Steve Pohlit – Page 34

Blogging For Profits Issue # 12: How To Build A Highly Response List Using Your Blog

Every business needs a profitable sales funnel. The top of the funnel is the entry point for potential customers or prospects. Prospects who accept to your offer represent sales. The higher the volume of relevant traffic and the higher the rate of offer acceptance equals a higher rate of sales.

Every on line marketer and an increasing number of traditional businesses are focused on increasing targeted traffic at the top of the funnel. Wal-Mart recently announced a test program in my state of Florida offering deep discounts on approximately 300 prescription drugs. Are they buying leads? What will it cost Wal-Mart for those leads? Why are they doing this?

There are very bright and successful people in traditional retail.” Look and you will see examples of successful marketing daily. Of course, just like in the Internet marketing world, there are many examples of companies wasting their money.

The most successful marketers are those successful increasing targeted traffic at the top of the funnel and converting them to buyers. Wal-Mart knows their generic prescription test will drive more traffic to their stores. Some percentage of those people will buy other products offered by Wal-Mart with normal gross margins.

Wal-Mart’s prescription drug marketing program is being tested with a group of drugs representing about 15% of the total number of prescriptions offered by a typical pharmacy. Wa-lMart is testing for two reasons: First even though they have extensive experience with product introduction and price changes, they do not have experience with the impact of a major change in prescription drug pricing. Second Wal-Mart has a major risk that has nothing to do with the prescription drug program itself.

Every major initiative engineered by Wal-Mart is tried in the press before it even has a chance of being voted on by its customers. You may think that since you are not Wal-Mart, that you do not have to consider this risk. You are wrong.

Your marketing strategy, including the information you write about in your blog, is designed to capture the attention of you target audience. Everything you publish is open to evaluation by your current customers, your target market and the media. If you are an Internet Marketer, Direct Response Marketer, Ad Agency, or Sales Rep., your work is constantly being evaluated.

If you offer your target market incentives to visit your store, register for your on-line promotion or purchase a new customer special, please be sure you are not offending your existing customers. Wal-Mart’s offer is open to everyone in the test market. If you still are not sure what I mean, remember the last time you read about a hot offer on a new cell phone and rate plan offered by your current cell phone service? Remember trying to get that deal as an exiting customer? It is likely you were told that to upgrade for the special offer your account will have to be renewed by two years in order to receive that upgrade. How did that make you feel?

What does all this have to do with using a blog to build your list? A blog is one of the best ways to drive relevant traffic into your marketing funnel. A blog is part of your foundation for publishing information that is of high interest to your customers and prospects. If you have followed previous articles in this series you already understand why search engines love content published in blogs.

There are a number of articles in this series published in their entirety at www.stevereports.com For all the complete article on other issues, you need to be a subscriber. Subscription is free. Subscribers to this series conveniently receive all of the articles as they are published directly in their email. Respecting their interest in this series, I do not blast this list with unrelated information. I recommend you always respect your subscribers interests and you are likely to have a growing loyal following.

Technically I use Aweber ( http://www.aweber.com/?213390 ) for my subscription box on my blogs. At my Steve Reports blog, you can find an example of this in two places. First there is a subscribe for updates box in the right hand column of www.stevereports.com Below it there is a link that takes the reader to a page dedicated to registering those interested in the Blogging for Profits Series. The difference between the two is not significant. Using two registration boxes on the same blog seemed like a good idea at the time, since I was intending on creating an exclusive series for those only interested in using blogs for building profits. The strategy is sound. However since Blogging for Profits is part of all the content published at Steve Reports, I am not sure that strategy is optimal.

It is easy to set up a subscription form on a blog with your Aweber account( http://www.aweber.com/?213390 ) . They have a section of their system designed specifically for that purpose. Once this is set up, any time you publish content to your blog, subscribers receive that content in their email. I think this is far superior to the traditional use of autoresponders for list management. Everyone on your list already knows what you are publishing from reading your blog and does not want to miss a single issue. You have multiple benefits by writing articles in your blog with links. In addition to gaining fast visibility in the blog directories and search engines, you are generating inbound links for other sites. You are able to use the content you are writing for your blog in article directories. Your articles can be set in your blog to go out at times you specify similar to an autoresponder series. There is a public archive of all your material for any new visitor to easily read which further helps build the quality of your subscribers. Autoresponders are great but it is my view articles on your blog structured with a list registration section is far superior.

There is no limit to the number of blogs you can create with content of interest to your target audience. I am advising every client I am working with including a huge recreational vehicle dealership, a dominant regional construction company, an international manufacturer and distributor of specialty skin care products and a local cosmetic surgery clinic to use blogs as part of their marketing strategy. Each one is making progress in developing multiple blogs to their target markets.

There is another book waiting to be written on this topic. For now, develop or fine tune your marketing strategy. Part of this process is a clear definition of your target audiences. Decide which blogs are likely to be of most benefit to your business and who will be accountable for developing the content and measuring the success of your blogs. Finally have realistic expectations as to the development life cycle of your blogs.

Be healthy, prosperous and happy,

Steve Pohlit, Business Consultant
www.stevepohlit.com
www.stevereports.com

P.S. My mini series “How To Increase Profits by 30% or More in 90 Days or Less” details the steps used by my clients to achieve improved business performance. This mini-course is complementary. Subscribe at www.stevepohlit.com

The Dark Side of Business

Fraud and Failure are the two big F’s that represent the dark side of business. Both are rampant in on line and off line business models. This article addresses the risk of business failure in business with focus on an online Internet Marketing example since the true story included in this report is recent. It also provides guidance on achieving long lasting business success..

Nearly all marketing copy focuses on building revenue. Building revenue is required to build a business. Building profits is required to stay in business.

During a recent visit with the CEO of a company that markets physical products on line. This particular company has regularly recorded sales near $200,000 a week ($10 million a year.) They inventory nearly nothing and their gross margins are very good.

This CEO I met had no internet experience when he started. He had an idea and taught himself some web site design skills. With a very basic web site he began selling a few products that manufacturing companies drop shipped for him. From there, sales took off. With money rolling in, he hired people to help him and sales increased even more.

Today when you talk with him in detail about his business, you observe two things. He knows a lot about search engine optimization. He can tell you all the positives and negatives about each of the sites making up his VRE. The other thing you will notice is that he is very worried. He knows his business is in big trouble and he is hoping someone will help him fix it.

His business can be fixed. I am not sure who will be selected to help him, since once a person is “shell shocked” it is hard for them to pay attention to any rational discussion for more than about a minute. Others have already influenced his thinking on what should be done. My course of action would be different.

How does all this relates to you? Are you making as much profit as is possible from your business? Are you driving a proportionate share of each new revenue dollar to bottom line profit? What is your comfort level in running a business and I don’t mean just generating revenue?

How is it possible for a company to build online sales with decent margins to a level of approximately $10 million a year and be on the brink of total business failure? How is it possible for a off line company with sales of $1.5 billion to go out of business? Failure happens and the frequency is high.

Here are some things to consider. My FREE course “How To Increase Profits by 30% or More In 90 Days or Less” details the steps I recommend to all clients. Guess what!! This material is focused on the exact steps for achieving continual business success. For example, one of the products you receive with this course is a spreadsheet showing you how to maintain a schedule of cash receipts and disbursements on a rolling 8 week forcast. This ties to a financial flash that reports on your company’s financial strength. I use this very same template with every client whether it has $3 million in sales or $200 million. The course is FREE and you can register at my business consulting site.

A final note: if you are worried about the financial strength of your busiess, please call me at 727-587-7871. The initial consultation is complementay. It is possible corrective action is needed immediately to strengthen cash profits and protect your business. Most often with businesses that fail, the signs are not acknowledged soon enough and the corrective action is inadequate. Don’t let this F happen to you.

Wishing You Health, Wealth and Prosperity

Steve Pohlit, Business Consultant

Blogging For Profits: Issue # 11: Using Current Events Related To Your Business For A Niche Blog That Drives Traffic To Your Primary Business

Several weeks ago airport security rules were changed. The government pronounces them enhanced security measures.

I am a frequent air traveler and quickly set up a blog www.fastairporttravel.com The primary purpose of this niche site is to provide information that would help fellow business air travelers and others navigate airport security. In addition to information on security lines, there are tips on checking luggage, renting cars and more.

There is anther purpose for most blogs I activate. Each of my business related blogs has a very defined goal. Each one also serves to increase awareness of my consulting practice. In many cases, information is provided that businesses and marketers can directly use to help improve revenue and profits. In the case of Fast Airport Travel, the information is indirect. In all cases there are links to my primary site www.stevepohlit.com and to my primary business blog www.stevereports.com

Every business and entrepreneur can benefit from first activating a primary web site and blog. Once in place, there are almost no limits to the topics that can be developed for your blog that tie into the goal of your business and blog. There will be times when you come across a theme that warrants its own blog.

Examples of Creating Niche Blogs For Business Growth

Restaurants
The topics related to food and drink along with a tie in to health, increased energy, weight management and issues like diabetes are easily developed. If wine and spirits are served, they represent an opportunity for specialty blogs or at least major categories on the restaurant’s primary blog.

Retail Store
Depending on your offer, there is most likely a wealth of information on most, if not all, of your product categories. I once owned a drug store chain. If I still operated that business, I would likely outsource the development of content related to items sold. This could easily be a full time position for a person. However, I have learned from the Internet Marketing experts frequently posting articles at Internet Marketing Newswatch, to test using writers from elance, rentacoder or one of the other independent contractor broker sites. Imagine the range of topics possible particularly since drug stores have pharmacies, food, magazines, eye care, dental, cosmetics, skin care and more.

Professional Services
Legal, accounting, medical, title, marketing, financial services and others each have no shortage of content which form the basis for a blog. In addition, there are niche markets for most professional firms to have separate blogs. Many professionals are hesitant to offer too much information since they believe their ability to charge fees will be impaired. In my course “How To Increase Profits by 30% or More In 90 Days or Less” offered at www.stevepohlit.com I give away the exact process I teach clients that are paying me. Most people are too busy to implement new ideas, even when all the information is available for free. Of course, in the professional services industry there is value associated with working with the professional chosen, as there is often more than one way to achieve a goal. Also, there are specialties that are not easily self taught or practiced.

Name Your Industry
This article could be book by expanding on the above examples and including more industries. While this issue of Blogging for Profits may be the foundation for a future book, today’s purpose is to give you ideas on how you can develop your information and communication strategy and implement that strategy with the help of niche blogs. Ultimately, your business revenue and profits should benefit.

A Closing Recommendation
My region’s weekly business journal recently printed an article highlighting the small percentage of businesses using blogs and the relatively small percentage of people on line reading blogs. Do not be deterred by statistics. Valuable content will help your business. You may not see an immediate impact. However, consistent attention to providing valuable information to your target audience will have a positive return on investment long term.

May Your Profits Grow and You Enjoy The Journey

Steve Pohlit, Business Consultant

P.S. You are invited to post your success stories and tips at www.successtips.us and remember, most content developed for blogs can be submitted to article directories.

(Learn the exact steps to developing your own blog by reading the back issues of Blogging for Profits. Subscribing at www.stevereports.com)

Huge Opportunities for Direct Response Marketers

The number of companies using classic lead generation and direct response marketing is very small, the opportunity for marketers to help others is huge. You don’t have to be one of the gure’s to make a difference. Here are some examples of what is working:

McDonalds

McDonalds promotes a $1.00 menu in many markets. Do they lose money on this promotion? For just the $1.00 menu, McDonalds probably covers all of their food costs. In the accounting world after considering other direct costs, McDonalds is probably not making any money on the dollar meal promotion. So why do they do it?

First the dollar promotion is very popular with students and even that group generally spend more than a dollar adding on additional items to their order. Students who like the deal, bring their friends and the average ticket often exceeds $3.00. In the fast food industry McDonalds is doing quite well.

The $1.00 meal is classic lead generation. Is it perfect direct response marketing? Hardly, since McDonalds still does not do much to build their data base of customers and use it for a direct to customer communication strategy.

Here are a couple of other examples:

Men’s Warehouse

They offer the “Perfect Fit Program”. This is classic direct response marketing. On line or in the store there are attractive offers to become part of this program. Members receive attractive offers by email on special buys and sales. Based on my experience with this retailer, they execute their lead generation and communication strategy very well.

Blue Hippo

Have you ever seen these brief informercials on TV? Blue Hippo wants you to send you a computer. They target people with limited resources by offering them a weekly payment plan. It appears they will send a computer to just about anyone. Their promotion is also classic direct response. The ad runs and viewers are asked to call an 800 number. Very easy to calculate return on investment. Run the ad, measure the calls received and measure the conversion of calls received to shipments booked. I have no idea of the economics of their business, but if it is like other pay by the week businesses the profit margins are huge.

The Number of Good Examples of Direct Response Marketing Are Increasing. Companies are beginning to wake up to the importance of measuring return on investment from marketing dollars. However, for every business having a marketing program that is structured to track return on investment, there are thousands that do not.

Even the companies that have in-house marketing experts often do not really know how to maximize the return on investment from their marketing dollars. Just this week I met with the CEO and marketing expert of a medium sized company that I am helping with a business plan and projections in connection with their interest in securing additional funding for an accelerated growth program. In examining what they have done in the past, I learned they purchased a targeted list of 5,000 leads. A mailing campaign with postcards was designed and implemented.

Sounds good so far. Upon closer examination, no testing was done on the marketing message. They could have used Google Adwords to test response rates and conversion of versions of their message. Even if they didn’t want to do that, they should have tested a sample of the 5,000 before have the postcard printed for a three step sequential mailing. The point is they are doing something, they are trying but they missed several key points that would have increased their return on investment.

Being on the list of most of the well known direct response marketers, it seems natural to identify gaps in my marketing expertise. Then I simply start paying closer attention to the marketplace and find huge opportunities for improvement. With every one of my consulting clients I work through with them enhanced processes and procedures to grow revenue and maximize gross margin and net profit. This approach is detailed in the free course “How To Increase Profits by 30% or More in 90 Days or Less” which can be found at www.stevepohlit.com and “Blogging for Profits” which is another free series that can be found here at www.stevereports.com

May Your Profits Grow and You Have Fun With The Journey

Steve Pohlit, Business Consultant

Blogging for Profits: Issue No. 10 A Profit Building Opportunity From A Home Repair Appointment

Recently I had a door including the frame replaced at my home. When a frame is replaced, it is common for the wiring and connectors for the security system to be compromised. One call to Brinks and the appointment for the repair was set. Their call center was very helpful.

The Brinks representative who came to my home arrived at the front end of the appointment window. Normally with other services I find I am usually the last call for some reason. He was professional and friendly. The work was completed quickly, he checked my entire system while he was there and the service was completed in less than an hour. I rate this experience very high on the customer satisfaction scale. However, to date they have not asked my opinion.

Discover how this appointment at my home turned into a Blogging for Profits opportunity for Brinks. Subscribe today at the main page ofSteve Reports

Steve Pohlit, Business Consultant

How Advertising Promotions Backfire

How often have you been attracted to a hot promotion only to discover the product is out of stock? This is one of the fastest ways to weaken customer loyalty and completely defeats the purpose of attracting new customers.

Boston Market has been running a family dinner promotion. The price point is $19.95. While I was not stopping for that special, I noticed a steady stream of customers ordering that special. And while I was there – they ran out. The manager was apologizing and letting people know another location nearby was still in stock. She also said the other location had a line of customers and only four dinners left. That was not a good suggestion.

A friendly crowd soon became quite irritable. Goodwill and the credibility of any future promotion was compromised. Now this was not the only issue in that location when I was there. The wait time was quite long. Boston Market is a fast food restaurant. The food is already prepared and simply needs to be served or packed for take out. The people working there moved as if the store was empty. It’s not their fault. The pay is low, the labor pool of people who will work for low pay is small and so you get what you pay for. This is systemic problem in the service industry and will not be solved until management recognizes the huge
opportunity for increased profits that will be realized when they have people working who will give customers customer service. This is not just about the pay scale, it is about having the right number of people available to provide customer service.

Now back to the advertising and more specifically the advertising process. Most retail companies have an advertising calendar because time is required to finalize a campaign including any print or electronic media that will be used. For a business the size of Boston Market, this is not small task nor is it cheap. So now all this work goes into a advertising campaign and what happens. first there is no customer contact information required on any of the coupons. Nobody asks you to fill out a satisfaction survey. So all these people come into your business to spend money and you have no idea who they are and no system in place to invite them back. Next you proceed to run out of product that you are promoting. In defense of Boston Market there are only so many whole chickens you can roast at one time and if customer traffic blips I can see where running out of product can happen. Every effort should be made to minimize out of stocks and when they do happen, have a substitute product lined up and a generous bounce back coupon – FREE would be good. Yes I am suggesting that if you are promoting a $19.95 family dinner and if you run out, give them a bounce back coupon for $19.95. It will cost the restaurant less than $8.00 and you will probably win a customer for life.

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Steve Pohlit is a business consultant helping companies achieve extraordinary increases in revenue and profits. "How To Increase Profits by 30% or More In 90 Days or Less" is a free course found at www.stevepohlit.com "Blogging for Profits" is another free mini series Steve has developed and is offered at his blog www.stevereports.com Steve’s newest service, www.successtips.com offers others to contribute articles and advice as well as promote their business. CEOs of companies with revenue exceeding $10 million annually are invited to contact Steve for a complimentary consultation.

Leadership Is The No.1 Key Success Factor

Leadership is the most important factor in predicting business success or failure. A company’s strength or weakness is determined by its leader.

Recently, I started working with a privately held company that is owned by a family and where a number of family members work in the business. This is a very common picture. What is also common whether the business is family owned or not is a lack of clear direction and day to day discipline where resources are focused on the most important revenue and cost drivers.

I regularly hear a list of excuses and over time while I am working at different companies in different industries, the list is nearly always the same. In nearly every case when I ask a question as to why a certain work function is not performing it invariably comes down to a family member in the job or some loyal employee in the job that has established their way of doing things and the company’s leader is afraid of upsetting the apple cart.

How To Establish Strong Leadership In A Business

When I talk about this subject and give examples of ineffective leadership, most people think I quickly recommend replacing the person. Since some of my clients are family owned companies and the CEO is often the head of the family in addition to being head of the business, replacing that person is not an option. Even if the company is not a family owned business, replacing the CEO is far down the list of preferred options for strengthening the leadership position.

The process of strengthening leadership is detailed in my free course “How To Increase Profits by 30% or More in 90 Days or Less” which you can subscribe to at www.stevepohlit.com This article will further enhance your understanding as to the actions I have taken with clients that have been successful in creating leaders that have helped their companies build revenue and profits.

I have found most leaders do not have a clear plan for making money and so they cannot guide their organization to success. The second most common issue I find is that where a leader does have a plan for making money, they fail to follow the steps that are needed to be taken each day and each week to implement the plan. I would say that among the CEOs I have counseled, most know what makes them money, most know how to make more money, but many do not have the disciplined process in place to make it happen.

My most recent client is a great example and is the motivator for me writing this article. This client absolutely knows how to do the work of their business. The CEO is a master of this work and teaches others how to do this work well. They are awful at knowing how to make money at what they do. In fact, they do not get receive accurate information on their business performance and without change they never will because there is nobody employed in this company who has the training and skills required to produce the information they need. We are fixing that. This is more common than you think. Even where there are people trained on providing required information, it is often too little and too late.

Step number 1 is to make sure there is a clear understanding of what makes a company money and how. Step number 2 is to fine tune the day to day resource allocation so people spend their time making money. Day to day means every day and this is where we run into problems. It is not human nature to follow a disciplined schedule every day no mater how important the tasks are to making money. This discipline deficiency factor is often most acute among CEOs who are entrepreneurs and CEOs who are leaders because they were born into it. So it is important to teach them Steps 1 and 2 first and then if that doesn’t work another person is likely to be needed as the company’s day to day leader.

Recently in Business Week, Jack and Suzy Welsh advised a family member concerned about business direction to recruit a CEO. I really hesitate to disagree with Jack since he has been so successful as the now retired CEO of G.E., but in my experience many companies do not have the experience to hire an experienced and highly qualified CEO. Some that come to this conclusion will rely on a recruiter. This can work but is very risky. Of course I am going to recommend the right consultant. Are there others besides me that will guide you on the approach that I recommend? Yes I am sure there are. If you decide to talk with your banker, attorney, outside accountant, tax accountant, prospective consulting firms or your neighbor, here is what you need to do first:

1. Make sure you have a clear definition of what makes money in your business and how much. This means you need to have good information on revenue trends and gross margin by categories of revenue source.
2. Objectively define your human resource strengths and weaknesses.
3. Accurately forecast your near term cash inflows and expenditures. The worksheet I provide in my free course that I mentioned earlier details how this should be done.
4. Outline what you believe is the best near term strategy for your business (12 months or less) based on your company’s history and performance in the past six months.
5. Take a couple sheets of paper and see what your actual organization chart looks like. Enter the pay for each person you include on this functional organization chart.

The above five steps are not all you will need but when someone is advising you on how to run your business or how to recruit a leader, they better be bringing up at least four out of five of the above or you should be running away from that meeting as fast as you can.

Does a strong leader guarantee business success? There are no guarantees but a strong leader who is fixated on the handful of actions that make the most difference in revenue and profits will give your company the best chance for success long term.

To Your Extraordinary Success,
Steve Pohlit, Business Consultant
www.stevepohlit.com
www.stevereports.com

P.S. I am developing a new blog at www.successtips.us You are invited to check it out and submit your own success tip.

Blogging for Profits Issue No.9 How To Use The Powerful Motivators Recognition and Praise In A Special Blog To Help Grow Profits

You probably have noticed companies in the hospitality industry encouraging customers or visitors to acknowledge outstanding service, or to comment on their dining or hotel experience. Maybe you have read a survey card delivered with a the check at a restaurant. There are businesses where you are asked to write a note or complete a form if an employee did something extremely well and made the experience at that place of business more pleasant than you expected. Some companies send on line and off line surveys asking for feedback.

All of these programs were started and then duplicated by someone who realized that by asking for feedback you demonstrate you are interested in doing things better and want your customers to be happy. Employee recognition programs were started by someone who knows that praise and recognition are the two most powerful motivators.

Blog are a great tool to further enhance the customer comment and employee recognition programs. This article details how using blogs for customer feedback and employee recognition should be structured. When implemented properly, revenue and profits will increase as direct result of this effort. In this Blogging for Profits series, every issue is focused on how to use blogs to increase revenue and profits. All prior issues can be found at www.stevereports.com Register now at the main page and read all the issues starting with No. 4 Issues 1-3 are posted in their entirety at the blog.

Trends In Your Niche Markets Are Opportunities For Increased Sales and Profits

Companies in the retail industry often face significant challenges to achieving consistent growth in revenue and profits. Large companies with very recognizable brands like Dell, Wal Mart, Home Depot and Microsoft as examples have all recently reported issues that have affected profit trends.

No company had ever succeeded long term with a low price strategy. Go to Wal Mart’s web site a look right below their logo. It reads “Always Low Prices…Always!” Now they are modifying their product offer in many stores in an attempt to become appealing to shoppers with more money to spend. Will it work? I wouldn’t do it. However, I am not their CEO and they didn’t ask me. Why are they doing it? They see the results being reported by Target, Kohls and others who appeal to a customer base more affluent than the typical Wal Mart shopper. Is Wal Mart a leader or a laggard on the spending trends? Laggard.

What about some of these other companies? Microsoft was to big and clumsy to recognize how fast and furious Google’s model took hold. They also ignored Apple and the iPod until the results kept hitting them in the face. Firefox has 12% market share and open office is growing at a rapid pace. The information on these trends and others are public information and largely ignored by Microsoft. Now it is an underperforming company.

Not that long ago McDonalds was in the news as being one of the companies that was experiencing difficulties with profit performance. Now that has changed and McDonalds has been reporting very good sales and profit growth in recent quarters while some of the leaders in recent past like Cheesecake Factory, Outback Steakhouse and a number of others have been reporting softening sales and profit.

What’s changed and what has McDonalds done different to capitalize on the changes? The Federal Reserve has just announced the continuance of their “let’s kill the economy program” with the 10th or 14th or whatever in a row increase in interest rates. Then there is the ongoing international issues which continue to keep the price of oil at record highs. So while unemployment remains relatively low, the costs associated with credit card debt and gasoline prices affect a lot of things including where people eat, how much they will pay for a meal and how far they will drive when it is optional. McDonalds is lower priced than many of the sit down restaurants and offers an increasing number of food items that are not as high in calories and cholesterol causing ingredients which leads to another shift in demand patterns. With the increased awareness on price due to the pressures of higher fuel costs and interest expense, this is a perfect opportunity for restaurants to implement loyalty programs with meaningful incentives. It is also a great time to be spending more on the customer service experience in the restaurant. Of course just the opposite is occurring with increasing regularity.

There is frequent publicity on the obesity issue in the US. This new story for the media seems to have had an impact on what foods people order to eat. McDonalds recognized this trend and started adding appealing salads to its menu about three years ago. The salad category is accounting for a significant portion of their increased sales and profits. At the gym I visit there is a big poster ad for McDonalds grilled chicken salad. Not only is it big, it is appealing. Applebees is devoting more of its menu to health conscious customers but I have not seen much change in the Outback chain or others. I have noticed more convenient stores offering a wider selection of higher quality foods including soups and salads. Many convenient stores seem to notice what people want faster than other companies and adjust.

Many of the examples used in this and other articles are taken from information published about public companies. This information is readily available as public companies are required to report on their business to their shareholders. This information often offers tremendous insight as to strategies that work and ones that don’t. Today’s Success Tip: pay close attention to the trends for your niche markets and adjust your offer accordingly.

Steve Pohlit, Business Consultant
“Helping Business Make Extraordinary Profits Now”
www.stevereports.com
www.stevepohlit.com

Blogging for Profits Issue No.8: Increase Sales and Profits of Less Popular Products and Services With The Help of Your Blog

Blogging for Profits issue No. 8:
Increase Sales and Profits of Less Popular Products and Services With The Help of Your Blog

Reviews of recently released book "The Long Tail" by Chris Andersen summarizes his focus on niche markets and the resulting sales and profits from product sales that are generally obscure to the mass markets but appeal to special interest
groups.

Ed Dale and Frank Kern are guiding thousands through the updated 30 Day Underachievers program. This is designed to teach you how to identify a profitable niche market and create a product that will meet a need in that niche. If you are an internet marketer or otherwise interested in using the tools of the Internet, you will be well served to pay attention to this program (www.underachieverlife.com).

This series is about how to achieve a dramatic increase in profits for your business by developing and managing a blog. In The Long Tail Chris says only 20% of the items offered by retailers are hits. Of course it is by no coincidence this is consistent with the 80/20 rule I have mentioned in previous issues. In summary, 20% of the items, or customers account for 80% of the revenue and profits. Ed Dale and Frank Kern teach you how to identify the top 20% of the keywords in you niche market research. I spend most of my time helping clients identify and focus their resources on the top 20% of their offer. In other words spend 80% of your time on the 20% of the items that account for 80% of your sales and profits. Rich Shefren teaches this extensively to his coaching students. Read his interviews with two students at http://www.strategicprofits.com/interview

Part of what both Rich and I advocate is the leveraging of skills. For example if you are great at sales, it would be a mistake to have you devote a lot of time to maintaining the accounting system. I am sure you understand the principle.

Register for Blogging For Profits and read all of this
post plus issues 4-7 in their entirety. Registration is FREE at
www.stevereports.com

Biggest Successes Result From Simplicity

Do You Recall Economics 101 by Father Guido Sarducci on Saturday Night Live?

I remember most of the skit like it was played this morning. Father Sarducci would explain how he was able to master four years of economics theory by learning one principle: The Law of Supply and Demand. He said it was the only law anyone who studied economics remembered.

The Law of Supply and Demand is easy to understand. If you lower the supply and keep the demand constant, price will rise until the demand equals supply. Father Guido Sarducci successfully explained this principle in about 5 minutes to a Saturday night crowd up late and heavily influenced by recreational medication and alcohol. Even with those most challenging environmental factors, most of the audience in the studio and in front of their TV sets learned more about economics in those five minutes than in any economic classroom.

Many economic theories are hard to master. The law of supply and demand is relatively easy and it works. The notion that complexity is required for something to work is wrong in most cases. I see countless examples every week of companies working to make business hard? Here is another recent example:

USA Today reported on the disastrous test results experienced by passengers boarding Southwest Airline’s flights originating in San Diego. What Southwest was testing is the procedure already perfected by nearly every other airline which of course is assigned seating. Southwest decided to came up with their own definition of assigned seating. They literally assigned you a seat and it didn’t matter when you made your reservation, showed up at the gate or where your preferred to sit. Apparently some people arriving early and preferring a window seat in the front of the plane were assigned middle seats in the back of the plane. In summary, Southwest pissed off a lot of people and as a frequent flyer of Southwest and other airlines, I could imagine not being a happy camper.

So what does this have to do with Father Guido Sarducci? The lesson is keep it simple and do what has been proven to work. I am astounded that the leadership of Southwest Airlines could not have copied the already perfected system of assigned seating developed by other airlines and tested that. I am even further amazed the CEO of Southwest basically downplayed how rattled some of the passengers were by this stupid test. I noticed he was not part of the test group. I also notice Southwest employees flying Southwest board before all other passengers. I believe if the executives and other employees were automatically put in Group C or in middle seats of their assigned seating test things would change fast at Southwest.

There is another important item about Southwest as report by USA Today. Southwest has raised prices nine times in the past 12 months and their stock price has hardly budged. I just checked fight availability on a midweek flight from the Midwest to Florida. Looks to me like it is nearly empty a week in advance. I wonder why?

Let’s bring this back to your business. The simplest thing to do is look at your business from the perspective of your customer. If you have a retail store, shop it or hire a mystery shopper. If you have a customer service center, call them. If you develop information products that you sell on line, ask your customers 90 days later how they have benefited from the product and what else they would like to have seen included. If you have a membership program, and someone drops out, stay in touch to find out what it takes to get them back. Recently I discontinued a membership program where I was paying a lot of money each month – much more than $100. I have not received one call or even one email asking me why. This is really amazing considering how much money it takes to get a person to sign up for the basic plan yet alone the plan I was in.

Now here is a big bonus for those who have read this entire rant: Follow Your Instincts! I have said this before and will be saying it in many articles in the future. Every client I have worked with knew the fundamental solutions to the issues they asked me to help them with. For a whole host of reasons they didn’t act and accepted inertia. In nearly every case the solutions were obvious and intellectually simple.

Right now list the top 3 issues that are holding you back from making breakthrough profits in your business. Then starting right now, spend at least 80% of your time solving those three issues. Once solved, do it again and keep doing it. Simple stuff.

Be well and prosper,
Steve Pohlit, Business Consultant
www.stevereports.com
www.stevepohlit.com
“Helping Business Make Extraordinary Profits Now! No Reports..Just Results”

Blogging for Profits Issue No.7: Earn Massive Profits With Your Message

Blogging For Profits Issue No.7 Earn Massive Profits With Your Message

1.Is one blog enough for your business?
2.What is the goal of your blog?
3.How often should you post information?
4.How do you measure the effectiveness of the time and energy spent in developing and writing the information in your blog?

These questions and more are answered in this issue. Follow this series and you will earn massive profits for your business – guaranteed!

Register for Blogging for Profits now at www.stevereports.com and receive all the back issues starting with Issue.No.4 The first three issues are posted in their entirety on the blog.

The Buzzwords May Change, The Profit Growing Principles Do Not!!

(This article links traditional business with entrepreneurship. The focus is on sound success principles that are proven to work and not on their labels.)

Phred Dvrak writes in the Wall Street Journal that management trends fade quickly. He refers to consultants as fashion surfers and uses dramatic declines in articles published on programs including “Business Process Reengineering” and “Total Quality Management (TQM)” as evidence of his statement. In a nutshell, he believes consultants jump on the latest management theory buzzwords as a means to sell work.

There are a lot of consultants in the world. Like any other profession, there are those who are totally professional and absolute experts at what they do and there are those who are not. Most people in business have their favorite experts. There is a growing list of very credible experts in specialized field and every industry. There is also a growing list of people who pretend to have a lot to offer but really don’t.

The best experts consistently offer guidance based on proven business principles. In a previous article I discussed the importance of testing and cited two retail stores with dramatically different results. If you read material published by direct marketing experts, they have been advising testing for decades. When you read the books and articles published by management experts, the ones who have actually successfully operated one or more companies, you will consistently find they focus on creating a culture for consistent improvement in business performance. It doesn’t matter if the the process is called Business Process Reengineering, TQM, Six Sigma, Kaizen or anything else. What matters is that a company maintains a consistent discipline to examine all details of their business for the purpose of improving business performance.

It is not that hard to know what to do. Every owner or CEO I have worked with always says “I knew what to do. I just did not consistently implement.” My course How To Increase Profits by 30% or More in 90 Days or Less, which is available FREE at www.stevepohlit.com is mostly about the disciplined process of making money in your business.

Consistent discipline is the hardest part. Most CEO’s don’t follow a disciplined management system in running their business. I get paid to remind them and their team how to do use an focused sequential process for running their business and most of all I show them the consequences of not doing that. Sometimes I am called in when the patient is critically ill and they are looking for a way to reverse the slide. Sometimes they are too far gone.

A disciplined approach to running your business applies to multi-billion international companies and home based entrepreneurs. John Reese discusses the benefit of rational work long term. He consistently reminds his readers that his current success is a product of working consistently on his business for quite a number of years. Read Dan Kennedy’s book on time management. You will quickly understand the discipline he applies to his business. Everyone I know who has achieved a measure of success with their business has experienced disappointment, financial setbacks, the wrath of creditors and family members. However, they remained focused on their goal and followed a disciplined plan of action to achieve the goal.

In my own career, I have experienced huge success and huge failures. Today I work in two arenas. I work with traditional businesses helping them get stronger and I work on further developing my entrepreneurial interests using on line and off line tools. Many days I am more successful making sure my clients follow the work plan than I am following my own work plan. So I have stepped up my efforts to be in the right mastermind group and I am considering having a business development coach to assist me in accelerating the development plan for my business by holding me more accountable and challenging my priorities.

Most of us need to reinforce the importance of following a work plan to accomplish our business goals. Now this assumes you have clearly written goals and a work plan designed to accomplish those goals. Most people and companies do not have a current definition of their goals, a current work plan designed to achieve those goals and feedback system designed to monitor progress. As a consultant, I help business with that process in all areas of their company and it works very well. As a consultant I know this process works for entrepreneurs which is why I may I am stepping up my own process for achieving optimal results for my own business.

Steve Pohlit, Business Consultant
www.stevereports.com
www.stevepohlit.com
“Helping Business Make Extraordinary Profits Now! No Reports…Just Results!”

P.S. Issue No.7 of the very popular, Blogging For Profits will be published in three more days. You don’t want to miss another issue. Register now at www.stevereports.com Registration is free.

Market Tesing for Maximum Profits

Zale Corp. vs. Signet: One Tested…The Other Didn’t…Look At The Dramatically Different Results

Ann Zimmerman and Kris Hudson reported a very interesting article in the Wall Street Journal that describes the dramatically different results of two very large mass market jewelers – Zale Corp. and Signet. Zale’s jewelry division is headquartered in Texas. Signet which owns Kay’s Jewelers and Jarid is based in the UK. Both companies target market share in the huge U.S. market.

If you are in business, you must read the papers and magazines that deliver lessons and ideas that will help you. A quick review of the articles I publish reveals many examples taken from publications that are used as valuable lessons. Today’s article is no different.

In direct response marketing circles there has always been a lot of attention to the importance of testing. That industry uses what is called the “control”. This is the direct mail piece that has a predictable rate of response when mailed. Once established, writers are challenged to beat the control. The best copywriters, the ones with long running controls, make a ton of money because they deliver the goods.

I was trained in retail by some of the best in the industry in the 80’s. Then I worked with fashion retail, mass merchandisers and specialty stores. The divisions of The Limited were particularly skilled at identifying fashion trends that were popular in foreign markets, replicating enough of an item for a market test and then if the tests met their expectations, they would quickly mass produce the item and fly finished production to their US distribution center where the garment would be in the stores in a matter of weeks.

Every successful retailer is constantly testing market response. Every successful internet marketer is constantly testing market response. Market testing is critical for maximizing profits at companies. So what was Zale Corp. thinking when they implemented a complete change in jewelry merchandising strategy following a lackluster Christmas selling season in 2005? I don’t know and if it has worked the story might be different. But moving from a mass market strategy to an upscale market strategy in a matter of months chain wide end in a financial disaster for Zale and possibly the end of the careers for a number of people at the company including the CEO. Signet on the other hand is following a strategy of consistently testing and modifying its product offer based on the results of the testing. They base their merchandise strategy on listening to what the consumer wants as evidenced by how they spend their money.

I have been in business long enough to know that the former CEO of Zale Corp. probably has his side of the story and it is different from the message published in the WSJ. However, the financial results of the two companies speak for themselves and reinforce the importance of testing.

The roadmap to success in business is relatively easy to follow. Every day I am working with companies who realize hire me because they know they can be doing better and need a refresher on the fundamentals of doing business. Testing is one of the fundamentals for most businesses. If you are not doing it, or if you do not have a formalized testing process in place with the details of the tests being run presented at management meetings, start now.

Steve Pohlit, Business Consultant
www.stevereports.com
www.stevepohlit.com
“Helping Business Make Extraordinary Profits Now! No Reports…Just Results!”

Blogging for Profits: Issue No.6: Do This One Thing A Explode The Profits From Your Blog

In previous issues we have reviewed the mechanics of setting up a blog and the information strategy you should be developing for your blog. If you need help with setting up a blog, go to one of the outsourcing job boards like www.rentacoder.com or www.elance.com and issue a request for a proposal. Quite candidly I recommend you or someone in your business learn how to set up a blog because it is likely you will find opportunities for operating more than one blog as you get better at defining your niche markets. But do not delay getting started. I personally used a person skilled in Word Press blogs to help me when I started www.stevereports.com Now I update the site and make changes for the content I post. For this blog I am the writer so I find that is the easiest and fastest way for me to do it.

The goal of Blogging For Profits is to advise you on how to maximize the profit potential of a blog for your business in the shortest amount of time. As promised, I am now going to disclose possibly the single best action you can implement right now to explode the profit potential of your blog. This action item is not being discussed by internet marketers and I have not seen it discussed in business magazines, newspapers or in on-line forums. However since it is impossible for anyone person to monitor all on line and off line content for a topic I am not claiming to be the first to reveal this powerful tool. On second thought yes I am until someone can show me an article or forum discussion that is legitimately dated prior to June 30, 2006.

(The remainder of this article is FREE for subscribers to Blogging For Profits. Register now at www.stevereports.com )