Just the other day a friend published an article based on some nurture advice that I’ve given, and I realized that with as strongly as I feel about nurturing your leads, I still hadn’t written a post for my own blog about nurture.
I’ve written for a few other blogs, like that of the Australian Businesswoman’s Network, and PureChat, but I hadn’t taken the time to craft something on the ole Monkeypod domain.
Well, nurture is a really complex subject. And there are plenty of angles from which you can approach it. Eventually I’ll address as many as I can, but today I wanted to talk about one specific lead nurture myth I’ve seen circulating in the small business community.
Nurture Myth #1: Your nurture process has to take place over a long period of time.
When people think about nurture they almost always think about a drip sequence of some kind. Something that follows up with leads over a period of weeks, months or even years. And yes, that’s usually how it works. Nurture exists because someone expressed interest in your product or service; and if they aren’t ready to buy today we need to have a process in place that follows up with them so that when they are ready, we’re the brand on the top of their mind.
This makes total sense if you’re selling something requires a lot of information and deliberation before someone makes a purchase. Like, real estate for example.
But the reason that this is a problem is because not all businesses have a long buying cycle. Plenty of businesses have a very quick and transactional sales process. And unfortunately these businesses tend to recognize that their business model is different, so they assume that nurture can’t (or won’t) really play a role in their Lifecycle Marketing strategy.
But it can. And it should. Nurture exists no matter the length of your buying cycle.
(Disclaimer: If you ever came to Infusionsoft University while I was running it, this story may sound familiar.)
In January of 2012 I moved to Arizona, and prior to moving I had lived in Lansing, Michigan, where I ran a business servicing and installing draft beer dispense systems. Like, installing and cleaning draft beer lines for bars, restaurants and country clubs. And because of the nature of my job I was in and out of a lot of bars on a daily basis. My job took me to a lot of bars, some of which I’d probably never have patronized on my own, but because I got to see these charming little hole-in-the-wall dives so regularly, they kind of grew on me.
So when I moved to Tempe there was a dive looking bar around the corner from where I lived. So my girlfriend and I decided to check it out. So we pulled into the parking lot, and we actually bottomed out as we pulled in. Now, I drive an SUV, so to have us scrape the bottom of our car as we’re pulling into this parking lot was a little unusual. But, “No matter” I thought. We were in the parking lot, may as well park.
As we went to park, I noticed there was some shattered glass in the “spot” in which I intended to park, so we readjusted, and we parked further back along the side of the building. (I say “spot” because the parking lot had no real discernible lines of any kind) As we got out of our car, I noticed that there was an empty lot behind the bar, and through the chain-link fence I could see several big black garbage bags. This was 2012 and Sara and I were avid fans of the TV show Dexter, so I made a mental note of the garbage bags just in case.
The entry was had one of those two door entrances, where you step into like a small alcove, and then open another door into the actual bar. So, as we step into the first one, I notice there’s a Cinco de Mayo poster hanging up. I remember thinking to myself “Wow, 4 months early. That’s some really solid commitment. But, this is Phoenix afterall, so maybe its a bigger deal down here than it was in Michigan. Oh, wait, that says 2011. It’s not 4 months early, it’s 8 months late…”
Yup, they had a poster in their entryway that was advertising holiday specials from 8 months prior. Doesn’t exactly send the message that they’re on top of this stuff.
Then as we opened the second door and stepped into the actual restaurant Sara and I were both stopped in our tracks by a very pronounced and specific odor. It was one I quickly recognized as urinal cakes.
Which is not a terribly unusual odor when you are in the men’s room. But for this to be the first and strongest thing that we both smelled the moment we stepped into their restaurant was more than a little unsettling.
We looked at one another, walked outside, got in our car, and drove away.
Here’s the moral of the story: This whole process took place in less than 90 seconds. We pulled in, we parked. We walked into the restaurant’s entry way, and opened the next door, and then we never made it any further.
Prankster’s might have excellent food. They might have an awesome beer list. Or any other number of redeeming qualities. But for us, it didn’t matter. We never made it that far. Between the ill-maintained parking lot, the visible trash out back, the outdated poster and the overpowering odor, there were too many strikes against them in the simple process of entering the restaurant.
I’d challenge you to look at your buying process. Nurture exists even in the most mundane ways. It could be the music playing while folks are in line at your store. It could be the color scheme of your website. Or the number of clicks it takes to get where I want to go. Put yourself in your prospects shoes and see what hurdles they have to clear to become a customer. How can you make this process more fluid?
Nurture is the single most cost effective way to grow your business. It’s all about doing more with what you already have. (Oooh, tweet that.)
Here’s a free download with 11 questions to help guide your nurture.
Now, I use Infusionsoft to run my marketing campaigns and carry out my nurture. You don’t have to use Infusionsoft, but you should use something. If you’re looking for a comprehensive Infusionsoft review, this is the best one I’ve seen.
I was scrolling through Facebook this morning, as I do most mornings. And afternoons. And evenings. And I noticed this article that someone had shared, and two of my friends (Jeryl and Shelley) had commented on, so I read it.
It’s a list of 12 things that they say only people who work from home will understand. And man, they really hit the nail on the head with a lot of them. But it occurred to me that just as all offices are not the same, all home offices are not the same either, so I wanted to adapt it and give you my version.
Yeah, I’ve been warned that working from home isn’t all it’s cracked up to be, and I’ve been told that you get really lonely, and that you need to make an effort to maintain a normal schedule, and regular contact with humans and sunlight, and on and on and on. I even read a handful of these articles with their own tips and suggestions. But still, I couldn’t have predicted some of this stuff.
So, here are 6 ways my life has changed since I started working from home (and I mean changed on a day-to-day basis, not on a higher philosophical level. Although, that’s happened too.):
Yes, I wake up later than I used to. For the past three years I was up between 6:30 and 7 am, and I was usually in the office by 7:30, or 8 am at the absolute latest. Now, I wake up between 8 and 8:30 and I’m in the office by 8:33 am. So, it’s really not too dramatically different. But it’s nice that I can manage my own schedule; although if I was keeping track of hours, I would wager that I’m averaging more hours per day of work now than I ever have before.
I never deal with traffic.Never, ever, ever. Because I work from home my commute is literally a walk from my bedroom to my office/kitchen. So as a result, the only times I drive are if I am taking Gatsby to the vet, or meeting someone for lunch, or running to the grocery store. And because I have this luxury, I am very strategic about driving at times when I know I won’t hit traffic. It’s nice. On the downside, sometimes I’ll go several days without moving my car and it’s really easy to forget where I parked. (In my neighborhood we don’t have dedicated parking, so it’s just on the street “somewhere”)
I’m acutely aware of the small things, like the mail man. Because Gatsby barks at him nearly every single day I always know when the mail has come. And it usually comes between 10 and 11 am. But sometimes it’s as late as 2 pm and I find myself thinking “Man, where is that guy…”. It’s not that I need my mail, I mean, who really gets mail anymore? It’s more just that I wonder what could have happened that his route is so far behind. Oh, and some days I’m convinced the mail man just skips us altogether. Jerk. When you’re gone all day and you get home your mail is usually there. End of story, but when you work from home it becomes a benchmark in your daily life.
I wear a tank top every single day. Or, a singlet as my Aussie friends might say. And it’s not because I’m some dirty bearded hippie. I get up, and I shower, and then I choose to put on a fresh clean tank top. I live in San Diego; and 99 times out of 100 a tank top is appropriate for the weather. Or for wherever I may be going that day (if I’m going anywhere). Now, if I’m filming a video that requires my face, or if I’m skyping with someone I haven’t met before I’ll put on something with sleeves (Sleeves are fancy, right?). I’m not a crazy person. But usually after that 30 minute call I’ll change back into something normal people wear on a jog.
I find myselftalking to Gatsbymore and more. It started with the usual stuff you say to your dog, you know, asking them if they want a treat. If they’re hungry. If they need to go out. If they want to take an extremely long walk to that one burrito shop with the best guacamole. That sort of thing. But now I find myself carrying on full conversations with him as I deliberate about the structure of one of my blog posts. Or consulting him for advice as I’m fervently trying to troubleshoot something technical that isn’t making sense. It’s really useful that he’s here because it makes me feel a lot less like an insane isolated hermit.
Social Media. I’ve always been a really active participant in the social media space. I love tweeting my random thoughts, and I love interacting socially on Facebook and LinkedIn. But now I spend more time on Facebook than ever, and it’s not just because I’m reading Buzzfeed articles that Jeryl shares (although I do that too). It’s because I am legitimately working. You see, part of how I keep my Infusionsoft knowledge sharp and polished is by trying to answer questions, and solve puzzles that pop-up in the various Facebook groups. In fact, a few months ago I started my own private group as part of my Monkeypod OG Membership. And I spend a lot of time curating resources and providing support for that group. So, Facebook is pretty much always open, but it’s not because I’m avoiding work, it’s because I can’t stop working.
I could go on and on, but I think that’s a pretty decent snapshot. All in all, working from home has been awesome.
Yes, you need to be disciplined about setting boundaries or you can accidentally work until 2 am. One of my biggest struggles has been that because I work from home, I literally could be working at any time. And so if I’m doing anything but working, I feel like I’m not being productive. It’s been about five months now and I’ve developed a little more of a rhythm and a structure now, so that happens a little less.
But as with anything, developing a system and structure is key. I miss interacting with real live people, but at the same time, no one is stopping by my desk to interrupt my when I have noise cancelling headphones on and am wearing a look that says “don’t bug me”. I think that is something to which we can all relate.
That’s it, there’s no deep and meaningful lessons to this post. I just wanted to share what my experience working from home has been like. I’d love to hear yours!
If you’ve got a social media account of any kind you probably couldn’t help but notice the excitement generated by a few select football plays this weekend.
First, there was the wild conclusion to the Michigan v Michigan State game. (As you may know, I’m an MSU alum and was pretty pleased about this)
And then there was another play with the Indianapolis Colts trying some trickery with an unconventional line-up.
As I sat down to finish writing a blog post this morning I kept getting distracted by posts about those plays. They were popping up in my Twitter feed, my Facebook feed, and I even got a few texts and emails from people rehashing the excitement in one way or another.
So, I decided to postpone the blog post I had been writing, and tackle this one instead. (See what I did there?)
I want to talk about the importance of having a contingency plan.
Now, the U of M play doesn’t really deserve to be bashed too hard. They were punting the football away, on fourth down, with 10 seconds left in the game. One way or another, the ball was mishandled and MSU was able to get to the kicker; and the ball flew almost directly into the hands of an MSU player who was already streaking toward the end-zone.
Really tough luck.
Yeah, the kicker probably should have fallen on the ball instead of trying to handle it, but hindsight is 20:20 and it was a broken play once the snap was mishandled. So that one may not illustrate my point as clearly here, but as an MSU fan, I felt like I needed to mention it. It’s the Colt’s fake punt play that really baffles me. They were trying to trick the defense. The coach even said so after the game.
They had a play designed to move some players around, and the whole goal of the play was to catch the defense unprepared, perhaps to lure them into some sort of penalty, and generally cause confusion which they could then exploit.
But as players shuffled around and then settled into their spots, it became clear (to most people anyway) that this play wasn’t going to work out very well.
In fact, it looked like it would certainly be a loss of yardage as the Colts were now set to snap the ball to a seemingly undefended player. They stood for a few seconds…and then they snapped the ball anyway.
And sure enough, they were sacked for a loss of yards and gave the ball to the Patriots with excellent field position.
Now I’m not saying you shouldn’t practice and run trick plays.
Some coaches and teams have made their names running unorthodox plays. What I’m suggesting is that whether it be with football, or with marketing, you need to have a contingency plan.
You need to have a safety net in place.
Let me share a real life example from a campaign my friend Tyler recently launched. You see, Tyler runs a successful business where he teaches strategies for how to trade stock options. Recently he launched a membership program so that he could make himself available in one-to-many typesetting, instead of his usual consulting packages.
So, Tyler sent out an email message to his audience announcing the new membership he’d be building and driving people to the page where they could learn more about it.
He built it like this:
Pretty straightforward. Totally functional.
He built it as a campaign instead of a broadcast because he wanted to send more than one email plugging the membership and the benefits, and he wanted all the emails to stop in someone signed up. We had a conversation around this scenario, and decided to drill in a little deeper.
If we want someone to buy, first we need them to click through to the sales page. And because we know that clicking is something Infusionsoft can track, that gives us the ability to add in what I like to call “The Infusionsoft Nudge”. You see, if you ever have two actions you want someone to take, you can (and should) always include a nudge. So that if they take action number one, but don’t take action number two, they get a reminder prodding them to move along.
Here’s how it looks for Tyler:
The first sequence and the last goal are still identical. But now what we’ve done is we’ve added a follow-up for those people who click but don’t buy.
This is our safety net.
We’ve still built out what we’d like to happen ideally, but we’ve also structured our contingency plan in case it doesn’t happen exactly as planned.
This simple strategy can be employed literally any time you need someone to do two things.
Like, click and then register. Register and then attend. Buy and then buy again. Submit the first part of a form, then submit the second part. If you are designing any sort of strategy, you should always ask yourself:
What do I want to happen? What are the other scenarios that could happen? What will I do in each of the scenarios?
And then practice your plan B, your plan C and your plan D. If the Colts had simply said “We want this to happen, but if it doesn’t, we’ll call a timeout” they’d probably have been much more successful.
If you’d like to learn more about this concept, or see it in action, you can download the Abandoned Cart Recovery sequence from the marketplace, or check out my CB: Trilogy course where I cover this concept (and much more) in depth.
Editor’s note: Back with another stellar contribution to the ole’ Monkeypod Blog, one of our most popular guest authors, Paul Sokol. If you want Paul’s background or a full info, check out the first post he wrote for Monkeypod way back when.
An Expert’s Opinion On The 5 Most Underused Features of Infusionsoft
Look at all the cool bells and whistles on your car. Are there ones you almost never use?
For me personally, living in the desert, it’s rare to use my windshield wipers. Its even rarer to use the defrosters because it typically isn’t cold enough to use them.
However, those features are still really important in the right circumstance.
Infusionsoft is very similar. There are so many things you can do that may not be very well known OR simply aren’t fully understood from a tactical standpoint.
What follows are five features that I believe can provide great value for about 80% of small businesses using Infusionsoft. I’ll bet for you, fair reader, that you can use at least one of these to innovate and improve 🙂
Underused Feature #1 – Buy Now Links
In general, Opportunities (sales pipeline management) in Infusionsoft are typically misused. Most small businesses don’t deeply understand the theory behind what a pipeline actually is. Or if they do, they often aren’t super clear on the different stages for their specific process.
(For a great sales pipeline starting point along with training on properly pipeline management, download the Sales Pipeline Starter Kit from the Marketplace).
From a 40,000 foot standpoint, Opportunities are intended to help a business track its sales pipeline and make money. The “Buy Now” link functionality is where the rubber meets the road on that last part.
On an Opportunity, you can indicate which products and/or subscriptions someone may be purchasing. A “Buy Now” link comes in an email to a prospect and when they click it, they are taken to the shopping cart pre-populated with the products/subscriptions on that specific Opportunity. It will also include any discounts, payment plans or subscription free trials.
This way, you can talk to someone on the phone and then send them a link for them to make the purchase. Making money with Opportunities in this manner is definitely not used as much as I would like to see. But if you haven’t, now is your chance 🙂
Pro-Tip: If you look in the CRM Settings for Opportunities, there are action triggers for when someone clicks on a Buy Now link AND for when someone successfully purchases through it. If you create a unique tag for each of those triggers, you can build an advanced follow-up campaign for cart abandonment. For example, when someone clicks, you can add them to a sequence that waits 15 minutes and sends the sales rep an email with the prospect’s phone number telling them to call them right now. If they purchase within 15 minutes, that sequence can be exited based on the buy now trigger.
Making sure you get paid is really important, especially when your business has subscription revenue. Following up and collecting on failed auto-bills is a part of this kind of business. However, we can minimize the number of credit card fails by being proactive and having customers update credit cards that will soon expire.
Under the Billing Automation in eCommerce Settings, there are expiring credit card triggers. You can automate whatever you want. Maybe you do a task to call and update. This may be a great touch point to also take a sentiment check with the customer and handle any potential issues.
For a more automated approach, you can actually send an email with a link that allows the customer to update the credit card on file. In addition to this, you could also apply some functional tag to start an expiring card campaign (like the task idea above). However, for the email itself, it has to be built directly into the billing automation trigger.
To learn how to create one of these card update emails, see this tutorial.
Pro-Tip: Similar to the Buy Now automation triggers, there are triggers in eCommerce settings for when someone clicks on a card update link and when someone successfully updates their card. This can be used to notify a customer support person of any activity that needs to happen.
Editor’s Note: I actually spoke on this topic at ICON in 2015, and if you’re interested in setting something like this up, I’d recommend grabbing the free download from my talk here.
Underused Feature #3 – Lead Sources
Everybody on this planet has one mom. The person that brought them into this world. Lead sources are like the “mom” for a contact in your database. An attribution of who “brought them into the world” of your database.
What makes lead sources so powerful is that you can associate expenses with each lead source. For example, if you spend $200 on some direct mail, you can record that. Then, for each contact associated with that lead source, the system can generate ROI reports based on how many orders have come from that cohort of contacts.
Not knowing which of your marketing efforts are effective is a surefire way to throw away a marketing budget and, probably, not get the results you were expected. Unfortunately, when you don’t use lead sources, you have no data to indicate which channels are producing paying customers.
The topic of lead sources could be an entire blog post (or even series of posts) by itself because it is such a critical distinction to understand. It is absolutely worth your time to learn how they work and begin incorporating them into your marketing efforts.
For some articles on lead sources, see this tutorial and the other articles on the side there
Pro-Tip: If you create a hidden lead source field on a web form or landing page and leave the value blank, you can append ?inf_field_LeadSourceId=xx to all links pointing to the form (where “xx” is a specific lead source id) and it will attribute the lead source to any leads that opt in. This way, you can drive many different kinds of traffic to the same page and, as long as you have a different lead source ID in the URL for each traffic source, you can have one capture point and still track which channels are the most effective. For a tutorial on this tactic, read more here.
Underused Feature #4 – Note Templates for Workflow
There are definitely instances where you need to trigger some automation, but have no earthly idea how to ACTUALLY automate it. For example, when someone asks you a frequently asked question. You have a pre-written email for it, but how can you automate the delivery of it when someone asks you. Artificial intelligence? Some fancy natural language processing on your emails?
Maybe, but this is where note templates shine brightly!
Think of a note template like a big red automation button. You need automation, just press the big red button and rest easy knowing what you need to happen will occur.
Using the FAQ example above, it is super easy to build a note template that, when applied to a contact, sends out the pre-written email. This can save you time and streamline your workflow down to the 5-10 seconds it takes to physically apply the note. In fact, Greg actually has a YouTube video outlining this exact example.
For a campaign template you can use as a starting point for FAQs, use this campaign and replace the task step with an email.
Pro-Tip: The name of the Note Template goal in the campaign builder is how it will display to the end-user. For a better user experience, use prefixes to group similar notes. If you are making a bunch of FAQ emails, start each note’s name with “FAQ – ” so you can quickly find them all.
Underused Feature #5 – Internal Forms for Workflow
If a Note Template is a big red automation button, an Internal Form is a big red automation button that also allows you to add or update a contact’s data at the same time.
This is particularly helpful when someone needs to make a choice or indicate some outcome. For example, having an internal form that you use to approve or decline a new referral partner. Based on the choice, you can automate and follow-up accordingly.
They are also very helpful for adding a new contact because you can, obviously, also automate whatever might need to happen (tagging, create an opportunity, etc).
Another handy use for internal forms is to personalize a templated email. Take the example of an email offering two possible times for an appointment. The only thing that changes from person to person are the times being offered, but the rest of the email is the same. You can create an internal form that collects the two times and then those are merged into an email. Talk about saving time!
Pro-Tip: If someone needs to be submitting an internal form as the result of a task, explicitly put the name of the form in the task body to minimize human error. For example, if there is a new lead task and an internal form to indicate how the first contact attempt went, in the task body you could say “When you have made this call submit the ‘LEAD – First Call’ Internal Form”, by being this specific and clear it reduces the chance someone will forget, or be unsure which form to use.
What do you think? Can you use any of these? Did I miss a feature? Let me know in the comments! Thanks for reading.
A few weeks ago I participated in the first Mastermind Panel, hosted by my friend Jordan Hatch. It was basically a strategy session where Jordan, Paul Sokol, Nathan Paris and I dissected some campaigns, made recommendations and explored different campaign building strategies. If you missed this one, you can check out the recording here.
(It was a bunch of fun, and we’ll certainly do it again. If you’re interested you should sign up here to be notified for the next one.)
Anyway, after the mastermind panel I received an email from a Michael Rogan (A friend and Infusionsoft employee) who said that while listening to us strategize he had a big “Ah-ha” moment.
You know, the type where you finally connect the dots and realize that Leah Remini on King of Queens was also Stacey Carosi from that one weird season of Saved By the Bell where they all worked at a beach resort.
Anyway, his ah-ha moment can be boiled down to this:
Notes are for humans, tags are for computers.
I think Nathan said it on the call, but it resonated with Michael, and then it stuck with me when I read his follow up email.
The reason this is so important is because there are a handful of issues in the Infusionsoft community that all tie back to tags.
You see, lots of the other CRM or email marketing platforms out there operate with what are called lists. Infusionsoft doesn’t use lists, it uses tags.
But those tags can also be used to trigger automation. They can also be used as criteria for your reports. Or for your searches. And can be applied and removed automatically when someone clicks a link (or doens’t click a link).
They’re all over the place. I like the quote “Tags are like a swiss army knife. They can do a lot of things, but you have to be careful with them.”
But just because a swiss army knife can open a bottle of wine, doesn’t mean it’s the easiest way to open wine. And just because a swiss army knife has a blade doesn’t mean you should cut your steak with it when you have a steak knife.
Just because a tag can be used for something, doesn’t mean it should be.
I hear people say all the time that their tags are a mess. I hear people complaining that they have too many tags, or that their tags are repetitive, or confusing. So I want to set a few things straight:
There is no tag limit. So there isn’t an official “too many” number. I’ve seen people with a few hundred tags, and I’ve seen people with 10K+.
What matters is whether or not the tags are carrying meaningful information.
If they’re redundant, or if they don’t mean anything at all, then yeah, you might want to audit your tags and trim it down. So, there are plenty of philosophies on tags, and strategies for organizing them out there, and in fact that’ll probably be a whole course of it’s own some day (here’s a good post on tags for the meantime).
I think a big part of the confusion surrounding tags is that people don’t fully understand what their other options are, so they rely on tags when they could have easily used something else.
This brings me to notes. Notes, and note templates are a remarkably valuable way for recording something that happened offline. They’re perfect for denoting something that took place as part of a process online, or even recording a specific action that took place online. You can personalize the note and add context to it as you’re using it. You can automate the application of a note, to create a time and date stamped record that something happened.
If you need to manually start a campaign process, you could use a tag to achieve a goal. Or you could use a note. (Here’s an example of a campaign I think everyone should be using, and it starts with a note)
The beauty of using a note is it allows you to not only record what happened, but also add additional details about the interaction so you can reference them down the road.
Here are the key distinctions:
Notes can be applied more than once, and maintain a record of each time it was used.
Both can be used to achieve goals.
Both can be applied manually by a human, or as an automated step in a sequence.
Notes can be customized to add details from your conversation, or context around why it was applied.
Tags achieve multiple goals in more than one campaign.
With Infusionsoft there tend to be multiple ways to do most things. But the more you understand, the easier it’ll be to choose the best tool for your particular needs. I’m not saying that you shouldn’t use tags, just that you should use them judiciously.
BONUS: Recently I had someone ask about the difference between legacy notes in the templates section, and the notes we create in the campaign builder. So I created this video to help clear up how both work.
Once upon a time I was a nobody. And in the past few months I’ve skyrocketed to fame and I think I can trace it all back to the time I appeared on Coach Cameron Roberts podcast. Okay, so maybe skyrocketed isn’t quite true. And maybe fame isn’t the right word. But I was on a podcast with Coach Cameron and it was awesome. Here’s why: He’s super smart. Coach Cameron runs a consultancy in Australia, is an Ironman athelete, hosts a podcast, and has helped thousands of entrepreneurs. He’s a multitalented digital renaissance man and I was honored when he agreed to write a post for the Monkeypod Blog.
The 7 Steps for Creating a 6 Figure Coaching, Consulting or Training Business in 6 Months or Less
If you’re reading this, there’s a good chance you’re in the coaching, consulting or training industry.
But are you taking advantage of the opportunity to capitalize on what is a $200 Billion Global Industry?
The sad fact is many coaches and consultants never really make serious money.
Most are struggling to make $40k, $50k or $60k per year…
So how do you quickly flip your consulting or coaching business around so you go from making $50k per year to $50k per month?
That’s a great question. Glad you asked.
To help you out – I’m giving you my 7 Steps for creating a 6 Figure Coaching, Consulting or Training Business in 6 Months or Less.
And it all starts with the most important step of all…
Step 1 – Adjusting Your Attitude
Being a leading sales coach and marketing consultant – I love studying the human mind and the truth is that most coaches and consultants are not “sold” on their own services. They don’t back themselves. The vast majority act like a personal trainer for business owners when they should be acting like the heart surgeon.
It’s a mindset shift – you’ve got to adjust your attitude.
I recently discovered that we have 12,000 to 60,000 thoughts per day and 98% of these thoughts are the same thoughts we had yesterday!
What’s more alarming is that 80% of these thoughts are negative!
So the first and most important step is to adjust your attitude.
The reason is simple: All success starts in your mind.
You must be able to believe it before you achieve it. (I know, corny, right?)
If you can’t see yourself being a 6 figure coach, consultant or trainer – you’re limiting your own income potential.
Many years ago I adopted the habit of writing my financial and business goals down daily and it’s served me very well. I’ll also take 5 to 10 minutes out of my day, to visualise these goals “as if” they have already been achieved.
Then I’ll “act like” I’m already the person I want to become!
You should do the same thing.
Take out a piece of paper and write down all the goals you are COMMITTED to achieving in the next 3 months, the next 6 to 12 months and the next 12 months and beyond.
These form your short, medium and long term goals.
The main thing here is to only write down the goals you are 100% committed to achieving. This is not some “big dream for your life” or “vision board” – do that somewhere else.
This is an execution plan for driving your business to the next level regardless of what you go through, what the economy goes through or what your competition throws out you. It keeps you on track.
You’ll also want to listen to positive speakers, coaches and trainers who inspire you. With 80% of our daily thoughts being negative – you’ve got to be proactive about inserting some positive thoughts into your mind.
Then invest big in coaching yourself.
Here’s the odd thing about some coaches…
They dream of making lots of money but they won’t invest in other coaching programs and mentoring.
How do you expect to charge your clients $1000, $2000 or even $5000 per month if you flinch about paying a mentor the same (or more) per month?
I’ve had coaches and consultants contact me asking for help to grow their business but then tell me they don’t have the “budget” for that level of mentoring…
Talk about a money mindset block!
Let me make this crystal clear – your income as a coach or a consultant is capped to the level you’re prepared to invest into your own coach or mentor.
Want to charge $5000 per month to your clients?
Find a mentor you can pay $5000 per month to show you how it’s done!
Do yourself a favour – find a coach, consultant or trainer who is already getting the results you want and them pay them whatever they want to show you how to get the same results.
It’ll be the fastest way to grow your coaching, consulting and training business.
Step 2 – Define Your Niche then Drill Down Deeper!
To succeed as a coach, consultant or trainer you must specialize. No-one wants to pay big money for a generalist.
Consider the difference in fees between a general practitioner Doctor and a Heart Surgeon – even though they are both “Doctors”, which one earns the big money?
You need to stop being the “generalist” and start being the “specialist” – you need to become the heart surgeon of a niche market.
Then once you define your niche market – you need to drill down deeper.
You need a niche within a niche.
When I was a teenager I had a passion for competitive swimming… and this is where I first learnt about becoming a specialist and competing in a niche within a niche.
In swimming there’s over 5 freestyle events ranging from 50m to 1500m and there’s 3 form strokes (Fly, Back, Breast) that have 50m, 100m and 200m races and then you have the 200m and 400m Individual Medley. So in total there’s over 16 different races you can do and each require a very different type of preparation and training.
My old swimming coach use to say to me “Cameron – you can me a jack of all trades or a master of one, but you can’t be both.”
So I “mastered” the 200m breaststroke.
My sport was swimming. My niche was breaststroke. My niche within the niche was the 200m breaststoke.
I’ve down the same with every business model I’ve ever owned and operated over the last 15 years – and I help my clients do the same, because that’s where the money is.
It’s like drilling for oil – sometimes you’ve got to drill deeper to strike it rich!
Step 3 – Create an Avatar
Once you define your niche within a niche and you have a clear picture of your target market – you need to create an avatar of “who is your ideal client” within that niche market.
The truth is, you are not right for everybody in your market.
And not everybody is right for you!
So put pen to paper and describe your ideal client.
Who are they?
Where do they hang out? What do they enjoy doing? What are some of their character traits? What problems do you solve for them?
Get a clear picture of who your ideal client is – then create all your marketing messages, your sales dialogues and your business around them and for them.
It’ll stop you wasting valuable time taking on the wrong clients and you’ll be able to get better results for your ideal clients.
Step 4 – Build Your Brand
If you’ve completed the previous 3 steps then you’re ready to start building your brand.
Consider where you’re ideal clients hang out the most and be where they can see you.
Play hard on social media, Facebook, Google and Linkedin but don’t forget about some of the more traditional ways to network and build your brand.
Join traditional “offline” networking groups, attend business breakfast events, join community groups and even consider becoming part of a business group or chamber of commerce.
People want to do business with people they know, like and feel like they can trust.
The intention is not to sell your services to the people you form relationships within these groups – but to position yourself as the “go-to-guy” or “go-to-girl” for what it is you do so they can refer prospects to you.
We’ll be back in a few days with tips 5, 6 and 7. In the meantime, start mapping out how you can integrate this first four steps into your business growth plans. And as always feel free to ask any questions below!
If you’d like to contact Cameron Roberts, Australasia’s Leading Sales Coach and Digital Marketing Consultant, you can find him at:
As we went to park, I noticed there was some shattered glass in the “spot” in which I intended to park, so we readjusted, and we parked further back along the side of the building. (I say “spot” because the parking lot had no real discernible lines of any kind) As we got out of our car, I noticed that there was an empty lot behind the bar, and through the chain-link fence I could see several big black garbage bags. This was 2012 and Sara and I were avid fans of the TV show Dexter, so I made a mental note of the garbage bags just in case.
