TheBusinessCommandos.com

Retaining team members in the 21st century is a large problem for a lot of businesses. Business owners are required to be more entrepreneurial in this area and embrace out of the square creative thinking to retaining team members and maintain an entrepreneurial culture.

In this segment we will cover some keys to retaining and attracting quality team members. It really comes down to marketing, but on an internal basis, rather than an external basis as the case with clients.

Start with the basics:

• What are your target markets (teams) needs and wants?
• How do they currently feel about the organisation?
• What can the organisation offer them?
• How can the organisation translate what they have to offer into benefits for team members?
  And finally the big one…
• What is your team marketing USP (Unique Selling Proposition)? – Why are team members going to want to work for you rather than someone else?

Richard Branson’s Virgin Blue are a great example of what we are talking about (at the time of writing). Generally Qantas staff get paid substantially more than Virgin staff, however Virgin have created a fun and happy environment to work in, that people want to be a part of and are happy to be paid less to be a part of that culture.

The truly great Entrepreneurial organisations satisfy the 3 key attributes to attract and maintain team members, which is summarised as GEL;

GROWTH OPPORTUNITIES – Growth is one of the 6 human needs, hence their must be growth opportunities for team members within your organisation to keep them happy. Everyone wants to grow in one way or another.

ENTREPRENEURIAL CULTURE – Team members want to work in a fun, happy and healthy work environment with good conditions and be a part of an entrepreneurial culture.

LEADERS CHARISMA – Team members want to work for charismatic leaders. If team members respect and like who they are working for, they are more productive. The days of the army sergeant major type of leadership are long gone.
Make some notes on how you can improve in making your business the work place of choice for team members.

Yours in success,

Aaron Parsons
http:/www.BusinessGrowthGuru.com

The enemy of the entrepreneur is clutter, we are all bombarded by marketing material everyday, don’t quote me on it, but I believe the number is around 4,000 messages per day we’re exposed to.

Attention is what everyone is fighting for today. Your job as an entrepreneur is to attract the Attention of your market place to Stop them in their tracks and take notice of what you have to offer.

Some of the basics includes your USP, what makes you unique in your market and with your marketing pieces your Attention grabbing headline. Depending how far you want to go and how bold you want to be, you could pull stand out stunts like the great Richard Branson, they certainly get everyone’s attention.

Maybe you have some stand out achievements to display or you’ve partnered with celebrities that your market place respect or speaking from the platform is a great media for gaining the attention of your audience.

Crazy guarantees, stand out track records and even authoring your own book are all effective attention grabbers.

Attention is the new currency, in Japan they have vending machines where you can get free drinks or snacks just for watching some advertisements. So the advertisers are paying for your attention

A good strategy in direct mail is to use Lumpy Mail to get your prospects attention, which is covered in detail in my ATTENTION Marketing Program, which will be released for the first time very soon, so stay tuned.

Don’t fall for the plain vanilla, ‘me-too’ strategy, focus on what you can do to stand out and own the Attention of your audience.

Yours in success,

Aaron Parsons

www.TheBusinessCommandos.com

www.BusinessGrowthGuru.com

1. Big Promise Headline

The headline of your sales copy is the most important part because if you don’t catch the prospects attention with your headline they will not read any further. So first you must craft a compelling headline that grabs people’s attention. Ideally your headline may be a benefit filled headline that spells out specifically why people want to read this now. Put the necessary time in to create a strong headline as it is considered that 80% of the power of your sales copy comes from the headline.

2. Paint the Positive Picture

Spell out to the reader how much better their life will be when they invest in your product. This is your chance to enter the conversation they are already having with themselves by talking about how things are usually done by the majority of people who continue to struggle and present your product as what the future can be like when they own your product that will give them more money, more time with family, less stress, bragging rights or whatever it is that your product can do and what your market actually want. Talk in their terms using the word you throughout your copy and filling it with benefits for the reader. It’s all about getting them to imagine how good things will be when they own your product.

3. Uniqueness

This is where you explain how your product is unique and different. People love rarity so you need to point out to them how unique your product is compared to what else is available in the marketplace. If your product isn’t unique at the moment, then you need to get creative and make it unique so it can’t be compared to competitors. This is where your USP (Unique Selling Proposition) comes into play, which highlights why people should do business with you as opposed to your competitors.

4. Benefit Filled Bullet Points

You need to include an extensive list of bullet points that highlight the benefits for the prospect in investing in your product. When you have a long list of bullets it’s best to bold every second bullet point to make it easier on the eye to read and generally try to break the bullet points up into groups of 7 rather than a very long list. The easier you can make the copy on the eye to read and flow the more likely you will get the person to read the complete sales letter or advertisement.

Put yourself in the prospects shoes to think about what they really want. For example people who are buying a drill, don’t really want a drill they want a hole.

The other important point to note here with regard to bullets is one of the main reasons you want to have an extensive list of bullets is that different benefits will appeal to different people and the more benefits you have listed the more likely you are to hit a hot button with more people, which broadens your market and increases your chances of getting the sale.

5. Outrageous Offer

From the outset I stated the most important part of sales copy is the headline, well not far behind the headline is the offer. The offer is absolutely crucial. You must have an irresistible offer for people to buy NOW! The offer needs to be a ‘no-brainer’ to make your prospects want to pull their wallet out on the spot and buy now. You may offer a free 30 minute consult valued at $297 when people invest in your offering now or they may receive some killer bonuses valued at $797 or whatever you decide. Just ensure it is so irresistible that they must have your product right now. Our online coaching membership site www.BusinessGrowthGuru.com is a good example as business owners and entrepreneurs can own a membership for less than the cost of a cup of coffee per day, plus they receive thousands of dollars worth of killer bonuses and they’re protected by a 12 month Double Money Back Guarantee, that states if they haven’t made at least 10 times their investment from applying the Business Growth Guru strategies, I will personally cut them a cheque for double their money back for wasting their time.

Be bold when you’re creating your irresistible offer, if you’re offering a boring me too type of offer that everyone advertises, you will get the same dismal results. So invest your time and money if need be to get some assistance and develop an outrageous offer people can’t refuse.

6. Proof

So now you’ve made all of these promises and explained how good your product is and what it can do for the prospect, well now it’s time to prove it! You need to present the reader with evidence that you’re a credible person to deliver on what you’ve promised with your bio revealing your background, past success and why they should listen to you. Include a long list of testimonials from past satisfied clients that have achieved great results with your product and case studies work well also of past successes. Just remember the market place is already saturated with marketing materials so you need to prove that you are the real deal. You will want to include at least one or more bullet proof guarantees to remove the risk for people in doing business with you. If you aren’t confident to guarantee what you’re doing, maybe you should be doing something else. At a minimum you should have a 100% guarantee for a set period of time spelling out to your clients that they can essentially try your product risk free and if it doesn’t do exactly what you said it would do for them you will give them their money back.

7. Call-To-Action…

Last but definitely not least is your call to action. You need to finish your copy off strongly, spelling out exactly what the reader must do next to take advantage of this amazing offer. You may finish with something like; to take advantage of this limited time life changing offer that will eliminate your money problems forever then click here right now. Do it right now because if you’re one of the first 27 people you will also receive the killer bonus package valued at $497. When they’re gone, they’re gone. Do it now and get Instant access before you let another life changing opportunity pass you by.

Just remember that you’ve put a lot of hard work into your sales copy and you need to finish off strongly to get the sale.