TheBusinessCommandos.com

The most valuable asset any business has, whether it be an online business or offline business is a database of people who are interested in what you have…

In fact it is really a database of people who you have developed a good relationship with who are interested in what you have to say and offer.

Building your database is an ongoing daily task, remember it’s all about building the relationship and staying in contact with your prospects so that you are their when they are ready to buy.

A good point to keep in mind when building your database is that each time you get a new addition to your database it is future income, now I’m not saying that you will sell to everyone that enters your database, however you will obviously sell to a percentage of your database.
So if you’re struggling to see the value in focusing on your database, just think of it as future revenue.

There are many different strategies you can use to build your database and let’s start with someone traditional offline business examples;

A good one for a traditional bricks and mortar business is to run an in-store competition where people enter their details into the draw to win a prize that can be something you’ve packaged up in house or you may even offer a holiday to gain more attention. This allows you to capture peoples details so you can stay in contact with them to build the relationship and send out special offers to generate more business.

Here’s an example from a café business I worked with;

Everyone who entered the café was invited to enter the draw to win a free lunch, which created street talk “Who said there’s no FREE lunches?” and was an effective marketing strategy in itself generating more clients.

With the details that were captured was the clients birthday, then every year just before their birthday we sent them an invite to come in for their free birthday cake that we had made specially for them. Now the key here was that how many people celebrate their birthday by themselves?

Yes these people would bring all of their friends and family, which sky rocketed the cafes sales… Then the café would also capture all of the extra peoples details and the whole thing just ‘Snowballed’ BIG time.

See how simple it can be to massively increase your sales - simple strategy, BIG results!! And a great example of the benefits in building your database.

For an online business you can simply use an auto-responder on your website to capture prospects details. To get a great cost effective auto-responder system go to www.autowebbusiness.com

Generally you will offer a free report, book or audio in exchange for your prospects details. The information that you are giving them should be good quality information to help them get what they want, as this is the first step of the relationship building process and if you help them get what they want then the law of reciprocity comes into play and most people will want to repay the favor.

The beauty of an auto-responders is that you can have it all set-up automatic, so that as soon as they enter their details the they will receive their FREE gift and also receive messages from you, even if it is just once per week with helpful information for them, which allows you to build the relationship and to ensure that you are there when they are ready to buy.

These messages can be all pre-written and entered into your auto-responder. Remember most people won’t be ready to buy on first contact and auto-responders are a great way to stay in touch without any extra investment of your time.

For an example of the auto-responder process just enter your details and claim your FREE gift we offer here on our website.

Auto-responders give you great leverage, do it once and get paid forever!

Magnetic marketing involves giving your clients some thing of tangible value when they do business with you that they can redeem on their next visit. This is designed to attract them back to your business for repeat custom.

If you have a mechanic shop for example with every service you may leave a $20 discount voucher off the next service, which expires in 3 months time. So when the person needs their car serviced again they are more than likely going to call you, otherwise they would be effectively wasting $20.

This works especially well when you are trying to attract new clients to your business.

Here’s how it would work for a dry cleaning business. First you would send out vouchers for Free dry cleaning to the people you are targeting for this marketing campaign and then when the people who took you up on your offer come back in to pick up their dry cleaning, you would give them a 50% discount voucher for their next lot of dry cleaning, which would expire in 30 days.

When they come back you would give them another 50% voucher off their next dry cleaning bill also to attract them back to your business again and get them into the habit of dealing with you. From then on you would treat them as a normal client.

The psychology behind this strategy is that firstly you offering a no-brainer offer that your prospects would be just throwing money down the drain if they didn’t take you up on it and then you’re following up several times with more magnetic marketing offers to get them into the habit of dealing with you.

For this to be effective obviously you must deliver excellent service.

You don’t have to use discounts with your magnetic marketing, you can offer holidays, free meals at restaurants, gift packs or whatever else you can come up with that is appealing to your target market and makes sense to give away to attract a new client or keep an existing client coming back to buy more.

Get creative, you could even partner up with other businesses and work together on this one.

P.S. This and a whole lot more will be covered in details at The Business Commandos Boot Camp

Lumpy mail is a very effective strategy to secure Attention and increase your response with your direct mail campaigns. If you’re trying to get the Attention of a key prospect, lumpy mail will help you stand out and be remembered.

I’ve even heard of someone sending a CEO of a large company a $1200 golf bag to get the CEO’s attention and get his foot in the door for a presentation. Mind you this deal was probably worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, I’m not by any means suggesting you use a $1200 golf bag. You must know your numbers and stack the odds in your favor.

When a prospect receives a lumpy piece of mail they are curious to open it and see what is inside. You know yourself when something arrives in the mail for you and it’s an odd shape and you can feel that there’s something different inside, which makes you want to open it immediately to find out what it is.

There are many lumpy mail pieces you can use including the following;

· One red sock with an invite to an event where they will get the second red sock to make the pair

· A tape measure – “Do you measure up to today’s standards in ________? Get our Free report on the 3 biggest mistakes made by business today.”

There’s a few to get you started and we haven’t even scratched the surface. I remember a copywriter I know who sent a lumpy mail piece that turned up in a large express post bag with a pair or red underwear inside and a note saying; “I’ve sent you these undies, because when you read my offer, you’re going to shit yourself” – Now I must clarify, this individual knew his market and they loved the joke. So pick your mark if you plan on any outrageous campaigns like this one.

Remember your lumpy mail is to grab their attention, then your message must end with a call-to-action as to what they must do next. Whether you’re offering a free report, seminar or consultation, you must make it clear to your prospect the next step.

Attention is the currency in marketing today and Lumpy Mail will help you cut through the clutter and get response from your market.

P.S. This and a whole lot more will be covered in detail at The Business Commandos Boot Camp

First of all to attract new clients into your web you need to give them a compelling stand out reason to choose you. Stack the value high and keep piling on the value so that your offer is so good that they would be nuts to walk away from it.  And that’s the beauty of information products… High value and low fulfillment costs in most cases. Once you invest the time and money to create information products you can leverage off them over and over again. They’re an excellent tool to create an irresistible free offer to get them into your web.

Let’s face it if you don’t attract them into your web and capture your prospects details, you totally miss out. And the money’s not in the front end, it’s in the back end! You have to have a website with stick factor and it’s not just your website every single marketing piece that you’ve got. If you’re using business cards or a book, you need to use all of your marketing tools as a magnet to attract new clients to you.

Bear in mind that today more than ever in the information age people are getting hit from all different angles… Especially marketing-wise and everyone is busy, busier than ever… Your job is to cut through all of the clutter. The enemy of the business owner and entrepreneur is clutter, you must cut through the clutter to get your markets attention.

Strategic alliances are an awesome strategy to cut through the noise and catapult your results. Whatever market you’re in partner up with somebody who’s already well-established in your market preferably with a big client list and help each other grow. You can create several different alliances where everybody wins.

It’s all about leveraging. You can only do so much by yourself. When approaching a potential alliance partner always come from their point of view, explain what you can do for them and all of the benefits your alliance offers them first. With a group of solid alliance partners you will have access to an abundance of potential clients to drive into your web.

This strategy is covered in more detail in our inner circle. Take a look on the inside now at:
http://www.TheBusinessCommandosInnerCircle.com

1. Stake your claim…

The marketing matrix pictured below is the foundations for marketing;

It all starts with targeting the right market. So you must be crystal clear on who you’re trying to reach. Who are you aiming at? Quite often people play blind archery and they’ll be firing off arrows with a blindfold on just praying they may hit a target. What a waste of m~oney!! Think of each of those arrows as a dollar. They’re just throwing out money everywhere, a totally ineffective strategy. So get clear on who you’re talking to, your target market.

Then you need to craft your message so you enter the conversation that your prospect is already having with themselves in their own mind. So you find out what your target markets life is like each day? Because if you’re targeting corporate CEOs, you’re going to talk to them a little bit different maybe than if you’re targeting mums at home, working a home business and looking after a couple of kids or whatever it may be. So you need to be crystal clear on what specifically they want. Your message is all about having an attractive hook that appeals to them. Otherwise you won’t get them into your web. (more…)

One of the fastest ways to grow your business is to give your products away for free allowing people to try before they buy. With this strategy you must know your lifetime customer value.

Let’s use a hairdresser as an example. The average value of a sale when a client comes in is $60. Minus the $20 cost to service the sale, which leaves $40 in profit. A client returns on average 8 times per year, which makes them worth $320 in profit per year. And on average each client stays with the business for 4 years, which makes every new client that comes in the door worth $1,280 on average to the hairdresser.

If this hairdresser offered his service FREE for first timers, in most cases he is giving away $60 to make $1,280. Not a bad deal at all!

Too many business owners and entrepreneurs today still struggle with this concept, but as you can see with this example, providing you know your numbers and the odds are stacked in your favor, it makes good sense to give your product away for free to attract more new business.

I also know of a Deli that used this concept when they first opened for business. They did their maths and figured rather than spend a fortune in advertising, it was cheaper to give away FREE lunches for a whole week, which they did and their business went Gangbusters from day 1.

Now a key concept to employ when using this strategy is to combine some magnetic marketing with it to help get the new client into the habit of shopping with you. Here’s what I mean; If we use the hairdresser example, the first step involves giving away the first haircut free, then before they leave hand them a coupon to be redeemed in the next 60 days for a special offer for their next haircut. Then when they come back the second time do the same again with either the same offer or a different offer to attract them back to you and after that the majority will stay on as repeat clients.

There are countless other examples of this powerful strategy and I’m sure you get the concept.

Yours in success,

Aaron Parsons.

P.S. The Ultimate Entrepreneur Boot Camp is only a week away, only a few seats left, book yours now at:
http://www.TheUltimateEntrepreneurBootCamp.com

As it was put by the great Henry Ford -
“Whether you think you can or think you can’t you’re right”

If you find yourself reading book after book, attending seminar after seminar and still not getting your desired outcome this may be the most important article you ever read…

Every person on the planet has a part of their brain that acts as a centre of arousal and motivation.

This powerful part of your brain is called your reticular activating system (RAS) and it works by filtering the barrage of information supplied by all your senses and passing on only what is believed to be the important stuff.

The great news for you and all of us is that it can be trained… Click Here (more…)

Who better to listen to in the current economic environment then the great man himself… Warren Buffet. Watch this video and pass it on to your friends.

Yours in success,

Aaron Parsons.

The harsh reality is that we live in a nation of cynics and justifiably so when you look at the facts. People have been lied to and cheated too many times.

Bill Clinton the former president of The United States, blatantly lied to the people who voted him into office and entrusted him to lead them.

In Australia a lot of people link the word entrepreneur to Alan Bond, etc.

The list of reasons why people are so skeptical today is long, which brings us to the all important point of PROOF!

You must back up everything you say with proof that what you say is true. People will be thinking why should they believe you and it is up to you to back up every statement you make with an abundance of PROOF!

You can do this with any of the following; (more…)