Newsletters Made For You- Exceptional Living

Have you ever been someone’s regular customer and then stopped doing business with them? Anyone ever ask why you stopped?

Probably not.

The average company loses up to 40 percent of their clients every year. And they don’t come back.
Sure, we all lose customers.

But here’s the REAL problem: Most businesses blame the customer for going AWOL.

The truth is, only 5% boycott your biz because they were unhappy with you. The vast majority (95%) of customers had a pleasant experience with your company.

So the fault belongs to YOU. The customer didn’t come back because they were ignored.

Reclaiming a lost customer is actually easier than gaining a new customer.

Studies show a 60-70% success rate selling to a current customer; a 20-40% chance of winning back a former customer; but only a 5-20% chance of turning prospects into customers.

The IPA client is the easiest one to rescue.

An Intentionally Pushed Away customer (IPA) was neglected, ignored or simply fell through the client contact cracks. He or she was profitable. But they were not pursued (or romanced) after the initial sale.

Your best chance of regaining an IPA’s business is through regular client communication and better customer service.

Note: Lost customers do not live in a vacuum. If they aren’t doing business with your, they’ll be doing business with somebody.

These two simple steps can get them back:

1. Ask the customer, “What can we do to win back your business?”  Listen closely to what they tell you.

This takes courage.

No one likes to be criticized. And most likely the IPA customer isn’t going to take the blame for not coming back to you. Whatever reason they give, being ‘defensive’ negates the reason for asking them in the first place.

Just listen patiently… and learn.

2. Stay in touch with the lost customer; earn his or her business every day.

This takes discipline.

Finding them and keeping them are two different things. You have to be committed to maintaining constant client contact.

Customer loyalty today is nearly nonexistent. Earning it requires vigilance, dedication and determination.

Who knows, one day an IPA customer could turn out to be one of your top clients.

Brett and I can lend a hand. Click here to get help.

Taking action just feel right.

- David Gruttadaurio
“The Print Newsletter Expert”

Copyright 2010

This post is protected by copyright. All rights reserved. Reproduction of any portion of this email is strictly prohibited without the express written consent of David Gruttadaurio

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Romancing the client is a lot like a real romance.

Both relationships require a bunch of effort to be successful.

Both also need good communication skills.

When a customer relationship is cultivated, it grows stronger. Just like a real romance, it can last a lifetime.

Most entrepreneurs don’t bother with this. They think it’s a waste of time and money. So, they’re constantly prowling around for new customers.

That’s a really, really dumb thing to do.

Here’s why…

When you ignore your clients, they tend to ignore you.  And if your clients feel that you’ve forgotten about them, they WILL forget you.

BTW: Every business needs new clients – just not at the expense of overlooking your existing customers.

Did you know it costs 6 times more to get a new prospect to buy your stuff than it does a current client?

What does this tell you?

When a client relationship is ‘romanced’, it continues to be productive, long-lasting and (most importantly) very profitable. Yep… even in a recession.

Marketing relentlessly to them isn’t a business cost – it’s an investment.

Look at your return on investment ROI). NEVER look at just the ‘cost’.

For example, would you spend $1000 to make $10,000?

A 10-to-1 ROI? It’s a no-brainer.

That’s how you should look at relationship marketing – as a smart investment.

A customer newsletter – or a patient newsletter – has the marketing magic to easily accomplish this for you.

Try Exceptional Living for free – the first month is on me.

Your clients will ADORE you for it.

Taking action just feel right.

- David Gruttadaurio
“The Print Newsletter Expert”

PS: Wanna get touchy, feely with Exceptional Living? Click here and I’ll send you three free issues to check out.

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One of my businesses is a service company.

I got a call last Friday from one of my clients. Her name is Betty.

She called to answer the trivia question in the December newsletter.

Customers will usually leave their answers in voicemail or email to me. I recognized her name on Caller ID, so I picked up.

After Betty gave me the correct answer, we talked for a few minutes. It was nice chatting with her… I enjoy my customers a lot.

Then she literally shocked me speechless.

Betty was telling me how much she loved reading Exceptional Living (that wasn’t the shock).

Then…

She referred to a little story I told in the monthly “My Corner’ column. It was about texting and how a clerk was texting the entire time we were checking out at the register.

Anyway, while we talked, Betty related this story back to me like she had just read it…

… but I wrote it FOUR MONTHS ago. It was in the August newsletter.

Either she still remembered the story or she had saved the newsletter and read it again recently.

I think it was the former. Betty simply remembered my story from way back in August.

BIG marketing lesson:  Include stories in your marketing ’cause stories get remembered and make you memorable.

Why is that? Psychologists tell us stories form the basis of how we think, organize, and remember information.

Telling a compelling story is an art. But don’t worry about being an expert. I’m not. I discovered telling ANY story is better than no story at all.

Give it try in your marketing – be a story teller – become memorable.

BTW: I almost forgot. Betty got her December Exceptional Living 2 ½ weeks ago… and saved it. Kinda interesting, huh? Do your customers save YOUR stuff?

Taking action just feels right,

- David Gruttadaurio
“The Print Newsletter Expert”

PS: Click here to tell me where to send your 3 sample issues of Exceptional Living… if you’re one of the few that haven’t requested them.

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Don’t have one?  You better not wait too long.

I’m not making this up. There is a real-life Director of Wow.

He works at High Point University. HPU is a private liberal arts university in High Point, North Carolina. It has about 4000 students.

The position was created TO ATTRACT AND RETAIN STUDENTS.

Gee… I wonder if applies to your business…

HPU explains why the position was created:

“Without students, there is no university. To continually move forward, we must always ‘wow’ our students, our faculty, staff and friends. We must ‘wow’ anyone who comes into contact with our university.”

The top three things they did to create WOW:

1.   Brought in an ice cream truck and put up kiosks for free ice cream, food and drinks. This sells the value of generosity.

2.   Free car washes on the weekend. With all of the construction, this sells the value of respect for the students’ property.

3.   Valet parking for students after 9 PM. This sells the value of safety and security – even on an already-safe campus.

There’s a concierge desk, a hot tub and free snacks. Classical music wafts through the grounds. If it sounds more like a five-star hotel, HPU discovered when students know you care, they reward you by doing well in the classroom.

The list goes on and on. It’s really remarkable.

The bottom line: Enrollments have high skyrocketed and these students don’t want to leave.

How could this work in your business?

Be extraordinary. Be memorable. Knock your customers damn socks off.

Offer impossibly great customer service.  Let your customer know you and LIVE AND DIE by your guarantee to them.  WOW them so much they feel OBLIGATED to tell people about you.

YOU are the Director of WOW for your business… and I can help.

A full, edge-to-edge newsletter will create an amazing WOW factor for your company.

I do all of the heavy lifting for you. Exceptional Living client newsletter really is 97% done for you because our template is online.

It takes about two minutes to activate your free account.  Click here for WOW!

Taking action just feels right.

-  David Gruttadaurio
“The Print Newsletter Expert”

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“Reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated.”

Mark Twain said it first. Print newsletters have been saying for the past ten years.

Why?

1.  The internet. “We don’t need newsletters anymore. All we need is content on our web site. All we have to do is post our content online, and everyone will flock to our sites to read it.”  And it’s FREE!

2. Email is king!  Just send an ezine. It’s FREE!

3. Postage keeps going up along with printing costs… but email is FREE!

Yep… print newsletters should have died a long time ago.

But a funny thing happened on the way to the funeral…

The print newsletter suddenly became Lazarus and a resurrection took place.

BTW: I love the internet. And email is the greatest thing since sliced bread.  But it’s not the ‘be all and end all’ of MARKETING.

In fact, it’s got some definite downsides.

Everyone is bombarded by email overload. And 91% of it is spam. That means 1 out of every 1.1 emails is junk.  Do you really think your ezine is being read?

A Nielsen Norman Group Report revealed that the typical email newsletter gets 51 seconds of your reader’s time.

That was four years ago. Today, many say its closer to 20 seconds. And, that’s if your email even gets  opened.

YOUR NOT AS POPULAR AS YOU THINK

While you believe YOUR ezines are special and opened like gifts on Christmas morning, in truth emails are routinely wiped out by the dozen in one swoop with the push of the delete key.

Even if the reader recognizes your name, you risk being expunged just because your email got caught in a large block of spam.

Now, I’m not suggesting that you stop doing email newsletters. In fact, I advise you to do an email newsletter on a weekly basis. But, I also suggest doing a monthly print newsletter.

Three Reasons Print Newsletter Are Still Breathing

1.  Printed mail gets delivered – It’s never blocked or caught in spam filters.

2.  Print newsletters have more perceived value – Think about it: How many companies are willing to do this?

3.  Print newsletter are sticky – Print newsletters have great ‘hang-time’. Not only are they likely to be read from start to finish, they usually get passed around.

Exceptional Living does all of this and more.  Check it out and click here now.

Let’s get to work,

-  David Gruttadaurio
“The Print Newsletter Expert”

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It’s impossible to have too many of them.

A cachet customer is a high-status client. The customers that are well-known and respected in your community.

A cache client gives your company instant status. Few will question your competence or credentials. It’s reassuring proof to others that you’re the right choice.

A REAL WORLD EXAMPLE

I live in a small town of 10,000. One of my clients is the guy that owns the local radio station that everyone listens to.

That in itself makes him a cachet customer.

This is how we maximized his value:  Not only have we done business with his radio station, we have also provided service at his home, his mother’s home and his brother’s house.

AND… I make sure everyone knows this. In fact, he even does a radio ad for us stating exactly what I just said.

His ’star power’ is so strong, people call us on their cell phones after hearing his radio ad. His endorsement also runs in a local newspaper ad as well.

We have several cachet clients – all prominent business people that everyone knows.  Guess what? They ALL do radio ads for me. At the very least, I use their testimonials in my print marketing.

WHY IS THIS SO EFFECTIVE?

1.  Statistically, most clients are followers, not leaders.

2.  Many fear making bad decisions; so they tend to trust the judgment of others. This is why getting referrals from ANY customer is so powerful.

3.  If that client is a cachet customer – someone prominent, well known and respected – their judgment becomes nearly infallible.

Why do you think big companies use celebrity spokespersons? Of course prominence doesn’t equal intelligence. However most people today just can’t see the difference.

BIG FISH – SMALL POND STRATEGY

You don’t have to be a large company or live in a big city to snag a ‘celebrity’.

They could be the client that owns a busy beauty salon or the customer that’s the local computer guru.

Offer them an ‘ethical bribe’: A great deal on your products or services for their endorsement. But however you do it, get them into your marketing stable ASAP!

Isn’t time that you turn your cachet clients into celebrity spokespersons for your company?

Let’s get to work,

- David Gruttadaurio
“The Print Newsletter Expert”

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Don’t have one?  You better not wait too long.

I’m not making this up. There is a real-life Director of WOW.

He works at High Point University. HPU is a private liberal arts university in High Point, North Carolina. It has about 4000 students.

The position was created TO ATTRACT AND RETAIN STUDENTS.

Gee… I wonder if applies to your business…

In their words:

“Without students, there is no university. To continually move forward, we must always ‘wow’ our students, our faculty, staff and friends. We must ‘wow’ anyone who comes into contact with our university.”

Here’s the top three things they did to create WOW:

1.   Brought in an ice cream truck and put up kiosks for free ice cream, food and drinks. This sells the value of generosity.

2.   Free car washes on the weekend. With all of the construction, this sells the value of respect for the students’ property.

3.   Valet parking for students after 9 PM. This sells the value of safety and security – even on an already-safe campus.

There’s a concierge desk, a hot tub and free snacks. Classical music wafts through the grounds. If it sounds more like a five-star hotel, HPU discovered when students know you care, they reward you by doing well in the classroom.

The list goes on and on. It’s really remarkable.

The bottom line is that enrollments have high skyrocketed and these students don’t want to leave.

How could this work in your business?

Be extraordinary. Be memorable. Knock your customers damn socks off.

Offer impossibly great customer service.  Let your customer know you and LIVE AND DIE by your guarantee to them.  Wow them so much they feel obligated to tell people about you.

You are the Director of WOW for your business. And I can help you with this.

A full, edge-to-edge newsletter will creates an amazing WOW factor for your company.

I do all of the heavy lifting for you. Exceptional Living client newsletter really is 97% done for you. The newsletter template is made for you.

It takes about two minutes to activate your free account.

This is how you get clients for life,

-  David Gruttadaurio
“The Print Newsletter Expert”

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To review…

The Law of Leadership says two bodies can’t take up the same space.  So if you become the first one, it’s your spot forever.

Having your own category is a powerful thing.  And being FIRST in your own  category makes it impossible for anyone to copy you.

If there’s not a category for you to be the first, fashion one.  And if you’re not already the first one in that category, then create a spot.

How can you do this ethically… without LYING?

It easy and ethical.  Here are 7 ways:

1. Be the first to accommodate a specific area of business

2. Take existing products or services and create another option that’s new

3. Be the first to cater to a market in a brand new way – offer the same product or service but put a new spin on it.

4. Customize a product or service for a specific market.  If you’re a carpet cleaner, say your customer base is residential homeowners. You could become the first to offer a special dust mite treatment exclusively for your customers.

5. Even if you’re not the first, you can market yourself as ‘the leader in carpet care for asthma sufferers’ or ‘the first cleaning service for the smart homeowner.’

6. Can you add a brand new service or product to your business no one else has?

7. Can you sell the same service but in a brand new market – using carpet cleaners again – specialize in working with pet owners.

It’s not hard to do – but it does require some deep thinking.  And once you come up with your strategy, market the hell out of it.

THE BOTTOM LINE

Don’t worry about being the best.  If you’re an ethical entrepreneur, you already have great products or services.

Being first is a heck of a lot more important.  When you do this, you will automatically receive status and ranking – and YOU never even have to bring it up.

Whatever you come up with  it doesn’t need to be exclusive. It just needs to be perceived that way.

Your next step? Create a USP (Universal Selling Proposition) and plaster it all over your monthly client newsletter.

Hey, did you know I have one you can use?  (I had to put that in there, right?)

Anyway, check out the December issue of Exceptional Living.  It’s a great print newsletter. Click here to see the December issue.

Let’s get to work!

- David Gruttadaurio
“The Print Newsletter Expert”

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It doesn’t seem to make any sense, does it?  Prevention doesn’t sell.  Not even if you have a ton of it.

This is what sells:

People care a lot more about the CURE.   If you have a cure… NOW you have their attention, interest and dollars.

Uber-marketer Perry Marshall talked about this recently.  He mentioned a video created back in the late 80’s to help keep kids off drugs.

Noble and worthwhile, to say the least.

Nancy Reagan, Hollywood and top shelf copywriters all got involved. A beautiful and moving video was produced. It was then sold on a truly inspiring infomercial.

And remember, this was created to help keep your kids off drugs.  It was truly a *must have* product.

Guess how many they sold?  Zero… nada… zilch.

Prevention, even in the form of virtue and goodness, is just a tough sell.  This may sound cynical, but it’s part of human nature.

Stroll through the aisles of Barnes and Noble and you’ll see what I mean.  Every other novel is about murder and mayhem, passion and deceit.  Not too many books about goodness, virtue and faith.

BIG marketing lesson:  Create ‘cure-themed’ marketing as opposed to selling ‘prevention.’  But if prevention is what you really sell, then bundle it as part of the cure.

Exceptional Living client newsletter follows this principle as well.

“5 Secrets For The Perfect Black Friday Battle Plan” is the feature article this month. Check it out here.

I could have featured, “5 Ways to Prevent When Holiday Shopping.” But not only is it boring, it’s prevention-driven, too.

Read the article and you’ll see what I mean. Click here.

Taking action just feels right,

-  David Gruttadaurio
“The Print Newsletter Expert”

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The Curious Case of the Muddled Message

So I’m driving home and I notice a billboard with a pretty lady holding a humongous pearl in her hand.

The headline says:  “Age like a pearl”.  Huh?

I had just enough time to read it again. Yep… “Age like a pearl” is what it said.

As I fly past the billboard, I’m pondering what the heck that means. What’s the marketing message?

To be fair, it did say something about laser treatments. I googled it when I got home and found a reference to ‘Pearl Laser Treatment’.

But you know what? I still didn’t know what ‘age like a pearl’ was talking about.

We see this messy marketing all the time…  a bunch of muddled messages with mysterious meanings.

Makes you wonder what people think of YOUR marketing message, doesn’t it?

Think about this: The person that came up with the billboard idea assumed it would be crystal clear to anyone reading it. That person was dead wrong. It was just a waste of good marketing dollars.

BIG marketing lesson: Being cute or clever is never a substitute for an attention-grabbing headline that tells the reader EXACTLY why they should keep reading.

This kind of marketing doesn’t win advertising awards, but it sure reels in people that will spend money.

You cannot afford muddled messages with mysterious meanings.

Go here now: www.InfoMarketingBlog.com and bookmark it!

It has absolutely nothing to do with customer newsletters or Exceptional Living. It’s just pure content to keep your marketing laser-focused and on the right track.

(Be sure to click on the first category: Advertising Headlines)

Let’s get to work,

- David Gruttadaurio
“The Print Newsletter Expert”

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