you send. But over time, with repeated communications you can create a huge number of new customers, repeat sales, referrals and testimonials. Here’s a simple example: A few years ago I came across an interesting article on marketing by a person called Bob Serling. When I read this article, I also had the opportunity to sign up

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266 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ for a regular free ezine on marketing ideas that Bob wrote. At this point I had never heard of Bob Serling. However over the next 12-18 months I received a number of articles on marketing and increasing sales from his marketing ezine. I liked what I read and eventually decided to purchase one of the products Bob had for sale on marketing. It was a short easy to understand downloadable book on getting a competitive advantage in any business. I invested around $39 and continued to get my regular articles from Bob‘s ezine. About a year later Bob offered a six month personal mentoring programme to help individual clients increase sales with more effective marketing. The investment was many thousands of dollars and I had no hesitation in signing up for the service. It was an excellent investment and was directly responsible for helping me increase my sales by over 91% within the first six months. Bob‘s approach is an excellent example of the Added Value dripping tap concept. Bob is continually in touch with existing clients and also with potential new clients in a way that adds great value. And while many of the individual communications he sends may not produce a huge amount of sales, the cumulative impact over a period of time is excellent. Here’s another great example of the huge impact of using an added value dripping communication programme... Around ten years ago I worked in a sales and marketing role for a business that sold Investment Properties. In my first year I made a big mistake. I didn‟t stay in touch with my clients. So my clients would purchase an Investment Property from our firm and they would only hear back from me about once a year. (I think I sent them a Xmas card.)

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267 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ This was a costly error on my part because I got next to no referrals from any of my clients and very little repeat sales. What was worse was that when I did make contact a year later there was no real connection or relationship between us. After a year or so a client named Steve sent me a letter that said he was really quite disappointed with me. He was surprised about not hearing from me after becoming a client. He was delighted with his investment property, however he had not heard from me and wondered why not? He told me that he felt that by not staying in touch I didn‘t really care about him. He told me he was a good potential source of repeat and referral business and that I should treat him better. He then gave me a list of things I could do to stay in touch with my clients like him. I was highly embarrassed to get Steve‘s letter because I knew the importance of staying in touch and adding value to clients. I had just forgotten to do it. So I swung into action with a simple added value dripping tap communication programme. I started by sending every client a personal note in the mail every 6-8 weeks. I made sure I included something of value with every note I sent out. One note would have a couple of free movie passes with it and said something like ―Thanks for being a client. I thought you would appreciate a couple of free movie passes with my compliments. And while you are enjoying the movie, remember that you are growing your wealth at the same time with the investment property that we are managing for you.” Another personal note would include a short motivational article I had come across on something like goal setting. It would say “Hi John, thought you might enjoy this short article on goal setting. Thanks for being a client. Regards Graham.”

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268 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Sometimes I would include a newsletter that I wrote that had helpful ideas on personal success. Everything I did with my added value communication programme was something tangible that people received in their hands. (So I didn‟t use email for this.) Within 12 months of using this added value communication programme the results were obvious. I started getting calls and even letters from my clients telling me how much they appreciated the added value follow up. I got referrals, I got repeat sales and best of all I now had a good relationship with most of my clients. My client Steve told me that he was now thrilled with how well I was treating him. Within 18 months he purchased another Investment Property himself and gave me a referral to a family member who also became a new client. Within two years of using my added value dripping tap communication programme regularly, I was getting nearly 70% of my sales every month from repeat sales and referrals. And the people who referred me or contacted me were thrilled at the great benefits they received from being on my added value dripping tap communication program Tom: That‘s great Graham, so how can you actually use the Added Value Dripping Tap in a business? Graham: You start by identifying three groups of important people for your business. First of all you have your existing customers and clients whoever they happen to be. The second group are potential clients or customers for your business. In other words prospects, people that you think could be interested in what you have. The third really important group of people in your business is what we call Centres of Influence. These are people that know large networks of people that again potentially could buy your products and services. A recommendation from just one of these

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269 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Centres of Influence could actually make you a lot of sales. So three groups of people. Customers and clients, prospects and centres of influence. And all you do with the Added Value Dripping Tap is this. You stay in touch preferably in a hard copy format with clients and customers, prospects and also centres of influence at least once every 90 days. Ideally at least four times a year or more. You can do it a lot more if you want, you can do it six times a year, you can do it 12 times a year. By hard copy format I mean you physically send an added value item to these people whenever you make contact. So while email is very good, I also like to send something in the mail that people can get in their hands. I‘ve found that if you can just stay in touch with people like this it works really well and this is what I am getting all my clients to do right now. Some of my clients are real estate agents so what I‘ve done for them is I‘ve prewritten a couple of very short motivational booklets. I‘ve got one called the Instant Guide to Happiness and one on goal setting called How to Make the next 12 months your Best Year Ever. And we have these customised with the client‘s name and photo in and they get them printed. I think they cost about $2 each so they are pretty affordable. I give my clients some cover letters to send these out to their clients, prospects and centres of influence. I had an interesting email the other day from one of the real estate agents that had used this process. He took one of these booklets called the Instant Guide to Happiness and he actually sent it out to about 38 people on his database. Some clients, some prospects and some centres of influence.

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270 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ He then got a phone call from a lawyer that he‘d sent this booklet to saying please call me. He thought ‗oh what have I done?‖ Anyway he phoned this lawyer and the lawyer said ―We love this booklet, it is so positive, can we have four more copies please to give to some of our staff and clients? And we‘ve got one of our legal clients who had her husband die last week. She is going to need to sell her property, can you please make contact with this client as we‘d like you to help her sell it.‖ Tom: Perfect. Graham: Isn‘t that interesting. The real estate agent emailed with this story and told me it was so much fun to get a call like that from the lawyer. He really appreciated being able to add some happiness and positivity into their lives. Another comment here is that when you are using an added value dripping tap communication programme, what you send people doesn‟t have to be related at all to the product or service that you sell. It could be a movie pass; it can be a little helpful article. It could be a humorous cartoon. It just has to be something that adds value to that person in some way. It might help them to solve a problem, achieve some goals, it might just help them feel good. It could be a birthday card, it could be a Christmas card, it could be an anniversary card, so it‘s just something that adds value to them. The whole idea here being you want to do it at least once every three months. If you leave it more than three months as you and I both know, with the research done by Wendy Evans, people forget you. So ideally you want to do it at least once every three months and my preference, even though email is great, my preference is to do this hard copy in the person‘s hand. In my case I try and do something on a monthly basis. It could be something simple as in the first month you send them a handwritten thank you card, thanks for

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271 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ being a customer or thanks for your interest in our services. Something as simple as that, that‘s your first communication. Then you might send them a special report the second month. The third month you might send them a $1 instant scratchy lotto ticket, the fourth month you might send them a couple of movie passes or an invitation to get a free report or an actual free report or something else. And you are doing this over and over again. By doing this you develop an incredible relationship with these people, you are adding real value and you make yourself very easy to recommend and refer for these people. You get a ton of repeat business and a ton of referral business. So that‘s my strategy; the Added Value Dripping Tap communication Programme. Tom: That‘s a wonderful strategy and I can why it works so well Graham: It certainly does and it‘s been my great pleasure to share this strategy. Action Exercise: Make a list of 10 clients, 10 prospects and 10 centres of influence. Then write down what you could send each of these people over the next 12 months that will add value in some way. You might write down things like Handwritten thank you note, birthday card, free movie pass, helpful article, tasteful business cartoon, special report, Xmas card and so on. Then send out one thing to each person along with a personal note. ―Hi John, thanks for being a client. I thought you might enjoy this XYZ. With my compliments.‖ Then at least four times a year send something else to each person. Expand this programme so it covers more people and make it a standard part of what you do. The results will delight you. In most case the sales and referrals you

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272 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ get from doing this are worth many times the small cost of implementing your Added Value Dripping Tap communication programme.

22: Dr Ivan Misner The VCP Process ® for effective networking

Reprinted with permission

Graham McGregor: In this interview for the Unfair Business Advantage Report it‘s my great pleasure to be talking to Dr Ivan Misner the founder and chairman of BNI the world‘s largest business networking organisation. BNI was founded in 1985. The organization has over 5,800 chapters throughout every populated continent of the world. Last year alone, BNI generated 6.5 million referrals resulting in $2.8 billion dollars worth of business for its members. Dr. Misner is a New York Times Bestselling author who has written twelve books including his latest #1 bestseller Networking Like a Pro. Ivan, it‘s fantastic to be talking to you today. As you know I am talking to a range of experts around the world in sales and marketing on what‘s their

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273 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ favourite sales and marketing strategy to help them or their clients get an unfair business advantage? What would your favourite strategy be and I am pretty sure I know what your answer will be. Ivan Misner: Well it certainly relates to networking, there‘s no doubt about that. I think that the thing that people who want to build a business through networking need to understand and what is a distinctive advantage for those who do understand it, is what I call the VCP process® of networking. I think a lot of business people confuse direct selling with relationship networking. If you want to build your business through networking you‘ve got to understand VCP ®. It stands for Visibility, Credibility and Profitability. It‘s a chronological process and It begins with first of all Visibility. People have to know who you are and what you do. Then its chronological so then you go Credibility where people know who you are, they know what you do and they know you are good at it. And then once you‘ve established credibility with people you move to profitability where people know who you are, they know what you do, they know you are good at it and they are willing to give you referrals on an ongoing basis. Where networking goes bad, where it goes wrong, is when people practice what I call premature solicitation. That‘s where you try to get people do business with you before they really get to know you. They walk up to you, they are networking and they go ‗hi Graham, my name is Ivan, you know we should be doing business together‘ and they jump ahead and that almost never ever works. Those people who want an advantage at building their business through referrals, have to understand that

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274 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ networking is more about farming then it is about hunting. It‘s about cultivating relationships with other business people. Make sense? Graham: Makes perfect sense. So how did you get started in this whole area of networking yourself? Ivan: I got most of my business through two ways, speaking engagements and referrals and I needed to develop the referral side of it more effectively. I knew how to cold call, I knew a little bit about advertising and marketing but I just wasn‘t very successful. I was a management consultant, I wasn‘t successful at drumming up new business through advertising and cold calling forget about it. So referrals were the best way to get business and I actually created BNI as a way of helping me generate referrals for my consulting business. (BNI ended up becoming an animal all by itself which we can talk about later.) Referrals were the best way for me to build business and that‘s why I did it. With every survey I‘ve ever done where I ask people ‗is networking an important way for you to generate your business?‘ I get this huge response. Last one I did was 12,000 business people all around the world, 94% of the respondents said networking is a very important way for me to build my business. Yet we don‘t teach this stuff in colleges and universities anywhere in the world. We don‘t teach people how to build their business through networking. Most professors think it‘s a soft science and they don‘t teach it yet when have we ever seen 94% of business people agree to anything? But they agree networking is critical to their success yet we don‘t teach this stuff in colleges and universities. Graham: That obviously brings us to the purpose of our interview. Let‘s say you are speaking to a group of business people, what are some action steps they

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275 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ could take to start using networking properly using this VCP process®? Ivan: Let me give you one more spin on the VCP Process ®. There is this major disconnect in networking. I call it the networking disconnect and you can measure the disconnect by going to any networking event and saying ‗how many of you in the audience are here hoping today that you might possibly sell something?‘ Last time I did this 75% of the people in the room raised their hand. Then ask the next question. ‗How many of you are here hoping, raise your hands, hoping to buy something?‘ And nobody raises their hand, nobody and that my friend is the networking disconnect. People are there to sell but they are not there to buy and so if you go into it with the VCP concept in mind then you are much more likely to be building a long term successful business. It begins with by diversifying your networks. You‘ve got to participate in different kinds of groups. Sometimes it surprises people to hear the founder of BNI say ‗hey go join another networking group.‘ But one of the things that I‘ve found is that you‘ve got to get out there and be in different kinds of groups. A casual contact network like a Chamber of Commerce, a service organisation like Rotary, Lions, a group like BNI where we have one person per profession. Online media like Ecademy.com or LinkedIn. I think these are all very important if you want to build a solid word of mouth based business. That study that I was talking about earlier with those 12,000 people that we surveyed.

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276 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ One of the things we asked them was ‗how much time do you spend networking?‘And we asked ‗have you achieved any success through networking?‘ The people who said ‗yes‘ to that question spend on average six and a half hours a week on average networking. The people who say ‗no this networking thing doesn‘t work for me/, the majority of them are spending less than two hours a week networking. So the first thing to do is devote the proper amount of time to networking and if you want to achieve success you need to spend at least six and a half hours a week on it. And you want to diversify your networks, participate in a group like BNI, a service club or professional association, online networks and so on. Be in different kinds of groups because you have different connections, different strengths, different exposure to different groups of people. Understand that it‘s more about farming than it is about hunting. So go deep and start building relationships with people and there are a lot of things that you can do to help start that process. I think it‘s important people understand that networking isn‘t a get rich scheme. This isn‘t something where you just flip the switch, hand out cards and get business. Networking is a long term process of building great relationships with people. Graham: I think one of the philosophies you have with BNI, is the concept that ‗givers gain‘. So I understand that you need to go in with the attitude that rather than trying to get business you are actually going to help other people in your group do better. You will actually get far more business yourself in return by doing this. Is that pretty well the philosophy behind what you are doing?

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277 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Ivan: It is and the concept of ‗givers gain‘ is actually predicated on a concept in social capital theory called the law of reciprocity. By getting together and helping other people will help you in return. A good friend of mine, Dr Wayne Baker, he wrote a book called ―Success through Social Capital.‖ He says in his book ‗it‘s like people view that as coin operated networking. Let me put the coin in, give me the candy. I want something in return right now‘ and if you are networking like that it‘s not working. That‘s not the law of reciprocity, that‘s not givers gain. Let me find ways to help you and through that we build a relationship where you are willing to help me. Let me give you a real ‗hands on‘ example of this. I was at an awards ceremony in December for a BNI region in Southern California and I am taking photographs of all these winners. This guy comes up, he won an award for having the most one-to-ones in the entire region. He met with more people one-to-one than anybody else. That‘s real nice, good for you. Well done. Well about ten minutes later, he got another award but this award was for giving the most referrals in the entire region. He gave more referrals than anybody else and so he came up again. So then I asked him the really important question. ‗How has this turned out for you in business? Have you gotten business as a result of giving all these referrals to other people?‘ He said ‗Ivan, let me tell you something. I‘m in commercial real estate. I‘ve been in this business for 26 years and 2010 was my best year ever‘. You‘ve got to diversity you networks, go out there and meet people, go deep, build the relationships, do oneto-ones, and give business to others.

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278 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ That‘s part of the law of reciprocity and it does come back to you and this commercial real estate sales person is a great example of that. Graham: Perfect example. So to make networking work properly for you to get the full value from it, number one you have to devote time. To make it work properly you are going to have to devote six hours of effort each week to get some good results out of it. You can‘t just play at it and do an hour a week in the hope it‘s going to work. It‘s not really going to produce the results that you want. You‘ve got to put time in. Secondly you‘ve got to do it from the other person‘s point of view as well. You‘ve actually got to help other people first before you get the rewards coming back your own way. Is that pretty well the message? Ivan: Yes I think that summarises it well. But I want you also to understand that networking is not only a great way to get business it‘s a better way to do business. It becomes a lifestyle as opposed to saying ‗I‘ve got to put in my six and a half hours this week.‘ I will give you an example. I went to a small art house play over the weekend on Sunday. I went to this play because I was invited by Chet Holmes who‘s really well known in sales and marketing and I knew that Peter Guber who is the past CEO of Sony Corp was going to be there. Peter had just written a book called ―Tell to Win‖ where he talked about face-to-face networking. I had met Peter once before and I wanted to reconnect with him. So I went to a play and had a chance to meet somebody who I‘d wanted to reconnect with and talk about his new book that was coming up. I say this because there are many different opportunities to network. You don‘t have to just block it off on your schedule and say ‗ok this is my networking time. It‘s part of my 40 hours or 50 hours of work.‘

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279 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ No, it becomes a lifestyle. You can integrate it into your life so that you can be having a good time. I had fun, I went out to dinner, saw a play, took my wife, but let me tell you there was some great networking going on in between the people there. So if you incorporate it into your overall life and understand it‘s not just from nine to five that you do this, then it‘s easy to spend six and a half hours networking every week. Graham: In fact this reminds me I‘ve had a couple of email communications with a gentleman I‘m sure you know well called Bob Burg. And in our email communications Bob said to me ‗Graham look can I introduce you to this person, can I introduce you to that person would that help you?‘ I am thinking ‗here is someone that‘s going out of his way to help me. He doesn‘t have to help me‘ and as a result I am talking about him to you now. And I believe Bob is extremely successful in his business and what he does because he‘s going out of his way to help people. Ivan: Yes, let me tell you about Bob Burg. Bob is one of the best experts in networking around; he‘s a guy that absolutely walks the talk. I meet a lot of people that are ―networking experts‖ but Bob totally walks the talk and he knows the field, he knows the business, he knows the material and he lives the material. I have the highest respect for him and I love his material and he‘s a great individual so I‘m glad to hear that he did that for you. But I am not in the least bit surprised. That‘s who he is as a person. Graham: We‘ve covered some great tips so far you‘ve mentioned you want to get involved in a variety of different organisations or different groups because you never know who people know. So what are some more things that people can do to incorporate networking as a more serious marketing strategy so they get a lot more value out of it?

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280 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ I guess one is to join formal networking groups like BNI and others? Ivan: Yes, you may want to participate in formal networking groups and participate in online networking like with Linked In and Ecadamy. A lot of people say to me online? Really, I thought you are all about face-to-face networking. Well to me it‘s not ‗either or‘, it‘s ‗both and.‘ The people who really integrate their face-to-face networking with their social networking or media are going to be much more successful. Of course I recommend groups like BNI and I was a 16 year member of Rotary. I love organisations like that. I also believe that online networks like even Facebook and Twitter, are a great way to connect. But let‘s go back to the VCP process ® because VCP® applies online as well as offline. Now the beauty of social media is that it gives you great visibility but you still need to nudge it through to credibility and profitability because people aren‘t going to give you referrals until you‘ve got credibility with them. You see when you give a referral you give a little bit of your reputation away. If you refer me and I do a good job I enhance your reputation. If you refer me and I do a bad job I hurt your reputation. So people don‘t refer people until they know and trust them. That means you need to get credibility with them before they are even going to consider trusting you. So online networks are great for visibility but they aren‘t always as fast as one might hope for credibility and profitability. It takes a while before you trust people. Sometimes it takes a phone call with them if you are in different countries, a phone call to talk to them.

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281 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ If you have a chance to get together and actually meet face-to-face that‘s really powerful so both online and face-to-face are really great but you‘ve got to do them both and you‘ve got to understand the social media side of it is good but takes time. You know I talked about premature solicitation when we got started. It still applies online except it‘s at light speed. It happens really fast so you have to work the VCP process®. Graham: What are some helpful resources that business owners could use to help them get better at networking? Obviously they come to BNI they can find their local chapters and go along and I‘ve been to a number of BNI meetings myself. I‘ve been amazed at the amount of business that it produces. People are very welcome to come along as a guest for organisations like BNI aren‘t they, just check it out, see what they think, see if it‘s a comfortable environment for them to work in or not? Ivan: Well yes we‘d love to have them come to BNI. Our International Website is www.bni.com. And they can get information on where to go to visit. But there are other places that are useful as well. You mentioned Bob Burg; he‘s got a wonderful online newsletter. Just go to his website at www.bobburg.com I‘d also recommend a great blog I write. It‘s free for anybody that wants to stay on top of what‘s going on in the networking field. It‘s part of entrepreneur.com so go to www.networkingentrepreneur.com I have a blog there with almost 400 messages on lots of different topics. And actually when I am working on a new book I actually try out some material before the book even comes out.

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282 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ So you will get some of the latest stuff that I talk about like the networking disconnect and premature solicitation. They first came up on my blog. Graham: Speaking of books I know you‘ve written quite a number of books on networking and how to do it. What‘s been your most popular book with readers so far? Ivan: Well there‘s two or three. Really the bible for us in terms of networking was my ―Worlds Best Known Marketing Secret‖ which is now is going to come out in its 4th edition this year and that one has been a perennial seller. If somebody wants a plan, they want a system, they want to sit down and go step by step, it‘s got to be ‗The 29% solution‘ and the sub title is ―52 Weekly Networking Success Strategies‖. What we did was we broke up a year into 52 weeks and we said week one do this, week two do this, and so somebody who is really organised that would be the book. And if you want kind of a real good overview of networking in general with a lot of specific techniques in it my latest book ―Networking like a Pro‖ would be a good read. Graham: Excellent. You speak to large business groups all over the world on the topic of networking. What‘s a couple of words of encouragement that audiences really appreciate? A lot of people are saying business is a lot tougher today, and you mentioned your real estate broker before. He still had his best year ever. What are some words of encouragement to business people anywhere that are reading this right now? Ivan: Well a couple of things. One is I tell people they have to refuse to participate in the recession and that‘s really important. It starts with that kind of an attitude and it‘s not a platitude it‘s an attitude.

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283 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ The people who I‘ve met who are being successful during these difficult economic times are people who say ‗look there‘s still opportunities out there‘ Guys like this real estate agent. They are saying ‗hey there‘s still opportunities out there and I am going to find those opportunities and I‘m not going to participate in the recession. I‘m not going to let everybody complain.‘ Have you gone to networking meetings and there‘s like all these people complaining about how bad business is? Graham, do you ever see that? Graham: I‘ve seen that but I try to avoid people like that if I can. Ivan: Right. Here‘s the deal, don‘t be one of those people who go out there, I am talking to your listeners, don‘t go out there and complain to people about how bad business is because half the people you tell don‘t care and the other half are glad you are worse off than they are. You‘ve got to focus on opportunities and there are opportunities out there. I meet many people that are having their best year because they are looking for the opportunities and they are using their relationships. If I give one last comment it would be I think the most important thing I‘ve learned in the last 26 years of running BNI. It‘s not what you know or who you know, it‘s how well you know them that really counts.‘ So it‘s that relationship that really counts in terms of networking. Graham: That‘s been very helpful. I know that anyone that reads this will get some practical ideas that they can use to improve their results but like you‘ve pointed out it‘s not a get rich quick scheme. It‘s a whole way of thinking.

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284 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ You have to go in it with the attitude that for networking to work for me, I‘m going to have to be of great service to a lot of other people as well. I‘m really going to have to help. Givers gain. That‘s the right attitude to bring to networking isn‘t it? To get the best results out of networking? Ivan: Yes it really is. I think sometimes people go ‗oh gosh I haven‘t done this yet and I don‘t have the time and I need to do something right now. Well you‘ve got to remember desperation is not referable so if you come across desperate you are not going to get referred. So take a deep breath and remember the old Chinese proverb... When is the best time to plant an oak tree? The answer is 25 years ago. It goes on to say the when‘s the second best time? And the answer is now. So if you haven‘t planted that networking tree, if you haven‘t spent all of the time necessary to build a powerful personal network, it‘s ok. Take a deep breath, focus on now, begin now, devote the time, you can build your powerful personal network. If you devote the time and give it the effort necessary to do just that. Graham: Fantastic, thank you very much. That was most helpful Ivan: Thank you Graham. Action Exercise: I have seen the power of networking in action in many situations. The key element when it works well is a great relationship between people.

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285 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________

A great way to start is to read some of Ivan‘s blog posts at www.networkingentrepreneur.com They are very helpful and practical. In fact one I‘ve just read gives you two great thank you notes in template format that you can copy and send to different groups of people you have met. If you haven‘t yet been to a BNI meeting, check it out. You are very welcome as a guest and you‘ll meet some interesting people at the same time. One of the best things you can do to begin networking is to start doing a couple of small favours each day for other business people. Say a positive word about a business you really like. Recommend businesses where you get great service or treated really well. If you come across a useful article that would be of interest to a business person you want to know better send it to them with a short note. ‗Hi John, thought you might find this useful. Regards Graham.‘ Finally I also recommend a delightful little book by Bob Burg and John David Mann called ‗The Go Giver.‘ It is a wonderful little parable that really illustrates this attitude of helping other people to do well and getting great rewards yourself at the same time.

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286 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ 23: Bob Negen Give to Get

Reprinted with permission

Graham McGregor: It‘s my great pleasure today to be talking to Bob Negen the owner of Whizbang! Training. www.whizbangtraining.com I love your background Bob. You started a kite shop many years ago and you took, using some of your marketing ideas, the sales for this kite shop from $17,000 a year to well over 3 million dollars a year. That‘s remarkable. I see that you actually helped create a yoyo boom as one of the projects you were involved with. At one point you had eight full time yoyo professionals and you actually managed to sell 2 million dollars worth of yoyos in about six months. I know you‘ve got some great strategies that can help anybody in business to get an unfair advantage and quickly increase their sales and profits. So what‘s the idea that you‘d like to share today Bob for our Unfair Business Advantage Report? Bob Negen: Thank you Graham.

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287 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ The single most important thing that progressive, innovative marketers do is they give things away. What I‘ve found is that the more generous you are, the more receptive people are to listen to you. For instance it could be information, it could be help, it could be a product, it could be almost anything but there are a couple of operative terms here. First what you give away should ideally be low cost, high value. Meaning preferably that whatever you give away has a low cost to you but a high value to your prospect. Now of course that can be changed if your business has a lot of repeat business meaning your customers have an extremely high lifetime value. Sometimes you may want to give away something of high value to acquire a new customer and then build into that whole, into multiple purchases. But to acquire new customers, just being able to give something low cost, high value, to your prospects what happens then when you open your heart and really try to give something of value the rule of reciprocity comes into play. The rule of reciprocity simply says ‗givers get‘ and when you give something with the proper spirit and you give something that has genuine value to your prospect they will reciprocate and be more open to your proposals, will be more open to setting up a meeting, will be more open to buy. So what we‘ve found in our business, and certainly what we teach all of our retail clients is give things away. Give the right things away and it‘s a sure fire way to build your business. Graham: Right Bob, a fantastic strategy, one of my own favourites as well in fact. I guess the Unfair Business Advantage Report, basically the interview we are doing right now is probably a perfect example of this.

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288 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Because we are giving away a 395+ page reference manual with some of the smartest sales and marketing experts around the world like you, each sharing a very practical idea that people can read and then use in their business to make some money and it‘s completely free of charge. Bob: That‘s right. Graham: So Bob give me some examples of how either your business or some of your clients have used this giving away strategy to get some great results. Bob: Sure well you know at Whizbang! Training we give away a lot of things. At our most basic level we send out a free email tip of the week. We make sure that it‘s not just teaser copy to try and sell them something but it‘s of value by itself. Also, a couple of times a year, we do something called a Retailerthon and its totally free and it‘s eight hours of live-streaming video. People call in or email us with questions, there‘s live chat but again what it does is it builds what I call social capital. I don‘t expect anybody to just meet me or come to our website and start buying right away. We need to prove to them that a) we know what we are talking about, b) that we care about them, c) that we are going to be good to do business with and d) that they are not taking any risk when they do business with us. We can do all of this by giving away the right things. We just did a four part video series called ―The Foot Traffic Formula‖, this is part of our marketing strategy of regularly creating between four and six times a year incredibly high value information. We can give this to our clients, we can give this to trade associations and manufacturers, people who we call influencers, people who also have relationships with our prospects and so on. Creating and giving away high quality stuff is probably our number one marketing strategy. I mean super, high quality stuff that we could charge for, giving them away.

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Graham: OK Bob, let‘s say you are advising a typical business person right now on how to use this strategy of ‗Giving to Get.‘ So they could be a retailer, they might be a professional services firm, they could even be a tradesperson, or something else, it doesn‘t really matter because the concept applies to any type of business. How would you tell them to go about doing it? Bob: Sure, of course. With retail we teach our retailers to give away gift certificates. So most retailers give away coupons because they want to protect the margin on every transaction, but we tell them to throw away their coupons and replace them with gift certificates. Because people treat coupons like trash but they treat gift certificates like cash. Now this would work for retailers, this would work for service industries, this would work for a plumber, this would work for anybody. So what you want to do is give them a gift certificate with very, very few strings attached. Understand that that gift really is a gesture that brings people closer and so when you give away a gift certificate a couple of things happen. First of all the redemption rate, meaning the percentage of people who get the gift certificate and actually use it increases dramatically. It‘s dramatically higher than the redemption rate on a coupon. The other thing that‘s great about giving away a gift certificate is that is has high perceived value and low cost. The beautiful thing is that with a gift certificate the only time you actually pay to acquire a new customer is when you actually get a new customer. So if I am a retailer and I give a gift certificate to someone I meet on the street who I am having a casual conversation with, if they never use that gift certificate I‘m out a 1/3 of a piece of paper.

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If they use that gift certificate and come into my store I have acquired a new customer. So that simple concept of a gift certificate can be used many, many, many ways but it‘s all sort of the same thing. You are giving a gift, you are putting the rule of reciprocity in play and remember there‘s a difference between sales and marketing. The object of marketing is to get them in the door, the job of selling is to actually turn them into money. So if they use the gift certificate, marketing has done its job. Graham: Actually that brings me to mind, I heard an interesting business speaker, talk on a similar concept one year. I think it was a high class lady‘s wear boutique and what he did is he created a gift certificate just like you are mentioning and the gift certificate entitled customers to come in and get free of charge, no strings attached, a completely free lady‘s negligee. It was worth maybe $40 or $50 and I think he bought them in bulk for maybe $5 or $10 each. So again, high perceived value, low cost. But what he then did was really interesting. He went to a local Mercedes Benz dealership and said ‗look can you pick out two hundred of your best customers and send them a letter with this gift certificate from me. They can come in and actually get a free lady‘s negligee at no charge, worth $50 on me.‘ The Mercedes Benz dealership said this is a pretty good deal so they sent out 200. A huge number of those people came in, but what was really interesting is that even though they all came in and got the free negligee, a huge number of them also spent a lot of money at the same time. I think he made something like $40,000 or $50,000 of additional sales at the same time. Bob: What you just described there is what we call an endorsed mailing. You can do an endorsed mailing like you just referred to where another business

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291 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ endorses your business to their customers and sends them a gift certificate or you can also do the same thing. One of my favourite retail marketing tactics is called cause-marketing. By the way as long as we are talking about this, I think it‘s important that your readers know that there needs to be fine print on every one of these gift certificates and that‘s „please only one gift certificate per person.‟ Otherwise people will bunch up their gift certificates, if they have ten $10 gift certificates; they‘ll expect it to be treated like $100. That‘s not what we want to have happen. Now with cause-marketing let‘s say a local non profit comes into my store and wants me to give a cash donation. I no longer give them a cash donation what I say is look how many members do you have? If you have 100 members or 100 supporters I‘ll give you a 100 $10 gift certificates and you give them to your supporters and when your supporters come into my store not only will they save $10 (or whatever denomination value gift certificate you choose) but I will also give 10%, 15%, 20%, whatever percent you choose, of those total purchases, minus the amount of the gift certificate and tax, back to the cause. Graham: Great idea. Bob: So if the cause, if it‘s the Humane Society. If the Humane Society rallies their membership, their membership comes in and spends a lot of money, there‘s a big fat cheque at the end of the day and you have a full cash register. If the cause doesn‘t do a good job getting their members to spend, there‘s absolutely no skin off your back because all you lose is essentially a stack of paper. Graham: Thank you Bob. What are some other examples you‘ve actually used? Bob: You can make it a product but you see there‘s a problem with making it a product.

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292 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ So for instance this person did a nice job in your example of the lingerie shop and the Mercedes dealership. I mean clearly it was very successful. But what I recommend is that you make it a specific dollar amount instead. Because suppose I would have gotten that or my wife would have gotten that offer from your friend or your client, and she wasn‘t in the market for lingerie this week, it wouldn‘t have had any impact. But if you make it for a specific dollar amount that can be a lot more effective. Here’s a story that sort of ties into this. We have a client who has an ice cream store and they were giving away gift certificates good for one free small ice cream cone. She came to me (and her father is kind of a tight guy) and she said my dad he‘s not real happy with the way this whole programme is going. So I asked a couple of questions and I recognise that the problem was the gift certificate tactic was wrong. The problem was that she made it for a small ice cream cone so that‘s all people could use it for. I said ‗Kelly you need to change this and make it for a $1‘ and when they made it for a $1 now people can buy banana splits at $7, they can buy flurries at $8 so all of a sudden now it started to work really, really well. So almost always what we recommend is rather than having a specific offer that limits what they can get with this offer, is we give them a gift certificate worth a specific dollar amount and then they can buy whatever they want. It makes it much broader and it increases the likelihood that the recipient of the gift is actually going to come in. Graham: And what you do I assume is the dollar value that you pick still entitles them to come in and buy something up to that dollar value without necessarily having to pay a lot of cash at the same time?

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293 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Bob: That‘s right. Graham: So in this case the gift certificate was for $1 and they could come in and buy some stuff like a small cone for $1 or less if they wanted. They could also use it towards other stuff, is that what you are saying here? Bob: That‘s correct. When you give a specific item you limit the response. When you make it a specific dollar amount people will buy more. So what you are saying is ―Here‘s a gift, I don‘t care what you get with it, I just want to see you in my store and have an opportunity to serve you.‖ Graham: So how would you use the same concept if you provided a service of some sort? You‘d just say look here‘s a gift certificate worth x dollars towards any of our services? Bob: You could do and there are other things you could do as well. With a service you could also provide things like evaluations. If I had a lawn care service I would do a free lawn analysis where I would come in and test your soil and make sure that you had the right kind of grass growing for the conditions so there‘s other ways to approach giving something away for free but we‘ve also found that just a flat old dollar amount is still incredibly effective. Graham: I love this strategy. I know on your website you‘ve got a huge amount of resources that retailers and also other business people can use to improve their sales and profits. So what‘s the website address for them to take advantage of all these wonderful resources that you do have? Bob: Oh sure it‘s www.whizbangtraining.com. Graham: I know I‘ve looked through the site myself many times. I get your tip of the week and it‘s very good. You also have a wealth of other great resources as well.

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294 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Thanks for sharing that great strategy of giving away something for free that has high perceived value to a potential client, at low cost to yourself. What it does is it creates that wonderful reciprocity effect where when you do nice things like that for people, they want to do nice things back for you. And how do they do that? Of course they can give you business, they can give you referrals, and they can certainly recommend you as well. It‘s certainly a wonderful strategy that‘s worked well for you and your clients and also virtually everyone that I know that I‘ve recommended it to as well. So thanks again for sharing it with us. Bob: It‘s my pleasure Graham. Action Exercise: Bob has shared a great strategy here. He recommends that you give away something for free that has high perceived value to a potential client but has a low cost for your business. Bob has found that in retail, Gift Certificates with a specific dollar value work just great. And this strategy can be used in other businesses as well. Write down five ways you could use this strategy of giving away something valuable for Free to attract new clients or customers to your business. Then put at least one of these ideas into action. Remember also that helpful information packaged into formats like special reports, CD‘s, DVD‘s etc has very high perceived value with very low cost.

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295 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ 24: Tony Parinello Start at the top when selling

Reprinted with permission

Graham McGregor: In this interview for The Unfair Business Advantage Report it‘s my great pleasure to be talking to Tony Parinello. In 1995 Tony Parinello started a revolution. He created his own brand of sales training called Selling to VITO™ , the Very Important Top Officer. He personally coaches sales and marketing professionals and entrepreneurs all over the world. He is a Wall Street Journal best-selling author and the Marketing and Sales Expert on Entrepreneur.com, a site that is visited by more than 6 million unique visitors each and every month. Tony, why is it so important to start at the top when you are selling? Tony Parinello: I believe that in life and in sales, the most important step we take on a journey or in pursuit of a goal is the first step! For example…I am an avid surfer, to get to my favourite surf spot, I leave my driveway make a left turn and in less than 5 minutes I am at the beach. If I

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296 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ were to make a right turn it would be 5 days before I am at the beach! You can have the best solution in the world for your marketplace, you can have the best price, best service and the best sales skills but if you‘re trying to sell to someone who doesn‘t have the influence and authority to buy you‘re simply wasting your time. And that‘s exactly why I‘ve perfected a process to get appointments with and sell to the person I call VITO, the Very Important Top Officer the person with the ultimate veto power. The person who cares the most about everything that takes place in their organisation…the President, CEO, owner and other privileged ‗C‘ Suite executives. To date I‘ve trained over 2 ½ million salespeople and the majority of the Fortune 100 companies to gain access to these difficult to reach top officers where sales opportunities are bigger and they happen faster! Graham: That sounds like sales heaven, so how do you approach VITO? Tony: Let‘s start with VITO‘s private assistant or the dreaded, ―gatekeeper‖. When you get VITO‘s private assistant (let‘s call that person ‗Tommie‘) on the phone I want you to forget every tactic you‘ve ever learned about how to get through, past, under, around or ‗over‘ gatekeepers because these tactics just won‘t work with Tommie. When Tommie picks up the phone….Forget that the President, CEO or owner exists. In other words you will never say something as stupid as ―Is VITO in?‖ Because VITO is always ‗never‘ in! Of course we will never say something like ―when will they be in?‖ because VITO is never going to be in. And we will never say something ridiculous as: ‗will you take a message?‘ because now it sounds like Tommie works for you and not VITO.

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In other words, If you have a value proposition for VITO then you are going to say it to Tommie, exactly the same way as you would say it to VITO. Graham: Let‘s give a couple of examples so what would you say when ringing up? Tony: Let‘s say you actually have social proof that you‘ve helped five other organisations in this VITO‘s industry. One of the first statements you could say is: ―Tommie, five other CEO‘s in your industry trust and rely upon us to enhance corporate economics by as much as 22% in as little as six months.‖ Of course I am making these numbers up but I want you to take note that there is no mention of product names, numbers or other ‗mumbo-jumbo‘ or technobabble or industry acronyms or jargon…. You will reach a point very quickly in the conversation with Tommie that they‘ll say ‗you know what, you really do need to speak to my President.‘ Graham: That makes sense and if you don‘t have social proof what would you say? Tony: Well you can suspect or predict all sorts of results because the chances are that VITO‘s company was built a suspicion or prediction, hunch or a study of some sort! Let‘s say I have no direct experience in this industry but you strongly suspect that your ideas can have great results for this particular VITO… So you could start your conversation by saying ―we suspect that within six months we can enhance corporate economics by as much as 22%‖…there is a catch….you must have some evidence to back up your ‗suspicion‘. Please keep in mind…you can‘t do this with anybody else in the organisation because the lower you go in the organisation, the more proof people demand because they don‘t take risks, they are not getting paid to take risks…they get paid to be right!

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298 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ So this only works with VITO and as a matter-of-fact here‘s a real nugget. If you have something that you‘ve never sold before, it‘s a brand new product the only person to sell it to is VITO because they have an early adopter mindset. They would love to be the first person in their industry to have something that no one else has. So think about that. Graham: That makes good sense. Graham: Let‘s say you want to talk to or get in contact with a VITO at a particular organisation…is it best to send some introductory letter, something that wets their appetite or makes them curious about what you have? Tony: You know it‘s interesting, you can send a letter, you can send a fax, you can send a presentation, an email but today more than ever the personal touch of picking up the phone and speaking in person or leaving a voicemail message becomes even more powerful. Because everybody else has been spending so much time thinking and acting out of the box, the box is now empty!!!! Jump back in the box and pick up that 3,000 pound phone. Leave an effective voicemail message which is maybe another tip we should give your readers. Graham: Can you give me a couple of ideas on how you do leave an effective voicemail message? Because most of the time today at least one call in two or one call in three we are going to get voice mail, it‘s very common. Tony: Ok, when you get dumped into VITO‘s voicemail all you have to do is say something like this. ‗Ms Importanta if you were in your office to take my call this is what you would have heard... five other CEOs in your industry trust and reply upon us to increase corporate economics by 22% in as little as

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299 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ six months…this topic could be important to both of us, that‘s why you will be hearing from me again later on today at 2.30. By the way if you would like to chat with me sooner call me…Tony, Tony Parinello at 800777-8486 Thanks for listening!‖ Now what did I just do on that voicemail message? I left my value proposition, introduced myself, I said I was going to call back. What‘s really important is that at 2.30 or whenever you said you would call you‘d better call. Because if you don‘t, you will loose what little credibility you didn‘t have. Now here‘s another tip on voice mail. Let‘s say there are five areas that you can possibly help this VITO. On your first voicemail message you might say something like this. ‗Mr Benefito if you were in your office to take my call, this is what you would have heard. We suspect that there are five different areas in your company that we can have a favourable impact in, in the next six months. Here‘s the first one. When you call me back, I‘ll share the other ones with you………‘ What did I just do? I just set myself up for the next four-voicemail messages. Graham: Excellent. So you call back and say if you don‘t get them, say by the way here‘s the second way we can help you with and I will tell you about the other ones on my next call. Tony: That‘s exactly right. Graham: So to summarize you are highly recommending that when you are selling to businesses of any size, start at the top. That‘s the logical place to go no matter what you are selling, no matter who‘s going to make the final decision, it‘s still far more effective to start at the top and then go down rather than go the other way, start lower down and go up.

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Tony: That‘s right and when you start with VITO you need to get the answers to three very important questions before you go anywhere else in the organisation. Graham: I‘d love to know what they are. Tony: Here‘s the first one. Where does this top officer want to see the biggest improvement in the shortest period of time? Now once you get the answer to that question… ask VITO ‗How do they personally, [key word, personally] select or go about selecting a business partner who can help them over-accomplish what they just said they wanted to do?‘ Third question, if we could help you, Ms. Importanta, over achieve that goal(s) and exceed your personal expectation(s) of a business partner, could you see yourself becoming one of our clients in the next 30 days? Graham: Thank Tony, those questions are great. Now I know that you‘ve got a huge range of resources that can really help anybody in business to improve their sales by selling to VITO. What‘s the best way for them to actually get hold of some of these great resources you have? Tony: Just go to www.vitoselling.com and join Club VITO! Graham: What‘s Club Vito? Tony: It is a weekly, live broadcast that gives members everything they need to have a successful VITO sale, from a to z, whatever it is. All my secrets, it‘s all in Club Vito and I help each member individually, tailor my stuff to fit their products and marketplace…It‘s really the fastest way to sell to VITO!

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301 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Graham: So Club Vito is obviously the paid subscription model that you have. Tony:

Yep that‘s right!

Graham:

That sounds like an excellent idea Tony.

Can you give my readers perhaps a sample or sneak peak of what Club Vito is like? Tony:

I‘d be delighted.

Go to my website www.vitoselling.com and click on contact us and send us an email saying you‘re a reader of The Unfair Business Advantage Report and we‘ll give them a FREE one-month membership! Graham: That‘s great Tony and I know a lot of my readers will take you up on that great offer. Thanks for sharing such valuable ideas today. I appreciate it. Tony: Thank you for including me in your work. Action Exercise: The more I look back over my own 31 years in professional selling the more I can see the value of Tony‘s strategy of start at the top. When I did start at the top the decisions were always faster, quicker and more enjoyable. What Tony has shared in this interview is some very specific things you can do to start approaching and selling to the people at the top of any business or organisation. So if you do sell to organisations or businesses don‘t hesitate to take Tony up on his FREE membership in Club VITO so you can continue your journey to VITO‘s office! Go to www.vitoselling.com

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302 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ 25: Tom Poland The number one word in marketing and OPN

Reprinted with permission

Graham: It‘s my great pleasure today to be talking in this interview for the Unfair Business Advantage Report to my good friend serial entrepreneur, Tom Poland. Tom has started five businesses in industries as diverse as software and security. Since 1995 he‘s taught marketing and strategy to thousands of business owners internationally. He is the Managing Director of The 80-20 Center and is based in Queensland Australia. One of the things I like about what you do Tom is that at last count and it‘s probably a lot higher now, but you‘ve actually personally worked with something like 1,476 different businesses and 173 industries on four different continents. And you‘ve actually helped quite a large number of your clients to build up their business to the point where they can sell it for millions and millions of dollars. In fact I was talking to one of your clients just the other day. He told me he sold his business after a bit of coaching with you for something like 9 million dollars.

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303 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ That‘s pretty incredible. Tom Poland: Yeah I don‘t remember getting my commission on that sale either but there you go. Graham: There you go. So Tom as you know in this particular report we are talking about your favourite sales and marketing strategy that you are using yourself or with your clients, it‘s making you a lot of money and giving you or them a real competitive advantage, an unfair business advantage if you like. So what‘s the strategy you want to talk about today? I think from the notes you‘ve sent me it‘s the number one word in marketing and how to use it with OPN. So let‘s talk about that. Tom: Let‘s do that. I mean to me lead generation is the number one most critical capability in any business. We all know that the old saying nothing happens in a business until something gets sold, well nothing gets sold until a prospect is identified. So to me the smart way to do this and I know we are going to focus on one but the smart way is to do multiple lead generation, it‘s the only way to go. The scariest number in business is number one, the dependency on one of anything, one client, one staff member, one niche market, they are all scary markets and it‘s the same with a dependency on one source of lead so I am going to talk about one specific source of lead but I want to preface that by encouraging people to develop multiple lead generation sources. Graham: I recommend exactly the same thing. I suggest everyone in business has at least 10 to 20 different lead systems they are using every month because some months some of those won‘t work that well. Just the way the world works. Tom: Absolutely and as many as possible are automated or at least semi automated because once you‘ve developed that many lead generation systems you simply don‘t have time to run them all manually.

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304 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ So, let‘s get down to this number one key word in marketing and everyone has heard of OPM, Other People‘s Money, use other people‘s money to help yourself make some money and there‘s also OPT, OPS, Other People‘s Time and Other People‘s Skills and that‘s what we do when we hire staff or specialists or suppliers. But the one I like the most is OPN, Other People‘s Networks and that brings me to the number one word in marketing which is distribution. So let‘s say I want to go and do some prospecting, I want to generate some leads. Me doing that prospecting versus me tapping into other people‘s networks is the difference between me trying to go fishing with a fishing line versus someone else inviting me and my trawler into their well stocked private ocean. So distribution. Other people‘s networks so we can talk about this in terms of licensees, franchisees, affiliate marketing, joint ventures, host beneficiaries, there‘s a whole lot of different great ways to build and grow a network. The important principle is that we want to be able to tap into someone else‘s network. They‘ve spent the time, they‘ve probably spent the money, they‘ve certainly made an investment of energy over a number of years and they‘ve built up great relationships with a wide number of people so what are the steps that I take on a regular basis, on a weekly basis and I recommend my clients take to tap into other people‘s networks. I think there‘s six key steps and Graham you and I have worked over the years on many different ideas and concepts. Step One: The first thing is to get incredibly clear on who your ideal client is. What‘s their demographic, so age, income, if it‘s a company, the size of the company and so on. Also the psycho graphics, why they are wanting to buy, what needs they might have or frustrations they want to make disappear and so on.

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305 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ I guess it probably sounds a little elementary to say figure out who the heck your client is but once you‘ve got real clear on who your ideal client is then you can go to step two. Step Two: Identify who else has exactly the same ideal client profile, same target market if you like but who‘s offering complementary products. For example I have a client who manufactures yoghurt he can look at an ice cream maker. Menswear stores can look at sports goods stores, a management consultant works through bankers, plumbing clients with electricians, a home storage specialist networks through hairdressers because a home store specialist ideal client is typically a young mum wanting to organise the house and hairdressers have a lot of those. So pretty much everyone on the planet, every industry on the planet has a complimentary, not a direct competitor but someone who wants to sell products in the same market. So that‘s step two. Step three is the tricky part. This is where the creativity comes in. You figure out a host compelling offer. So what I mean by that is that you figure out an offer that the person who owns this network, who‘s created the tribe or the community, that person I am calling a host, it‘s an offer that they will want to put in front of his or her clients because it makes that host look like a good guy or the good girl and possibly and preferably also because the host can make a lot of money out of it. Now the second part I will come back to in a moment, making a lot of money out of it. So step one is get clear on your ideal client, really clear. Who it is, who it isn‘t. Step two is identifying a host who has the same ideal client but who offers complimentary products to that market. Step three is you figure out the host compelling offer that this person will want to put in front of their clients,

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306 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ and we can talk about that in a moment, time permitting. Step four is you set everything up and this is something that tripped me up for too many years. You set everything up so that there is little or no cost to the host in making the offer. So to be clear on what that looks like, that means there‘s little or no money involved for the host, there is little or no time involved for the host, there is little or no effort involved for the host and there‘s little or no thinking involved for the host. It‘s a very simple value proposition. Step five is, and this is another one that tripped me up and this is something you helped me with Graham. I remember the conversation we had about this. Step five is a real key. You must find people who are already actively and aggressively marketing to your target market. That‘s the key so these are the people who are commercially motivated, if you like they are the hardnosed ones, the ones that have a bit of testosterone pumping through their veins and they are doing this with integrity but they want to make money. Because as soon as you‘ve got that person you‘ve got someone who‘s motivated to listen. I‘ve wasted too much time with people who just don‘t get it, they want to keep everyone happy, they don‘t want to be seen to be selling anything, they want to just be smelling the roses the whole time. Step six the last step is you agree on the campaign details. Now this is another important thing to trip me up. I wanted an agreement from this other person, what is going to go out, I will write everything I will do everything for them but when is it going to go out, who‘s going to do it, when is the review meeting going to happen? I want to know all the numbers. We want to be able to measure what went out. We want to measure the response. We do not leave any of this to chance so that‘s the level of commitment that some people will say well if you need that I‘m not going to be a party to this.

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307 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ That‘s fine ‗ding‘ next please, because you want to be able to measure the results and you also want to have an opportunity where you need to talk about the next campaign. The last thing I will add is don‟t write off direct competitors because they are actually out there actively marketing. I‘m in the marketing business and I have several relationships with people who are all but direct competitors, who have the same ideal client, the product or service offering might be a different form, but they are offering marketing services to business owners just the same as I am. But I‘ve had good success by approaching the ones again who are actively, aggressively marketing because they have built very extensive databases a portion of which is unresponsive to their style but they may well prove to be responsive to my style so don‘t write off direct competitors. Graham: Fantastic, well Tom what you‘ve shared so far, those six steps are very important. What I can do now is give you an example I used myself where I actually followed all of these six steps without knowing them and they worked out remarkably well. A couple of months ago I created a very simple product to help real estate people get testimonials. I thought ok who am I going to sell that to? Who‘s my ideal client? Well obviously its real estate sales people that are keen on buying sales or marketing material to improve their sales results. That‘s the target market. Who already has that target market? Well I thought probably real estate trainers who are training real estate people and getting money for various products and services.

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308 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ So I emailed two real estate trainers, one locally, one offshore and said look this is what I plan to do, are you interested? One person came back and said sure, love to do that. We then agreed on exactly how we would offer this campaign to his clients. So I wrote a simple sales page, I wrote a couple of emails, I set it all up so all he had to do was copy and paste an email to send out to his clients. And by the way this person certainly followed step number five because he was already aggressively promoting his own products and services to his database and he had been doing that for many years. What happened is we reviewed the figures, basically hourly as the sales came in, we made changes and at last count we‘ve done about six or seven projects together, we‘ve both pocketed tens of thousands of dollars in new sales. It‘s been very easy, he‘s delighted, I‘m delighted, and we‘ve both had a great relationship and it all started with basically using your six steps. Tom: Terrific. The absolute key is to get the right person. Graham: A person who thinks the same as you, and says this is what I want to do. The person I did this particular project with on a number of projects is very keen to add value to his clients. He wants things that are simple, that are easy to use and that‘s my style as well. As you know I like things that are simple and easy to use and we work well together so I‘ve learnt the same thing. If you can make it as easy as possible for your clients, ideally they should be able to send out an email to some of their community tribe if you like, inviting them to check out a particular offer by going to a specific web page. That web page is already pre-written by you so a person can then order it.

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309 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ It‘s very simple and then you can arrange how you are going to split revenues and revenues can be split a whole range of different ways as you know, depending upon the products and services that are being sold, what type of additional work is involved in providing those products and services. But it‘s a very simple process because as you quite rightly pointed out these people already, like my real estate trainer client, he has 4,500 active clients and subscribers that are interested in real estate products and services that will help them improve their results. Probably when I started my particular programme I only knew maybe a couple of dozen real estate agents so if I tried to do it myself it would have taken forever. But by getting into bed with him if you like I was able to speed up the whole process and get everything done basically within a few weeks. Tom: And just imagine the difference between you trying to create that database yourself of 4,500 real estate information hungry people versus simply tapping into his existing network. Graham: Exactly. It would not have worked nearly as well because he has spent ten years developing this particular database and the trust and the rapport and the credibility and that‘s the key word. It‘s the trust and credibility and with other people‘s networks, you already have that trust, that credibility going in. What I love about this OPN strategy, Other People‘s Networks, is that it‘s very simple to do and the keys as you mentioned, first of all, decide exactly who your ideal client is and then decide who else if you like is actively marketing to that same client base and has quite a good database and a good relationship with those types of people. Then you want to put together a compelling offer that they are happy to send out and the offer can be a variety of things. It can be a free offer of some sort that they offer their clients which might generate the leads for your business, perhaps you‘ve got a two stage process.

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310 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ It could be an offer where they can actually buy. You want to make it so it‘s really simple for that person to send out. I recall a few years ago I did an interesting joint venture like this where I sent an interesting offer to the clients of a dry cleaning firm and I actually printed a one page flyer. I gave them the flyers and I then encouraged the dry cleaner to send it out with their monthly statements with a covering letter. Again which I wrote and paid for the printing of so all they had to basically do was stuff the envelopes and I even offered to do that if they wanted as well. In other words it was really easy, they were already sending out the statements by good old fashioned post at that point, they just got my flyer and my letter and put it inside. It went out and we both made some money and it was very successful. And I knew at that particular point the particular thing I was promoting was aimed at clients that were already using commercial dry cleaning services. So that was the target market I was after at that time. Tom: What you‘ve just said it reminded me of another important point and that is that value proposition you put in front of the host has to be really simple. It can‘t be anything that‘s complicated or they have to think through it‘s got to be real simple. Talking about simple I will give you another example of what a client did. As we talk, it‘s January 2011. My client Mark is a management consultant and attended my copywriting course, he wrote a nice special report on how a leader can develop their senior management teams. So the target market was corporates, corporate MDs or CEO‘s who had senior management teams and wanted to develop them. So he gave them the seven ways to ... and so on and so on and what he did is he finished the report. The report was ok, it wasn‘t brilliant but it was kind of good enough and then I had him send that to every

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311 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ past client and key influence person that he knew and simply asked them for their opinion, that was it. Just, please I‘d like you to read the report, it wasn‘t that long, it was rather simple, just interested in your opinion. He then had a follow up phone call in some cases, in other cases it was a face-to-face follow up to get their opinion and at the phone call or the face-to-face he simply got their opinion, took note of that obviously and made some improvements. But the most important thing is he said do you know of anyone else who would appreciate this information? In other words anyone else who is in a leadership position who wants to develop their senior management teams. Now he did this I would say with no more than perhaps nine or ten past clients or key centres of influence. This took place I guess around about May 2010. By November 2010 he was booked solid and that is the only marketing he did but again it was other people‘s networks. You can‘t get much simpler than that. Graham: You really can‘t. That‘s fantastic. Now Tom I know you‘ve got a wonderful bunch of great resources of your own to help business owners improve their sales and profits and results, what‘s the best way for people to make contact with you. What‘s your website address again? Tom: www.8020center.com and if people go there they will find a fabulous free offer with in excess of $700 worth of marketing resource which is free so they will see that on the home page. They can have a good poke around the inline store and see what else they like but that‘s the one I‘d start with, that‘s hopefully an exceptionally interesting and valuable no brainer for people, anyone who‘s interested in getting more clients on board, that‘s

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312 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ $716.83 worth of marketing training resources available free. Graham: Great and just before we finish Tom can we just share your great motto that I really like for your business, what are the three things, what do you basically help business owners do? Tom: Get more clients, make more money and have more fun. Graham: I like the sound of that. Tom: It works. Graham: Thanks for your great ideas and we look forward to talking again soon. Action Exercise: Tom has shared with you one of the easiest ways to create new sales and profits in any business. Tap into the magic power of other people‘s networks. OPN. Remember the magic word is distribution. Take a few minutes and identify your ideal clients and who else is selling to these ideal clients or has a database of ideal clients already. Then put together a compelling offer that this business can make to their database on your behalf. It must make them look good and be super simple for them to do. Agree on how you will measure the results and if you are sharing revenues how these will be split. I have personally used this strategy dozens of times and it‘s a great way to get a really unfair competitive advantage because so few businesses actually use this idea

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313 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ 26: Michael Port Keep it Simple

Reprinted with permission

Graham McGregor: In this interview for the Unfair Business Advantage Report it‘s my delightful pleasure to be talking to best-selling author and marketing expert Michael Port. Michael has written 4 bestselling books including Book Yourself Solid, Beyond Booked Solid, The Contrarian Effect, and The New York Times Bestseller, The Think Big Manifesto. Michael didn't start out as an author, speaker, and entrepreneur. Instead, he began as an actor. No kidding. You might even have been able to pick him out of a crowd from his starring and supporting roles in TV and film projects like Sex and the City, Third Watch, All My Children, The Pelican Brief, Down to Earth, The Believer, and more. Michael, I loved your first book, ―Book yourself Solid‖The fastest, easiest and most reliable system for getting more clients than you can handle even if you hate marketing or selling.‖ What a great title that is and it is delightful to have you on the call today. Michael Port: Great to be here thanks.

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314 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Graham: As you know I am talking to a wide range of sales and marketing experts around the world and I am asking them each one question. ‗What‘s your favourite sales or marketing strategy right now that‘s helping your clients get more sales, higher profits and a bit of an unfair business advantage? What would you like to share with our readers today? Michael: I think a lot of the small business owners that I serve feel very overwhelmed by the current state of social media and marketing in general. I think they feel like they don‘t have the time for all of these activities that many suggest they do. And they find that a lot of these platforms are just creating more noise and more clutter. So that‘s taking them away from doing the work that they need to do in their business. So I really work with them to simplify. I try to get my clients to do the least amount possible for the greatest results. I think there‘s this misconception in marketing that you need to build huge followings, have relationships with large numbers of people. Now that‘s great if you can do that and that‘s something you need to do for your business. But most of the people that read ―Book Yourself Solid‖ only need 20 clients a month or 30 or even 10. Most of them don‘t need huge numbers of new clients. So what I suggest they do to create new business is very simple and there are two specific areas that I encourage them to focus on. The first area is working your network. Most people think networking is meeting new people. I think about networking as how you develop deeper relationships with the people that you have already met and already know. That‘s one area you focus on.

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315 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ The second area is meeting the people that you do not yet know but should know because they carry some weight or influence in your industry. These are the two areas that I suggest my business clients focus on So each morning there are four things that I have them do. Just four. Graham: That sounds good to me. Michael: Let‘s start with what I call Direct Outreach. This is where you try to meet people you do not yet know but would like to know. I am not talking about the Oprah‘s of the world, although that would be great. I am talking about the people who are relevant to your industry and who you probably could get connected to if you worked at it. So you create what‘s called your List of 20. This is your BYS, your ‗Book Yourself Solid‘ list of 20 people. Here you identify 20 people that you should know. These might be, if you want to get booked to speak they might be meeting planners. If you want to write articles they might be editors, if you want to develop relationships with bloggers they may be bloggers. You get the point. They may be great referral partners. Graham: So if you are someone like a mortgage broker who arranges mortgage finance, you might want to meet with some top selling real estate agents in the area? Michael: Absolutely. Exactly right. You put these people on your list of 20. Now if you don‘t have 20 people who come to mind right now, just start with three. But eventually you keep it at 20.

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316 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ I say 20 because it‘s large enough so that your focus is expansive and you are not myopic in your focus, you are not just thinking that there are only three people are going to mean everything to you. And at the same time 20 is small enough so that you can focus on these people. So there are four things I suggest that my clients do each day. The first thing is to reach out to one person on this list of 20. Either by writing a blog post about them or just commenting on a blog post that they wrote. Or by writing them a not (an actual handwritten note) to express appreciation for something cool that they‘ve done. Or you could re-tweet a number of different things that they have put out on Twitter. There are lots of different ways you can connect with somebody but one of my favourite quotes is from Winston Churchill. He said, ―It‘s a mistake to look too far ahead. Only one link in the chain of destiny can be handled at a time‖. I believe building relationships is the same way. If you go to the end of that chain it‘s just too fast. You have nothing to hold you up. So you don‘t call somebody up for a cup of coffee that you‘ve never met who has a high status in your industry and just say ‗hey I‘d like to take you for coffee.‘ It‘s not relevant to them unless they have some prior connection to you or you‘re as high in status as they are. I say ‗one leg in the chain of destiny at a time.‘ So what you do is after you reach out to that person, did something for them that was relevant, you put them on the bottom of that list of 20.

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317 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ So the person who you reached out today becomes number 20. The person who was number 20 becomes number 19 and the person who was number 2 becomes number 1. And then tomorrow you reach out to the next person at the top of that list and you do this every single business day. So that each day you are connecting with one person on that list of 20. Which means over the course of a month you‘ve connected with every person on that list at least once. Graham: That‘s very simple and easy to do. Everyone can imagine spending maybe five minutes to do this each day? Michael: Absolutely. Five minutes maximum is all it will take you to reach out to one person on this list of 20 each work day. Of course if something happens and you develop a strong connection right away and it starts to build quicker then maybe you take them off the list. Because now you know them, so you move them into what I call your ‗Network of 90.‘ And then you add a new person to that list of 20. So it always stays at 20. Let‘s move over to your ‗Network of 90‘, this list of 90. The reason I say 90 in the network, the people you already know and 20 are the people that you are trying to meet is because it keeps it under 150. This keeps everything to a manageable number. There‘s something called ―Dunbar‘s Rule of 150‖, this idea that you can really only manage between maybe 100 and 250 people in your life at one time. More than that is impossible. So that‘s why I say you keep these lists manageable because you really don‘t need to know a million people, you need to know the right people to put the

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318 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ business around you and then your job is to earn that business. So now you‘ve got that network of 90 you remember I said there are four things to do each morning? We just talked about one thing which is to reach out to one person on your List of 20. Now there are three more things to do each day. Here‘s the second thing you do. With the people that you already know in your network of 90 you introduce two of those people to each other if you believe they do not yet know each other. But only if they are relevant to each other. It could be something that‘s personal or it could be something that‘s professional that makes the introduction relevant. So you might have two people in the network who are scratch golfers and they live close to each other. Golfers are always looking for a 4th but they want somebody at their own level. So you might introduce them. And if you are nervous about whether or not to make the introduction you might ask each one individually ‗hey I would love to introduce you to another scratch golfer, would you like me to? ‗He‘s really cool because of this or she‘s really cool because of that.‘ And then they will tell you ‗yes‘ or ‗no‘. Generally, people who are in business and wanting to move ahead, love meeting new people. Especially people that they would find relevant. So 9.9 times out of 10 they are going to say ‗oh my god that‘s wonderful, thank you so much.‘ You then make the introduction, you share their professional contact information with each other, the public published contact information and then you just excuse yourself. You do that once a day for two people in your Network of 90.

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319 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ The third thing you do each day is this. You share some useful or helpful information with at least one person in your network of 90. The way that I do is by reading articles every day. I read the papers, the journals the blogs that are relevant to the work that I do and the world in which I live. When I see something that‘s relevant to one of the people in my network, I will send it to them, personally by email. I‘ll say ‗hey Tom I just read this article and it was about this and I know that you are working on this or having this issue in your business or whatever it was, I just immediately thought of you so I thought I‘d send it to you. Have you seen it? What do you think?‘ And now you can get into a conversation with him about that and go deeper into your relationship. Graham: Adding value like this is easy. And you only focus on one thing. Michael: Just one thing and you know people worry that I don‘t know everything so what am I going to share? Well you don‘t have to know everything. You are finding things out in the world that are relevant to the people that you want to build relationships with. Now let‘s recap quickly on the three things you do each day that we‘ve covered so far. 1: Reach out to one person you do not yet know from your List of 20. 2: Introduce two people from your Network of 90. 3: Share some information that is useful to one person from your Network of 90. A really easy way to do this is give them a link to a helpful online article you have read that they will find relevant to their business or situation. Now here is the fourth thing you do each day.

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320 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Here you share some compassion with somebody in your network every day. Now usually that‘s a phone call to somebody. You might get the machine but you just call and say ‗I was thinking about you and I know that you are really working hard on your business right now. I just wanted to say if you ever need any support I am here because I just have so much respect for what you are doing..‘, Or if you know somebody is going through a tough time, sometimes you just go and sit with them. We make the assumption that networking is quid pro quo and that our reputation is primarily based on just the work we do, but it‘s not. It‘s based on ‗who we are‘ and ‗how we take care‘ of the people around us and that‘s not always just in a professional way. And so if you are doing these four things every single day, if you are relevant to the people that you want to build better relationships with, then you are going to be top of mind when they think of someone who provides the kind of products services that you do. This is pretty simple to do isn‘t it? Graham: Absolutely. And all this hardly costs any money. Michael: It doesn‘t cost any money. Graham: It would take you what, 10 minutes a day in total to do your four things? Michael: It takes me now about 10 minutes a day to do. You know when you start maybe it will take you 20 or 30 minutes because you are thinking about how to do it and what to do. However now I can bang it out in ten minutes and sometimes it only takes five minutes. So it‘s real quick. Let me summarise again what I have been saying. There are two groups of people that I get my business clients to focus on.

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321 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ There‘s your ‗List of 20.‘ Here your action each day is reaching out to one person on that list. Then there‘s your ‗Network of 90‘. There are three things you do for this group. You introduce two people to each other, share useful information with one person and then show some compassion to one more person. What happens is once this becomes habitual for you, then you don‘t even just have to do it each morning as part of your routine. You will find yourself doing it all the time as an opportunity presents itself. Graham: I‘ve been some maths here Michael and four things a day is 20 things a week. So that‘s effectively 1,000 positive connections you are making out there into your networks every year, at least 1,000. Michael: Not only that, on a monthly basis you are actually doing a lot of things. For your ‗List of 20‘ you are reaching out to at least one person on that list every single month. (You shouldn‘t be reaching out to somebody you don‘t more than that. That would be stalking.) But the people you know on your network of 90, you are also reaching out to every person in that network of 90 once a month as you do those three things for them. You see how the maths adds up? Because you are introducing two people a day, you are introducing two people to each other so that‘s two people. You are sharing information with at least one person so that‘s a total of three, people. And you are sharing some compassion with one person that‘s a total of four.

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322 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ So if you are every day reaching out to four people in your network of 90, over the course of 20 business days you are pretty close to your total number of 90. Graham: It‘s so simple and of course sometimes we want to make life a lot more complicated than it really is. Michael: I think my job as an educator, as an author is to take things that have become complicated and noisy and simplify them so that the entrepreneur can work quietly. I think that‘s my job. I am fortunate that I happen to have a natural talent for taking lots of diverging themes, complicated processes and reorganising them into comprehensive, simple systems that you can execute. I am actually developing a software programme that will help people do this to keep them really focused on it and make it really simple. It‘s called ‗Solid.ly‘ and so the tag line for the software is ―Build your network. Get booked solid‖. Graham: I like that. I know you‘ve also got some wonderful resources that would help a huge number of business people to use these ideas. What‘s the best website you would recommend to go and check out some of the resources that you do have? Michael: Well first of all they should go and get solid.ly at www.solid.ly Because that will help them do exactly what we‘ve been discussing. But also they should go to www.michaelport.com When they sign up for my newsletter they get immediately four chapters, one chapter from each of the four books that I‘ve written. This is with my compliments and delivered directly to them. Graham: Perfect. What I really like about what you‘ve just shared here is I could start on this in the next five minutes.

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323 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ I don‘t have to spend any money, I just have to sit down and think ‗ok who‘s in my network of 90?‘ I just write down some of the people I already know. There‘s my first ten, over here, here‘s three people I‘d like to meet and let‘s just do one thing for that person over there and a couple of things over here and I‘ve done it. Michael: And for some people it helps to schedule it into their calendar so that they devote 15 minutes every day to doing these specific activities. Graham: One more thing Michael. You are speaking to a lot of business audiences all the time. What are a couple of positive words of encouragement you would just like to share with us about business? Because the economy is obviously quite different from what it was say five years ago. Michael: Well generally people can do a lot more with a lot less than you think and you generally do it better when you do it with other people. So make sure you don‘t isolate yourself especially during difficult times because isolation is a dangerous disease I think. But also think about working on your business as the pursuit of mastery because the entrepreneurs that have the best long term success are those who are pursing mastery in their particular domain. I think there are three types of business owners that at least I see. The first type is the opportunity seeker. So the opportunity seeker is the one who is like ‗oh I think this one TV thing is just going to make me a million bucks‘ or if I just try that new software product then... you know. There‘s always like some sort of scheme they are hatching and they are looking for that big thing. Graham: They are looking for that one magic bullet.

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324 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Michael: Exactly the magic bullet. They buy a lot of products that they never open or they work for a week or two and that‘s it. Then the second type of business owner is the ‗dabbler‘. They incorporate, they talk about their ideas, maybe they even start on some, but they never really ship, they don‘t put it out into the world in a big way. They put it out a little bit, maybe they have a website but it‘s a little bit, they are the dabblers, they are not fully committed. And then there is the third type of business owner which is the one who is in pursuit of mastery. And this is somebody who has made a full non reversible commitment to doing big things in the world. They don‘t know what the future looks like, the future is uncertain, they cannot predict a result, but they are invested in a long term development of self and they learn in action. So while they are acting their learning and while they are learning, they are acting. Graham: I recently met a young real estate salesperson and he‘s only been in the business 2 ½ years. He‘s one of the people I interviewed for this programme. In his first year he earned $135,000 but in his second year just selling average homes in Brisbane in a normal area he made $880,000. Michael: Big difference. Graham: His background was he spent five years selling TVs in a retail shop. He‘s just turned 30 and this year he‘s half through his third year in real estate and he‘s well on target to earn over a million dollars. Michael: Wow that‘s great. Graham: I‘ve chatted to him about what he‘s doing and it‘s just what you mentioned. He‘s in pursuit of mastery, he wants to do big things, he wants to change the perception of real estate sales people in the minds of the general public.

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325 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ And he‘s doing sales figures that are just unbelievable for his industry. Michael: After his first year I bet he didn‘t say ‗ok this year I am going to do $800,000.‘ He probably didn‘t even have that in mind. Graham: No. He had a goal to go and buy himself five homes for him and his wife and that was his exciting target. He actually told me ‗Graham, the funny thing is I see all my competitors at the same training seminars I go to, I just implement a lot of the things I learn and they don‘t.‘ Michael: Exactly right. Graham: That is a guy who‘s committed to mastery I would say. Michael: That‘s right, you got it. Graham: And obviously yourself as well you are learning from all the best of the best as well and passing the ideas along. I think that‘s what you are doing, and you are simplifying. Thanks for such helpful ideas. Michael: My pleasure. Action Exercise: What Michael covered here was just do four things a day. They will take you around ten minutes of time and will have an amazing impact on your business when you do them consistently. You will get to meet and connect with people who are important to your business by reaching out to one person each day in your List of 20. These are people you want to know. And you are also making a positive connection each day with four people in your network of 90 with the other three activities you are doing. All of this is super simple to do and only takes a few minutes. ‗Just do it‘ as the famous Nike ad says.

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326 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ 27: Neil Raphel Change the way you ‘Play the Game’

Reprinted with permission

Graham McGregor: In this interview for the Unfair Business Advantage Report it‘s my great pleasure to be talking to Neil Raphel of Raphel Marketing. Neil Raphel is an expert in marketing and publishing. His marketing company, Raphel Marketing, develops websites and produces direct mail campaigns. His publishing company, Brigantine Media, specializes in business books where the authors are partners with the publisher, sharing costs and revenues. Neil is the co-author of several books, including "Up the Loyalty Ladder", "Tough Selling for Tough Times" and "Business Success in Tough Times." To contact Neil, go to www.raphel.com. Neil, what‘s your favourite sales or marketing strategy that‘s working really well for you and your clients to give you an unfair business advantage? Neil Raphel: Well Graham, sometimes when you are competing in business and your are not doing very well it‘s better to change the rules of the game and I can give you a few examples of how that works.

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327 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ One that comes to mind is Flip camera. I don‘t know if you have them over there. Graham: We do, I am familiar with them and they seem to work really well. Neil: Flip came along about ten years ago when all the video cameras were adding extra features, increasing the size of the image they were taking and more. And Flip said, ‗Why don‘t we make a worse camera?‘ –‗Not a better camera but a worse camera.‘ Let‘s take out some of the features that we don‘t need. Let‘s make it really small and let‘s make the video quality a little worse. But what they did in turn was they changed the playing field. They made a cheaper camera, a smaller camera, a camera you could just plug and play into your computer right away and they were a remarkable success story because that‘s what people wanted. They really didn‘t want more features, the products were too cumbersome and too hard to use. This was very easy. Even your grandmother could use it and it worked extremely well for the types of videos that most people take. Graham: That‘s what I think about Flip cameras. I think it‘s something you can actually plug and play, shoot a video, upload it straight to YouTube or whatever in a few seconds and it‘s really simple and easy to use. That‘s what I think about Flip. They changed the playing field, basically made it simpler rather than more complicated or flashier. What are some more examples of how you can change the playing field? Neil: In the 1980‘s I worked for Victor Niederhoffer. He became kind of famous for making and losing a lot of money in the commodities markets. But before he did that he helped people sell their companies and he did a remarkable thing. He was competing against the likes of Goldman Sachs and he couldn‘t compete with them because they were so famous and so well known.

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328 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ So he decided to go after the companies that Goldman doesn‘t want, companies that are worth 5 million dollars or less because Goldman had a threshold of 5 million or more. He sent postcards to companies in that size range, with a really simple story. They said if your business is doing really well, if you are not even thinking about retirement, if you are at the height of your game and you think your business is going to be worth a lot more years later, now is the time to sell. His point was that you should sell when you are doing well -not when you are nearing retirement age and not when somebody else is ready to take over the business, because you will get your maximum value when the business is at its prime. Victor concentrated on small companies, he did direct marketing and he ended up doing more mergers and acquisitions than any other firm on Wall Street at the time. They were smaller in size than the Goldman Sachses of the world but he changed the playing field, he just took the business that they couldn‘t afford to go after and made a fortune doing it. Graham: Wow great example. So if you were just advising a normal business person, they could be a person providing a service, they could be in retail, they could be in a variety of other fields, what are some of the things that business people can do to change the playing field? How would you suggest they start? Neil: Well I think it‘s a great strategy when your business or when the industry you are in is in trouble. I think that‘s when this sort of thing really makes sense. One thing that‘s happening in America now is the collapse of the publishing industry. The way the publishing industry worked in typical times was they gave the authors a big advance, they gave the authors a little bit of money when the book sold and they figured they would have about nine failures for every success but the success would be so big it would pay them back.

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329 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Well those times are over. The publishing companies haven‘t survived. The ones that were doing that are all falling by the wayside. You can‘t have nine failures for one success so what we‘ve tried to do in our small publishing business is change the playing field, change the rules. We said to business people wanting to write books, we will be your partners. You put up half the money and we‘ll put up half the money. You get involved in marketing, we‘ll get involved in marketing and when the money comes in instead of getting you 8% of 10% we will give you 50% of the sales. So we became partners with our writers and the writers at the same time had to change the way they thought about things because now they are no longer just writers, they are actually partners in a business relationship. Instead of having nine failures for each success, we‘ve had over nine successes for every failure. We changed the odds, we changed the paradigm and we make money with every book we do. Graham: Excellent and I assume also with that new model you probably get these book published a lot faster than the traditional model which could take up to a couple of years by the time everything is done? Neil: Yes, we plan on no more than six months from the day we do the contract till the book is out there and we‘ve done it much faster than that. Graham: That‘s a lot faster than the traditional model of publishing isn‘t it? Neil: Absolutely. That whole business is undergoing a seismic change and I think the authors are beginning to realise that the old days where they get a big advance and don‘t have to do any marketing are gone. It‘s absolutely gone. Another example in a totally different field is Edward Jones. They are a big brokerage firm in the United States and what they did is interesting.

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330 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ A typical brokerage firm has a location, they may have 15, 20 brokers working at that location. Edward Jones didn‘t want their brokers competing with each other. They wanted them incentivised to give the best possible customer service to every customer. So they said one location, one broker. They may have 10,000 locations in the US, far more than everybody else but each location only has one broker. And they give such marvellous customer service that every year they are ranked No. 1 in the brokerage firms by JD Powers & Associates that ranks the quality of service. So they changed the playing field, they knew they didn‘t have the name recognition that Merrill Lynch did and they had to give their customers a different kind of service than Merrill Lynch does. Graham: In terms of changing the playing field I assume there are a lot of different ways that any business could change the playing field. For example I read about an interesting dentist in Los Angeles many years ago. He was called the vampire dentist because he decided to only operate between something like 4.00 in the afternoon and 4.00 in the morning. He reasoned that there were a lot of people working in places like Hollywood film studios that wouldn‘t have the time to go and see a dentist in normal business hours so perhaps after hours would suit these people better. It worked really well and they advertised in local trade magazines going to local film studios and they made a fortune because a whole bunch of people would rather go to the dentist at 2.00 in the morning if you‘ve been on the film set all day rather than try and do it during traditional hours. So maybe even just changing when you offer your products and services can be a way of changing the playing field couldn‘t it? Neil: That‘s a great example. There‘s a similar, medical example that we are very familiar with.

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331 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ A doctor decided he‘s now going to make house calls. Nobody makes house calls these days. He‘s going to make house calls and he‘s going to do it through the internet. Using Skype he puts himself in your house to talk to you and treat you. He does one office visit to get all your background information but he keeps up with his clients regularly either by walking around Brooklyn and visiting them or doing it through emails and Skype. And he doesn‘t take insurance, by the way. He said insurance is different than paying for medical care. Insurance should cover the big emergencies that you may have, a huge operation or cancer, but for your ordinary stuff, just pay me. He is very successful and it‘s a paradigm for other doctors. Graham: Some of the people that you are familiar with in terms of changing the playing field or changing the game, do they offer perhaps new products and services to their existing clients that traditionally people in that field haven‘t done? Neil: Well my sister was in commercial real estate and that goes through horrendous ups and downs. Her firm was essentially bankrupt. She got the idea to make the whole visit to a medical practitioner more palatable by having retail services at the same time. So she came up with the idea of wellness centres where you take your child in for a check up but there‘s also a children‘s shoe store or a children‘s book store, and other retail stores, so you can get your shopping accomplished at the same time. Combining retail and medical was a new idea and it‘s been amazingly successful. She sort of invented a new industry by changing the rules of the game by combining retail and healthcare. How about NetFlix? I mean what a great example. www.netflix.com Graham: Yes, perfect example. Neil: They are up against Blockbuster who controls the video market in the US and they said we are just going to change the playing field; you don‘t have to

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332 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ return the videos to us, keep them for as long as you want. Graham: And also no late fees. Neil: No late fees. How about iPhones? When they first came out you couldn‘t take a photo with an iPhone. A camera was a big feature in other cell phones. Even without the camera people flocked to them. They made such an aesthetically pleasing phone that even though the phone reception wasn‘t great, they did a lot of other things to it to make it a different animal. Change the way you think about a product or service and your customers will probably go along with it if works well for their use. Graham: That makes sense and I love this concept of changing the game or changing the playing field because what it really means is that any business can position themselves as being totally different from all their competitors by just changing their game in some way. But it‘s got to be done in a way obviously that has value to a customer. Neil: Yes I totally agree with you. You don‘t forget the other basic tools of marketing and taking care of customers. When something isn‘t working these game changers usually occur when there‘s too much competition or your business is down in the dumps and you have to think of a way to get out of your rut. I think you should go to other businesses for ideas, ask your employees opinions what they think, do all the things you should do in business and also think about how can we run our business differently, or what do our customers really need that‘s not being provided. Graham: Wow and as you‘ve mentioned in the examples so far, that can totally change the way you do business and really give people a reason to call you or talk to you rather than any of your competitors. Neil: Yes, I think so.

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333 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Graham: That is wonderful. Neil, you‘ve got a range of great resources that can help people in business, to quickly improve their sales and profits, so what‘s the best way for people to make contact with you? Is that through your website? Neil: Yes. Basically we are doing three things now. We have a publishing division, publishing business books and starting to publish fiction. Two, we are doing marketing for firms and three we have started to do a lot more internet design and videos for companies because we think right now this is what companies need to do to stand out from the crowd. But anyway back to your question, you can contact us through our website at www.raphel.com Graham: Neil thanks for those great ideas you‘ve shared today, they‘ve been very helpful and I know our readers, if they can change the game, change the playing field, they are going to get a really totally unfair business advantage and they will do a lot better very quickly. Action Exercise: There are dozens of different ways you can change the way you play the game in your field of business. You actually have a lot more choice than you think. You can change how you ‗add value‘ to clients for instance. You can choose which customers you will sell to. You can choose how you are you going to position yourself to your customers. You can choose how you will make sales. You can choose how you are going to stay in touch with customers (before, during and after a sale.) You can choose the strategies you will use to attract new customers. You can choose how you make a sales presentation and so on. Any one of these things can totally change the way you play the game in your field.

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334 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Write down five things you could do differently in how you play the game in your own business. Then put into action at least one of these ideas.

28: Al Ries The Power of Focus:

Reprinted with permission

Graham McGregor: It‘s my great pleasure and privilege to be talking today with Al Ries, Chairman of Ries and Ries. Al is a legendary marketing strategist and a bestselling author (or co-author) of 11 books on marketing including Positioning, Marketing Warfare, Focus, The 22 Immutable Laws of Branding, The Fall of Advertising & the Rise of PR and his latest War in the Boardroom. Al, thank you very much for agreeing to talk to me today, I really appreciate it. I‘ve been a big fan of your books for many years. I remember when the first one came out on positioning it made a big difference to my thinking and my business career at the time and I‘ve enjoyed everything you‘ve written ever since. As you know I am talking to a wide range of sales and marketing experts around the world in a number of different countries. I‘m asking each person to share a

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335 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ practical strategy that can give a business a real competitive advantage. What‘s one strategy that you would recommend to business people today? Al Ries: Well from our point of view at least we think the biggest single thing a company can do is what we call focus or narrow the focus. It‘s been our experience that most companies fail to build brands because the brands don‘t stand for anything and if you don‘t have a narrow focus the brand can‘t stand for anything. For example almost every high tech company wants a Hewlett Packard, I mean I don‘t know what a Hewlett Packard is, they make everything under the Hewlett Packard name. What‘s a Sony? I don‘t know what a Sony is, they make everything under the Sony name. As a matter of fact Sony in particular has been quite unsuccessful. In the last ten years they‘ve had net profits, get this, of 1.1%. Net profit margin of 1.1%. I mean in America it would get you fired and I think in New Zealand too. Now what‘s the solution for a company that makes everything? Multiple brands. Look at the success of Apple for instance. Everybody says Apple is a terrific brand. Apple is not a brand. Nobody ever says I bought an Apple unless they went to the grocery store The thing that makes Apple successful is being narrow focused for each of their brands. The iPod was the first high capacity MP3 player, the iPhone was the first touch screen smart phone and the iPad was the first tablet computer. (There was an old tablet computer that you wrote on but I mean this was totally different.) So in each case Apple has built a powerful business. As a matter of fact Apple is more valuable than Microsoft. That‘s absolutely incredible

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336 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Focus is a concept that‘s important. You don‘t necessarily get to be successful just because you are focused but that‘s the first step you have to take. If you have a broad line in everything under the same brand name with no focus it is very, very difficult to build a brand today. Graham: So if you are a typical business person, and you could be a professional person, you might be an accountant, a lawyer, you might be in retail, you might be trades person, how could a typical businesses like these and others use your concept of focus to start to get if you like a bit of an unfair advantage in the marketplace? What would be your recommendation? Al: Well let‘s look at a difficult business, research or Market research. Well there‘s a company, that is the most successful market research company in America today and they focus on automobile research. They are called JD Power. Graham: I‘ve heard of them many, many times. Al: They are incredibly successful and they happen to be in Detroit so it was easy for them to say why don‘t we focus on automobile research as most of their business was automobile research. But they‘ve been very, very successful and the same thing is true I think of the medical profession. Who makes the most money, General Practitioners or Specialists? Graham: Specialists by a country mile. Al: Of course and whether you are a lawyer or I don‘t care what you are, you can start by saying to yourself what should I focus on? Because it is difficult to get inside people‘s minds unless you stand for something. A brand that stands for everything stands for nothing. The best example is BMW. They focus on driving and became neck and neck with Mercedes around the world in terms of the best selling worldwide luxury car.

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337 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________

Driving, the ultimate driving machine and they‘ve been doing that for 35 years. Incredibly successful. Most companies don‘t want to do that. As a matter of fact it‘s been our experience, I‘ve been on several boards of directors, we work with a lot of different clients and guess what the word inside the company is? In every single meeting ( just about) that I‘ve ever attended the word is expand.     

How do we expand our business? How do we get into more markets? How do we get into more price levels? How do we get into more distribution? How do we put our brand on the internet?

It‘s just the opposite of what we‘ve been recommending. Again focus won‘t necessarily make you successful but without a focus it‘s going to be very difficult. Graham: I know in a lot of your work you talk about owning a category in a customer‘s mind in a particular type of business. So with Red Bull their category is energy drinks isn‘t it? They are the first energy drink if you like. Al: In other words when you have a focus that gives you the opportunity to verbalise the focus hopefully with a single word. BMW said instead of selling luxury, instead of selling reliability and durability and interiors, exteriors etc etc we‘ll focus on the way the automobile drives. That then led to their verbalisation, the ultimate driving machine. So the first step is to focus but do it tactically. If you can do that and focus your entire marketing programme on a single word or phrase you can be enormously successful. We have a website here that sells shoes called Zappos. Zappos has been in business for ten years and they just sold the company to Amazon for 1.2 billion dollars, selling shoes on the internet.

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338 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________

What was their idea? Here‘s their idea. Free shipping both ways. In other words people hesitated to buy shoes because what if they didn‘t fit? I mean if you bought them in a shoe store you try them on to make sure they fit. This way you buy them on the internet if they don‘t fit you ship them back and you don‘t pay for the shipping either way. Graham: That‘s a great concept. Al: This simple idea, free shipping both ways. It‘s the both ways that‘s the killer. That‘s what I mean by focusing on a single word or concept. Graham: So if a typical business person that‘s reading your ideas here, starting with a focus, can they use that focus concept to focus on perhaps the types of products or services they offer or the types of clients or customers they go after? Is that part of your focus? Al: In truth you can focus on almost anything and be successful. First it has to be unique and different for you. In other words nobody was talking driving until BMW did it, nobody was talking safety until Volvo did it. Now since Volvo focused on safety many, many, many companies including General Motors and Honda and Toyota and whatever have run safety campaigns, saying hey our cars are safe too but it goes right over people‘s heads. I mean they don‘t pay any attention to it so you‘ve got to be the first in a sense. You‘ve got to pick the focus that you will be first in and if you don‘t do that you are just talking in the wind because your message is the same as everybody else‘s. Ikea was the first furniture chain to focus on unassembled furniture which has a number of benefits. I mean it‘s cheaper and you take it home in the car.

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339 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________

Google was the first to focus on search. I mean a lot of websites allow you to do search but Google was the first to focus on search and it‘s built a powerful, unbelievable brand today focused on that single idea search. And again oddly enough you can be successful not necessarily by focusing on the number one reason people buy a brand. I mean I don‘t think the number one reason people buy a BMW is because it‘s a good car to drive. I think that‘s one of the features but by focusing on a single feature you can own something in the mind and it‘s kind of the halo effect. If you can own one attribute people tend to give you a lot of different attributes. If they think well it‘s a good driving car, well it must be reliable right, might have good gas mileage right and it has all those other benefits. Whereas if you try to advertise everything all the reasons that people buy a car, your message doesn‘t get through. I mean it‘s logical and believe me when people go into an automobile dealership they walk around it and they say well how does it look, does it have enough room and they get in and drive and they look at the sticker to see where the gas mileage is and they read the reports to see if it‘s good reliability and take it out for a test drive. They want everything and that‘s what leads people astray. I mean people don‘t want one thing so it‘s illogical to focus on one attribute but the thing that makes that effective is that‘s the only way to get in people‘s minds. It‘s not so much that they want one attribute, no. They want everything but when you tell them everything they can‘t remember it. They can‘t differentiate you from the competitive brand so that‘s why most companies don‘t do that. They say well gee we can‘t advertise driving I mean that‘s only one of the reasons that people buy a brand. We can‘t do that. We‘ve got to advertise everything.

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340 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ I mean believe me I‘ve had this argument with so many companies. I don‘t even want to mention the name, but one of the biggest technological companies in the world today and I disagreed on this very same issue. They had one feature that nobody else had, they didn‘t want to advertise it because that‘s not the reason people buy the brand. They buy the brand because it‘s this and this and this and this and very difficult to get people to focus. I mean it‘s such a powerful concept but difficult to get people to do that and sometimes it‘s simple ideas. I mean Monster has become our second largest energy drink by doing exactly the opposite of Red Bull. Monster came out in a 16 oz can instead of an 8 oz can that Red Bull came in and would you believe it, now its number two brand. It‘s different. Now the second thing is about owning a word in the mind. Here‘s the thing, people say that can‘t be right I mean what word does Coca Cola own? Well when you are the leading brand you own the word leader. I mean in other words in a sense your brand stands for the category. If the word that Coca Cola owns is the word cola and that‘s a powerful word to own so in every single category the leading brand, the leading search engine is Google, Google owns the word search. Porsche owns the word sports car because they are the leading brand of sports car. When you are the leader in the category you tend to own the word that stands for the category. Graham: Excellent. I know you spend full day sessions with your major clients just on strategy and focus and positioning. Have you got any simple tips or questions that the typical business person could ask to help them identify what might be a good focus?

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341 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Al: All right, the place to start. Graham: That would be great. Al: The place to start is the prospect‘s mind. See there again it‘s the opposite of your natural tendency. Your natural tendency is to start with the product and the benefits and the features of the product and so what are our features, what are our benefits, how do we verbalise, visualise, whatever the product, features and benefits. That‘s not the place to start. The place to start is in the mind of the prospect and the first thing is what do you stand for in the mind? When your brand, like BMW, Volvo and many other where you have an established position, you can‘t change that position. I mean BMW in the last two years in the US market and Europe too, has been advertising joy. The joy. They don‘t even say the joy of driving, they just say joy and for most people that word goes right over their head. Same thing with Volvo I mean Volvo over the years have been trying to move away from safety, they‘ve talked performance, they‘ve talked luxury, now they are thinking about coming out with a small Volvo. None of these things are going to work because for good or for bad, they are stuck in the mind with safety. If you have a concept that you own in the mind, you better figure out how to make it more powerful. For example Mercedes Benz, we worked with Mercedes years ago. Mercedes owns the word prestige because they are like a Rolex, they are expensive right so what have they been doing lately? They‘ve become a cheap Mercedes and it‘s not very effective. I wouldn‘t do that at all. I would say you know people perceive a Mercedes as an expensive car. We have to have expensive Mercedes, forget the cheap ones. Stick with what you own because you can‘t change minds. Here‘s what I would have done for Mercedes to argue against coming out with a cheap Mercedes.

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342 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________

Now many people trade a car in every two or three years. I would advertise ‗look buy a Mercedes, keep it for a decade and you will save money and you‘ll have a reliable, durable, expensive top of the line car.‘ Focus on the idea of keeping the car. And paying more for the car to start with and then keeping it longer rather than buying a cheap car and trading it in every two or three years. But of course that‘s not their strategy. Their strategy is how can we come out with cheaper Mercedes to broaden the market. Graham: So what you are saying is if you are a typical business person right now reading this, you go ok I do want to own a particular category or word or attribute in my prospect‘s mind, what can that be? Obviously it can be a whole range of different types of things for different types of businesses. Al: Let me mention New Zealand for example as you live in New Zealand. We developed something for New Zealand years ago which they used for a while and abandoned. In other words what could you say about New Zealand that differentiates it from every other country in the world? Here‘s an idea. The two most beautiful islands in the world. Graham: Perfect. Al: The North Island and the South Island. Graham: Because they really are beautiful places, as a lot of people comment on this. Al: And for me, people like islands anyhow, but the fact that New Zealand is two islands doesn‘t occur to most people. I mean you guys know all about it so it‘s not exciting to you but to most people two islands? Graham: What a great concept.

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343 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Al: Well the other thing unfortunately is that when you are trying to encompass everything in a slogan it usually becomes very, very unmemorable and abstract. And so you have to sacrifice and of course most companies don‘t want to sacrifice on one idea. They say we are too big to focus on one single idea. That‘s true but unfortunately if you want to get into people‘s minds, you‘ve got to do that but not only that but you‘ve got to do it for an extended period of time. I mean the other things we‘ve learned about marketing is forget years, you‘ve got to think in terms of decades. Some of the best slogans are ―A Diamond is Forever‖. I mean unbelievable, that‘s 63 years old. A Diamond is Forever and they still use it today. It‘s a very powerful slogan for selling diamonds as wedding and engagement rings. Graham: Al, you‘ve written a number of best selling books on marketing and positioning etc. If a business person wanted to use your ideas on focus and positioning, where would you suggest they start? Al: The basic book is called ―Focus-the future of your company depends on it.‖ This book outlines the rationale for focusing a company. Graham: So the first thing that a business person could do is definitely get a hold of that book ―Focus‖, read it. Al: Again we‘ve done 11 books so ―Focus‖ is really the book that outlines our basic philosophy. If you want to launch a PR programme, we‘ve got a book on PR or if you want to get more involved in the brand itself, we‘ve got a book called ―22 Immutable Laws of Branding‖. The Positioning book talks about how to get inside people‘s minds.

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344 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ In other words each book has a different take on the overall subject of marketing but the basic core idea that we have believed in for a long time is focus. Graham: That makes perfect sense. So one of the most important things you are saying to people in any business, no matter what size, what type of business is this. You‘ve got to focus your business, have that strategy of focus on what you do and how you do it, and that‘s going to be a key way to get an unfair business advantage. Al: Yes, I think that what to focus on of course is a problem but if you start from the other direction, if you start from how do I expand the business you are going to totally miss the idea of focus. Because oddly enough if expansion is the single idea in your mind you are going to overlook the core idea of the product itself because if that‘s not a way of expanding the business. I mean Mercedes is big at the high end expensive cars so when they look about how do we expand the business, that‘s the last thing they think about, doing something with expensive cars. I mean no, they want to do something with cheap cars so expansion is kind of like the opposite of what focus is all about. But I have to tell you expansion is the number one idea that I think most managers have. The problem with selling focus frankly is it‘s not logical. I mean I don‘t disagree with a company that wants to expand its business, increase its sales. I think every company should be looking for ways to increase sales but logically if you want to increase sales you expand. Well that‘s logic but that doesn‘t necessarily work. What we are saying is you increase sales by focusing and that‘s a difficult sell for most people. They say wait a minute, that doesn‘t make sense.

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345 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ You want us to have a narrow product line so we can sell more? Yes and the reason is that‘s the way to get into people‘s minds and get excited. Apple is a very good example. Apple makes an incredibly small line of products compared to their competitors. And they make a lot more money. Graham: I think your idea of focus brings back to mind if you like an insurance sales person that I met many years ago. This person was a multi millionaire who had been in the business for 30 years. I asked him when did you start to do really well? He said ‗Graham, when I started to focus on one thing.‘ This goes back to your concept of focus. He decided he was only going to sell insurance policies and investments to people who were aged in their 40‘s. So between the ages of 40 and 49, that was his target market and his sole focus. His reasoning was that those people first of all had enough money to pay for some of his insurance and investment products. Secondly at their age, they were also concerned about retirement in maybe 20 years or so. And they also knew other people in their 40‘s could give this insurance person great referrals as well. So he focused strictly on that group and within a short period of time he was number one in the country and he went on to become a multi millionaire. Is that a good example of focus? Al: Fantastic example. Graham: So focus is the key message in this interview. Al on your website at www.ries.com you have some very helpful material on marketing that people will find useful. How would you recommend people use your website as a valuable resources? Al: Well the thing about the website is that people that are into our ideas like to check the website because

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346 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ when there‘s a new development we tend to be writing an article about it. Or we will write a blog or something like that. So in other words our website is a good site for people who are interested in our take or in the latest developments in business.(Be it the use of the internet or whatever.) So there should be something on almost every category, automobiles and obviously food and beer and cola and energy drinks. So whatever category a company is interested in there should be something on our website that kind of comments about the marketing things that are happening in this particular category. Graham: Excellent and I think if people read your books or read your articles, whatever category of business they are in themselves, they will certainly get some valuable ideas they can take away and use in their type of business as well. Al: Unfortunately while we tell people look it‘s the principles that are important, most people really would rather read something about the category. If they are selling cars, having worked with automobile people, if you are selling cars, you don‘t want to read anything about anything except automobiles. The automobile industry has a number of annual conventions. Every speaker is an executive from one of the automobile companies; I mean I don‘t believe it. How can you learn something if all you do is talk to other automobile people but that tends to be what people want to do? I mean if they are selling liquor they want to talk to or read about liquor products. Whatever they are selling. They only want to read about case histories or what‘s happening here or there or different countries in their particular category.

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347 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Sometimes you can learn more actually by applying marketing ideas outside of the category. In other words coming out with a larger size can, for instance for an energy drink. There was a brand of tea in America called Arizona that became a big brand by doing exactly that 30 years ago so when Red Bull came into the market place someone said it should have thought gee this Arizona brand became a big brand years ago by coming out with a larger can, maybe we should come out with a larger can of energy drink. So almost any category frankly you can find analogies with marketing ideas that have happened in different categories and kind of apply them to the category that you are interested in. So I think you can learn more sometimes by reading case histories outside of your business. A lot of the successful websites were started by people with no experience in the category. The internet shoe store Zappo‘s I mentioned was started by a guy with no experience selling shoes, Amazon was started by a guy with no experience selling books and so it goes. Most of the successful websites selling stuff were launched by people with no experience in the category. Because the people with experience in the category said nobody will buy books online or nobody will buy shoes online. These people actually knew too much about the category. Graham: That makes sense. Al you‘ve given us some fantastic ideas today. I really appreciate you giving up your valuable time. I know your time is valuable because your clients pay you a lot of money for your advice and strategy so I thank you for your ideas today. Al: Thanks for calling and I enjoyed talking with you.

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348 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Action Exercise: I love the idea of focus that Al Ries shared in his interview. In fact if you go to his website www.ries.com you will notice at the top of site this is exactly what they do.

There are a huge number of ways you can apply this strategy of focus to your business. You could focus on a certain type of customer and become amazingly successful in that niche market. There is an insurance company that only deals with people over the age of 55 and they are doing remarkably well. You could focus on having an extraordinary guarantee that is different from what everyone else is offering in your industry. A pest control service used this idea well. They would offer a commercial pest control service (insects, rats, fleas etc) for restaurants and hotels. They added a unique guarantee to their service. Firstly if the hotel or restaurant lost a booking because of a problem with pests the pest control company would pay for that lost booking. If the hotel or restaurant was ever closed down by a health inspector for a pest problem the pest control company would reimburse them for any lost revenue they might have had. The guarantee went on to cover 10 other points. This pest control company is twice as expensive as anyone else in their field. They also have 80% market share in every area they go into. Best of all they have a simple insurance policy that covers them for any money they might have to pay out. What they have done by focusing on this

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349 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ guarantee is they have greatly reduced a customer‘s fear of paying for their pest control service and it not working. You could focus on how much value you add to your clients before, during and after the sale. And the list goes on. So invest 15 minutes this week and ask yourself ‗How can I apply this strategy of focus to give my business an unfair advantage? This is a great strategy to use in any business. And do read the great book by Al Ries called Focus. (It‘s very good.)

29: Bob Serling The Past Forward to the Future Process

Reprinted with permission

Graham McGregor: In this interview I am talking with my good friend and marketing expert Bob Serling. Bob is the founder of Profit Alchemy, Inc. and the developer of an unconventional approach to marketing that‘s producing exceptional results for its clients during this difficult economy. Instead of ―pioneering‖

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350 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ new marketing campaigns that stand a high chance of failing, Profit Alchemy only uses marketing campaigns that have been proven successful many times across a broad range of industries. This greatly reduces the client‘s exposure financially and substantially increases their likelihood of success. Some of the accomplishments Bob is well known for include: 

Creating a unique licensing strategy for Corey Rudl and Derek Gehl that added $1 million in profit to their business in the first week and a total increase in profits of $2.6 million.



Creating and licensing a toy skateboard that had the logo of Tony Hawk and five other major skateboard brands that was a massive success. It was sold worldwide by dozens of large retail chains including in Toys-R-Us, Wal-Mart, Kaybee Toys, Target, and large drug store and department store chains.



Authoring one of the best-selling guides to writing online copy ever, ―Power Copywriting for the Internet‖. Although well over 10 years old, this guide is still sold by Jeff Walker, Paul Myers, the Internet Marketing Center and hundreds of others. And many internet marketing ―gurus‖ count it among the most influential products they‘ve personally used to earn their own fortunes.

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Wrote the marketing promotion for Pamela Yellen‘s insurance sales training workshop that increased her profits by 714% - and maintained that increase for over four years, adding millions to her company‘s bottom line.

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Created the original and most knocked-off course on creating and selling information products, ―Info Millions‖. Though seriously out of date, this course is still sold on thousands of web sites and has inspired many of today‘s best known experts to create their own courses emulating Bob‘s proven formula for info product success.

I‘ve known Bob for many years and just a couple of his sales and marketing strategies were responsible for increasing the sales in my own business by over 91%.

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351 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ (So I know that whatever ideas that Bob recommends are always well worth trying.) Graham McGregor: Bob, what‘s the one sales or marketing strategy that you‘d like to share today that‘s either making you or your clients a lot of money and it‘s also helping them get a real unfair business advantage? Bob Serling: Well the technique I‘ll share with you today Graham is something I particularly love because not only does it work today but it‘s truly evergreen. It will work, I‘ve been using it, I will give away my age, I‘ve been using it for over two decades now. We use it every year. I use it with probably 98% of my clients and it‘s always effective. So it‘s got a long, long track record, and you can apply it again and again in your own business. We call the process ‗Past Forward‘ and it‘s a very simple but very powerful process that you can apply to your marketing, to your product, to your services, to your customers and you can even apply it to your competitors to get competitor intelligence and help you in determining how to adjust your marketing strategy, your product and service development and your approach to your own customers. Graham: It sounds like this idea is worth a million dollars so tell me all about it and how to use it. Bob: All right well first send me a cheque for ½ a million. Laughter. Basically what it is it‘s kind of like have a New Year‘s resolution only having that resolution I recommend that people use it twice a year. We do it at least every six months in my own business. At New Year‘s what happens is everybody kind of looks at the past year and says gee what went right, what went wrong, what do I need to fix. Well we are going to do that but we are only going to look at what went right and what I like to do is take the past two or three years. (You can go deeper and sometimes you can go as deep as ten years.)

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352 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Let‘s take marketing as the first area and you go back and you look at your marketing and you say in the last couple of years what has been my most effective marketing piece, what‘s been my second most effective and what‘s been my third most effective? Now how do I take those pieces and either reuse them exactly as they are or make minor updates to them and use them again? One of the big mistakes all businesses make is that they always want to invent something new but when you have things that have been proven to be successful they will work again and again. Companies get tired of what‘s working, especially in marketing, because it gets boring. It‘s more fun to invent something new but it‘s a big mistake because those things that have worked once will work again and even when they stop working after a period of time you can go back years later and as I said you can reinvigorate it and make it more current, maybe tie it to a current trend or something that‘s changed in the market place and that old marketing works just as well or better when you reuse it. Graham: That makes perfect sense. Can you give us a couple of examples of doing this with some of your clients in your own business? Bob: Absolutely. Many times I have clients who have similar situations. Let‘s say they want to increase the prices without scaring off their customers. Well I don‘t reinvent the wheel for them, I obviously keep records of all the marketing campaigns we‘ve done for clients in the past and I keep them categorised. What I do is I go back and I look at my own price increase campaigns for my business and the ones that were most successful for my clients. I then take those and I simply modify them. Obviously you don‘t want to create any conflict of interest and use something directly for one client that you use for another but the basic strategy and the core language can be 80% of it is transportable from any client to another and we then customise it.

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353 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________

It does two things. Not only does it make our job easier but it increases the likelihood that that client is going to succeed because reusing a price testing methodology and strategy and copy that we‘ve used with dozens of clients and dozens of industries and customising it for that client. So the track record of success there makes it much more likely that it‘s going to work for the client than if we invented something new. That makes sense? Graham: That makes sense so you are taking what‘s already working and just adapting it for another industry if necessary Bob: Right but we always look to the past because the more you‘ve used certain marketing campaigns repetitively the more lessons there are, actually the more proof there is in those and it makes great sense rather than reinventing the wheel to take what you‘ve already used successfully. Obviously you take the things that weren‘t successful and get rid of them. But the ones that were successful you want to try to recast them as many times as you can and there‘s a lot of profit and a lot more surety in doing it that way than in reinventing the wheel each time. Graham: Ok so in terms of a specific example could you say look I‘ve got a client in the retail field or in the cosmetic industry field or in your own business, you had a particular product or service that you had copy for and you used it again. Perhaps share an example, just so someone could know this is how I could adapt it to my business or concept. Bob: Well sure let‘s say for example I do have a very good client who‘s a cosmetic surgeon and if he happens to know that there‘s a certain cosmetic treatment process, like a facial treatment process that‘s really popular at Christmas because women want to look their best. (Let‘s face it 90% of the customers, probably 95% that get cosmetic treatments are female).

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354 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Well that same campaign is going to work identically well on Valentine‘s Day because women want to look really good then too so that same campaign can be adapted for Valentine‘s Day. And then when you roll around to the next year if it worked great at Christmas one year, 90% chance it‘s going to work just as well at Christmas next year. So why go and create an entirely new offer, entirely new campaign that may or may not work when you already know what did work. Graham: Makes sense. How do you use this to get competitor intelligence? Bob: What you do with competitor intelligence is I tell companies to pick their top five competitors and sometimes it‘s three depending on the market, let‘s say three to five. Then subscribe to their ezine and start following all their promotions. Now smart companies and I use that term broadly because many times companies won‘t have the intelligence to do this, but with smart companies you will start to see the repetitive use of ads that are working. Now going back to the old days of direct marketing pre internet, companies would always use the marketing that was working over and over again until something else beat it. Because it‘s less expensive than marketing online, a lot of companies in the online marketing don‘t do that. Now when they have to pay for it, such as a television commercial they will, they‘ll repeat what works over and over again but the point is when you track your competitors and you see which of their pieces are working and they are reusing over and over again, you can then borrow the themes or the structure of those. Again you cannot take it word for word, that‘s plagiarism but taking an idea or a theme and working those ideas and themes into your marketing is not plagiarism, it‘s smart competitive intelligence.

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355 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ You can then take their history of what they‘ve used and what was working for them and use it in your own marketing. I know we have limited time so let me throw this back, but you are going to do exactly the same thing with your products and your services and your customers. You are going to go over the past couple of years and say which products were most successful, which services were most successful? Those are the ones you are going to want to feature more in your marketing. Those are the ones you are going to use as a foundation for developing new products and services and with customers you are going to say which customers did I do the most business with. You are then going to make special offers to them and you are also going to try to profile them and say what industries are they from. What income range are they in? Are they male or are they female? Are they young or are they old? And you want to profile them and then use that in your lead generation to attract more customers based on your prior successes not based on some new technique that comes along whether it‘s Twitter or its mobile marketing or whatever it is. It‘s always important to remember that whatever new type of marketing comes along is just a media and it‘s no different. Twitter, I mean it‘s a different media but the marketing is the same. A lot of businesses tend to think the next hot item is what‘s going to get them over the top but it isn‘t. It‘s understanding your market place and your customers‘ needs and what products and services sell best for them and then using the best media to reach those people. So that‘s kind of a wrap up of how you apply past forward to not only your marketing but your products, your services, your customers and competitor intelligence.

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356 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Graham: That‘s a fantastic strategy. It‘s so obvious when you explain it but I‘ve actually never used it myself consciously like you‘ve explained but I have probably used it unconsciously every so often. Saying this marketing campaign worked particularly well, let‘s try that again here or try it again over here and of course in most cases it works just as well when you do it again or use it in other markets. So it‘s a very, very powerful concept. What you are essentially saying is getting people to look at what has worked particularly well in their sales and marketing in the last year or two and really just adapting it. Either using it again perhaps with new target markets or with some of the customers that you haven‘t been in touch with for a while or adapting it in some way, tweaking it a little bit if you like, so it‘s a little bit new but it‘s still the same basic concept that went well before, rather than trying to reinvent something brand new every time. Is that pretty well what you are saying? Bob: That‘s exactly what I am saying. Graham: Fantastic Bob. Well that‘s a very simple way because I would imagine that very few companies actually use this process. Bob: That‘s absolutely true and it‘s a shame that more don‘t. You couldn‘t ask for a better marketing intelligence than what you know about your own business and your own customers. But most companies tend to want to go outside and look for intelligence from other sources from experts or books or magazines or articles or whatever but that intelligence is right there within your experience and it makes just great sense and very profitable sense to take that intelligence and apply it and benefit from it. Graham: And could you use exactly the same concept for various parts of your marketing so let‘s say you did a telemarketing campaign for one day to some old customers and that worked really well.

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357 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ You would just repeat that again maybe a couple of times a year as well if it‘s worked well? So it doesn‘t matter what type of marketing it is, it could be social media, ads you ran, it could be email campaigns, it could be telemarketing, it could be seminars, it could be basically anything that‘s worked well in the past is worth repeating again? Bob: Absolutely. If it‘s worked once it will nearly always work again. I mean with some exceptions. Let‘s say there‘s a media that is no longer effective and it was effective for you before well certainly you don‘t want to use that media anymore. A good example is Yellow Pages advertising. People especially in the United States don‘t use the Yellow Pages hardly as much as they used to. But even there you can take the themes of your Yellow Page ads that were most successful and apply them to your pay per click advertising or your Facebook advertising or whatever other media you are using so all of those concepts that have proven to work for you are transportable to other media. Graham: Excellent what a fantastic strategy. Bob I know you‘ve got a lot of useful resources and ideas that you willing share with business people at no charge on a regular basis. So what‘s the best way for people to make contact with you to get access to some of these resources. I know you send you ezines, you send out useful ideas and tips on a regular basis so where would you suggest they make contact? Bob: The best way would be to go to my website which is www.profitalchemy.com and on every page on that site you will see a box where you can sign up for a free ebook called Ten Minute Business Success. This contains great business advice from people like Tony Hsieh of zappos.com, the ex COO of 1800junk, Brian Tracy, Robert Cialdini, all kinds of people and

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358 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ really great digestible chunks of information you can apply to your business right away to get a real competitive advantage and that‘s probably the best way to get going. Graham: I‘ve read Ten Minute Business Success myself. It is outstanding and I can highly recommend it. Bob, thank you very much for the great strategy you‘ve shared today. Past Forward is a wonderful way for people to get a really great unfair business advantage very quickly. Bob: My pleasure, thank you so much Graham. Action Exercise: Bob has shared a great strategy with Past Forward. What you are doing is taking successful results from the past and reusing the same process that produced these great results. I recommend you take 10 minutes and quickly review some of the sales and marketing campaigns you have done in your business over the last 2-3 years. Write down at least five things you did that worked really well. Then ask yourself ‗How can we reuse this same campaign again?‘ Sometimes you can use the identical process without changing anything. Other times you may need to make a few minor changes and it will work just as well. One of the key lessons from this concept is to track the results from all your sales and marketing activities. That way you will know what is working well and what is not. Then just do more of what is already successful and discard the things you did that didn‘t work.

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359 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ 30: Tessa Stowe How to Create Customers for Life

Reprinted with permission

Graham McGregor: In this interview for the Unfair Business Advantage Report it‘s my great pleasure to be talking to my good friend and sales training expert Tessa Stowe. Tessa Stowe is an evangelist for Customer for Life Selling and selling without being sales-y and pushy. You‘ll want to learn and follow her approach if you are looking for an exponential increase in sales versus just an incremental one. You can connect with Tessa at www.salesconversation.com What I am really impressed about with Tessa is that not only is she a fantastic sales person in her own right, she‘s sold tens of millions of dollars of very complicated IT products in her sales career, and she has also taught thousands of business people and sales people around the world how to quickly improve their results with some very simple sales and marketing strategies. So Tessa thanks for being on the call today, great to chat to you. Tessa Stowe: Well thank you Graham for having me along. Graham: My pleasure. Now as you know the purpose of the Unfair Business Advantage Report is to get

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360 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ people like you just to share one strategy that you are using yourself or getting your clients to use that is giving them a fantastic competitive advantage. So what‘s the strategy you want to talk about today Tessa? Tessa: Well this strategy Graham will definitely give you an unfair business advantage because very few people do it and its very, very simple. Most people when selling focus on getting the sale that‘s right in front of them. The unfair business advantage is that instead of focusing on the sale that‘s right in front of you, you focus on gaining a customer for life. Graham: Wow that sounds pretty impressive because obviously if you have a customer for life they‘ll come back and make multiple sales in the future rather than just a one time, one off sale. Tessa: Well actually it‘s even bigger than that Graham. By implementing this strategy you will exponentially, dramatically increase your sales with very little effort. I will give you an example. Graham with you what is the average value of a single sale? So if you were just focused on a single sale with a customer, what would you typically get? Graham: Obviously I do a variety of different types of sales. Some are product sales some are service sales but let‘s say a person decided to use my marketing consulting services. Typically a person would spend anywhere between $3,500 and $14,500 to use my services for a marketing project. Let‘s say it was only $3,500 just to be conservative. Tessa: Ok so let‘s say $3,500. So now that‘s the initial sale, now just suppose (and I know with you Graham they would) they became a raving fan and a customer for life, what would be the lifetime value of that customer?

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361 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Graham: Well typically and I actually do have some figures on this, I have had a number of marketing clients that have stayed with me for many years. A good client would actually use me for a number of projects each year so at least two or three, so they would spend $7,000 or more a year and maybe stay with me for at least five years. So a good client could easily be worth $35,000 in revenue for me. Tessa: Great, so that‘s $35,000. Now just suppose they became a raving fan and then we all know what raving fans do, they tell other people. So therefore if your client just told one other person, gave you a referral, and they became a customer for life, that‘s another $35,000 isn‘t it? Graham: That‘s right, so suddenly you‘ve got $75,000 which is quite a bit more than the one off sale initially of say $3,500. In fact it‘s 20 times higher isn‘t it? Tessa: But it‘s more than that even because if they told one person, they‘ll probably tell two people and if they told two people and those two people tell two people, how many people is that? Graham: Two people and two people, that‘s four people. Tessa: So now we‘ve got four times $35,000. Graham: Wow, it‘s $130,000, it‘s getting better all the time. Tessa: And we are working on really small numbers here because raving fans typically tell more than two people. Graham: In any business no matter what product or service you are selling, the big problem is a lot of businesses focus on making just one sale and they forget about the massive amount of money which could be 50 times, 100 times or even 1,000 times higher of creating customers for life.

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362 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ So you‘ve got my attention Tessa, how do we create customers for life? Tessa: Yes it‘s actually Graham quite simple. First of all you must have an intention of wanting customers for life so it‘s a mindset about wanting customers for life because there are some people unfortunately let‘s face it who are what I call ―hit and run‖ sales people. They just want the initial sale and then they are onto the next one and forget the customer. So you have to just have a mindset that my business is all about creating customers for life. So take on that mindset and then when you are going through the sales process just ask yourself will this action that I‘m about to do, or will this thought, create a customer for life? If it won‘t create a customer for life, don‘t do it. For example sometimes you might know that this particular solution is not right for your customer, that there are better ones. If you actually are open and you simply say ‗look I actually don‘t recommend that you go with this particular solution because of x, y and z,‘ that‘s going to create a huge amount of trust and it helps you create a customer for life. Graham: In fact a good example of what you are talking about Tessa is this wonderful word called preeminence that Jay Abraham talks about in one of his first marketing books. ‗How to get everything you want out of all you‘ve got.‘ Jay talks about the example of a man going into a bicycle shop with his very young son, maybe 7 or 8 years old to buy their first bicycle. And the sales person in the store said ‗look you probably don‘t want to buy a really expensive bike for your son for his first bike because let‘s face it he‘s going to grow out of it, he‘s probably going to damage it, it‘s going to have a few things happen to it.

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363 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ You should probably get this budget model to start with and then once your son decides that he actually enjoys riding he can get a more expensive model further down the track.‘ So rather than try and make a really expensive sale once off, in this case he‘s actually recommending a solution that costs less because this is actually better for the customer. That‘s the type of thing you are talking about isn‘t it? Tessa: Absolutely and it‘s a mindset Graham which is all about your intention with selling which is not about making a sale, believe it or not, but it‘s about helping your prospect or your customer. You are trying to help your prospect and you are advising them on what‘s best for them. Like the guy in the bicycle shop. He was advising on what was best for them, for their needs at that time and the irony of this is that even though you are not focused on making a sale and you are instead focused on helping them, as a consequence of this, more sales flow because you‘ve built up a huge amount of trust. Graham: Exactly and they can see, in fact this example that Jay Abraham gave he actually talked about this person who then came back and became a regular customer because he was so impressed that the person didn‘t try and make a big sale on the first meeting. Tessa: Absolutely, so it‘s all about your mindset. It‘s all about making sure during the sales process that your actions and your thoughts are going to help create a customer for life. And then really important, once you have made the sale, once they‘ve become your customer, you want to obviously deliver on what they are expecting. That‘s really important and a part that‘s often neglected. Because people think that all I have to do is deliver the service or the product and give great customer service and people will become a customer for life.

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364 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ How many times Graham have you been to a restaurant and you‘ve ordered a steak, they‘ve delivered a fantastic steak and the service was impeccable but you‘ve never actually gone back to that restaurant? Graham: Lots of times. Tessa: But sometimes have you ever been to a restaurant, Graham, where the food is maybe not so fantastic, the decor is not all that amazing, the food is sort of mediocre but you just go back there probably every week. Do you have a restaurant like that? Graham: We have been to a couple of places like that and really it‘s probably because of how the people made us feel rather than the quality of what they have. They knew us by name, they said hello. They had a chat, had a bit of a laugh, they got to know us and it was a fun place to hang out in if you like. Tessa: That‘s right so the other thing with making customers for life is really connecting with them as people. Turning it as quickly as you can from a transactional relationship to a personal relationship and appreciating them. It‘s amazing but a lot of customers will leave because they feel you don‘t appreciate them so it‘s very important to have an appreciation strategy in place for your customers. Appreciate them. Graham: Ok, could you give us perhaps different ways that you could quickly show appreciation to your customers? Tessa: Well it‘s as simple as sending an unexpected card, and you know Graham I am a great card sender myself. It‘s just cards. If you are out and about with your customers take photos of them and then just put that in a card, send it to them and say ‗thank you so much for being my customer‘ and even include a small gift with it. That will go a long way. I‘ll never forget this, I went into an office of one of my clients recently. About six months before I had sent

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365 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ this client a thank you card and I walked into his office and the card was sitting on his desk. It had been sitting on his desk for six months and I said I can‘t believe this card is still sitting on your desk and he said well I just so appreciate being thanked. It‘s so rare so if you want to stand out, instead of sending an email which is quick to delete, send people something real like a real card, it goes a long way. I had one of my clients this past Christmas who sent his top clients (those that were bringing in 80% of his revenue) a tin of chocolate brownies. They were in the States and he had his clients ringing him up saying thank you so that went a long way. So it‘s not complicated, it‘s not rocket science, but you will definitely have an unfair business advantage if you actually implement an appreciation strategy and appreciate your clients. Graham: That makes perfect sense and I‘ve seen lots of examples of this myself. I know that I occasionally refer some of my business clients to an accounting firm that I know. And every time I give him a referral, regardless of whether that person turns into a customer or not, he sends me a very nice thank you card. It is handwritten and says ―Graham, thank you for the referral, and here‘s a free $50 Westfield gift voucher you can go and use at any Westfield store‖. I‘ve given this accountant 4 or 5 different referrals now. I do know that a number of them have turned into sales but not all of them. However he knows that the lifetime value of one new business owner as an accounting client is actually worth tens of thousands of dollars to him. And he‘s got a great appreciation strategy in this case just for thanking people like me for giving him referrals. So it‘s exactly what you are talking about isn‘t it? Tessa: Yes it is. And yet Graham you know, like I do, so many people who are just out there all the time

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366 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ chasing sales, trying to get that sale that‘s right in front of them. Graham: Whereas they should actually be nurturing and putting in an appreciation strategy in place for existing clients. And I do like that phrase you gave before, make sure that every action that you do, every action that you take in relation to your business and your customers, ask yourself the question ‗does this action, does this activity, does what I plan to do now, is this helping me to create customers for life?‘ Yes or No? I think what I‘ve learnt in business Tessa is that everything you do counts. It either has a positive effect or it has a negative effect and I think nothing is neutral. So I think it‘s a great guiding concept you‘ve shared there Tessa. To make sure that everything that we do is helping create customers for life rather than just a one off sale so that‘s a fantastic idea. By the way, you‘ve got some great resources yourself that I know that a lot of people will get a lot of benefit from participating in. I know you put on some wonderful free sales training courses each year for people all around the world on different parts of selling, what‘s the best way for them to make contact with you Tessa? Tessa: Well if they go to my website which is www.salesconversation.com, and there they can just simply subscribe to my newsletter and in that newsletter once a month I write a valuable article. As you know Graham I am very straight forward. It‘s non fluffy, it‘s not salesy, it‘s non pushy, it‘s simple, powerful strategies and mindsets that you can implement straight away so if you subscribe to the newsletter, you will get an article, a high value article, once a month. Plus once a month I run a free tele-seminar on one particular aspect of selling. I am running one tomorrow on my five step sales process so subscribe to the newsletter and you get to hear about the tele-

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367 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ seminars, you get the articles plus other valuable resources Graham: Excellent, thank you Tessa and I know that I‘ve been a subscriber of yours for many years. The articles and the seminars you put on are fantastic value and of course they are free of charge but there‘s some amazingly useful ideas that you put in them. So thanks very much for sharing that great strategy today on creating customers for life. I know that‘s a perfect way to help many of my readers to get an unfair business advantage. Tessa: Thank you very much. Action Exercise: Tessa shared today two concepts that we often forget in business. The first one is to the huge lifetime value of any potential new customer or client you get. And the second one is to focus on making these people customers for life. You will find it a useful exercise to work out the life time value of a customer for your business. This is simple to do. Customer Lifetime Value is the total amount of money that a customer will spend with you or your business over the time frame they continue to spend money on your products or service Here’s how you work this out for your business Step One: How much do customers spend on average when they buy products or services from your business? A: $................................ Your number Step Two: How often do they buy from your business each year? (If they only buy once every two years just use .5 as the figure.)

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368 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ B: ......................... Your Number Step Three: How long does a new client continue to spend money with you in years? C: ................................Your Number Now multiply each of these three figures together (A, B & C) and you have the Lifetime Value of a new client or customer for your business. $................................. Lifetime Value of a new customer Example: Let‘s say I go to the supermarket once a week for groceries. I spend around $200 each time and go about 50 times a year. So far I have been going to the same supermarket chain for about 3 years. Already my customer lifetime value is $30,000.

31: Jamie Tulloch Share valuable knowledge before you sell

Reprinted with permission

Graham McGregor: In this interview for the Unfair Business Advantage Report I am talking to the owner of one of my favourite accounting firms.

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369 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Jamie Tulloch from E3 Business Accountants. The business has been around for over 20 years and in 2009 they changed the way they offered their accounting services to their clients. Although Jamie owns the business and is the major shareholder he is interestingly enough not an accountant. And I think that is one of the main reason your business does so well isn‘t it Jamie? Jamie Tulloch: I think that‘s a distinct difference with our company here because inside E3 Business Accountants we have a great team of chartered accountants who do the nuts and bolts of working with our clients. My role as the Managing Director and major shareholder of the company is to do the marketing. I head up the company, I‘m the person who is responsible for generating the new clients and building relationships with existing clients so my sole role is to grow the company and be the ‗director of growth‘ for want of a better name. Graham: What does the name E3 stand for and who are your main clients? Jamie: E3 stands for energy, enthusiasm and enterprise and our main clients are family owned or managed businesses. We help our clients in the five key areas of cash flow, growth, profits, protecting assets and maximising the sale price of the business when an owner sells or retires. Graham: Jamie as you know, I am talking to a wide range of sales and marketing experts around the world to get their answer to one question. ‗What‘s one sales or marketing strategy that you are either using yourself or recommending to your business clients that‘s giving them an unfair business advantage but also it‘s helping them make a lot more sales and profits?‘ What‘s the strategy you want to talk about today Jamie?

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370 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Jamie: Sharing valuable knowledge ahead of the sale. Building that trust, building that relationship before the sale is made. To work with a prospect, to work with a potential client and not be in a hurry to close the sale. The sale will close itself. If you are developing a relationship with a person who may need or want what you have I think you should slow down and share your knowledge first. When we are talking about professional services, whether you are an architect or an engineer or in the legal profession or in the accounting profession a lot of what you do is intangible. It‘s very hard for a client to see what you actually do and they certainly are not aware of all the work and all the nuts and bolts that goes on behind the scene. So you have to work at ―tangibilising‖ what you do. The best way to do that is to share the valuable knowledge that you have. And invariably the clients will come back or convert themselves into a client and say ‗I want to do business with you, you‘ve shared a lot of knowledge, you have a lot of information, and I want to join your firm as a client.‘ Graham: We‘ve got a great example you are going to tell me that actually happened in real life about five minutes before this interview. But before we come to that, I know one of the ways that you share helpful ideas and valuable information with potential clients you‘ve got a couple of newsletters that go out each month haven‘t you? Jamie: Yes we send an email newsletter out to our clients and we send another newsletter out to subscribers who are what I euphemistically call ‗clients in waiting‘. We have a specific newsletter that goes to our clients to keep them informed on business tips and tax tips

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371 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ and we have a little bit of trivia, the odd joke and whatever just to lighten the mood. We also have something quite similar to go out to our subscriber base and that shares knowledge and information. I think that that helps to alert our subscribers that we have a very good team here, we have a lot of knowledge and they start to buy into that. They understand that we are not holding back with sharing our knowledge. So you don‘t have to become a client for us to assist them with valuable ideas for their business. Ultimately they do come on board, but in the meantime as I say tangibilising what we do, showing and sharing what we do that‘s the biggest way for us to be able to convert a non client into an advocate of our company. Graham: What I like about it compared to say most newsletters that are coming out from other accountants is that it‘s actually got very helpful business tips. Often I will read one of your newsletters and think ‗oh there‘s a good idea on what I can do to get more referrals or increase my gross profit margin or do an add-on sale or here‘s a couple of things I can do to save money on my costs‘. So it‘s very practical along with the odd helpful tax tip as well. I‘ve actually heard a number of business people that I have met tell me your newsletter is one of the few newsletters that they enjoy getting and reading on a regular basis. Now tell me the story that just happened literally five minutes ago in real time. Jamie: Well Graham as you were phoning and I was answering your call, I‘m sitting down in front of my email monitor and an email came in. I couldn‘t resist reading it while we were making the connection and it was from someone who had just

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372 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ received my email newsletter about 10 to 15 minutes ago. They are from the other end of the country, 1,000 kilometres away, and they were saying that they were disgruntled with their current accountant. Graham: What did it say that was so interesting? Jamie: It says, ―Hi Jamie, I am writing as I have not been happy with my own accountant just this past year. My account manager left without advising me and my very small business was charged an extra $2,500 for the new person to come up to speed and the rest of their reasons which didn‘t make sense to me just to ask a question such as what account do I use to put x in, gets me an invoice for $300. I do my own day-to-day monthly accounts on MYOB, all my records are in good order, receipts all dated and itemised etc so it is very straight forward. I enjoy reading your newsletters and have taken advice from then on several occasions. Should you think that your company could help me I would appreciate hearing from yourself or one of your colleagues, best regards.‖ This arrived literally as we were making our connection Graham and that came as a result of the newsletter published 10, 15 minutes before that so there‘s an instant response coming in. Graham: So there‘s someone that you‘ve shared valuable information with for a period of time now, they‘ve obviously read a number of editions of your newsletter, they‘ve been unhappy with their current situation, they‘ve decided I can probably get better value elsewhere and here they are contacting you, an accounting firm who is 1,000 kilometres away. The current city they are actually contacting you from is here in Auckland and there are probably 1,000 accountants in this particular city. But they are preferring to contact you because they think you can be of value and wanting to know basically can you be of help, and would I be allowed perhaps to use your services? Isn‘t that a nice position to be in, in terms of marketing your business?

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373 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Jamie: It‘s somewhat flattering, but it does prove the point that we have been sharing knowledge and information and tips with that person to the point where we have shown up the inadequacies of their current supplier. We have to remember that every single person in business already has an accountant. If we want to win clients we have to take them away from their existing accountant and that‘s not easy because relationships build up over many years and they are hard to break, even if the level of service or knowledge delivered is not the best it should be. So our clients have arrived on our doorstep because they are disgruntled with their current accountant and they are disgruntled sufficiently enough to go looking for someone else. Now if you are within their radar, within their field of vision because you regularly share information, you are going to get the call when that disgruntlement comes to a head and motivates action. Sure we deal with business start ups and these are companies that literally start from ground zero. We‘ve got a number of these but the majority of our clients have converted from someone who was not providing the degree of knowledge or service a business owner needs and wants. And they are choosing us because we‘ve shared information before we‘ve sent them an invoice. I got an email from Jamie five minutes after our interview ended with this message... Hi Graham, Just to let you know the email request was from someone who had been getting my newsletters for 3 (three!) years. Had a conversation with her. Now a client subject to formal signing! Jamie. So there is a real live example in real time as well, of how well this strategy of sharing valuable information up front actually works.

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374 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Graham: That makes fantastic sense and I think what you are doing by sharing valuable information that will help a potential client is you are building up that amazing level of trust and rapport and credibility. There are many ways that you could share valuable information with potential customers. One of my favourite strategies, in fact it‘s sort of what we are doing right now, is to to give talks and share your information perhaps with large or small groups of people. I know that many years ago I was involved in sales training and I had a client in real estate. He belonged to the local Rotary Club and he asked if I could come along and speak for 10 minutes on customer service. So I went along and I spoke to a group of about 40 people and gave them some helpful tips on what they could do to improve customer service. I gave away some pretty helpful tips that had worked for me and worked for some of my clients, just freely shared the knowledge, and I had one person come up at the end of that particular meeting and said ‗Graham that was fantastic, here‘s my card, I want to train all my sales people, can you come and see me‘. That turned into a five figure consulting contract simply because I shared some valuable ideas at a local Rotary meeting. It‘s a good example isn‘t it of what you are talking about of sharing valuable information before you make a sale? Jamie: Yes and the second major strategy that we have developed and I think it should apply to a lot of professional firms and especially firms that sell services, is to create trust via certainty. We believe certainty is generated once you have a client by committing to a fee and committing to outcomes and committing to a delivery date. So they are the three certainties that you provide for a client who‘s about to buy professional services or any service. You are committing to a fee or price and you are committing to some outcomes, and you are committing to a delivery date.

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375 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Graham: So how do you apply that in your own firm? I know it‘s been spectacularly successful for you in your accounting practice. Jamie: It has. We changed the business model internally and then promoted it externally so that we know longer charge in 6 minute or 10 minute intervals for clients. My point is that it is not easy to pay for someone‘s time when you are not there to monitor that time to see if the job is being done effectively and efficiently. You don‘t care how long the job itself takes, just so long as you know the fee, the outcome and the delivery date. It‘s a bit like sitting in a taxi in a strange city and you note the driver approaches a green light and slows down sufficiently to catch the red. You watch the meter ticking over and you start to think that maybe the driver is in no hurry to get to the destination because you are paying for both time and distance. You might be pointing in the right direction but there is no incentive for the driver to be efficient and deliver you at your destination by the shortest route and in the least time. So when you buy services by time, where is the incentive and what is the incentive for the person delivering that service to actually speed up? There is no incentive and so the work expands to fill the time available. And who pays for that? The client ends up paying – or is asked to pay – for inefficiency. So we turned that right around and said ‗we think that‘s unfair so we are going to charge on a fixed price, fixed delivery basis.‘ So we look at a job carefully before we start it, we commit a fee to that job, we commit a delivery date for that job and we say this is the outcome of the work. We have a binding contract between our clients and ourselves before we start the work. This certainty of price, certainty of delivery and certainty of outcomes develops trust.

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376 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Graham: So you‘ve basically said to them ‗look we will do your annual accounts as an example, that could be one particular project you are doing for them, and we will do it for x dollars, you will get them on this day, 2nd February 2012 or whatever the date happens to be, and it‘s guaranteed.‘ Jamie: I think it‘s the most powerful single marketing strategy that we have developed in over 20 years in business. One of the biggest grumbles that our new clients bring with them when they leave other accounting firms is that they never knew how much they are going to be billed and they seldom knew when they were going to get the jobs delivered. So we‘ve reversed that. Graham: Would it be fair to say that you often share valuable information in the form of educational seminars for potential clients as well or groups of interested people on topics that would help them in their business? Is that one of your strategies of providing valuable information as well? Jamie: Yes we run regular breakfast sessions for our clients. For instance in the middle of last winter we did a series of breakfast sessions. I was surprised at how many people turned up, how many of our clients turned up and then we opened it up to non clients. Lots of tax changes happened last year as you will be aware and that impacted on just about every business owner throughout the country. We had developed some strategies, ways in which to explain the changes in the tax, the way it would impact on clients and what they could do to take advantage of those changes. What the Government said last year is that we are going to lower corporate tax because we want people to leave money inside businesses and take less out.

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377 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ The corporate tax rate is now lower than the personal tax rate at the top end. The Government is saying ‗do better things with your money, leave it in the companies.‘ So our role was to say if you leave money behind what are the things that you can do inside your business to take advantage of what the Government is encouraging you to do? Now that‘s quite a dull subject, but we turned it around to show the advantages of the Government‘s new tax policy. We had breakfast seminars starting at 7.30 am in June and July, the middle of winter which is not that great in Christchurch unless you‘re off skiing. And we had clients turning up at 7.00 am for breakfast and then sitting down for two hours and listening to how they could use the tax changes to their benefit and the advantage in their own business. So there was a powerful marketing tool because we were sharing knowledge and it was considered so valuable to the client that they were prepared to get out of bed and probably some of them getting out of bed at 5.30 and 6.00 to get here at 7.00 am in the middle of winter. Graham: Jamie that‘s a fantastic strategy. I know that providing valuable information before a sale can actually be used by anybody in business. They could give them a special report, they could give them helpful articles, they could give them, like you do, a valuable newsletter that‘s fun and interesting to read. I would highly encourage business people to sign up for your newsletter even if they are not based in New Zealand. So what‘s the website address for them do this on Jamie? Jamie: www.e3accountants.co.nz.

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378 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Graham: Are there any other resources that you do have on hand that you‘d willingly share with business people that would be helpful to them or would the starting point be the newsletter? Jamie: The starting point is the newsletter. I‘m also quite happy to answer general business enquiries or queries that might come through via email. If I can answer something off the cuff I will answer that the same day to anyone who actually sends me a query. You can email me on [email protected] There‘s no cost or fee for that, no one gets an invoice and again it helps to indicate to that person that hey we are willing to help and we want to see your business grow. One of the interesting things is that I believe in social responsibility on the firms like us to help businesses stay in business. And not only stay in business but we should help to grow it as well. Because a business that fails can often take three or four or five other businesses down with it. So let‘s take a social point of view and say it‘s a duty and a responsibility for us to help businesses stay in business and make a profit. If they make a profit they are paying tax and they support the community that they operate in so I‘m happy to answer those queries free of charge if I can off the cuff. Graham: One more thing on providing certainty. You actually have I think an email guarantee with your clients don‘t you. How does that work? Jamie: Graham, we have an in house policy. All emails that come in and all phone call queries get answered the same day. Now sometimes a query might not be able to be answered in full the same day but we do respond to that enquiry the same day. So we acknowledge that the person has made contact with us.

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379 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ We don‘t wait until the next day to say ‗got your email on Tuesday, here‘s an answer.‘ We will acknowledge our client the same day that their query comes in. Graham: That is incredibly rare in business and also it‘s something that any business could do, not just you. Any business could just respond to every phone call, email, the same day and that‘s their policy and people know it. It is incredibly frustrating not hearing back when you have made contact with a business and you don‘t know whether they‘ve got your message or not. You‘ve shared some fantastic ideas today, I know you‘ve got to go and meet another happy client in a moment so I really appreciate the ideas you‘ve shared. I know that our readers will get some great value as they implement the strategy of providing valuable information before you actually make a sale. Jamie: Thanks Graham. Action Exercise: This strategy of providing valuable knowledge and information before you make a sale is the whole purpose of the Unfair Business Advantage Report. You can read any of the helpful interviews in this programme and take away some strategies you can use immediately in your business to get better results. The big mistake is we think we have to hang onto all our knowledge and only share it after someone becomes a client. Yet the reality is that freely sharing some useful tips and ideas on your area of expertise builds trust with potential clients. And makes it far easier for them to choose your business compared to a competitor. You can start using this strategy by writing something as simple as this Here are the five most common questions people have about buying XYZ:

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380 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ XYZ is your product or service. Then write down what these questions are and what you would normally advise your clients when you answer these common questions. Then give this information to potential clients before they buy. Instantly you are sharing some helpful tips and you build trust and credibility. This strategy of regularly sharing valuable information before you make a sale is simple to do and amazingly effective.

32: Troy White Humanize your Business

Reprinted with permission

Graham McGregor: It‘s my great privilege and pleasure to be talking to my good friend, marketing and business expert Troy White from Canada. Troy is a top marketing coach, consultant and direct response copywriter based in Calgary, Canada. Troy has twin 10 year old daughters that have been a major inspiration in his entrepreneurial path, as well as encouraging him to get back involved in one of his true passions… martial arts.

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381 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Troy recently got his Black Belt in Tae Kwon Do and is pushing hard for further levels, showing his daughters along the way that success in life is all about persistence and determination. Troy loves to write – and has written thousands of articles, reports and books over the years to help entrepreneurs grow their businesses. Troy has a powerful approach to growing small businesses and entrepreneurial run ventures on a budget. His free Cash Flow Surges blog shares tons of great strategies at www.troysblog.com What I really like about Troy is that Troy has been in business for a number of years, he‘s created huge increases in sales and profits for his clients, in fact he‘s one of the smartest business people and copywriters that I know. Troy it‘s delightful to be talking to you today. Troy White: Thank you Graham it‘s an honour to be here and I am very excited about what you are doing with the Unfair Business Advantage Report. I think this is a great service you are providing so thank you for having me on the call. Graham: Ok Troy. Well let‘s get right into it. . What‘s the one sales or marketing strategy that you‘d like to share today that‘s working incredibly well for you and your clients to increase sales, increase profits but also give their business a real unfair competitive advantage? Troy: That‘s a great question. I specialise in working with smaller businesses and the mistake I find that most of those types of businesses make is they try and act like a faceless corporation. They want the email to come from the company name as they think that makes them sound bigger and better. I‘ve actually found the opposite. That when you personalise and put character and personality into all of your communication and all of your materials that you bring people closer.

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382 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ In other words „Humanize your Business‟. People want to know who is putting the products and services together, what is their story? I find that a great story packaged into a product and service delivery creates a viral effect. This means when people know your product and service and there‘s a great story tied into it that they are glad to go out and share it with all their friends. Over the last nine years I‘ve worked with thousands of different entrepreneurs through my articles and hundreds directly through coaching. I find it interesting that they are scared to tell their story and I never have understood that because it‘s your story that makes you special. I find that when you can get the entrepreneur to share a little bit of their personal side, where they came from, a little bit about their family, their kids, their spouses, their background, their failures and successes and you package that up into your marketing collateral, it becomes very, very compelling. Your prospects and your customers keep on coming back because they absolutely love this. You are creating this character that they want to get to know more and you keep providing more and more reasons they want to come back and find out more. Now when I started my own business nine years ago I was new in the writing business. I was a new writer; I had started to journal before I quit the corporate world and found that I quite enjoyed it so I went off on my own. I didn‘t quite know what to write about so I found it kind of interesting that here I am growing this small business but I was doing that at the same time that my twin daughters were growing up. Today they are now ten, ten year old twin daughters. At the time I started my business they were only one year old so they were growing up right at the same time I was growing my business.

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383 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ I found it fascinating on the similarities between them growing up and my business growing at the same time. So I just started writing about my twin daughters and it was really an eye opener to me to find out how much people were resonating with the stories of my daughters. It had really nothing to do with business, I am talking about my kids but people started to associate me with them. Nine years later, people that have been on my list now know my daughters as I write about them a lot, I share pictures of them, and it‘s really created this whole character around Troy that everybody knows and loves. Graham: And in fact I think you wrote recently that your daughters turned ten and they turned ten on a very unusual date didn‘t they? Troy: Yeah right. They turned ten on 10.10.10 and I actually leveraged that into some media exposure. All it took was a phone call to the newspaper and this goes to show you on how with a personal interest story the media is all over it. It was an interesting story because I have two twin daughters who turn ten on the 10th of the 10th, 2010. The newspaper heard about it, they phoned me the next morning, interviewed me that afternoon, the camera crew was out taking pictures of my daughters after school and then the following Sunday they were in the papers. I mean it was just amazing how it all happened, and that‘s why this is so powerful. People love good human interest stories and character profiles and that. Graham: So let‘s bring it back Troy to a business person who is reading this. You are basically advising them to humanise their business. So in all their marketing you recommend they talk about their personal story or experiences. Because these are actually things that potential customers or existing customers will find of interest.

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384 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ Can you give us a couple of examples of how you‘ve actually done this for your clients and how it‘s worked? Troy: One example is I do some work with a chain of Amish furniture stores and they sell high end customised Amish furniture. We‘ve used this concept of ‗humanizing‘ to build their business in their newest location. It‘s going just gangbusters and even in the present state of the economy when the average table they sell is $10,000 they are doing exceptionally well. So part of what we‘ve done is we‘ve kind of educated or re-educated people not only what Amish furniture is, but also who the Amish are. In other words, what is the typical day in the lifestyle of an Amish craftsman and what is the typical day in the lifestyle of an Amish child that‘s being schooled? So we started to tell these stories and people absolutely love this because it‘s a whole other world that they‘ve never really known about. It‘s no longer like dealing with Ikea where you go into the store and you walk out with a box and you go home and you put the furniture together. With these guys their clients come in, they already know the story of how the furniture is made and it‘s actually made by a craftsman and that craftsman signs their piece of furniture. So when they get the furniture delivered the actual craftsman‘s signature is on the back of it and it‘s got a lifetime guarantee. And if anything ever goes wrong that craftsman is the one that fixes it. This is a prime example on how to leverage the back story into the business. Another quick story is, and I‘ve written about these guys numerous times, is Catch a Piece of Maine and the lobster brothers. Two young guys have built this business around the personalities in selling lobsters.

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385 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ They sell high end memberships into a lobster club but one of the unique things they did and it‘s one of the reasons I think they have done so well with this idea, because it was a very unusual idea, is that when you get your shipment of lobsters with your lobsters it comes with a DVD. On the DVD is the video of your own lobsterman. You get your own dedicated lobsterman, you know his name, you know his cell-phone number and you know his email address and his blog. He‘s actually taking a video of himself, he‘s talking to you, mentioning your name and showing you „Graham, here is how we catch the lobsters, here‟s how we pull them out of the trap‟ etc. So you get the personalised DVD with your order and it‘s done phenomenally well. Just to add to that, my father-in-law‘s birthday is coming up, and while we are not buying him a $3,000 lobster membership for his birthday, what we are doing is buying, another service this same business offers. With this service, they have this bundle of lobsters and it‘s for two. You get your lobsters and you get some side dishes and desserts. So this gets shipped anywhere you want them to ship it. So my father in law will get this big package, this cooler with live lobsters in it, and in it there will be a picture of his lobsterman catching his lobster, holding a sign. In this case the sign will say ‗Bob, Happy Birthday‘. Now how cool is that, that‘s very unusual to hear that kind of thing these days and yet it is very easy to do. Graham: That reminds me of something I read a little while ago here in New Zealand. There‘s a company that makes milking equipment for farmers and it cost tens and tens of thousands of dollars. This business gets one of the people that actually worked in the factory to make this milking equipment to send a personal letter to each customer.

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386 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ It just says something along the lines of “Hi Troy, thanks for buying our milking equipment recently, by the way my name is John Brown, I‟m one of the people that actually made that equipment, I hope it‟s working really well for you, we take great pleasure in making and providing a really high quality piece of milking equipment like this. If you ever want to talk to me at any point here‟s my name, here‟s my number, here‟s my email, all the best for your farming business”. This company apparently is getting farmers ringing them up almost in tears saying that is the nicest letter I‘ve never got, that‘s just delightful and they are doing the same thing aren‘t they?. Aren‘t they just humanising part of their business for that farmer? Here‘s a letter coming from the person that actually made the equipment. Troy: That‘s a great example on how easy it can be to personalise what you do. I‘ve got a guy that I‘m just starting to do some work for in the plumbing business. One of the ideas I gave him, which basically won over the account was that he wanted to do some new advertising. So I said you know one of the things about the plumbing industry is you say plumbing and everyone has got this visual image right and it‘s the bent over plumber, the plumber‘s crack. I said why don‘t you bring the stories of your plumbers into the forefront and make your plumbers the ad? So we talk about the plumber and talk about his family and how long he‘s been in plumbing. And we have these stories so we are bringing personality to these guys that are going to come into their houses and make the profile, whatever you want to call it, the story or the ad. In an industry where it‘s very impersonal, we show up, we fix your stuff, no longer is it like that. Now they know these guys on an intimate basis.

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387 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ I did this in an unrelated, well somewhat unrelated to plumbing, in the garbage bin industry. Same concept where we mailed out a two page cold call letter to a list of prospects who have never heard of this guy before. And most of the letter talked about his family and the challenges in raising a young family these days and challenges in the business and we mailed it out to a couple of hundred very large home builders in the city. We got an exceptional response and similarly to the farming example what surprised us the most was how many thank you‘s we got. I mean it was extreme like people in very large companies who get dozens of pitch letters every single week emailing or writing or phoning back saying thank you for your letter, which was a very refreshing change from all the impersonal stuff I normally get. Graham: Humanising is such an obvious thing to do but so few of us actually do it. So let‘s say you were advising a typical business person right now. They could be a retailer, they might be a professional person, they might be a tradesperson. What are some things they could do right now that are really simple that could start humanising their marketing along the lines you suggest? What could they actually start doing now? Troy: Well the easy way is to do put down some personal information about each person in a business. Let‘s pick the owner of the business as an example. 

What are your hobbies?



what are your successes in life?



Why did you get into this business?

Start writing these things down and what you are going to do is you are going to write little bullet points about all the things in your life.

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388 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ 

Your pet peeves



Your favourite pets



Your favourite memories from childhood

You want to do this also with your key employees and your key partners. Now you are going to get a lot of resistance on this because most people aren‘t used to it. They are so unaccustomed to talking about their personal side. They think it‘s all got to be about business ,so keep it professional and nobody wants to hear about this personal stuff. But my experience and the end results have shown the exact opposite is true. The more you tell the personal stories, the more they will buy. So start telling these stories and the easy way to start is just writing down little facts, little ideas and then creating these one pagers on who is Graham McGregor? And have your picture on there and share some of the stories out of your past. Who is your assistant? Who is Helen? And then we do the same thing about her. And you can use these in all kinds of different ways. You can ship them with the products, so you send out these profiles with the products. You should always have them on your website so have pages dedicated to your key members on who they are and not the canned professional stuff that you typically see on a website but more personal. You want to start using these as additions in direct mail pieces so if you are there prospecting use these in order to get in touch with people. You want to use these as part of your email sequences too. Introducing people that your perspective clients are going to be dealing with.

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389 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ It‘s such an easy thing to do and you can be using them in ads. There‘s another side of this too. You can humanize your customers so when a customer buys from you, offer to do a write up like this for them. This works really, really well if you are in business to business. So you are selling to other businesses and what you can do is say how would you guys like some free publicity? I‘d like to do a case study write up on you and you do the same thing. You put a personality to their business and use that as the advertisement. It‘s a great way to position yourself differently and it‘s very, very easy to do. You just have to commit to doing it. First you have to commit to being more personal, second you actually have to get the thoughts down on paper and write down some stories. You need characteristics and pet peeves and get all this down. Then you need to just keep reformatting it into lead generation pieces or to things that you can put with your product shipments to keep that relationship going and the interest going. Another one last thing I am going to add in here too that always has worked for me is to do the same thing but talking about your pets. And I know people think, why would I talk about my pets? But you know what, there‘s so many pet cat and dog lovers out there. I did this with an office supply company, a very competitive business, they sell paper and pens and inks. We did a two page, we made it look like a private customer newsletter, it was actually a cold call flyer, but a significant part of this was we called it Roxy‘s Rant and Roxy is their office dog, a little dog that hangs out in the office. We took a picture of her and every time we sent this out Roxy had a new rant and she was ranting about something and I tell you people loved it.

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390 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ They came in to buy from them just so they could meet Roxy. Again I know it sounds hokie to some people that are reading this but I tell you this works. This works really well and it positions you so differently than all your competitors. Humanizing your business is one of the greatest things that I have ever discovered and I continue to use it every chance I get. Graham: I think this is just one of the best strategies I‘ve ever seen on marketing a business and getting a real unfair business advantage because as you quite rightly pointed out virtually nobody does this in business. In fact I‘m amazed at the number of websites I go to where there is not even a picture of the people that actually are running the business. I have no idea who they are, it‘s just a faceless email or a faceless phone number. I am thinking it‘s obviously a small business but I have no idea who I am dealing with. I‘d much rather deal with someone that I know and I think if I recall correctly that the two reasons that anybody buys anything number one is to solve a problem but also they want to feel good at the same time. Isn‘t it true that humanising your product or service in this way is going to make people feel really good about the experience as well because it‘s something interesting isn‘t it, that human connection if you like? Troy: Absolutely right. Graham: Troy, can you give me anymore successful companies that have used this humanising process in their communications and if you like made a fortune doing it? Troy: I think my personal favourite for 2010 and into 2011 now is still one business. Go to www.saddlebackleather.com

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I absolutely love these guys, their products and how they‘ve used the whole storyline in characterisation and personalisation. What they sell is high end leather goods. Leather bags and purses and so on. The briefcases are like $700 so these are incredibly well made, they are guaranteed for a lifetime. But what they do is the founder of the company is a young guy. He was into travel and he was trying to find a decent leather bag and he couldn‘t find it. So he says I‘m going to just get one made while I‘m here and so he started to seek out the best leather makers. Now how do I know all this stuff? Well I know this because it‘s on his website. Right there he tells the story on how the company was formed, why it was formed and his own frustrations with it. He built this beautiful bag and all of a sudden he started travelling with it and everyone was asking where he got it. So he started to make them for a few friends and then it just created this viral effect and so he really quickly realised that people love it because of the story. I think everybody should be going to www.saddlebackleather.com It has one of the best uses of stories I‘ve ever seen for personalising and characterisation of the owner of the company and not just the owner. He‘s done the same with his main guy that does the final work on the leather goods and puts them together. You learn about the guy‘s family on videos, you learn about his dreams and aspirations on how he makes the goods and the type of thread that‘s used and how the leather is treated and water protected and absolutely beautiful. One of the things on his site, the first time I ever saw this site I probably spent two hours there and this is a leather bag website.

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I just can‘t think of any other ones that I would have spent two hours on there but I found this page on there and it‘s very easy to find and it‘s called ―A Tribute to Blue.‖ Blue is his pet dog that passed away and he travelled the world with Blue while they were building these bags and they were travelling everywhere. It‘s a memorial to his dog and I tell you I‘ve showed the saddleback site to a lot of people and a lot of people wrote back saying that this story of the dog Blue actually brought them to tears. And I tell you, any time you can bring somebody to tears on your website you have created a bond that they won‘t forget. That person will not forget it, they will come back, they will talk about you. Graham: I can see exactly now, you‘ve just reminded me, why humanising your business particularly with stories works so well because that‘s how you and I and every person on the planet actually communicates. We talk and communicate in stories. We tell stories about our day and what we‘ve done, who‘s done what to who and so forth and our brain I think is hardwired to think and communicate in stories isn‘t it? And that‘s one of the reasons that humanizing your business by telling stories actually works so well. Troy: I completely agree. Throughout history it‘s been this way, there‘s nothing new this is just the way people have always been. We tell stories to communicate and to connect. Graham: I love this concept. Now Troy I know that you‘ve got a huge range of free resources that can help any business owner or any business person improve their sales and profits. And many of these resources go into this idea of humanising your business in a lot more detail. so what‘s the best way for people to get hold of some of these amazing resources that you have?

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Troy: Well you know one of the ones I think is a great way to start is this one. www.milliondollarlobster.com This has a detailed report where I show exactly how two brothers built an amazing business by humanizing it. Another great resource is www.troysblog.com which is my main blog. I post there very regularly and I‘m always sharing these kinds of tips to help people further this personalisation of their marketing. Graham: Well Troy, thanks for this remarkable strategy. I can see why it works so well for the clients and the people hat are using it and why it‘s going to work so well for the people reading this report. So thank you again, it‘s a fantastic idea. Troy: My pleasure and thank you so much for having me on this call. Action Exercise: Troy has shared a very simple strategy here that any business can use. Make your business more personal so people know a lot more about the people who work in it. Tell them how you operate, what you sell and why you do business the way you do. Give them interesting and unusual things they may not know about the products or services you sell. And tell them a lot more about the ‗real‘ you. I‘ve just read a remarkable book on business success called ―You, Inc.: The Art of Selling Yourself‖ by Christine K Clifford and Harry Beckwith. This book is jam packed with lots of interesting stories and the lessons they‘ve learned about being successful in business and in life. What I love about this book is that it‘s very personal because of the delightful stories they share. I feel I know Harry and Christine really well even though I‘d never met them when I read the book.

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394 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ (By the way, I highly recommend this book. It‘s one of the most useful and practical books on business success I‘ve ever read.) You could humanize your business by something as simple as talking about something unusual or fun or interesting that happened to you this month. When you start to humanize your business you begin to develop a very personal relationship with the people you are in contact with. This immediately makes you stand out from all your faceless competitors

Conclusions: As you can see I‘ve interviewed some interesting people in this report and they‘ve all shared some exceptional sales and marketing strategies. However there are some common threads running through what every person is doing to create an ‗Unfair Business Advantage‘. First of all each strategy is very simple. It is easy to explain and straightforward to use. Secondly each strategy produces great results when it is used consistently. The lesson here is you have to take action and actually do something with any helpful ideas you come across. The next common thing to notice is that you don‘t have to work a lot harder, or be smarter, or spend more money than your competitors in business. A lot of the time you can actually make more money by working less and using some of the low cost or even free resources you have on hand right now.

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395 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ You‘ll also notice that it is actually very easy to take most of the strategies that our experts have shared and use them in any type of business. This means that good sales and marketing strategies are very portable and can be used in a wide range of businesses. So the lesson here is keep your eyes open because great sales and marketing strategies are all around you if are observant. Another key point I want to make is that every single one of these Unfair Business Advantage strategies has been proven and tested in the real world. In other words they actually work. They are not theoretical. So I encourage you to use them in your business. You‘ll also notice how helpful it is to have exposure like this to proven strategies from people who are already successful with these strategies. I encourage many of my clients to do something similar in their own industry. In other words interview some of the top experts in your field and ask for some advice. You can then use this advice yourself and share it with other people in your organisation as well. I am also going to be adding new interviews on a regular basis to The Unfair Business Advantage Report. I‘ll let you know when these are available and I‘ll also send you other helpful tips on a regular basis to help you get an Unfair Business Advantage. „That‟s when we decided to use a few of the ideas in the Unfair Business Advantage Report. This was surprisingly easy to do and we are delighted with the results. I suggest you try some of the ideas in your own business as well.‟

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396 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ About Graham McGregor I‘ve been a sales and marketing consultant for over 33 years. I had my first sales job at 18 selling carpet cleaning services door to door. I have sold a wide range of products and services from insurance and advertising to investment property and sales training. I have created dozens of popular marketing programme including my ezine Easy Business Success which has readers in 14 countries www.easybusinesssuccess.com As a business speaker I specialise in showing my business audiences how to create an Unfair Business Advantage using many of the strategies covered in this report. I also work personally in an active ‗hands on‘ role with a small number of business clients to help them create wonderful sales and profits with very little effort. “Graham your marketing strategies have been the most profitable things we‟ve ever done to create new business. We had them up and working for us in just under two weeks. In the last few years we have generated over eight million dollars of new sales since we began using your strategies. Yet they were so easy to use.” Grant Laing Laing Building Relocators www.laing.co.nz After 34 years in sales and marketing I have noticed something very interesting which I would like to pass along in closing… The most successful sales and marketing results I‘ve ever helped create were remarkably easy to achieve. They took almost no effort to do and achieving these great results was fun for everyone involved. Yet when I forced myself to ‗work hard‘ and ‗struggle‘ my marketing results were never as good. So my marketing approach today is very simple...

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397 The Unfair Business Advantage Report _____________________________ 1: I only recommend marketing strategies that are fun, easy to use and produce great results with very little effort. 2: I also make sure that all my marketing strategies make people ‗feel good‘ and ‗add great value‘ to their lives at the same time. 3: 95% or more of the time I will recommend proven and tested sales and marketing strategies for my clients. And most of these proven strategies I get from top sales and marketing experts like the people I‘ve interviewed in this report. If you are interested in proven strategies to increase sales and profits in your business with surprisingly little effort I‘d love to hear from you. You can contact me on Email: [email protected] Phone (If calling from outside New Zealand) +64-21-222-6992 Phone (If calling from inside New Zealand) 021-222-6992 Postal Address: Twomac Consulting Limited 188 Scenic Drive Titirangi Waitakere 0604 Auckland New Zealand

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