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Why should I join a Peer Advisory Group?

team-training

A Peer Advisory Group, also known as a Peer-to-Peer Advisory Board or Peer-to-Peer Advisory Group, is a group of business owners or executives who meet regularly to share their experiences, challenges, and insights with each other. Here are some benefits of joining a Peer Advisory Group:

  1. Peer learning:  Groups offer a unique opportunity to learn from the experiences of other business owners and executives. Participants can share best practices, strategies, and solutions that have worked for them in similar situations and learn from each other’s successes and failures.
  2. Accountability: Your group members help each other to stay accountable to their goals and commitments. Participants can set goals and action plans and receive feedback and support from their peers to help them stay on track.
  3. Networking: These groups provide an opportunity to build relationships and network with other business owners and executives. Participants can expand their professional network, develop new partnerships, and gain new business opportunities.
  4. Perspective: Other members can provide a fresh perspective on business challenges and opportunities. Participants can gain insights from other industries and perspectives that they may not have considered before.
  5. Confidentiality: Advisory Groups should provide a safe and confidential environment to discuss sensitive business issues. Participants can share their challenges and concerns with their peers without fear of judgement or negative consequences.
  6. Personal and professional growth: Peer Advisory Groups can help participants develop new skills, knowledge, and perspectives that can help them grow personally and professionally.

Overall, Peer Advisory Groups can provide valuable support, insights, and resources for business owners and executives who are looking to grow their businesses, overcome challenges, and achieve their goals.

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Who is My Ideal Customer?

What if you could create a perfect marketing message that spoke directly to your ideal customer? I mean a message that really connected with the internal conversation they were having with themselves right at that moment.  In a previous blog post I spoke about marketing saturation and how many ads we are exposed to everyday, and the answer is just mind blowing.

Who is my customer

The fact is that most businesses sell to multiple customer types so how do you compose a message that resonates with all of them?  The answer is simple – You Don’t!  The idea that there could be one message that grabs the attention of everyone that might possibly want to do business with you is simply ridiculous.  But if you look at almost anyone’s website this is exactly what you see.  A massive amount of information that covers almost anything that anyone visiting the site might be interested in.  It just doesn’t work!

In the words of John Nemo, who runs a LinkedIn lead generation company, you need to niche it down.   If you have never read his book – LinkedIn Riches, you should.  It might just change the way you think about lead generation on LinkedIn.  Anyway, the concept is you need to clearly identify with one very well-defined customer – Your customer avatar.  This is not to say you can’t do business with other customer types but your approach and your solution to that customers problem are a perfect fit.

I often use the Dominos Pizza story as a perfect example of this.  If you have ever had a Dominos pizza you know it is certainly not the best pizza on the market.  So why are they so dominant in the pizza industry?  They discovered a market segment, that they would perform best in, and design their entire business around it.  The result is a $17 billion company with stores all over the world.  Pretty good strategy, don’t you think.

Multiple Customer Types

What if it’s just not possible to niche down to one customer type?  Not all companies can find a way to separate themselves from the crowd but you should at least try.  If you can’t and you must have multiple customer types than create unique messaging for each customer group.  In my own experience, my company sold multiple types of services to different departments within the same account.  One message wasn’t going to work.  The overall company identity and mission had to resonate with all of the department directors but the problem we were solving for each of them was unique.

In the old days, before digital marketing even existed, we didn’t have the advantage of landing or squeeze pages to direct our customers to, when marketing to them.  Today however, you can create a message unique to each customer without watering it down to make everyone happy while maintaining an overall company identity.   So, if you need to address multiple customer types spend some time understanding who each customer is and what the message and language is that will really connect with them.  Then create a location, be it in your CRM or on your website that you can direct them back to with a well-defined message identifying the problem they are having they don’t want, and the solution they want but don’t have.  You need to grab their attention by connecting with their internal conversation.  What is the specific problem you are solving for them and what does your solution look like in their eyes?  Pictures work well in this scenario.

Conclusion

Spend some time in the New Year identifying your ideal customer.  Who are they?  Where do they go to find solutions to their problems – social media, industry journals, support groups.  What language fits them best – professional, casual, witty.  What type of solution are they looking for in their mind.  You might have the right solution but are presenting it in the wrong way.  I have seen many business owners go immediately to price, thinking low price wins, when response time, efficiency, or quality is the answer the customer was looking for.  Starbucks coffee gets two and three times the price of other coffee vendors because they spent time to get this right!

If you have multiple customer types, speak to them separately rather than trying to create one message that will fit them all.  It’s not who you are – It’s how you solve the problem they are having!  Now let’s Get It Done!

 

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Leveraging Your Existing Customer Relationships

Strategic Planning

 

Your existing customers offer you the quickest and least expensive way to grow your company.  As we have covered in past articles one of the five focus areas for every business is the number of transactions you can achieve with each of your clients.  We all know how hard and expensive it is to attract a new lead and then convert them to a loyal and trusting customer.  It would be a mistake not to make the most out of your hard-earned relationship.  Today we will explore a few strategies to increase the number of transactions you do with your customers each year.

Cross Selling

We see this effectively used every time we go to a fast-food restaurant.  You order a burger and a soda, and you are instantly asked if you want fries with that.  A more subtle example is the store owner who places candy by the checkout register knowing well that Mom and Dad will succumb to the desires of the kids.  Shopify actually calls their upsell and cross sell option the candy rack.  As soon as you click the add to cart button, offers are displayed in the form of a pop-up, upselling and cross selling to the customer before they leave the site.  This is a proven strategy for increasing the number of transactions a customer will make during and after their initial purchase.

So, let’s say you are a hair salon and you have contracted with some hair product companies to display their products in your shop.  Most owners do this.  The question is will anyone ask the customer if they would like to purchase this product during their visit?  If you don’t ask, they will not buy.  If you do, it turns out that 34% of the time they will purchase an additional or alternative (more expensive) product at the time of purchase if they are asked.  Better still, open an on-line store that allows that customer to acquire the products they need to keep their hair style looking good between visits.  This store might just produce more revenue and definitely profit for the business than the shop itself!  By the way while shopping they will be reminded that it is time to book their next appointment.

Business Alliances

In the case of the hair salon, the distributor of the hair products sold in the shop is a good example of a business alliance partner.  An arrangement or contract between two parties to share in the revenue sold by the other party.  This is straight forward when it comes to distribution arrangements but what about other alliances.

Take the landscaping company who forms a relationship with an outdoor light company to help accent the beautiful plantings they install.  They don’t have the expertise to install the lighting so they find a company of similar quality that they can form a partnership with and share in the revenue added to the original project.  Think about your business.  Is there a product or service that your customer might buy from you that adds to the value of what you bring the client?

The painter who added window coverings (blinds, shades, curtains…) to his everyday offering increased the revenue of his company by 60% without spending a single cent on marketing.  They simply added this service as part of their normal quoting process.  The window covering vendor was thrilled to have met the painter and has since added many painters to his list of partners.

By the way, the profit of the painting job was increase exponentially because the painter added nothing in cost and a significant amount in revenue by forming the alliance.

Bolt-on Business

As a company grows it may make sense to add synergistic service units to the business.  I will often recommend a franchise business to an owner as an easy way to bolt-on additional revenue opportunities with very little up-front cost.

Take the case of the property manager who is responsible for renting and maintaining the properties for his customers.  They manage everything from the cleaning of the properties to the renovations to keep things looking new and fresh.  As a new business owner, it doesn’t make sense to do anything but find properties they can manage for a fee.  But as the business grows there is an opportunity to add multiple revenue streams by bolting on small low-cost franchises that will perform the cleaning, or painting or renovation work.  Obviously, the owner could go out and buy an existing business or start his own division in any of these categories but then he/she would have to learn the process of managing all these different operations.  With a franchise they come with the training, policies, and know how to run each business all for the low price of a franchise fee (normally between $10,000 and $50,000).

Often this strategy is proceeded by business alliances like those discussed above.  In this case it may be more appropriate to form a partnership or even an agreement to merge the two companies.  As a business owner you should never feel as if you are too small to think about these types of arrangements. I have seen many a large company formed by the merger of many smaller ones.  One word of caution when merging or joining organizations.  Culture is a very significant part of any company and if both parties don’t share the same philosophies when it comes to how things are done it can be disastrous for everyone involved.

Conclusion

As a business owner you know that there is nothing more important than protecting and nurturing the relationship you have with your customers.  There is no better way to do this than to have multiple touchpoints with that customer.  Leveraging those relationships by giving them multiple ways and multiple opportunities to do business with you is a win-win for both you and the customer.  They get to buy a service they need from someone they already trust, and you get to strengthen your bond with them by once again servicing them well.  Call me and we can brainstorm ways for you to leverage your relationship with your

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Lets’ Talk About Vendors

The vendors you work with are important to the success of your business and the relationships you build with them can drastically impact your top and bottom line.
Vendors and Cost of Goods:
First and foremost, your Cost of Goods (COGS) are directly impacted by what your vendors charge you for the components that go into the delivery of your product or service.  Revenue – COGS = Gross Profit.  If you have strong relationships with your vendors, you can drive costs down as your volume grows increasing your overall gross profit.  This can only happen if you understand how your vendor’s cost structures work.  To do this you need to be able to connect with them regularly to discuss how you can help each other grow.  After all nobody wants you to grow more than the vendor that supplies you. Here are a few things I would recommend when dealing with your vendors.
Go to see them or have them come see you so you can both get a better sense of how you can grow together.
Set goals for the relationship in terms of growth incentives, payment and volume discounting.
Meet at least once a year to review the status of the relationship and their competitiveness in the market. The market changes from year to year, so they need to know you are on top of things.
Lastly, track the effectiveness of their product and service. After all, your business is directly impacted by both quality and delivery times.
Vendor Referral Programs:
A good vendor can be one of your best referral sources.  Their success is directly affected by your industry after all and more directly your success.  The faster you grow the faster they grow.  With that in mind explore the possibility of them helping you grow through referrals. Look for unique ways to offer your vendors rewards for helping grow your business and everyone wins.
Here’s the step-by-step process to putting together a partnership with a vendor:
Approach all the vendors you work with and offer them an incentive based on performance.
Put the generous incentive plan together from their perspective, even take suggestions.
Develop a clear, concise and easy to track incentive plan. They need to understand how they will get paid for their efforts.
Encourage subsequent sales instead of focusing only on the initial sale. Creating an incentive trail allows them to continue to reap the rewards of their efforts past the initial purchase, which is usually the smallest sale volume.
Create an incentive plan that’s irresistible to your vendors by offering generous, exclusive compensation.
Think of all the vendors you work with and the creative ways you can put together an incentive plan that entices them to be part of your business. Use their talents, capabilities and connections and you’ll both be winners.
Putting together an incentive plan doesn’t have to be a complicated process. Use our FREE test drive to come up with some great ideas and put your incentive plan together for maximum results.

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Attention – Make It Pop!

 

 

 

There are 5 major components to good advertising copy (The order of these is essential to success):
Command Attention
Showcase Benefits of Products/Services
Prove the Benefits
Persuade People to Embrace the Benefits
Call to Action
Advertising is sales in print. So, you need to think about the unique benefits your products/services offer and showcase that in a persuasive way. You need to emphasize results, not features.
Let’s take a minute to talk about each of these components:
Command Attention: This is usually accomplished with the headline. You need an attention-getter that makes people want to know more about your products/services. The best headlines give a vivid portrayal of the benefits or show how a problem can be avoided with your products/services. The headline is the advertisement for the advertisement.
Showcase Benefits: You must showcase the benefits of your products and services and, more importantly, show how they will solve or prevent a problem. They need to know what’s in it for them. Include useful, factual, and clear information to show precisely what the benefits are and how they are going to help the customer.
Offer Proof: This is where you prove what the advertisement is offering. You need to establish you have a method to deliver. Consider information that establishes credibility and past performance.
Persuade: You need to add compelling reasons for your potential customers to purchase your products/services. Use a hard sell approach and create scarcity. This will enact your potential customers to feel like they have to act now. Which leads into the last component.
Call to Action: You need to compel your potential customers to DO something. They need to check out your site, sign up for your newsletter, purchase your products, contact you about services…something.  Offer a freebie, booklet, sample, product, bonus, demo, consult, limited time price…the list goes on. There are lots of ways to get potential customers excited about ordering and help them feel like they are getting an amazing deal.
Good advertisements include all these components and are not complete without any of them. You can sit down and think through any one of these components, then figure out how to best place them together for the most effectiveness. We can help you with this too. Try our FREE test drive to learn how to put together great advertisements from some of the best in the business – teccoaching.com.

 

 

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