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Archive for recession proof
What is The Best Response to a Bad Economy?
Posted by: | CommentsThose of you who’ve been around me a while know I spend a lot of time talking about what goes on in the few pounds of fleshy matter sat squarely between your iPod headphones (yes, your brain) and how IT — or better still YOU manifest what happens in your business, your life and happiness through your own thoughts.
Most people find the link between what they think and what happens to them a tenuous, often ’silly’ and in a lot of cases ‘pyscho-babble’ b**lsh*t…
Where you stand on the matter isn’t important.
And nor is whether you agree with me.
But for the next few minutes, ‘let’s agree that you agree with me’.
So…
What is the appropriate and best response to smashed markets, and economies battered so hard they’re nigh on unrecognisable?
A completely understandable, rational response is FEAR, worry, desperation, hiding out and waiting… But, you’ll wait a very, very, very long time before someone shout “Ahoy there!! Come out from under the rock! All is good again!”.
But, if YOU are after SUCCESS then it’s pretty obvious what your response CANNOT be — isn’t it???
Quite simply… What everyone else IS doing!
There is a lot of mileage in solving ‘Mysteries’ - whether it’s Agatha Christie, Morse or Einstein.
But your task of responding to what’s happening in the economy is NO mystery at all…
One of my most admired success coaches is Earl Nightingale (and if you aren’t aware of Earl, which you should be, go get all his books and tapes and absorb them like a sponge). Earl famously said “If you’re can’t decide what to do, look around at what everyone else is doing and do the opposite” (or words to that effect).
And that should be your response. You must NOT do what most are: shrinking; shrinking their thinking, their ambitions, their activities; shrinking the marketplace; shrinking what they offer and deliver.
Rather…You must create BIGGER, better, more exciting, more irresistible reasons for customers to get up off their butts, leave their homes, unlock their wallets and bring them to you, to be willing to spend when their every instinct screams “DON’T”.
You must do MORE, be MORE.
Ok, but what is the answer, or what are the answers to what you should be doing now?
Well, the quality of the answers YOU get entirely depends on the quality of the questions you ask.
This is certainly true of my consulting work with clients; some ask far better questions than others, and get better answers.
There ARE answers - right now - to how you can more effectively attract more affluent customer’s - right now - to prosper while the majority aren’t - right now. Getting to those answers depends on the questions you ask yourself, including those you aks yourself about what you’ve read here…
Dedicated to your success,
Henry.
PS: If you haven’t yet accepted my FREE GIFT then what are you waiting for? Sometimes something comes along that can really make a difference to your life. Just one decision can change everything. Accepting my FREE GIFT could be that decision. I’ll certainly do my best to ensure it is… Click Here to Accept Your FREE GIFT
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6 Ways to Kick Recession Into Touch
Posted by: | CommentsIt’s now 2 minutes to 5pm on Saturday and I’m sat here watching England play Scotland in the 6 nations.
Right now we’re 18-9 up.
Who knows how the game will end…
Plus, we’ve got the Ireland, Wales game in a bit which should be a ‘cracker’.
Anyway, as I was sat here watching the rugby, it struck me that beating recession is a little like a close fought battle on the rugby pitch.
I don’t know if you are rugby fan and it doesn’t matter.
But, if you remember England’s campaign in the last World Cup then you’ll remember the dogged, ‘bloody’ determination and ‘never, ever give up’ attitude our team displayed on their way to the finals.
We didn’t win but my word what a fight we put up.
And, if you’re being hit by recession it is that kind of ‘brutal’, ‘take no prisoners’, ‘I CAN win this’ attitude you need and need to keep firm.
But there’s more to it than that. You also need to be thinking, planning and implementing ideas FAST.
Here are 6 critical things you should be doing:
Recession Slayer #1: Account for Every Single lead, Prospect or Enquiry. I’m willing to bet that you lose anything between 5% and 50% of the business you could generate through ’slippage’. Telephone enquiries that don’t get followed up, emails that get forgotten, proposals that aren’t closed etc, etc. In tough times the cost of new client acquisition goes up. In many cases there are less new clients around (not all) and you need to do more to attract them. A world class lead generation system will help you keep costs down and free up resources. Secrets to making your client acquisition more efficient:
1. Track response from all your advertising and marketing. Identify which get the responses and which don’t. Do more of the ones that do and less of the ones that don’t.
2. Perfect your sales process. Whether that’s face to face in a shop or office, online, offline or whatever. Spend MORE here.
Recession Slayer #3: Get Some Friends: Recession hits all business and those in your area, industry and outside are looking for help too. Now is a very good time to develop mutually beneficial partnerships. In simple terms you offer your products/services to another companies’ customers and they do the same in return. Many benefits arise - you both gain clients, you both gain easy profit, your customer win because they get added value from you both!
Recession Slayer #4: Keep Your Mouth Firmly Closed. Back in my deep dark days as a corporate ’superstar’ there was nothing which would draw my inspiration, creativity and motivation to a stop faster than hearing from a boss or colleague that the company was in trouble. Wham! The shutters went down. You can and will have the same affect on the people in your business. The moment they get a sniff of despair it’ll run riot. Remember - the market for what you sell still exists. People ARE still spending money (and more of it than either I or you could ever comfortably suck up). Be the opportunistic entrepreneur - don’t ‘throw in the towel’. Excite your own and your employee’s imagination with opportunity and creativity.
Recession Slayer #5: Specialise and Raise Your Prices. Focusing on a defined, niche group of prospects and customers allows you to charge premium prices and beat generic competitors. The very best way to recession proof your business is to change WHO you are targeting. Remember, your best clients will be those affected least and last by recession. Who are they? You got it… The affluent…
Recession Slayer #6: Mine for Gold. Earl Nightingale and ‘Acres of Diamonds’ keeps ringing in my ears. It is way, way easier and cheaper to extract additional business from your existing clients that it is to go find new ones. It astonishes me that so many small business owners, coaches, consultants, speakers and authors don’t have a rock solid system in place to sell additional stuff to their customers and clients. To get more from your base you must communicate with them more. Send a newsletter at least once a month and do not be shy to offer products and service that will be of value to them.
Above all, keep your chin up and keep thinking, keep creating, keep going. There’s ample, abundant opportunity out there for you. Grab your share.
And don’t forget to take me up on my FREE GIFT — It is packed full of recession beating ideas.
Click Here to Grab Your FREE GIFT
Have a fantastic weekend,
Henry.
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16 Fast Ways to Recession Proof Your Business
Posted by: | CommentsThere ARE signs consumer confidence is UP!!!
High Street sales are up 1.5% on last year.
Woopeee sh*t (excuse me)!
That is UNIMPORTANT.
What is IMPORTANT is what YOU are doing in YOUR world to go get a BIG slice of the spend in YOUR area, industry, specialisation.
What it does confirm is what I’ve said all along (I hate being right) - people ARE spending.
And they are spending a LOT.
All ya gotta do is find where the money is changing hands and sit in the middle with something of value and open hands.
To do that you MUST employ as MANY customer/client gathering strategies as you can get your hot little hands on.
NOTE: The fastest way to dramatic business growth even in recession is to do as many things as possible to increase your success. You SHOULD look to improve your performance in ALL these areas:
1. How many new customer/clients you generate.
2. How many times your existing customers/client return.
3. How much they spend on each visit.
4. How many people they refer.
When I talk my new clients and member through this the reaction is often:
“Derrr…Yeah…Of course…tell me something I didn’t know.”
And that’s not a slight - it is seemingly obvious.
What’s not obvious is when you break each are down and look at what’s actually being done - really being done in
each area to make it as effective as possible.
Let’s just look at number 1.
What tools, strategies and techniques do you use to generate new clients?
Here’s a partial list of the ones you should be using, have tested or if not, get using/testing…
- Direct mail
- Joint Ventures
- Telesales
- Yellow Pages
- Magazines
- Newspapers
- Directories
- Pay per click internet advertising
- Search engine marketing
- Blogs
- Press releases
- Articles
- Offline networking
- Online networking
- Speaking
- Books
- Hot lines
- Reports and white papers
- Fax broadcasting
- Voice broadcasting
- Affiliate programs (if your product/service lends itself to such)
- Video marketing
- Viral marketing
- And tons more
Look down that list and tick the ones you use.
I bet it’s not more than a few to a handful?
That’s OK, just realise that by not using the rest you are leaving lots of money on the table.
Sure, some take more time than others and sure some will cost you more to acquire a customer/client than others BUT, IF you do numbers 2, 3 and 4 from the first list well then beating recession, destroying your competition and dominating your market becomes light years easier…
Oh, and it’ll make you a bunch of money in the process.
Happy recession slaying.
Henry Baker.
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Woolworths, Aston Martin and Recession…Yawwnnn…
Posted by: | CommentsWoh…What a week.
Apparently a hands down blockbuster winner for the recession.
Recession 1 - Business 0
Woolworths — woops.
Aston Martin — Ah!
Geez — apocalypse is setting in.
Or is it?
I ran a little laboratory test on myself this week.
If you’ve been around me a while you know I have a passionate objection to watching the news and reading newspapers. But this week I canned that and filled my belly with Sky News, BBC, the FT, Independent and a bunch more.
The effect has been nothing short of extraordinary.
Like sticking an Olympic athlete on diet of cheese burgers and Coke and then asking here to swim a world record 400m medley time — ‘aint gonna happen.
Before I began my news binge I was focused like a laser beam on where I, my businesses and family would be within a year, 2 years, 5 years and beyond.
Last night I was in absolute turmoil.
Fretting, sweating, worrying about our future, our families future, the worlds future and also the recession busting tips and stratgies I help my clients with (I know they work doubt was creaping in).
Plans started to unravel, my laser focus was way off target aiming at thoughts of losing everything, ending up an destitute alcoholic with a beard (a little exagerated).
Ok, what’s the point of this?
You have GOT to FILL your mind with PROSPERITY not poverty.
I’m not advising you not to watch the news or read newspapers — up to you. BUT, I am saying be VERY, VERY careful what you let into your environment — it has a HUGE effect on you.
Constant absorption of negative, recesison filled tales CANNOT help you. However, a constant commitment to associating with positive people, infomation and ideas WILL help you.
And I don’t mean looking in the mirror and chanting “Everything is great”. That will only help IF you have a REASON for everything to be great.
So here’s the key.
Get a reason.
Decide HOW YOU are going to conquer recession and set to work doing it.
If you needs more clients deverop a plan to get them. What’s in the plan?
- - More prospect generating marketing. Identify what’s worked well in the past and do more of it.
- - More referral marketing
- - Identify 100 possible joint venture partners, devise an irresistible offer and contact them all!
If you need a cash boot - put a cash boost plan in place.
- - Identify a need within your current client base.
- - Create something to fill it.
- - Write a bloskbsuter sales letter (or pay me to doi it).
- - Send out the letter.
- - Rake in the cash.
Whatever your challaneges are, there is ALWAYS a way to fix ‘em.
And even if apparently totally insermountable — look for the positive…It WILL be there.
The END.
Well, sort of.
A little different this week I know.
I simply had to share my little experiment.
Chin up.
Henry Baker.
PS: If you’ve only just subscribed to my ramblings, welcome! Hope you enjoy them and they help you.
PPS: If you know anyone else who could benefit from the endless spouting of a marketing genuis who loves to help others grow their businesses then please ask them to subscribe at http://www.recessionslayer.co.uk, forward this mail on or ask them to mail me directly.
PPPS: If you need to add a shot of ‘juice’ into your marketing and want some help — mail me with some specific POSITIVE comments on how my tips have helped you and you’ll get a a free 15 minute consultation worth a whole lot of money. Fair deal?
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