Business Coaching

Business Coaching From Your Profit Coach

Welcome to my Business Coaching Blog which you will find packed with tips and ideas to make a small business more profitable.

My particular interest is in owner-manager businesses with up to about 50 employees across manufacturing, distribution, services and retail sectors who use of a combination of direct marketing and Internet based marketing.

I believe that there is hidden profit potential in almost every business and my coaching is designed to find it.

Find Your Hidden Profit With The Eight Pillars Of Business Prosperity

My business coaching approach is based around the Eight Pillars of Business Prosperity to help you to get from where you are to where you want to be.

Briefly the Eight Pillars are:

1. Your key numbers and how you measure performance - this captures where you are.
    
   
2. Your vision and how that turns into goals, priorities and the way you use your time.
    
   
3. Your market positioning and how you create distance from your competitors and deliver great value for money to your customers and clients.
    
   
4. Your lead generation methods and techniques - how you attract interest from potential customers.
    
   
5. Your lead conversion methods - how you turn leads into customers.
    
   
6. Customer retention and how you increase your "share of wallet" so that customers stay with you longer and buy more.
    
   
7. The way you lead your team of employees and suppliers to deliver the promises you make to customers.
    
   
8. Your systems and processes so that your business works consistently, effectively and efficiently without you.
   

To learn more about my Eight Pillars of Business Prosperity approach and to get two excellent reports - Marketing Secrets for Small Business and How To Win Profitable Customers From Your Competitors please enter your details below.

Details Of My Business Coaching

My business coaching and mentoring is only available for businesses based in the United Kingdom and is delivered through telephone and email unless you live in the Birmingham West Midlands area.

I have been provide independent business consultancy and coaching services since 1995 and as well as many years of experience I am a chartered accountant, MBA and Certified Guerrilla Marketing Coach.

More specialised business coaching is also available as marketing coaching (based on Pillars 3 to 6 of the Eight Pillars or a six week Guerrilla Marketing Coaching course) and Finance Coaching.

Sorting Mail Into The A Pile & The B Pile

Legendary copywriter Gary Halbert used to teach the concept that most people get their mail and sort it into two piles - the A pile and the B pile - before opening anything.

Why do they do that?

Because everybody's time is limited.

The A Pile gets some attention.

The B Pile is often thrown away unopened.

You might argue that you actually you have three piles with the A pile split into A1 open and look at now and A2 open and look at later (which is how I tend to work) but you get the idea.

Your job if you are sending a direct mail letter is to make sure that you are in the A pile and you stay in the A pile even after the letter is opened.

So how do you send A Pile direct mail letters?

Gary Halbert goes into the A pile / B pile ideas in a lot of detail in his classic Direct Mail Nerd letter from The Gary Halbert Letters but the principle is simple.

You make your letter look as much like a personal letter as you can.

And that means removing all the tell-tale signs that it is a bulk direct mail letter from the envelope.

A proper envelope.

No teaser copy declaring "25% Off Our Magazine Subscription".

No commercial return address that gives the game away. Note that in the US, return addresses are used but are rarely used in the UK.

No labels for the address or window envelopes. Writers of personal letters don't work like that so an individual typed or even hand written address.

No franking machine "stamp" but genuine stamps - and I've even heard some direct mail experts say that you should be using several stamps to make it look like you are using the leftovers of what you've got. First class makes a much better impression than bulk mail / second class.

How do you stay in the A pile?

You get your direct mail letter opened so the next critical step is to stay in the A pile and not have your letter fail what Dan Kennedy calls the 3 second test - "Is this junk and if so bin it!"

So you want your letter to be revealed in the right order. No order form to give the game away. No fancy brochure or flyer to scream "I WANT YOUR MONEY".

The envelope has to be opened so that the reader sees your headline which has a strong "what's in it for me" or curiosity/news theme.

How Did Gary Halbert Discover These Secrets?

Well in some ways they are obvious.

It's probably what you do when you get your mail each morning - you sort into an A Pile and a B Pile.

But the copywriting experts weren't dishing out this advice and in his early days as a direct mail novice, Gary Halbert struggled to get by. He tells the story of spending the rent and utility money to do another test mailing.

Enough was enough and he asked himself a critical question.

"Gary, what would you do if you had to make your next mailing work? What if you could only mail one letter and, if you didn't get a response, you would quite literally, be beheaded?"

It's a tough question but it gets you into a great frame of mind for writing copy and it certainly helps you to focus on the critical aspects like making sure you are in the A pile and not the B pile.

Anyway you can get the full story, as told by Gary Halbert at the Direct Mail Nerd

Is Gary Halbert Always Right?

No.

That's the great thing about direct mail and direct response marketing.

You test, see the results, establish your control and then continue to experiment.

Sometimes teaser copy on the outside is needed.

Really important official stuff looks like boring post which can be put to one side - but a notice that says "You have only seven days from the date this letter was posted to avoid the fine" may well get you opening that letter immediately. 

Pre-Emptive Marketing: Innovative Tactics That Outperform

The third expert panel interview from the League of Extraordinary Minds is focused on pre-emptive marketing.

The full title is:

"Pre-Emptive Marketing: Innovative Tactics That Outperform What Everyone Else Is Doing"

The experts invited to this panel are:

• Jay Conrad Levinson - author of the Guerrilla Marketing books
   
  
• Al Ries - author or co-author of "Positioning: The Battle for Your Mind," "Marketing Warfare," "Focus," "The 22 Immutable Laws of Branding," "The Fall Of Advertising & The Rise of PR," and his latest "The Origin of Brands"
  
  
• Gary Vaynerchuk... Author of "Crush It: Why Now Is The Time To Cash In On Your Passion"
  
  
• Sergio Zyman... Author of "The End Of Marketing As We Know It" and former Chief Marketing Officer of Coca-Cola
   
  
• Vicki Kunkel... Author of "Instant Appeal: The 8 Primal Factors That Create Blockbuster Success",
   
  
• Paul Cherry... Author of "Questions That Sell"

It should be another fascinating and informative broadcast on Thursday November 12th at 8:00 pm your local time.  

You can hear this broadcast for FREE by signing up at the League of Extraordinary Minds - affiliate link.

I am lucky to have been given free access to the upsell for the upsell for mp3s and transcripts of the calls which is a very convenient way to hear these sessions and you get some great bonuses as well. 

My Instant Swipe File Review

I am fascinated by copywriting and I have been gradually building up my swipe file of sales letters.

With the one exceptions of headlines, what I have never done is gone through and pulled together examples the best of the individual sections of a compelling sales letter.

But Jeff Gardner has with My Instant Swipe File

Jeff has gone through the work of many of the top names in modern day copywriting and picked out what he considers to be the best examples - the copywriters included in My Instant Swipe File are John Carlton, Michel Fortin, Harlan Kilstein, Joe Vitale, Yanik Silver, Bob Bly, Dan Lok, Randy Charach, Mike Jezek, Grady Smith and Jesse Forrest.

It's an impressive list and the items in the swipe file include:

• Headlines

• Offers

• Creating Scarcity

• Proof

• Pricing

• Closes

• Guarantees

• Value Building

• Bonuses

• Benefits

• Postscripts

• Openings

• Bullets

• And much more...  
  

Looking deeper into the headlines section, there are some of the headline examples from the star copywriters (and yes you can see who wrote what), there are fill in the blank headline templates and notes and explanations on the main headline themes.

And it continues - without the explanations but with attributed examples throughout the key elements of a sales letter.

You could do this yourself but it will take many hours of work to pull everything together and many years to see the examples of great sales letters to pick up for your swipe file.

The easy way out is to buy My Instant Swipe File and it is a snip at the price.

My Instant Swipe File - affiliate link

I like the idea of My Instant Swipe File and I like it in practice.

It's not perfect but then what is?

I wish there were some more of my favourite copywriters included like Gary Halbert, Dan Kennedy and Clayton Makepeace but these are quibbles over what is a terrific piece of work.

What's more I am sure that it will help you make more money because just reading the copy from the masters improves your feel for compelling copy.

If you want to further improve, a trick many of the copywriting trainers teach is to start writing out the copy for yourself. Some say you should hand write them while others say it is OK to type. But the act of reproducing the copy helps to embed it into your brain and you get an instinctive feel for how copy is put together.

My Instant Swipe File - affiliate link

If you buy My Instant Swipe File after click through from my link I will earn a commission but this sis such a low price that it is a bargain.

My Instant Swipe File For Free?

I bought My Instant Swipe File and then searched Google while I was writing this review.

I was astonished to see the PDF file was available to anyone who searches.

Google.com - My Instant Swipe File

I am confused. I don't know whether this is intended but I have told support that it is happening and asked them to either a) block the file or b) refund my money.

I haven't heard from them so I don't feel that I can recommend this to you without explaining how you can get it for free.

You may only have a short window of opportunity to get My Instant Swipe File for free but it is sitting there in the Google index. 

What's Hot On The Blog October 2009

Interestingly my traffic for the League of Extraordinary Minds is tailing off as I look at what's hot on my blogs in October.

What's Hot Week ending November 7th 2009

1. The 4 Ps of Marketing - I look at just how many Ps there are in marketing
2. Industry analysis
3. What is a leader?
4. Business Coaching Blog- home page
5. League of Extraordinary Minds

It is proved to be a quiet week for Internet marketing launches and these five have all appeared before in my top 5 of the week list.

Bubbling just outside the top five and marketing new appearances this close to the list were Is iLearning Global A Scam? and SPIN Sales Questions .   

Marketing And Advertising Strategy - SEO Myths Debunked

How difficult is it to get to the top of Google for a phrase like "marketing and advertising strategy" and does it mean anything anyway?

I have just watched a video from UK marketing man Chris Cardell from his VIP Inner Circle about Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) and this is a subject I know a bit about myself.

This video commits the same kind of deception I see from people selling SEO services by picking an impressive sounding phrase like "marketing and advertising strategy" and saying "look go and check Google and you will see that I know what I am talking about because I am top of Google".

I should point out that Chris Cardell is not representing himself as an SEO expert but giving tips on how to improve your Google ranking as part of a bigger marketing initiative so this is not intended as a dig at him. It's just that he's inspired me to point this out and use it as a specific example.

When I go and check Google for "marketing and advertising strategy", Chris Cardell's website (cardellmedia.com) is indeed there at number one in google.co.uk .

It looks very impressive too as when I checked Google as listing 41,100,000 pages for the phrase "marketing and advertising strategy".

But what does it mean?

For that you need to know how many people are searching for the phrase and so you turn to the Google Keyword Tool which gives you the chance to interrogate Google's worldwide database of searches.

It's easy to use and just set the match type on the right hand side when you get to the numbers to "exact" or you will get inflated numbers.

And at the moment, "Marketing and Advertising Strategy" is showing 46 searches on average per month throughout the world.

Narrow it down to just the UK and it comes back with the answer "Not enough data".

That's right there are not enough searches for "Marketing and Advertising Strategy" to make it worth trying to optimise the page.

Sadly I see this manipulative technique used all too frequently by people trying to sell you SEO services. I seem to get quite a few emails and even telephone calls from people who want to get me to the first page of Google. They go away when I point out I am already there - see Google business coach.

You can fight back with the Google Keyword Tool since you only want to be spending the time and money optimising for phrases that will give you regular traffic.

I must admit I was surprised at how low the searches were for marketing and advertising strategy because I would have thought that it was human nature for Chris Cardell clients to try out the search and see for themselves the results.

Strangely enough I would say that the page is not well optimised.

Another good clue on whether a keyword phrase is worth optimising for is to see how many pay per click adverts there are for the phrase since if people think it is worth being on page one, they have the choice between investing time and / or money in SEO or to pay for clicks.

I won't go into detail for what Chris Cardell revealed in the video except to say that he is emphasising the importance of having incoming links which I agree with although I certainly wouldn't downplay the importance of on page search engine optimisation.

Now I am not going to try to build incoming links to the webpage for the phrase Marketing and Advertising strategy because, as I've shown, there is next to no traffic for it but I will be interested to see how it ranks for what is basically onpage optimisation.

What that means is that I have included the phrase Marketing and Advertising Strategy in

• the title
   
  
• the text on the page as it is scattered around with reasonable frequently without committing the sin of keyword stuffing which is the over use of the phrase
   
  
• in my meta description which is the two lines of text you see below the main title when you search Google
   
  
• the meta tags which are not supposed to be used by Google these days - but I put them in as good practice since you never know when the Google Algorithm will change and I think it adds to relevancy.