3 Ethical Steps To Staying Profitable
Today we’re going to look at 3, highly effective steps you can take as an entrepreneur to increase your sales when the world seems to be all messed up… And yes, this is how to do it ethically WITHOUT fear mongering or price gouging scared customers.
No really. DO NOT pull that.
How To Ethically Boost Profits In Times Of Crisis:
It should not be a shock at this point the entire world is reacting now to the COVID-19 corona virus. As it should. That thing is super infections & has already been a major pain in the butt for global commerce.
In preparation for a potential lock down, store shelves have been picked clean, people are (finally) washing their hands & live events are being canceled across the globe. (Get ready for a baby boom!)
Here’s The Good News: We’re going to be okay. No, I’m not a medical doctor or a member of WHO, but I am a guy who has seen enough of these situations in my lifetime to know humans survive. And we’ve all seen what happens when good people like you make smart moves to prevent problems.
At the same time yes, this is clearly a shake up.
Here’s The Bad News: What if you’re a business owner who can’t handle 1-3 months of sluggish sales?
What if you are a speaker, author or coach who relies on public speaking to get new clients?
THAT is a real, long term problem.
It’s not so much the virus but more so the economic body slam already in progress.
Profitability Booster Step #1: Don’t Panic & Determine Your On-Hand Assets
These next few weeks are going to be hard on A LOT of business owners. No way around that. The only way to thrive is keeping your wits about you.
Staying with the speaker/author/coach example above, you’ll want to determine how you can potentially “pivot” in your business model.
DO NOT allow phrases like “OMG I’m so screwed” or “Why did this happen to me” or “I don’t know what to do” invade your mind.
The reason is simple: If you do, you shut down your minds ability to work on the problem.
Why Is Asking Better Questions Vital?
Setting up your mind to ask better questions is going to set you up to see wins where you may not have before. The questions you ask determine the answers you get. The answers you get determine the outcomes you experience.
Ya feel me?
Your questions are the basis for all the success in your life. (or the opposite if you allow them to be)
Here are some examples of vastly better questions to ask right now:
- What assets do I have RIGHT NOW I can deploy to boost sales?
- What do I know/have that can be valuable to my market RIGHT NOW?
- What sort of marketing can I use to get in front of more customers?
- How can I take my business totally online?
- What can I do to stay “front of mind” with my customers?
Do you see how these examples can create vastly more powerful answers than a question like “how will my business survive this?”
Profitability Booster Step #2: DO NOT STOP MARKETING!
This is a huge one. Just like people tend to sell off stocks when the market heads South, most business owners tend to pull back on marketing & advertising when sales appear to be in jeopardy.
DO NOT DO THAT.
You see, just like when everyone sells shares it’s time for the smart investors to buy (because now everything is on sale!) when all the other business owners kill their marketing efforts, YOU need to be pushing.
I’m not saying you need to spend like an idiot (adjust accordingly of course) but DO NOT cut off your ad spend until “all this blows over”.
Here’s Why: This Is A Major Opportunity
Most of your competition is going to pull back, many of them will stop advertising. What this allows you to do is stay the course & scoop up MORE of your ideal audience. You have an incredible opportunity now to become and then stay “front of mind”.
Should you change it up a bit? Maybe shift some ads from “buy my stuff” to “here’s some great content to consume”.
Yes. You’ll, at least at first, want to get into more of a content based engagement game. Push content that can help them.
(Note: I published a full 3 part series on exactly how to do this. You can read it here >>)
What I’d like you to consider is how much better you’ll look to your customers when YOU are the person delivering great info to them right now.
Remember this: People buy from those they know, like & trust (thanks Zig!)
YOU can become that person/brand to them.
Right this second you have an amazing opportunity to accomplish the following:
- Grow your audience
- Expand your brand
- Engage your customers in a positive, meaningful way
- Outpace your competition
- Sell more by just being there & being cool
Profitability Booster Step #3: Rally Your Peers & Go Fully Virtual
(NOTE: Make sure to stick around as there will be a full “how to” post released shortly on this 3rd step)
Keeping with the speaker/author/coach example who earns a living from speaking at live events, you’ll want to start looking at how you can go fully virtual.
Here’s an awkward upside: Everyone is in the same boat right now. THOUSANDS of live events have been canceled all over the world. This means tens of thousands of event speakers need a place to speak.
You need to earn a living, they need to earn a living… why not join forces & help each other out?
What most folks don’t realize about virtual events is what powerful audience boosting tools they are. We can often see anywhere from 4K – 30K registrations (email based) as well as thousands more added to your social following with just one of them.
Warm Vs Cold Leads:
The other reason you’ll want to consider VE’s is because you’ll be building an audience of WARM prospects. In most cases when you’re doing normal “lead gen” that lead you grab needs to spend A LOT of time in the autoresponder sequence before they know/like/trust you.
When you deploy a virtual event they get to see you in action.
You Now Have A Reason To Reach Out & Engage:
If you think about the first 2 steps you just went through, the only question left is: “but what do I say to them if I’m going to do engagement content?”
Now you have something to say. Now you have a FULL reason to be getting in front of them & staying in front of them.
You set up your event, mark the date & start pre-launch engagement content.
You Now Have A Group Of Promotional Partners:
One of the elements I love most about virtual events is when all the other featured speakers promote as one. When everyone posts to social & sends via email about this it builds the platform like crazy.
With some of ours we saw well over 10K registrations along with a boost of over 850K reached during the event!
You Now Have Another Online Revenue Stream:
The vast majority of effective virtual events run like this:
Sign up for the free version –> Option buy a VIP ticket & get tons of bonuses & lifetime access
With upsell conversions potentially in the neighborhood of 8% – 14%, and VIP tickets running $67 – $97, you now have a pretty healthy new stream of revenue. (numbers from events that have self reported)
Here’s just an example: 4K registrations with a 8% upsell take rate at $67 would yield a $21,440 revenue stream.
Again, if an upsell is on the $97 higher end at 4K registrations with a 14% take rate it would yield a $54,320 revenue stream.
Not half bad no matter how you slice it.
Please understand, none of that up there is an “income promise”. I’m just trying to use basic math to illustrate my point.
Again, we’re going to be posting a multi-part series on how to set these up for yourself. Make sure you check back often.
Recap: Keep Your Wits. Ask Better Questions. Keep Marketing & Go Virtual
You keep pushing like this & you have a pretty solid shot at not only earning enough to weather this storm, but actually growing to a “thrive” level.
Leave a comment below & let me know if this was helpful!
Chatter soon,
Jonny Andrews
PS: Make sure to stick around for our series on launching your virtual event