Archive for the ‘Accountability Club Cambridge’ Category

How are you getting on with your Business Plans this year?

What goals have you set that really inspire you?

What elevator statement have you crafted that will get your target market motivated to buy from you?

What are you plans for running your business in a more streamlined way?

What strategy have you got for meeting your profit/turnover goals?

While coaching The Accountability Club business owners we’ve found the exercise below really useful in helping our clients and ourselves to make our turnover and profit targets more achievable and real.

Let me give you an example:

If Tim and I wanted to turnover £60k this year through our group business coaching programme, The Accountability Club, we could do it like this:

4 x Accountability Club  groups choosing option 1 (with 10 people on each one) =                        £24k

From that 40, 5 Accountability Club business owners choosing option 2 =                                     £5k

5 Accountability Club business owners choosing option 3 =                                                         £15k

4 x 4 training days/bootcamps on some hot topics (20 people on each one)                                  £16K

That would bring us to £60k

What would your business growth strategy look like?

Once you have your business growth draft strategy, here are some questions to ask yourself:

• What products and services give you the highest profit/satisfaction to deliver?
• What target markets will give you the best return on your time?
• What scope is there for continuity income (Starting at zero turnover every month can be a struggle if you’ve got to go and win the business all the time. It’s a good idea to plan for a proportion of your income to be coming in regularly e.g. through membership fees, subscriptions (e.g.to your wildly informative platinum content newsletter), retainer fees, maintenance contracts, royalties for something you’ve created etc
• What other elements in my business need to change to deliver this?

Let us know how you get on.

If you would like to know more about how The Accountability Club group coaching programme can help you create a more profitable business that’s fun to run, please contact us.

Tim Gale 07808 631 167 or Madeleine Morgan madeleine@growu.co.uk

Hi,

Last time we met, in the days when your prospect/client lists were much shorter , we had a lively discussion about all the excuses/reasons you could use to get/keep in touch with your list.

Let’s review why it’s important to stay in touch with your list.

If you  keep in touch you’ll

• show that you care by making sure they’re happy with your product/service
• show they’re under your protection (by giving useful info)
• get valuable feedback
• keep your information up-to-date
• remind them of a need for your product or service
• develop a relationship where they know, like and trust you and so will buy more
• be top of mind when they want to make their next purchase.
• get more referral business – especially if the content of your messages is worth passing on
• have a list you can promote to regularly – cheaper than other forms of advertising, smoothes out the ‘feast and famine’ periods
• develop a loyal following and so build a business you can sell eventually, if you want to

Some of your reasons for contacting your list need to be purely taking care of your list ones and some need to be promotional ones. You can combine the two. For instance, give a tip and then tell them how they can learn more by getting in touch with you.

Whatever message you send to your list, it needs to be valuable to the members. They are too busy and overloaded with information to put up with poor content – you’ll get loads of unsubscribes and poor responses if you send ill-thought out direct and e-mail.  

As with all promotion, please make sure your title (or subject line in email) acts like a headline, grabs attention and makes your reader want to read on.

Here are some suggestions for message content when contacting you list. How many have you tried and with what results?

• Thank you for your business
• Useful tips and information
• What’s new in your business (You need to show why it should interest them)
• ‘I’m re-establishing contact with important clients’ – helps your list feel special
• Great news! (perhaps a special offer)
• How are you getting on with ….product you bought from us?
• How has…..(work we did) made a positive difference to…… – This may trigger a testimonial
• ‘We missed you…’
• Update your list – ‘Can I check the information I have is correct?’
• Please help us to serve you better by completing our survey (questions about product, service, delivery preferences, feedback, suggestions for improvements etc. They’ll probably need an ethical bribe too, e.g. prize draw entry. Charities do this – they enclose a pen so you’re more likely to want to give them something back)
• Special services e.g. Xmas opening times
• Success stories
• Sorry for not keeping in contact
• Buying guides
• Introduce a new member of staff – and what they can do for your list
• Introduce another supplier who has the same target market as you but doesn’t compete with you (they’ll do the same for you)

How often should you contact your client and prospect list?

As often as you have something valuable to say.

Experience shows that the more a business stays in contact with its clients and prospects, the more profit it makes.

We’re looking forward to our next meeting of the Accountability Club, tomorrow Wednesday 10th November, at 5 p.m. at the David Lloyd Centre in Cambridge. Judging by the emails the members having been sending us, there will be loads of success stories to share.

If you’d like to grow your business in 2011, we’ll be launching a new Accountability Club group in January. Call Tim Gale on 07808 631167 or email Madeleine Morgan at madeleine@growu.co.uk for more information and an application form.