Red Zone Marketing's Blog

Guest Blog: Better Service Equals Better Referrals

Guest Blog from Bill Cates, President of Referral Coach International

Know Your Competition

When you know your competition well, it not only gives you a selling advantage early on, but also continues to help you serve and sell to your client throughout the relationship. You should always serve your clients with the knowledge that they are your competitors’ prospects.

Do you know what pressures your clients are under to move their business? Do you know what they say to all those other financial professionals who call them? If you don't, I suggest you get to know your clients better and find out. The more you know about your competition, the more you can do to make sure you are better than they are.

Your clients may not use you for all their financial needs. Do you know who else they are using and why? Do you know what they like and dislike about them? Not only will you learn from this, you may also find opportunities to increase your percentage of the business they do with you.

Get to Know Your Clients Better

Whenever possible, get to know your clients beyond what brought you together in the first place. Form business friendships with as many clients as you can. Get to know them as people. Take a genuine interest in them. Not every client wants you to do this, but most will appreciate it.

The clients who give me the best referrals and continue to give me referrals long after I've served them are those I now count as business friends. If your attitude is strictly business, you are probably missing tons of opportunities for referrals, not to mention more business from your existing clients.

Bottom line - creating business friendships increases client loyalty and enhances your referability.

Survey Your Clients – Over the Phone

You should be constantly asking your clients, "How am I doing?" "If we could do one thing better, what would it be?" And you should be asking these questions over the phone – not in writing. Here are 6 reasons to conduct your client surveys over the phone:

• You obtain more useful information – it’s easier to talk than it is to write.
• You demonstrate how much you care about serving them well.
• You obtain more honest information – it’s easier to “open up” over the phone than in person.
• Your response rate will be much higher – close to 100 percent.
• This is another personal contact with your clients.
• You can communicate feelings and intentions much better in a conversation than you can in writing.

Sometimes the Little Things Are the Big Things

- Serve them by giving referrals. If they have a need, financial or otherwise, and you’re not the right person to serve them, connect them with someone who can. Follow up to make sure your referral has “gone through.”

- Don’t just be there for them from 9 to 5. Handwrite your cell phone number on your business card as you give it to them. They’ll likely never use it unless they really need to, but it reassures them.

- Keep your word. Doing what you're supposed to do, when you are supposed to do it, is the very minimum required to provide good client service and get referrals.

- When something goes wrong and it will, apologize. When you apologize, you’re not admitting fault, you’re just sorry they are being inconvenienced. It reduces tension because it demonstrates you are there for them. (Almost no one in business ever says they're sorry.) Then, immediately after you apologize, fix the problem as quickly as possible. Even if it’s too late to fix the problem, they’ll feel better if you really listen to them.

- Set high service standards for yourself and your firm, and tell your clients about them.

- If a clients stops doing business with you, don’t burn the bridge. Go out of your way to make them feel comfortable about coming back.

- Say “thank you” every time you get the chance.

Want to learn more? Sign up for Bill Cates & Maribeth Kuzmeski's 2011 Client Acquisition Boot Camp. Register today and save $100!

Cultivating Relationships NOT Worth the Time?

Proactively cultivating relationships is often an afterthought. We are just too busy trying to get through the workload directly in front of us. And, relationships are not what we DO in our businesses, right? Most firms are not in the “relationship business.”  You are in the [INSERT your core offering] business. Simply spoken: We need sales, not more friends!

STOP RIGHT THERE!! Above is an excuse that we often create (myself included), subconsciously or consciously, for not finding the time to do one of the most important things directly affecting growth and profitability. 

Intuitively we know that relationships are important, but let’s just focus on the logical. When you look back on your sales from last year, evaluate the “why” when thinking about your best clients and your biggest sales. Quantify the value of the referrals you received, the word of mouth, and repeat business. When you add it all up, you may notice that the way others “feel” about you is critically important. They certainly would not go out of their way to do business with you or talk about you with others just because of your product or service offering.  There are probably many others who can do or provide the same offerings.

There's often a direct correlation between the quality of your relationships with prospects and clients, and the rate of sales and growth in your business. The question is, what will you do about this in 2011? How about you reach out to 1 person each day above and beyond your regular work. It may just make the tipping point difference.

Those Who Can Speak Close More Sales

One of the very best speakers I've had the privilege to hear isn't necessarily someone you may have heard of. He doesn’t make his living earning speaking fees; in fact, he probably has never received a payment for speaking services. He speaks to get his message across and to facilitate sales for his company. He presents within his industry only, so—unless you're a financial advisor or a financial wholesaler—you may have never had the pleasure of listening to him. 

So what’s his secret?

I wrote about Christopher Mee’s ability to close sales through his speaking abilities in my book, The Connectors. I have observed that Mee is such an exceptional orator because of the way he manages to so eloquently connect with an audience. Whenever he speaks, he seems to carry the audience in the palm of his hands. I've seen him take an audience and literally lift them out of their seats, give inspiration and motivation, instill confidence, enlighten, give solutions, and, as a result, get people to want to do business with his company…over and over again.

His secret? Spend 70% of a sales presentation on the audience’s challenges, 20% on solutions, and 10% on a call to action, in that order—then you'll have a well-designed presentation that will engage. A presentation—even a sales presentation—should not be about the speaker, but rather, about the audience. Great speakers I have heard spend time getting agreement and interacting with the audience about the challenges they face until their prospective clients are eventually hungry for solutions. An impactful presentation connects, but it always closes on an action. And in the case of Mee, I’ve never seen someone spend so little time on the traditional act of closing a sale and be so prolific at actually closing sales.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Guest Blog: New Kids on the Block

Guest Blog from Lena Rizkallah of Mosaic Consulting

The results of November’s tumultuous mid-term elections are in: for the third time in four years, a significant change has taken over Congress.  The Republicans took back the majority in the House while the Democrats maintained their lead in the Senate, albeit by a slim margin.  Overwhelmingly, the shift among voters resulted from the state of the economy, job losses and an uncertain future.

One thing is clear: the election results demonstrated what is most on the minds of Americans today, and that is the state of the economy.  It’s critical then to keep this in mind when meeting with your clients and prospects (because it’s clearly on their minds too).  They may be tired of talking about the slow economic recover and may be tired of hearing about it, but that’s because they’re ready to see results.  Are your clients and prospects still looking to you to help them as the economy continues to recover, or are they too looking to shift the balance in power and seek advice elsewhere?

It is in the best interests not only of the country but also for the future of our political leaders to make economic recovery the number one priority.  Not the repeal of the health care bill.  Not the pushing forward of a cap and trade bill.  Not a prolonged dissection of the Dodd-Frank Bill. And, seriously, the US can wait on whether to legalize marijuana or not.

That’s not to say that these issues are not relevant, and they certainly should be given their fair turn in debate in Congress.  But for now, let’s focus on the real issues at hand: setting policies into place that would lead to an economic recovery and long-term economic growth; creating incentives to encourage job creation; providing small business incentives; and for Pete’s sake, let’s make some decisions on where taxes are headed already!

President Obama has a tough road ahead of him.  Now that the Republicans are back in town, along with some Tea Partiers, it will be more challenging for him to push through his agenda.  In fact, the elections will probably cause him to scale back his ambitious agenda and result in a more conciliatory approach.  In his speech last Wednesday, President Obama indicated that he welcomes collaboration and bipartisanship to take shape in the next few years.  But judging from the squabbles of the past two years, it’s unclear whether either party will actually ‘play nice.’

Hopefully, with more clarity on income, investment and estate tax rates and a focus on the economy, Americans may finally leave the land of uncertainty and return to the land of prosperity.  It is important to address these concerns directly with your clients and prospects.  Be the one they can trust to get them back on track.  Lead them out of the current turmoil and you will have a wealth of happy clients--which could result in fantastic referrals and new clients too!

The 3 Elements of Infomercials Every Business Should Employ

 

 

Blog from Maribeth Kuzmeski of Red Zone Marketing 

Infomercials help brands sell over four billion dollars of products and services every year. While some members of the advertising industry view infomercials as second-rate campaigns, in general, they work. That’s why they are on all of the time! So whether you use the medium or not, following these 3 elements of what makes them so successful is smart business.
 

1.    Infomercials build a comprehensive and convincing case. Infomercials are designed to capture viewers' mindshare, inspire them to write down their phone number, dial it, and buy. And the only way that will happen is if the infomercial works as a complete stand-alone sales presentation. The goal is to build a comprehensive and convincing case for buying by giving viewers all of the information they need to make a purchasing decision. They explain every benefit, answer all objections; and then do it again.

2.    Infomercials present testimonials to eliminate objections. Infomercials prove the worthiness of a product by showing it in action and then presenting the results with real customers. The goal is to inspire action by taking all of your objections away.  But if you can’t use testimonials in your business, don’t worry. You can still verbally explain what others have said about your service and personal touch. For example: “The best way to describe what we do is by sharing what one of our clients said last week…”

3.    Infomercials provide strong and immediate calls to action. Infomercials make a very specific offer. They don’t give you lots of options or choices to customize; instead, they make the recommendation easy to understand. You essentially have only two choices: buy, or don’t buy.  And to get you to act right away, the offer is typically doubled, or accompanied by an additional free product.

Do you build a convincing case, eliminate objections and make a specific offer? If not, it may be a great time to test out the proven methods of infomercials. Why? Because they work!
 

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Guest Blog: Why Some Sales People Think LinkedIn Doesn’t Work For Them

Guest Blog from Jan Vermeiren, founder of Networking Coach

LinkedIn is a very powerful tool that can support us when we want to get in touch with potential
customers.

However many sales people tell us LinkedIn doesn’t work for them. In this article we talk about the
three most important misperceptions.

1. I have made a Profile, now potential customers will contact me one after the other.

a. Though crafting a good Profile helps to be found by people who are looking for your
expertise, products or services (via Linkedin or via Google or other search engines),
this is not where the power of LinkedIn resides.

b. LinkedIn is a very powerful tool for sales people who are proactive and don’t wait till
someone contacts them.

2. I have sent some potential customers an Invitation. However they don’t accept the Invitation
or don’t respond to my messages to buy my products or services.

a. LinkedIn is a NETWORK tool and not a SALES tool. LinkedIn helps to build
relationships with people. If you use it like a “cold calling machine” the reaction of
people will be the same as with a “cold call”: no reaction or rejection. Not only this
is not effective and not very efficient, but there is also another danger: LinkedIn has
some tools that people could use to indicate that you are a spammer. If you get too
many of these “flags”, your possibilities to connect with other people will be reduced
dramatically.

b. Always remember it is about building relationships. The golden rule of Bob Burg
always applies: “All things being equal people do business with and refer business
to people they know, like and trust.” LinkedIn offers you the opportunity to increase
these 3 factors if done in the right way. Crafting a good Profile, helping others in
Discussions and Answers and not pushing your products or services you already helps
a lot, just like in “real life”.

3. I use the “Get Introduced To” function to get me referred by my network to potential
customers.

a. Though this approach might get you some results, it is not always the best option.
Your own network doesn’t always forwards your messages and the prospect doesn’t
always reply. There might be several reasons for that, but the reasons most people
don’t think of are: your contact doesn’t know the prospect well enough, your contact
doesn’t know you well enough or your contact thinks that your message is too pushy.

b. Instead use LinkedIn as a research database to discover the relationships between
people and then proceed outside of LinkedIn. Call your contact and explain him the
situation. If he responds positively, ask him to write an email to introduce you and
the prospect to each other. In this way your prospect receives the message from
someone he already knows and trusts. If you use LinkedIn you are the one who takes
the initiative, which is much less powerful.

Author

Jan Vermeiren is the founder of Networking Coach. Following on the best seller success of his first
book “Let’s Connect!” , in his second book “How to REALLY use LinkedIn” he reveals even more the
dynamics of networking and tools that anybody can immediately apply.

Together with his team at Networking Coach, Jan gives presentations and training courses in the field
of networking and referrals. Customers are large organisations like Deloitte, Dupont, IBM, ING, SAP,
Sun Microsystems and Vlerick Leuven Gent Management School , as well as small companies and
freelancers.

Get your free light version of “How to REALLY use LinkedIn” at: www.how-to-really-use-linkedin.com 

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Upgrading Performance Closes More Sales: Lessons learned from 14 year old hockey players

Blog from Maribeth Kuzmeski of Red Zone Marketing

Performing at your highest level is difficult to do over and over again. It’s not your talent that fluctuates.  You may alter and upgrade your game plan and knowledge level, but at the end of the day true high-level performance seems to be driven by something other than talent alone. I believe winning at the highest level, closing the biggest or the most sales, is based on the energy you bring – with all other factors being reasonably similar.

Energy? Like the stuff you buy in the can under names like Red Bull? Unfortunately, they don’t sell this kind of energy in a can. This energy is a combination of both passion and confidence. When we’re playing our “A” game, we typically bring our talent, knowledge, passion and confidence to work together. The talent and knowledge are there to some consistent degree. We know what we know, that doesn’t change. The passion and confidence are what come and go, weighing heavily on our performance. Yet we spend far more time typically on all the other things, and when it’s “Game Time” the most important element, energy, is often dissipated by distraction.

This weekend I watched my son’s hockey team compete in a tournament in St. Louis. On Saturday afternoon they played a game and were absolutely dominated 1-11. They looked like they were playing in the wrong level in the tournament. It wasn’t a fair fight. They couldn’t move the puck from one end to the other to even get more than a few scoring opportunities. The coach told them he had never coached a team like this. It was a disaster! Then they played a game in the evening against an equally strong team as earlier. My son’s team came with the same players, same talent level, same skill and knowledge level of the game. But they were a totally different team. They brought fight, passion, and confidence that they knew they were better than they looked earlier. They were quiet before the game. No fist pumping or chest pounding. Quiet. And they went out and dominated this team 6-1.  They were NOT the same team. Passing was on, shooting was accurate, and goaltending was impossibly on.

Do you ever come with everything but the quiet energy to win? The boys in the first game on Saturday wanted to win. But they didn’t play like it.

Are you mentally prepared to:

•    Leave a powerful voicemail message?
•    Make a compelling follow up prospect call?
•    Be memorable when meeting people at a business function?
•    Close a sale with a potential ideal client?
•    Conduct your best meeting with a top client?

Most of the energy comes in preparation, reviewing the importance of the task at hand, and the ability to remove distractions. It’s about bringing the best you to the table.  It isn’t that we want to perform poorly, but sometimes we do. And it is not about what we know – it is about what we bring. The energy makes all of the difference.

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Recession-Inspired Smart Changes to Your Business

Blog from Maribeth Kuzmeski of Red Zone Marketing

I just want to be done hearing about  - and living - this recession. All of the analogies, comparisons, sound bites, and talk. Most of the firms I know are getting down to business, marketing and focusing on their target market of prospects. But it is true that the recession is still here and there continues to be stories of businesses folding or becoming unrecognizable in terms of staff, clients and success. One of the most successful individuals I had the privilege to know was a top financial advisor for many years - one of the best in the nation. But the recession has been exceptionally hard on him. It causes a few conclusions and lessons: 1. Success is fleeting. 2. Change is necessary. 3. Testing new ideas is a critical task so that time/money is not wasted. 4. Having the right staff in place is critical in moving forward.

Ultimately, today we have to get more quantitative. If what we are doing is not getting tangible RESULTS, we have to make a change. Firms that have come through are doing a few things differently and better than ever before. Here are some of their smart and simple activities:

1.       Focusing on sales and marketing again in an inspired way. The most successful have become more aggressive in messaging their value and benefits and letting their target market know what they do so well. It is simply getting back to a daily focus on the core of what makes a business successful – more sales.

2.       Asking…”What’s the return on investment?” For instance, a seminar or event isn’t successful based on the number of attendees; it’s on the ultimate results and measurable outcomes (ie sales or referrals). Firms are getting increasingly quantitative - as if they were a publicly traded company - imagine that! Sounds simple, but setting a sales objective for everything you do, and reaching it is truly inspiring!

3.       Reorganizing your staff objectives. How is your staff performing? Add a significant, measurable performance element to compensation. You may like your employees personally, but if they cannot meet performance measures, or client survey results are not showing that they are making an impact, then they could be hurting more than helping. Find out who is not a team player. A feud internally can cause significant issues that project onto your clients and prospects on behalf of your staff. And that is never good.

It is simple, but requires focus, strategy and motivation to make some small and large changes. Smart changes. Changes you probably should have made long ago.

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People ARE listening! The question is – Are you saying anything worth hearing?

Blog from Maribeth Kuzmeski of Red Zone Marketing

From years of experience, I’ve learned that if I leave a voicemail message for my husband, I have to get to the compelling and important information at the beginning of the message. If I leave it for the end, he never really makes it there. He begins doing something I call “light listening” (i.e. He’s bored with his own wife’s rambling message and can barely pay attention).

How are your voicemail messages? How about your email communications? Are you communicating something compelling that is short and concise? Does it give anything of value? Or are you becoming a victim of “light listening” as you fail to get to any point in a timely manner?

A serial entrepreneur I’ve worked with, who seems to turn most everything he touches into gold, told me his secret to communicating well on the phone. He told me he writes out the voicemail message before he makes a phone call. And he does it before just about every call he makes. Then, if he has to leave a voicemail, he is ready. And, if he speaks live to the person that he’s calling, he is much more prepared. It is especially important when talking with a prospect, a strategic alliance connection, or a networking contact. Because if you don’t give them your best, you have left them with a lasting message that may have them questioning you and your abilities (it happens)!

These days I text my husband and get right to the point with information like… “Can you please pick up Shane at 6pm or he will be stranded at hockey practice?” Best to get the important messages delivered without the fluff. And, it’s hard to be that boring in 160 characters.

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Winning Isn’t Everything…

Blog from Maribeth Kuzmeski of Red Zone Marketing

Vince Lombardi famously said “winning isn’t everything, it’s the only thing” or some variation on that theme.  Do you think it’s true? Is it really all or nothing? Well, what is true, typically, is that the runner up will not be remembered.

Sometimes, our instincts are to minimize the value of winning. We tell ourselves, “It’s ok if we don’t win” or “We’ll get ‘em next time” – but really that’s a justification.  Carrying that mentality makes room for failure before we have even tried to win. It is OK to lose. BUT…
 
It just really isn’t OK to convince ourselves that it is ok. It is mediocre, and from what I’ve seen, often has the effect of undermining the ability to give 100%. NOTE: For those of you that are, right now as you read this, minimizing losing, I ask you to put aside the various exceptions just for now. For instance, the person who wins American Idol isn’t often the best or the one that accomplishes the most fame. OR, the business that wins the big deal with Walmart has such low margins that they cannot afford to fulfill the orders. But, more often, big wins create superstars, superpowers, new leaders and most importantly, momentum.

The fact is that although we WILL ‘get ‘em next time,’ and yes our businesses will survive, and yes life goes on – capitalizing on the opportunities of winning is much better than spending time convincing ourselves that losing is ok.

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