Level Three Wealth

I get asked all the time, “How can we best get through the current economy?  After all, how much longer are things going to continue to be so tough?”

My first reaction to a question link that is that I don’t believe in “getting through” rather I want you to get FROM!

In fact, in today’s post I want to share with you 5 quick tips to thrive in today’s tough times.

Five Quick Tips to Thrive in Today’s Tough Times

Tip One:  Use this as a chance to reduce your business and personal S-Factors™.

Your S-Factor is your cost of living, or in the case of your business, your business’s cost of operating.  Now is a perfect time to look closely at your expenses and trim, cut, prune, and diminish where you can.
This might include negotiating with your vendors for better pricing… Or getting on a better calling plan with your cell phone provider (a friend of mine saved close to $1,100 a year by consolidating all his family’s cell phones to a better plan.)

We had one client who got a $55,000 per YEAR reduction off the rent she paid on her business’s office space.

Take a look at your real estate’s tax assessments. If the values have dropped, how about petitioning for them to lower your assessment.  I did this on two of my properties and it saved me over $3,500 per year!

Tip Two:  Forget about your expenses.

I know this one contradicts tip one, but what I mean is once you’ve made your cuts, don’t obsess about them.  If you live your life immersed in stressing over your expenses you’ll never create the financial successes you want.

Instead, spend some concentrated time getting your spending in alignment with your best interests, and then focus all your working attention on growth–growing your business, finding great investments.

You’ll want to regularly review your expenses, but don’t lose sight of the fact that you need to play offense too!

ESPECIALLY in your business… At a certain point, cutting costs loses its impact and you’ve got to generate revenue.  Don’t lose sight of this.

Tip Three:  Reach out to your peer group.

In tough times it’s quite common that people withdraw and go it alone.  This is not only painful and lonely, but downright dumb.

It’s in tough times that your peers need you.  Together you can keep your focus on the positive, on what you can do to move forward towards your goals, and to hold each other accountable for any “stinking thinking”.

Of course this assumes that you have a positive peer group of doers.  If not, I URGE you to do whatever it takes to create one.  If you can free yourself up, join us tonight! and be part of several hundred of your peers who are positive and ambitious doers.

Tip Four:  Focus on creating value and serving others.

No matter what is going on in the world you will always be rewarded in direct proportion to the value and service you share with the world.  So focus on creating value, and on serving others.

Not only will this help you shift your focus to positive places you can make a difference, but it will also stabilize your position and ultimately help you grow your business and investments.

Tip Five:  Remember to give thanks.

You are already a HUGE winner in life’s economic lottery.  You live in an abundant society.  You will never have to go hungry or sleep without shelter.

You have people who you love and who love you.

Take time to DAILY focus on the 10 things you are most grateful for, and where appropriate, tell the other people how you feel to have them sharing your life.

I hope these suggestions help you to maintain your focus and to use these current times to grow from.

Please feel free to forward this post to any of your friends or associates who you know could use a positive boost.  It’s my passion to share these ideas on building Level Three wealth with as many people as possible.  (This is my way of focusing on creating value and serving others.)

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One of the things that has become very clear for me over the past decade building businesses is just how important it is to focus in your business on the things that make the REAL difference, not just the sexy, glamorous things we want to focus on instead.

Here is a summary of the bottom lines to focus on in your business. (I’ve also put the direct links to the 5-9 minute training videos for each stage and level from our new online training tool. Remember, only follow the link to ONE of the videos so that what I cover in the video stays fresh and top of mind as you work on your business.)

Level One: 4 things you MUST do…
1. Clarify your business concept and do your market research.
2. Create your draft business plan.
3. Test market your offer so you get REAL feedback from people in your market.
4. LAUNCH!
Choose this link if you have not already started to market and sell your product or service.

Early Stage Level Two: Sell, sell, sell, sell. All kidding aside, if you’ve got an Early Stage Level Two business, no need doing fancy systems or planning 5 years down the road. You’ve got to make those early sales that ensure you have the cash flow to survive!
Choose this link to learn what the three top priorities are for your Early Stage Level Two business.

Middle Stage Level Two: Build out your core system(s) in four areas:
1. Lead generation (so you have a baseline system for reliably generating a minimum level of leads).
2. Lead conversion (so you have a baseline system for reliably converting your leads into paying customers.)
3. Fulfillment or production of your core product or service.
4. Your accounts receivable system to collect on the money you’re owed.
Choose this link to see the 5 critical components to build to solidify your Middle Stage Level Two business.

Advanced Stage Level Two: Finish fleshing out your systems, controls, and winning management team. This is the time you’re scaling your business and you need these building blocks to do it well.
Choose this link to learn how you continue the process of systematizing your business and building out your management team.

Level Three: Deciding, planning, and executing on your exit strategy… whether that be to sell, to own your business passively, or to scale it much larger.
Choose this link to learn about the three main exit strategies for your business and how to best choose and implement your desired exit strategy.

These are the bottom lines by Level and Stage. Don’t make things overly complicated. Building a business is a known equation. You don’t have to reinvent the wheel.

I hope these ideas sparked you today.

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One of our consulting clients asked how she could protect herself from team members she had delegated to not getting the job done on time. Or worse, how could she protect herself from them telling her they were on track only to discover that the deliverables they were responsible for just weren’t completed. Here is a short audio post of my specific, concrete answer to her, including the three biggest reasons why delegating this way works so effectively.

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Several of our consulting clients this week asked me about how they could start to get their management team and employees to step up their game and really deliver on their projects in a better way.   Here’s a short audio on the top 3 tips to create this results   in your business.

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Today is going to be a content rich   post that goes into 5 specific selling systems you can use to increase your business’s cash flow.   I’ll also share several actual case studies of clients in our consulting program who have used various ideas to grow their sales.   (Where appropriate I’ll give you their company websites and I encourage you to check them out if you need the product or service they offer.   They are all highly skilled and integral businesses that you’d do well to work with.)

My suggestion is that you read through this closely and choose one or two selling systems that you think would be most important for you to implement in your business this quarter.   Then let the other 3-4 systems go for now.

I’m a big believer that completely implementing one solid idea is worlds better than half doing 3 or 4 ideas.

Here we go…

1. Gateway offers: Every business should have 1 or 2 initial offers that they make to a new client that when accepted lead your new client into the best long term relationship.   We call this sculpted initial offer your “Gateway Offerâ„¢”.

Your Gateway Offer is the offer that has the highest odds of leading a new client along the most profitable pathway with your company. It’s the first sale that leads to all the other sales.

Most businesses let random chance dictate he first sale. That’s sloppy and bad business.

Instead, over time by properly strategizing and tracking your clients’ behavior, determine which offer you can make that will draw a new client onto the richest purchase offer pathway with your company.

Case Study: Dana Smith, Exalt Resources

Dana has an HR consulting company that provides comprehensive HR services on an outsourced basis for small and medium sized businesses.   Her ideal client lets her handle their payroll, HR compliance, and administer their benefits program.   But it’s a tough sell to start there with a new client.   Hence Dana has created two Gateway Offers that allow a new business to start working with her at a profit, with a defined upsell process in place to transition many of them into longer term client relationships.

Her two gateway offers are an “HR Risk Audit” that walks a business owner through the liabilities and risks he or she faces with respect to how they are doing their HR function, and an “Employee Handbook Package” that gets business owners an HR compliant manual to help mitigate some of their HR risks.

Both of these Gateway Offers give great value to the new client, are inexpensive, and give Dana’s team a chance to build the relationship with the new client and hence step many of them up into higher value service offerings.

For those of you who are interested, here is a short video with Dana sharing her experiences this past year in the consulting program.

2. Makeup offers: The next time you have a client complaint or a canceled order is a prime chance for your company to make a profit and deepen a client relationship at the same time through the use of a makeup offer.

Here’s how it works. Joe calls in and complains about his order arriving late. In fact, he says he wants to return it. You have a special sales script to handle just these types of calls. “Joe, thank you for telling me about how we messed up. Forgive us for our mistake. I don’t blame you for wanting to cancel your order just to teach us a lesson. If I were you I’d have been even angrier and more upset than you are. May I make it up to you?”

When Joe says yes, offer him some special gift such as a discount or certificate valid toward his next purchase. The key is to try to both close this sale (the most expensive thing that could happen is that Joe cancels and never orders from you again) and put Joe on the path to making his next purchase from you. That’s the power of a makeup offer that has been systematized for your team to use.

3. Reactivation offer: Go back to old clients who haven’t bought in a while to spark them to buy again. This should be a formalized sales system that happens automatically and regularly versus just a haphazard, random decision. Here’s the best part: You’ll typically have three times more success selling to old clients than you will going after new clients. They just need to be asked and given a compelling reason to buy again.

Case Study:   Dr. Kimberly Nguyen , Cottage Dental

Dr. Kim as she’s known by her dental patients has built a thriving two site practice in Fullerton California.   When she got started in the consulting program, it was clear that one of the fast and easy systems to put into place to increase her practice volume was to create a formalized system whereby her team reached out to past patients who for one reason or another had not come in for a dental visit for 12 months or longer.

As you can imagine, there are people who don’t like thinking about going to the dentist!   The system, which Dr. Kim’s team put into place earlier this month, is already showing results.

How can you formally reach out to old clients from your business’s past?   It can be as simple as picking up the phone and calling them to see how they are doing and how you can continue to support them and give them value.   This is a very powerful and simple technique and will usually generate immediate results in 60-90 days or less.

4. Unconsummated transactions: An unconsummated transaction is any client interaction that started with the client ordering, but then before the transaction closed the process got derailed. It could be a dropped cart from a website order, or a phone order that didn’t go through, or a sales call that got interrupted.

The key is to have a formal process in place, ideally technology driven and automatic, to follow up with that client. For example, you could have your system automatically send an e-mail that says: “I’m writing to apologize that we dropped your Web order earlier today. I want to personally take responsibility for this mistake and make it up to you. Please call my office at 800-555-1212 and not only will I see to it that you get 10 percent off your order, but I have instructed my staff to have a special gift waiting to send to you. This is my way of letting you know how much I personally value you as a client.”

5. Referral systems: Does your company have a formalized process to encourage satisfied clients to refer you more business? Does it have more than one? If your answer is no to either of these questions then you have a real opportunity to increase your sales.

Start off by looking at where your current referrals come from. Is there a way to super-size and formalize what your business is already doing? Look at other businesses, especially outside your industry. Is there any way you can apply and layer in their referral systems to increase your sales volume?

I’ll share an easy example that happened on a call I was on with Marge and Brian Thompson, who own a very successful precision contract parts manufacturing business called L.H. Thompson Co.

They’ve been consulting clients now for about 15 months.   In our monthly one to one accountability session this week they shared a compliment about the value they were getting from the consulting program.   In our business, we have a simple yet formalized referral system in place called the “The Referral Question.”   Here’s how it works…

Anytime a client gives your business a compliment or says how much value they got from working with you, that should trigger your team member to ask the one memorized (and written) referral question you have.   In our case the question is, “Thank you for that great compliment Brian.   May I ask, who are 2 or 3 other business owners you know who you think would really benefit from working together just like your business has?”   Then keep quiet and let them share 2 or 3 referrals.

This is both a simple and professional way to ask for referrals.   Try it in your business.   (By the way, Brian and Marge were kind enough to share two referrals with me.   They had a third but he was a direct competitor so they laughed yet seriously said they didn’t think giving me that referral would be a good idea.   Who could blame them!)

If you are interested,  here’s the link to a short video interview with Brian sharing his experiences in the consulting program and how it has benefited his business.

So there you have 5 specific, concrete systems you can immediately implement to increase your sales and your cash flow.

Remember, I suggest that you choose one or two selling systems that you think would be most important for you to implement in your business this quarter.   Then let the other 3-4 systems go for now.

Have a great close to your week!

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Today I wanted to share with you two specific suggestions for you to finish out the year strong in your business.

Too many business owners get trapped inside the very businesses they working so hard to build.   If they don’t show up each day, or something happens to them, their businesses die.  

Okay, now on to those 2 suggestions to finish out the year strong…

1.           What are the 3 most important things for you to complete to close out this year in your business?   In other words, what 3 things, if you could only do these 3, would have the greatest positive impact on your business?

I have to break it to you… you won’t get everything you want done done by the end of the year.   It isn’t going to happen.   That’s okay.   What matters is that you do the IMPORTANT things for your business.   The above question helps focus you very clear on what matters most.   This is what you need to make the time to do FIRST in your business over the next 3 weeks.

This could include making 3 key sales calls…   Or finishing a core system for your business… Or writing a job description for a key hire you need to make… Or… you get the idea.

2.           If you could only do one thing in the next 3 weeks to set yourself up with a running start for 2011, what would it be?
For me it’s completing our 2011 Maui company’s plan.   I’ve committed to have it to our exec team by December 17^th.   What is it for your business?  

I hope you have a great week ahead of you and that you take 5 minutes to write on a note card your bottom lines to close out the year strong and set yourself up with momentum for next year.

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I wanted to share with you two specific strategies to immediately boost your sales. I was talking with one of our consulting clients (a dentist who has a 2 location practice in Southern California) about simple steps for her to grow her practice. First, I’ve got to say Kimberly (our client) had done a great [...]

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