Do Your Potential Customers Forget About You?

Posted by Tom Kulzer (AWeber CEO)

Your web business probably gets product inquiries from potential customers around the globe. Inquiries come via e-mail and your web site, and you try to send information to each hot prospect as quickly as you can. You know that you can drastically increase the likelihood of making a sale by satisfying each person’s need for information quickly!

But, after you’ve delivered that first bit of information to your prospect, do you send him any further information?

 

If you are like most Internet marketers, you don’t.

When you don’t follow that initial message with additional information later on, you let a valuable prospect slip from your grasp! This is a potential customer who may have been very interested in your products, but who lost your contact information, or was too busy to make a purchase when your first message reached him.

Often, a prospect will purposely put off making a purchase, to see if you find him important enough to follow up with later. When he doesn’t receive a follow up message from you, he will take his business elsewhere.

Are you losing profits due to inconsistent and ineffective follow up?

Following up with leads is more than just a process – it’s an art. In order to be effective, you need to design a follow up system, and stick to it, EVERY DAY! If you don’t follow up with your prospects consistently, INDIVIDUALLY, and in a timely fashion, then you might as well forget the whole follow up process.

Consistent follow up gets results!

When I first started marketing and following up with prospects, I used a follow up method that I now call the “List Technique.” I had a large database containing the names and e-mail addresses of people who had specifically requested information about my products and services. These prospects had already received my first letter by the time they requested more information, so I used the company’s latest news as a follow up piece.

I would write follow up newsletters every now and then, and send them, in one mass mailing, to everyone who had previously requested information from me. While this probably did help me win a few additional orders, it wasn’t a very good follow up method. Why isn’t the “List Technique” very effective?

• The List Technique isn’t consistent. Proponents of the List Technique tend to only send out follow up messages when their companies have “big news”.
• List Technique messages don’t give the potential customer any additional information about the product or service in question. He can’t make a more informed buying decision after receiving a newsletter! If someone is wondering whether your company sells the best knick-knacks, what does he care that you’ve just moved your headquarters?
• List Technique messages convey a “big list” mentality to your potential customers. When I used to write follow up messages using the List Technique, I was writing news bulletins to everyone I knew! I should have been sending a personal message to each individual who wanted to know more about my products.

What follow up method really works?

Following up with each lead individually, multiple times, but at set intervals, and with pre-written messages, will dramatically increase sales! Others who use this same technique confirm that they have all at least doubled the sales of various products! In order to set this system up, though, you need to do some planning.

First, you’ll need to develop your follow up messages. If you’ve been marketing on the Internet for any length of time, then you should already have a first informative letter. Your second letter marks the beginning of the follow up process, and should go into more detail than the first letter. Fill this letter with details that you didn’t have the space to add to the first letter. Stress the BENEFITS of your products or services!

Your next 2-3 follow up messages should be rather short. Include lists of the benefits and potential uses of your products and services. Write each letter so that your prospects can skim the contents, and still see the full force of your message.

The next couple of follow up messages should create a sense of urgency in your prospect’s mind. Make a special offer, giving him a reason to order NOW instead of waiting any longer. After reading these follow up messages, your prospect should want to order immediately!

Phrase each of your final 1 or 2 follow up messages in the form of a question. Ask your prospect why he hasn’t yet placed an order? Try to get him to actually respond. Ask if the price is to high, the product isn’t the right color or doesn’t have the right features, or if he is looking for something else entirely. (By this time, it’s unlikely that this person will order from you. However, his feedback can help you modify your follow up letters or products, so that other prospects will order from you.)

The timing of your follow up letters is just as important as their content. You don’t want one prospect to receive a follow up the day after he gets your initial informative letter, while another prospect waits weeks for a follow up!

Always send an initial, informative letter as soon as it is requested, and send the first follow up 24 hours afterwards. You want your hot prospects to have information quickly, so that they can make informed buying decisions!

Send the next 2-3 follow up messages between 1 and 3 days apart. Your prospect is still hot, and is probably still shopping around! Tell him about the benefits of your products and services, as opposed to your competitors’. You will make the sale!

Send the final follow up messages later on. You certainly don’t want to annoy your prospect! Make sure that these last letters are at least 4 days apart.

Following up effectively seems complicated, but it doesn’t have to be! So many potential customers are lost because of poor follow up – don’t you want to be one of the few to get it right?

You’ve Got My Word…

When people are encountered with a new product they are often weary to make a decision to buy it. A way to overcome this is to remove the possible risk of making the purchase. The way to do this is with a guarantee.

How long should you make the guarantee? That depends on the nature of your product. For physical items you have to figure out what the expected life is, and take it from there. You don’t want people returning items just because the item’s time is due. For electronically delivered items, such as eBooks, a longer guarantee offers several benefits. A one year guarantee hard to beat for these reasons:

1. It removes the perceived risk of buying. The person reading the guarantee may even be thinking, “Ha! I’ll just use it for a year, then ask for my money back”. Which brings us to…

2. The buyer may intend to return the item, sight unseen, but thinking they can always return it later. However, after some time they forget about it. This tip will help take care of those who planned on asking for a refund even before making the purchase.

3. Less competition. Few people use a one year guarantee, so you will stand above and beyond them.

Guarantees can be conditional or unconditional. For simplicity’s sake, an unconditional guarantee is recommended. All that means is you will refund a buyer’s money with no questions asked. The conditional guarantee can be effective in some cases, though. A common condition for information products is that the person has to prove that they failed – AFTER applying the information.

Regardless, of the terms of a guarantee, they can make a big difference in the number of sales. Keep them simple enough to understand, but don’t get too hung up in the details.

Above all else, be sure to honor any guarantees you give. If you don’t, you have lost a customer for life. If you do honor them, and do it professionally and courteously, then you just may have made a customer for life.

For example, the ProHotList Forum offers a guarnetee on the membership. Yes, people may take advantage of that from time to time, but that’s okay. What counts is that I can stand behind anything I offer. Check it out now to get tips on the hottest niche marketing, IM advice, money-making techniques, and other member’s only benefits.

The Power of Feedback

Regardless of your business model as a niche marketer, you will have greater success when you receive feedback from people. This feedback can come in several forms. Here are a few things to consider.

1. You have to ask for it. True, there are times when people will make comments because they feel compelled to do so, but this is rare and will not give you enough feedback for real improvement. So, you simply have to ask people to voice concerns, suggest improvements and ask questions. Request feedback from the moment people are first exposed to your offer, all the way until they break the arrangement (such as unsubscribing or wanting a refund).

2. Negative feedback is better than …no feedback at all. And, in many ways, bad feedback is better than the goo kind. Why? Because this is where you get signals on what you can improve. Sure, you will get people who are having a bad day and take it out on you, but even then there may be some truth hidden in their vitriol. On the other hand, you may notice patterns in the messages you get; take note of these.

3. Use good feedback, too. While negative comments can help you improve weak areas in your business, good feedback reinforces what you are doing right. Again, if you spot patterns of good feedback, then be sure to highlight or ramp up that part of your business.

4. Don’t take it personal. Some people are afraid to ask for feedback because they are afraid of what others will say. After all, they have spent their time and money to get up and running. They are invested emotionally, as well. But, if you are afraid of your feelings getting hurt, then you will not go far. A simple way to handle this (besides getting a backbone) is to disconnect your emotions from the equation. Think that this is nothing more than business and that you now have a suggestion on how to do even better.

5. One comment does not a business make. Now, while you need to consider all of your feedback seriously, not all of it should be implemented. You still get to make the ultimate decision about what’s right for your business.

How you ask for feedback is less important than actually asking for it. Let people know you value their opinions. Just be sure to do your best to get those opinions from them – your success depends on it.

If you haven’t yet checked out the ProHotList Forum, you may want to do so now. There are frequent updates about the hottest niches, marketing advice, freebies, and YES a chance to offer suggestions and feedback.

What Is The Best Niche?

 A niche where people are likely to make only one purchase is fine, but only if you can generate the volume to support it. To make more money it is better to find a niche where people will buy the same thing repeatedly, or buy related products.

For example, a friend of mine collects sports cards. As a collector, he is not going to buy a few cards and then stop. This is a niche where people will buy the same thing over and over. On top of that, some of the cards may be very special, creating a need for special display binders. Proper storage is important for the other cards as well. But he also needs to know how much the cards are worth, and try to get an idea of their future value. Of course, to do this he has to be informed about the players on each card which leads to the purchasing of reference guides and perhaps a subscription to a few sports and/or collector’s magazines. So, not only have we established a niche where people keep buying the same things (sports cards), but it is also a niche market where people are likely to buy related products.

Catering to those niches that continuously spend money is part of what will keep people coming back to your site for what you offer. But there is one more thing to consider to get people to return to your site. You need to show people that you know something about the niche if you want to be recognized as an authority that people can trust enough to potentially buy from. That is one reason why when you are starting out that choosing a niche you are interested in will help.

Once you have found a suitable niche, try to branch out from it, but in a logical way. Think about the related products or services your current niche may also like. Check out competitor’s sites to see if they offer related products. Visit and read online forums related to your niche. There will often be discussions that point out ways you could logically add to your offerings.

Marketing to a niche where customers make one or two large purchases may be okay with you, and can put a large sum of money in your bank account, but only sporadically. Each payment may be bigger, but you will have to work harder to keep bringing new people in to buy from you. By finding a niche market that spends a bit here, a little there, and needs another thing, then something else to go with it, you may get smaller amounts, but in volume. While you will still want to seek out new customers, you will be generating income from current customers at the same time.

It’s easy to see that the best niche is the niche that keeps spending money. Go to ProHotList to find what some of these niches are and to stay ahead of the competition.