Sales is one of the most important parts of running a business. Obviously, if there are no sales then there are no customers to provide your product or service to. Sales are the first thing that you focus on when starting up a business, or trying to fix a struggling one. When I first started out many years ago, I made one single sale on an ecommerce website, and my service business made only $500 for the first year. I knew absolutely nothing about sales. Over the years, I have become an expert in the sales field and have become a consultant for some big names.

Getting the leads

Leads are the most important part of your sales job. Without leads, you have no business to sell. Targeted leads are what you need in order to have the best chances of closing sales. In order to get the leads, you have to put yourself out there. There are many outlets out there to allow you to build your audience. The trick is finding them.

As a seasoned internet marketer, and blogger, I have found lots of lead outlets over the years. That doesn’t mean that I don’t learn new tricks daily.  On top of that, some tricks cannot even be used until you reach a certain point in your marketing campaign. As example would be displaying your alexa traffic rank on your website when you first start out. It would be pointless and can actually hurt your site. People see the horrible rank and think that your site isn’t worth much. But after you reach the top 1 million alexa sites, you would be wise to display it.

A recent addition to my marketing efforts on this blog was to join EntreCard which allows me to get some free advertising on other blogs and sites. I have already been displayed on a bunch of blogs, and got some unique visits from them.

If you had it in the budget, it is so much easier to pay for leads. There are many lead providers out there who sell them for a set fee. Usually a couple of dollars, but the price tends to depend on the industry you are targeting. Higher cost leads as an example would be mortgage leads, or web design leads. These can run upwards of $30 a piece.

I would suggest starting a newsletter on your website, and trying to get people to subscribe for free. Build up your mailing list, and send a periodical newsletter. It can be once a week, or once a month. You can use the newsletter to provide updates about your company or website, and eventually you can sell ad space within your newsletters.

Leads get lost

What happens when a lead comes in, but you are out of the office? Or perhaps you are a small business and you can’t answer calls late at night. I have had issues in the past because I had a lead at 2 in the morning when I was asleep, and the potential client was shopping around. They found someone who responded quicker, even though I responded in the next morning after I awoke.

It is ok to lose some leads to competitors. Don’t stress over it because it happens. Nobody can get every single lead and close on it. But try to make sure you are doing your best to answer the leads as soon as possible. Provide ways for the customer to get a hold of you whether it be by email, phone, voicemail, messenger, etc. The more methods you provide, the better the customer feels about you. They want to know that you can be reached should they need you.

Convert the sale

Converting sales is something yet to be mastered by any company. It doesn’t matter whether you are a large corporation, or a sole proprietorship. The process is the same. It is your job to convince the customer that you are the solution to their problem.

In order to convert the sale, you need to find out exactly what they are after, and whether or not you are capable of providing it for them. Being a graphic designer, I have gotten leads who have needed graphic design, but they also wanted printing. I am not in the printing business, so I was unable to provide them with what they needed. I did not close the sale, and that’s alright. Sometimes it’s better to refer them to someone else who can provide them with what they require.

To make sure you are trying your best to convert the sale, you have to ask questions. The customer will appreciate the fact that you want to know more about their needs. That alone might impress them enough to work with you. Asking questions is something I do as a part of my web design business. When someone signs up, I send them a survey asking them for examples of sites that like, and what they like about them. I ask if they need a content management system and a blog. I ask if they need search engine optimization to go with their website design. No question is too stupid to ask if it ends up helping your customer in the end.

Keep the customer

Keeping a customer can be tough. It all depends on your industry of course. In the seo business, some people confuse what you do with sales. They don’t understand that your job is to get them top 10 google rankings, and they get upset because your work doesn’t convert into sales. As an seo, it isn’t your job to convert sales for the customer. It is your job to get them ranked which will in turn get them traffic from search engines.

There are times that you can keep a dissatisfied customer. A good way of going about that is by offering concessions. If a customer is paying you $500 per month for seo, you can offer them some free graphic design services for banner ads if they continue their contract with you for an additional 3 months. You can provide an additional service for them such as classified ad posting, or social network marketing in order to keep that customer.

In the end, providing what the customer needs and communication is what will keep the customer with you. I have heard of many times where someone didn’t communicate with the customer nearly enough, and the customer took off and signed up with someone else. Let them know that you are working for them, and what you are working on. They will appreciate the fact that you are keeping them in the loop.

Get referrals

Happy customers equals referrals. When your customer likes the work you are doing for them, they provide you with free word-of-mouth marketing. They might have a conversation with someone and the topic of your service comes up. It becomes instinct to mention your company to the person they are talking to.

I like to add an incentive to customers who bring me paid referrals. One of those incentives may be a heavy discount on the services I provide for them, or I might give them a commission for their referral.

The cheapest, and most viral way of promoting your business is through referrals. That is why it is key that you work hard to communicate with and provide for your customer in a way they appreciate.

Let’s sum it up…

In the end, it is how you run your business that determines your sales growth. Keep this in mind as you are starting your business, and keep it on your mind as you are running your business.

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There are some people on this planet that would rather die than have a traditional job. These kinds of people do better starting their own businesses because they tend to not be people persons. I will admit that I have had jobs in my past where I could think about nothing more than how much I wanted to get out of there. They were usually factory jobs in Chicago making car parts.

I promised myself (and everyone else) that I would start my own business and make enough money so I never had to work for anyone else again. I currently work from home full time. What made this happen? My strong desire not to have a boss, or to tell a customer that they are right when they are clearly wrong.

I am always on the lookout for ways to expand my income, and make it residual. The more residual it gets, the less work I have to do. I have found one of those ways. I now make money by blogging every single day. The best part is that I can take as long as I want off if I just schedule posts ahead of time. I sell ad space on this and other sites that I have on a monthly basis which means residual income. In addition, I write articles for other people who pay me for my expertise.

If you are not a good writer, that’s ok. There are other options out there which I have also done and made money at.  One of those ways is through real estate investment. Many years ago, my wife (fiance at the time), son, newborn baby and I were in a small 1 bedroom apartment on the top floor of a house. We were getting kicked out because I was laid off from my job at a factory, and I was 2 weeks behind on the rent. I thought that it was the perfect time for me to invest in real estate. Wait wait wait… I know that sounds ridiculous because of the situation I was in, but I also knew it was possible. At the time, I was reading a lot of books from authors like Carlton Sheets and Robert G Allen. I decided to put my knowledge to good use, and I drew up an offer on a 5,000 square foot Victorian mansion. I succeeded in that purchase with no money down, and 100% seller financing. We moved in just in time to not be homeless.

Not into real estate? What about stocks? I have made money in stocks. For those of you who believe the idiots who blast stocks, understand that they usually do not know what they are talking about. Penny stocks are very risky, but NYSE and NASDAQ stocks are very predictable. Every single one of them I have purchase has increased in worth. If you can start out with $5,000 minimum, then you can turn it into a million dollars. You can also turn that minimum investment into a monthly income in short time.

Not into investments? Start a business. Before I became successful from home, I worked my a$$ off. But then I started a search engine optimization business, and secured monthly clients. The first clients were referrals from a web development company owner who became a great friend. So good of a friend that I named my youngest son after him. You can start a business if you just think about what it is that you are capable of doing. If you are good with computers, then start a business related to them. If you are good at cleaning, start a house cleaning or office cleaning business.

If you don’t want to start a business or invest, you can write a book. I find that print books do very well if you get a good publisher that’s connected. It isn’t very hard to do either. The possibilities are endless here.

I know that I have my reasons why I will not ever want to work for someone else. What’s your reasons? And what are you going to do about it?

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If you have worked all of your life for someone else, then you will need to change your mindset. You have already begun the process by allowing yourself to dream of having your own business, but not it is time to put it into action and make your dream come true!

The way we were raised from day one, is to believe that if we work hard, get an education, and get a good paying job, then we will be rich and never have to worry about bills. This is simply not true! Can you say “ENRON”? I bet those employees that have made a career for themselves, and suddenly lost their 401k and health benefits were forced to change their mindsets quickly!

The fact is that any company that you work for can go under. There will be no warning. So knowing that it has happened in the past makes you understand that it will most likely happen again. On a more local level, whom do you know in or around Galesburg, IL that used to work at Maytag? Enuf’ said! (If you don’t get the reference, Google it.)

Your belief in your business is what will make it succeed. Remember that from the first lesson? You have to purge your brain of all of the junk that everyone in your life has told you about self-employment. If a person is telling you that you will not succeed, then you need to remove them from your everyday life.

Naysayers are always there to try and make sure you fail. If you fail, then it reinforces it in their mind that they were right. If you succeed, then they will feel salty because they were wrong, and they cannot handle that.

A good way to keep focused on progress is to create a system where you remind yourself that things are working. When you make your first $1,000, you should turn it into a party. Set income goals, but keep them simple. When you reach each goal, treat yourself to something small but satisfying. For example, let your family know that you will not be going to the theater to see that new movie until you make that first thousand. Once you reach that goal, go to the theater! As you realize your regular goals, the feeling will become instinct, and you will no longer need to have goals to treat yourself. You will be successful enough to be able to afford treating yourself anytime you wish.

Live like you are already successful:

I don’t mean that you should start spending money that you don’t have. I am just saying that by using leverage, you can increase your quality of life without increasing your tax bracket.

When you go to the articles about bartering, you will learn that you can get almost anything by bartering for it. Your limitations are only what the other person is willing to except in exchange for what they have that you want.

I have found limousine companies that wanted search engine optimization services in exchange for hours of limo time.

Guerilla marketing is what I call the “in your face” approach to networking. It’s warfare. The whole idea is to market your product or service to people without them knowing that you are trying to sell them something.

Networking is key to your success in this approach. One of the methods I have used in the new century is when I join social networks and add people to my friend list or network.

Facebook is meant to be a place where you can catch up and keep in touch with old classmates, and people you work with. But what if I told you that there are huge numbers of people who will accept you as a friend even if they don’t know who you are? I do it daily.

While I like to just add people, I also get multiple adds every single day by others looking to network. I made this viral process happen by joining a bunch of Facebook groups. People who join those groups are looking to get friend adds. One of the best groups to join is a marketing group. They are clearly your best option to get a quick 100+ adds.

The same process goes with Myspace. Myspace has so many tools you can use to network. If you have ever added a Myspace game such as Mobsters, or Sorority Life, you know that you can get thousands of friends every month by simply joining a friend train.

A friend train is setup to get you tons of new mobsters members on your team. The more mob family you have, the quicker you advance in the game. On top of it there are multiple bots out there to automate the process. It will add new friends for you when you are not at the computer, or tag other mobster’s walls with your friend id or url. After awhile of doing this, you will find that you get adds on a regular basis without even having to do anything at all!

In addition to the obvious adds by gaming, you have access to groups on Myspace, as well as classified ads. One of the nice features on Myspace is the bulletin posting that once posted, shows up on the home pages of your “friends”. It is excellent for generating traffic to your profile and whatever product or service you are offering.

I used to own a website dedicated to providing free “blingies” and Myspace graphics. I got a huge number of people to use my website by simply adding friends and posting bulletins, and comments on their pages. Mind you that the whole commenting process was done by a bot in large quantities. I was careful not to look like I was directly spamming though. I posted simple comments like “visiting to show some luv” and when they clicked on the graphic, they would go to my website.

I am not endorsing drug sales or anything when I say “by any means necessary”. What I mean is that sometimes it is easier for you to make money doing something other than what you want to do for a living.

If you start a business as an interior decorator, but that business is not bringing in any money you might have better luck starting another business cleaning houses and office rooms. That will allow you to pursue building your decorating business without having to go and work for someone else.

I own and operate a web design and seo company, but how it started was just a search engine optimization company. If I was unable to bring in regular decent paying seo clients then I needed an alternative service that would make up for the lack of business.

I already knew some basic web design at the time, and I took my time to learn more advanced techniques. I then offered the new service at discounts in order to build my portfolio. Once I had a professional portfolio to show would-be clients I was in the money for that branch of my business.

As time went on, I got into creative financing real estate. I created lead generating websites where motivated sellers can submit their information and it would be emailed to me. Then I would decide whether or not to write an offer on their property.

Shortly after I was generating hard money loan leads which eventually brought in regular loan leads as well. Once I had leads, I partnered with a loan officer and gave him leads in exchange for a marketing fee.

Soon after I started building adsense websites. These are websites that are built with lots of content, and display Google ads so that when my visitors click on an ad I get paid.

Some of the adsense sites became useful such as loan leads websites. Then I got a great idea to build loan leads websites and place adsense spots on them, then sell them for a penny on Ebay. I also provided them online as free downloads. People can grab the websites and insert their adsense code into it. Then they would market their own website because of the adsense revenue while I collect the loan leads.

Later on, I built a party planner website for my fiancée. It was something she was interested in and it could bring in another revenue stream for our household. It started slow, but after my seo kicked in she has some great rankings in Google. We also include this company in event planner and party planner directories for the added traffic.

Every single day I think of new ideas and new ways to make money. By doing this, I am able to create multiple streams of income (by the way, there is a great book titled “multiple streams of income” by Robert G. Allen).

By acting on your ideas you just might strike gold. Just like playing multiple numbers in a lottery game you build your chances of success by doing multiple things to generate income. You never know. You just might invent a billion dollar product or idea.

There are a lot of dot com’s then started out as ideas then later sold to larger companies. For example: MySpace.com was the first and today the biggest social networking website. They sold off to a larger company and the creator made millions upon millions. The company that bought MySpace is making a killing in ad revenue on the website.

Shortly after MySpace had success you see allot of copycat social networks come into play such as Facebook, LinkedIn, Hi5, etc, etc. It has become so popular that web developers capitalized on it and created turnkey social network scripts such as Dolphin Community, a php script. It is available as a free download but they make money in upgrades.

There are lots of clone scripts out there for the many successful ideas. Remember the Million-Dollar Homepage? It was a kid who needed money to pay for school and sold ad space by the pixels. He had 1 million available pixels and sold each pixel for a dollar each. He had a minimum requirement of 5 pixels for purchase for one ad. He filled the quota quickly and got his million dollars. Now there are many million-dollar pixel scripts available for sale online. It sells for as little as $19.95 per license.

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The high end customers are basically the customers with the most amount of money. These are the ones that will pay $5,000+ for a simple product or service. Of course, the product or service must match what the average high end customer is looking for.

To find out what a high end customer is looking for, just turn on your television. You can see an example of high end customers by watching the red carpet, or checking out shows that target rich people like The Kardashians, or Million Dollar Listings.

Keep in mind that you are getting yourself into something serious when dealing with rich people. Most rich people have a sense of entitlement, even when they don’t deserve it. They will be a very demanding customer. If your business hours are 9-5 before you get a rich customer, expect to be on-call after you get your first rich customer. If they pay the big bucks for your product or service, they want customer service and support to go with it.

I have had a few high end clients in my life, and to be honest, they were just not worth the hassle. I believe that the homeless man on the street has the same worth at the billionaire on Wallstreet. Therefore, I will not donate my time to a high end client who paid for business hours. I have had some high end clients who were just too demanding.

My services have a worth, and just because it may have cost them many thousands of dollars, does not mean that they become my single client for daily consultations.
With that being said, choose your customers carefully. The type of customer you attract depends on the business you are in. An example would be the web development business. There are many jokers out there that post offensive gigs on Craigslist for web designers, and they offer to give the designer credit on the website because they cannot afford to pay. The fact is that web designers automatically have the legal right to post the “website designed by” credit on the website footer, or another unobtrusive area even if you pay for the website. So for that credit to be payment in itself is a complete joke.

In addition, some low-balling customers demand this and that for below industry standard prices. Those are the types of customers to avoid. The customer essentially gets what they pay for. Do not expect to find a quality designer for less than $50 per hour unless they are hard-up for the money for some reason.

The rule applies to any industry, not just web design. YOU determine your industry worth with the prices you charge and the customers you decide to work with.

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Your customer will want to be able to reach you when they have a problem, or a question. If they cannot reach you, then you will turn them off. They will find somebody else who can be reached in their time of need.

In order to be accessible, you need to ensure you have clear contact information on your website, and business card. Your website should also include a contact form so that customers may simply type in their question or comment and hit a submit button.
Another great accessibility feature is a toll free number. You will find that you can get a toll free number with Vonage for a few bucks. The toll free number can be forwarded to your regular business number, or an automated answering system.

You should provide a business address, or at least a P.O. Box, and an email address for customers who want to email you directly. If you were slick about it, you would provide email addresses for different departments such as sales, customer service, support, returns, etc.

Your customer wants to remain your customer, so don’t give them reasons to leave you. Make sure you are accessible in every way possible for the comfort of the customer.

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As you know, I have a psd layout design service that I do for $250 and I do something unheard of in this business. I give you the psd source file. But for a limited time, I am offering this service for $150.

If you want to have a custom unique web layout designed for you, just fill out this form before this post is taken down!

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