Here’s a quick bit of insight for you before the week’s out. Remember this the next time you put together a marketing campaign.

One of the biggest mistakes any business can make is to send out materials that are dull, boring, and mind numbing. That’s right. Being boring is a HUGE mistake!

Think about it for a moment. How much advertising are you subjected to on a daily basis? Of all this advertising, is any of it really interesting? Or at the very least memorable? Unfortunately, probably not.

So, don’t be like everyone else! People LOVE doing business with real people. People that live, breath, have emotions, face daily challenges, and put their pants on one leg at a time. So, why not show your prospects and customers you fit that very bill?

How can you inject some personality into your marketing?

Well, the first thing you can do is to be yourself and don’t be afraid to reveal who you really are. As an example, I’m a HUGE sports nut, as if you need me to remind you. One of the ways I inject some personality is to periodically talk about my favorite teams. It’s not much, but it at least lets you know I have interests outside of marketing and hopefully, it lets you know I’m a real person.

So, next time you put out a marketing piece, no matter what it is, be sure to inject some personality and don’t let it be boring!

Yesterday I promised you a killer marketing idea today so here it is. This one’s called the Power 100 team. With the temperatures starting to drop and the growing season coming to an end, it’s a great project to tackle over the cooler winter months. Now, this isn’t necessarily going to add profit to your bottom line right now, but over the long haul it will add a TON of new customers to your roster.

Basically, the goal behind this marketing system is to become the ‘go to guy’ for your customers and prospects when they’re looking for other service providers. After implementing this system you’ll have prospects and customers coming at you from every conceivable angle.

Okay, here’s the way it works. The first thing you need to do is to make a list of all the different types of service providers that might service your target customer. This list could include cleaning services, accountants, plumbers, electricians, tailors, real estate agents, financial planners, insurance agents, etc. List as many of these types of non-competing businesses as you can think of.

Once you have this list, your next task is to list an actual business next to each item. You may be able to fill in many immediately with businesses you either know the owner of or have used previously. For the ones you don’t know, you’ll want to either ask for recommendations from friends, family, neighbors, or even your customers.

Now, you’ll most likely need to explain to these businesses what’s going on so here’s what you tell them. Basically, you’re trying to create a directory of RECOMMENDED businesses your customers can call on. So, anytime they need a good accountant they pull out your little directory and can know it’s someone that comes highly recommended. The same goes for the cleaning service.
And the baby sitter. And so on and so on.

However, it doesn’t just stop with your own customers because you will also offer this directory to the businesses you have on the list. So you’d send this directory to the real estate agent on the list and tell her to send it to her customers as well. And the same for the plumber. And the electrician. And so on and so on.

As a result of this system, you’ll provide your own customers a valuable service by helping them find reliable, trusted service providers for their other needs, but you’ll also be gaining access to literally HUNDREDS of additional prospects.

Now, setting something like this up will DEFINITELY take some time and effort, but I promise you it’ll be well worth both.

If you have any specific questions about how to make this work, please feel free to drop me a line and I’ll do my best to clarify any questions you have.

I’ve posted previously about the power of sending your customers a hard printed newsletter each and every month. Nothing will do more to build your business than developing lasting relationships with your existing customers and a monthly newsletter can do just that.

I’ve had quite a few people ask to see a sample of the newsletter template I create each and every month, so I’ve posted September’s here for everyone to view.

You can view the newsletter HERE.

I offer this service each month for $59, which of course does not including the cost of printing and mailing. With each month’s issue you’ll get a Word file that you can change and customize any way you like. All you need to do is go in and edit the appropriate parts. In some cases, the parts you need to edit are housed within these brackets “{ }”.

If you think it’s too much work to take care of all this, my team and I can do it all for you. For an additional $50 (NOT including postage) we’ll do all the necessary customizations to make it all yours, and then we’ll worry about getting it printed and mailed out for you. You’d simply send us all the information we’d need to customize it for you, as well as the mailing list we need to send it to.

So, if this is something you know you should be doing but just haven’t gotten around to it yet, you don’t have any excuses anymore!

Do you know what your business’ most valuable asset is? Well, despite what I’ve said many times in numerous articles I’ve written or in previous emails I’ve sent, I’m changing my story.

You see, typically I would say your most valuable asset is your list of customers.

Think about. Without your customers you don’t have any revenue. Without your customers there’s no way your business can grow. Plain and simple, right?

Well, maybe not. Here’s why. Even MORE valuable than your list of customers is the relationship you have with that list. The reason for this is because you could have a list of customers that have bought from you once, but unless you have a good enough relationship that makes them want to buy again, your list isn’t worth anything.

Having a good relationship with your list is almost like your very own private bank vault. Anytime you need to increase revenue, simply offer your list a new service. Want to get more new customers? Ask your list to help you out by referring their friends or neighbors.

If you don’t have a good relationship with your list of customers, none of this is possible. Each time you want to increase sales or generate referrals you have to start over at the prospecting phase. A VERY expensive way to run a business.

So, if you’re not doing anything to build and strengthen your relationship with your customers, START NOW. It’s especially important this time of year because very shortly they won’t need you (unless you offer winter services as well).

One method I HIGHLY recommend is sending a monthly PRINTED newsletter each month. This is a fantastic way to stay in front of them, remind them who you are, let them know they matter to your business, and ultimately strengthen your relationship.

If you think it’s too much work or very expensive it’s not. I offer a ready-made newsletter template that will take 30 minutes or so for you to go through and customize it for your business. Then once it’s ready to go I can even show you the source I use to print and mail it, all for less than $.80 a piece.

You can literally be done in less than an hour. And, it’s an hour’s worth of work that will go a LOOONNNGGGG way towards strengthening your business for the long haul.

I offer a brand new pre-printed newsletter each month for only $49, so if you’d like more information about this, just drop me a quick email. I’m working to get all the details up on my website, but unfortunately haven’t had time to do so yet. Sorry!

Anyway, if you’ll invest the time, effort, and money (doesn’t have to be much) it takes to develop a solid relationship with your customers you’ll be able to weather the difficult times as well as build a solid business that provides you with the comfortable live you’re after for many years to come.

Here’s a quick idea to help you generate some new business this fall AND get a bunch of referrals out of it at the same time.

You know how many neighbors will band together to rent an aerator on a Saturday in order to cut down on the costs? Well, why can’t you offer some type of discount to your existing customers if they can get some of their neighbors to use your service?
Think about it. You normally charge $100 for a fall aeration plus reseeding job. Well, what if you offered it to your existing customers for only $75 IF they’re able to get at least 2-3 of their neighbors to purchase the same service.

Now if you’re thinking I’m off my rocker, stop and think about the numbers. Your biggest expense is usually just dropping your gate. So if you can line up 3 or 4 jobs immediately next to each other, you can hop from one job to the next, to the next, to the next with very little time and expense.

Plus, if you can offer a sizeable percentage off the normal price for your existing customers AND every one of their neighbors that takes advantage of the offer as well, you all come out ahead. Your customers can spend their weekend doing something they’d enjoy much more, they get their fall aeration and over-seeding done professionally, and you get more business PLUS a few new customers out of the deal.

How can you beat that?

If you’re interested in doing something like this, I have a sample campaign package ready to go. The package includes a letter template, plus some inserts to give your customers that they can pass on to their neighbors. Shoot me an email if you’d like more information about this campaign package.

Anyway, I’m loving this cooler fall weather and am looking forward to the leaves changing cooler soon. Besides, it means more opportunities to get new business!

More and more I’m realizing the value of having a clear cut plan of attack in place because if I didn’t, I’d wake up and find out I’m still trying to figure out what needs to get done 2 days ago.

Anyway, that’s not what I wanted to talk about today. I want to touch briefly on the differences between Price and Value. Knowing what each of these are and how they’re different can make a HUGE difference in your business.

PRICE is what someone pays for something. Plain and simple. No fancy explanations needed to help you understand this one.

Value, on the other hand, may take a bit more explaining. You see, VALUE is a combination of both the price someone pays AND the total benefits derived from that ‘something’.

If the PRICE is way to high for the VALUE received, that business won’t be in business very long. I’m sure you get the picture.

So, how can you turn this knowledge to your advantage?

In many cases, especially the green industry, businesses try to compete on price alone. They think the only thing the customer’s worried about is the amount of the invoice you’re going to send. As a result, they’re willing to undercut their prices simply to try and land new customers.

Well, I’m here to tell you that that’s a HORRIBLE way to run your business and it’s not always necessary. If you do happen to have customers that are only worried about price, then I suggest you start looking for more customers that aren’t.

You see, instead of competing just on PRICE, you should position yourself to compete on VALUE. That way, you can provide basically the same services, but not have to worry yourself to sleep at night thinking your customer will vanish the next time some low ball scrub comes knocking on their door.

Aside from looking for customers that are more interested in VALUE than PRICE, you should constantly be educating your customers on why you do provide the best VALUE.

Go the ‘extra mile’ for them and demonstrate a willingness to do things other LCO’s aren’t willing to do and you’ll soon find you have a business filled with loyal, VALUE conscious customers instead of wishy-washy, price checkers.