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Write You - Marketing Techniques: What Works & What Doesn't for a PC Repair Business
As you know, everyone loves to be appreciated, recognized, and acknowledged for the good deeds they do. The world has changed a lot and being considerate and having manners are becoming a thing of the past.Here's a mortgage marketing tip that can help your business so much, your head will spin:Write notes to people everyday and tell them simply "Thank You."There's no doubt about it...when you take the time to thank someone, you connect with them on a totally different level. All of a sudden, it becomes extremely personal and extremely private. To the recipient, it's remarkably soothing and comforting and they experience that warm and fuzzy feeling. In all of this, you really stand out from the crowd as a caring Mortgage Professional.How many handwritten "Thank You" notes do you receive in the mail everyday? If your mailbox is anything like mine, I would guess that the number is probably zero. People just don't write "Thank You" notes these days, but you should. The logic here is...if someone goes out of their way to help you...you should go out of your way to say "Thank You."Get yourself some "Thank You" cards or print them yourself using a desktop publishing program. Thank those people that helped you or who did something for you today...it could be for anything.Thank your mailman or FedEx person for delivering your mail, Thank your processor for the effort on your file, Thank your underwriter for that positive
In my particular instance of only getting one response
"Charge more?!" my client exclaimed. "I don't think I could do that.""Really? Why not?" I asked her."Well, because..."What followed were umpteen reasons that sounded legitimate. Sort of. What I didn't hear was the real reason.Fear.Fear of being rejected and fear of being disapproved of certainly.But the real fear is of not being good enough.Fear of not being good enough is rampant in our country. I'm on a mission to UP our self-confidence, one business owner at a time!So, shall we start right now?Here are 3 simple ways to charge more and get it, plus feel confident about it!#1 Shift the focus where it belongs It's not your value you're charging for. It's the value of the results you're producing for your clients. There's only one way to do this and that's to investigate, thoroughly, what the value of those results are for your clients. In measurable terms. Really!#2 Give your fees the mirror test I love this tip! Stand up and take a look in the mirror. Now say your new fee out loud (there's no point in doing this with your current fee because I know it's too low). How do you respond? With a bit of a gulp? Or with the thought, "That's too low!"Keep upping the amount until you get to where you audibly gasp. Go down just a notch and there's your new fee.#3 Stop comparing what you charge to others in your industry Nearly everyone undercharges so if you're compa
NEWSPAPER ADS
I knew quite a bit about graphic design (being a graphic designer for many years), so I would put an appetizing ad, no, in fact, a COUPON, in the local newspaper. People are always looking for a discount. And EVERYONE has computer problems. So I should just get swamped with business just off this one ad. NOPE! I got one phone call from my ad. I had placed the ad in the local newspaper (our city’s main newspaper) which went to 33,000 homes, and I had it come out on the biggest readership day: Sunday. The ad I placed was a professionally-designed Computer Tune-up ad that I had done, giving them a discount from the regular price of $69, to $49. They were saving $20! It was an incredible deal! But I only had one response. Why? What did I do wrong?
Unfortunately, I was forced to use a horrible, red border. It is HUGE! In order to get the deal I was getting for this ad, my ad had to be put in with a couple of other ads (not related to the computer business) and have an ice cream-looking coupon border around it.
The ad had all of the elements of a good coupon. It has a GREAT deal! You are saving $20 off the regular price (this is the next best thing to FREE – a dollar value of savings). They have to act now (call to action) because it is for a limited time and expires in two weeks. People are graphic in nature and the picture of the computer and the words, “Computer Help!” in the screen will identify with people having computer problems. The headline is bold and heavy, it stands out from the rest – so that you don’t have a paragraph of information that people won’t read, and it speaks directly to people having a slow computer (everyone has a slow computer). Then it goes on to explain the headline in more detail with a subhead. Plus, there is a GUARANTEE of a speed increase. You CAN’T go wrong with an ad like this, can you? Well, I did. I don’t believe that the ad is evil and doesn’t work. I believe that I had the ad where people don’t look.
Whenever you get ready to do any type of advertisement, you should test-market it, first. Whether it is an ad, a website (or page), direct marketing (such as mailers, mailed brochures or ads), etc., you should test it on different types of people to see how they will respond, and record their responses. In the case of the ad, I should have passed this ad out to several people and got their responses of the ad. I should have then placed this ad on a page with several other similar ads and got responses from different people looking at the entire page of ads, had them put down the page, and asked them to tell me what stood out. Could they remember any good deals? This would tell me if my ad would stand out in a newspaper, among other similar ads.
In my particular instance of only getting one response f
It seems everywhere I turn someone is trying to upgrade me, or sell me something in addition to what I want, or get me to do more work to use their services - all in the name of providing me with more value. The heating and air conditioning service guy now wants to clean my ducts and my fireplace chimney. The dentist tells me that I need to have the area between my two molars and my gums cleaned (flossing doesn’t get there) at a cost of two hours and over $400. And every business now seems to have a telephone answering system that replaces their receptionist with way too many numeric presses by MY finger … only to be disconnected or routed back through the same choices again.Without realizing it (my wife pointed it out) I have moved away from many tried and true service and product suppliers to those who are sticking to the basics - or at least to the ones that reflect my basics. Even my old friend American Express received a nasty rejection of a service I had used for a long time - auto rental coverage. I recently opened a letter from the company advising me that changes had been made to this coverage as detailed in a brochure that was enclosed. The brochure was four pages (front and back), in 8 or 9 typeface, with no margins top, bottom or on either side.My letter canceling this coverage stated that I was not inclined or equipped to read that enclosure to find the changes - which I was confident were not made with my best interest at heart.
Unfortunately, I was forced to use a horrible, red border. It is HUGE! In order to get the deal I was getting for this ad, my ad had to be put in with a couple of other ads (not related to the computer business) and have an ice cream-looking coupon border around it.
The ad had all of the elements of a good coupon. It has a GREAT deal! You are saving $20 off the regular price (this is the next best thing to FREE – a dollar value of savings). They have to act now (call to action) because it is for a limited time and expires in two weeks. People are graphic in nature and the picture of the computer and the words, “Computer Help!” in the screen will identify with people having computer problems. The headline is bold and heavy, it stands out from the rest – so that you don’t have a paragraph of information that people won’t read, and it speaks directly to people having a slow computer (everyone has a slow computer). Then it goes on to explain the headline in more detail with a subhead. Plus, there is a GUARANTEE of a speed increase. You CAN’T go wrong with an ad like this, can you? Well, I did. I don’t believe that the ad is evil and doesn’t work. I believe that I had the ad where people don’t look.
Whenever you get ready to do any type of advertisement, you should test-market it, first. Whether it is an ad, a website (or page), direct marketing (such as mailers, mailed brochures or ads), etc., you should test it on different types of people to see how they will respond, and record their responses. In the case of the ad, I should have passed this ad out to several people and got their responses of the ad. I should have then placed this ad on a page with several other similar ads and got responses from different people looking at the entire page of ads, had them put down the page, and asked them to tell me what stood out. Could they remember any good deals? This would tell me if my ad would stand out in a newspaper, among other similar ads.
In my particular instance of only getting one response
A number of dramatic technological innovations have been added greatly to deal with the character of printing process. Linotype is a method of creating movable type by machine instead of by hand and was introduced in 1884 which marked a significant leap in production speed.The typewriter made the production and "look" of standardized print much more widely accessible. The process of setting type continued to go through transformations with the development of photo-mechanical composition, cathode ray tubes and laser technologies. Also the Xerox machine made a means of broadcast print documents available to everyone. Wherein Word processing transformed editing and contributed dramatic new flexibility to the writing process. Computer printing has already moved through several stages of innovation, from the first daisy-wheel and dot matrix "impact" printers to common use of the non-impact printers: ink-jet, laser and thermal-transfer.Now with the availability of internet in the world and interactive multimedia, providing ways of employing the printed word that add new possibilities to print's role in culture made it much easier. The printed word is now used for real-time social interaction and for individualized routing through interactive documents. It is difficult to gauge the social and cultural impact of new media without historical distance, but these innovations will most likely prove to signal another major transformation in the use, influence a
The ad had all of the elements of a good coupon. It has a GREAT deal! You are saving $20 off the regular price (this is the next best thing to FREE – a dollar value of savings). They have to act now (call to action) because it is for a limited time and expires in two weeks. People are graphic in nature and the picture of the computer and the words, “Computer Help!” in the screen will identify with people having computer problems. The headline is bold and heavy, it stands out from the rest – so that you don’t have a paragraph of information that people won’t read, and it speaks directly to people having a slow computer (everyone has a slow computer). Then it goes on to explain the headline in more detail with a subhead. Plus, there is a GUARANTEE of a speed increase. You CAN’T go wrong with an ad like this, can you? Well, I did. I don’t believe that the ad is evil and doesn’t work. I believe that I had the ad where people don’t look.
Whenever you get ready to do any type of advertisement, you should test-market it, first. Whether it is an ad, a website (or page), direct marketing (such as mailers, mailed brochures or ads), etc., you should test it on different types of people to see how they will respond, and record their responses. In the case of the ad, I should have passed this ad out to several people and got their responses of the ad. I should have then placed this ad on a page with several other similar ads and got responses from different people looking at the entire page of ads, had them put down the page, and asked them to tell me what stood out. Could they remember any good deals? This would tell me if my ad would stand out in a newspaper, among other similar ads.
In my particular instance of only getting one response
We have all had great service before at the grocery store, where a clerk helped us immensely and we unfortunately have all had poor service as well, where we could not even find anyone to help us and when we finally did, they were no help at all. Do I dare state the obvious about customer service at grocery stores? It starts in the parking lot!That’s right great service at grocery stores starts in the parking lot. The landscaping, trash control and those shopping carts must be put in the proper place and brought back in. If not we all know what happens to the sides of our cars and I will not bring up such a sore subject with you. Nevertheless the customer service becomes progressively more important as the customer enters the store, shops and then checks out.Let's face it how many times have you been at a grocery store only to find that there are only two lanes open with about 15 people in each. And I know the excuse because I have worked in retail and watched how things go in spurts. One minute there is no one at the cash registers and the next minute you have a line. It seems sometimes all the customers are connected and thinking the same thing.Nevertheless good customer service means you will see the changes as they occur and adapt to the situation immediately and you must train your employees to be on the lookout for this. No one likes to wait in line, everybody loves good customer service and at the end of the day; your bottom line a
Whenever you get ready to do any type of advertisement, you should test-market it, first. Whether it is an ad, a website (or page), direct marketing (such as mailers, mailed brochures or ads), etc., you should test it on different types of people to see how they will respond, and record their responses. In the case of the ad, I should have passed this ad out to several people and got their responses of the ad. I should have then placed this ad on a page with several other similar ads and got responses from different people looking at the entire page of ads, had them put down the page, and asked them to tell me what stood out. Could they remember any good deals? This would tell me if my ad would stand out in a newspaper, among other similar ads.
In my particular instance of only getting one response
From time to time, I meet people working in the healthcare field and end up talking about possible careers in medical sales since they often find out that I spend many years working for pharmaceutical companies. Recently, one such individual was a nurse I met at a public speaking meeting. Like others I met in her field, she was considering a career change and asked me whether her age would be a negative factor in getting hired for medical representative sales jobs. She was probably in her late thirties or early forties. She must have noticed that many of the medical representatives she sometimes see at her hospital are younger looking. I told her that people in all adult age groups can start new careers in medical sales.Although it is true that many medical companies seem to like hiring young people for their sales forces, many firms also prefer more mature individuals. Some companies will hire people with a variety of ages to fill new medical representative sales positions in order to get a good mix. Some don’t even factor in ages as they focus solely on the sales potential of the individual.So there is a lot of variance out there among hiring preferences of companies. The fact is that no matter what age you are, there is a company in the medical pharmaceutical industry who will be interested in you if you have excellent communications skills with the right aptitude for the sales world. As long as you are also trainable, companies will be willin
In my particular instance of only getting one response from my “great” ad, it was literally buried in with other ads that looked similar to mine. In fact, my ad was not even on a page with other services, but “hidden” on a series of pages that had nothing at all to do with what I was offering, or computers, or even a story about a computer… nothing! People who would be looking for my type of service were not going to look where my ad was, and that is the lesson: PUT YOUR AD WHERE YOUR POTENTIAL CUSTOMERS WILL LOOK, NOT WHERE YOU GET A GOOD DEAL ON ADVERTISING ! and DO TEST MARKETING.
After my ad came out, I gave my wife the newspaper and asked her to find my ad (test marketing after the advertising came out… too little, too late). It took her TWO TIMES of going through the newspaper, page-by-page (and this is a small city newspaper) to find my ad (and she knew what to look for and what the ad looked like). So how are potential customers going to find my ad if they don’t even know that they need to look for it??? They won’t!
Think of it like this… if you want to sell motorcycle parts, put your ad in a motorcycle magazine. You have to think like the customer. A customer wants motorcycle parts, so where should they go? They start looking at places that sell motorcycles and accessories, groups that are associated with motorcycles, magazines that cater to the motorcycle crowd, message boards and websites that are all about motorcycles. You may or may not go to the newspaper and look through every page and see if someone is selling motorcycle parts. In fact, it is probably safe to say that a person looking for motorcycle parts won’t leaf through pages of articles in a newspaper, looking for motorcycle parts. They may look through the only place in the newspaper that they think might list places that sell motorcycle parts, and that would be the business section of the newspaper and/or the classifieds. So, if you were in the business of selling motorcycle parts, you would want to have an ad right where your potential customer expects to find an ad for motorcycle parts. Place the ad in those sections ONLY. Do not place it where I did (in the middle of a bunch of articles) because I got a good deal.
So, in case your eyes just rolled back in your head, here is the gist of what I just said… when placing an ad for PC Repair in your local newspaper, either place it in the Business Listing for Services in your area, or place it in the proper classified sections, where people will look for your type of service. Do a test: ask a few people you know where they would look in your local newspaper if they needed PC Repair Help. Let’s say that their computer was running extremely slow and they ne
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