The verb “to pump” is in the headline
for a purpose. It implies effort.
When I was growing up, we had no running water.
If we wanted to wash our hands, or take a bath, or if we simply wanted
a drink, we had to pump water from a well… by hand.
The well was more than 200 feet deep and bringing
water to the surface required a cup of liquid to prime the pump, then a
sustained effort to keep the water flowing.
As long as you kept the handle moving up and
down, the water would flow but as soon as you stopped so did the water.
This same idea — the principle of the pump
— applies today in your business.
Marketing programs will yield results only as
long as your efforts are sustained. The moment your efforts stop, so
will the results.
It’s most important to be proactive with
your marketing in order to keep new prospects coming and your sales
growing.
But not all action is effective. You must know
what to do before you start doing it. Otherwise you may find yourself
pumping a dry well… expending a lot of money and effort, but
getting no results.
With that in mind, here are five steps you can
take to increase your sales.
1. Set sales goals
Setting goals is a discipline that almost all
successful people and corporations do on a regular basis. It’s an
important skill but it only works if you actually do it.
With regard to sales, what would you like to
achieve? You’ll need to set both monthly and weekly goals. Start
with the end in mind. Write down your goals. The more specific you make
them the better. Create a picture in your mind then write down specific
dollar amounts.
How much do you want to make each month?
It’s important that you set that amount as your monthly goal.
Once you know how much you want to make each
month, you can figure out how much you need to make each week. For
$40,000 a month, you’ll need $10,000 each week. That will be your
weekly goal.
The reason goal-setting works is because without
a goal, you will have a tendency to keep putting off your prospecting
and sales activities until it is too late in the month to do anything
about them. By breaking your goals down by the week, you make them much
easier to attain because they’re smaller.
Set your goals first and then compare your actual
weekly and monthly results with them. Don’t worry if you
don’t make your goals right away. As long as you are proactive,
each week and month you will get closer and closer until you eventually
meet them and then exceed them. It works!
2. Set prospect goals
It’s impossible to meet your sales goals
without prospects for your business, so you’ll need to set
monthly prospect goals as well. The more prospects you are able to
attract to your business, the more potential customers you will have.
If your flow of prospects slows, so will your sales. That’s why
it is important to have a steady supply of prospects.
Of course, not all prospects will buy your
service so having a large supply of prospects is a must.
If, for example, you have a 10 percent conversion
rate, you will need at least 100 prospects in order to add 10 customers
to your business.
Depending on the quality of your service and the
type of follow up you offer, your actual conversion rate could be
higher or lower.
The question is, how many new customers do you
want to generate each month? Once you know that figure, you can
determine how many prospects you’ll need in order to generate
that number of customers. This figure will then become your monthly
prospect goal.
3. Implement an effective prospect generator
This is where a lot of cleaners stop manning the
pump. For some reason, they let the handle go, assuming that prospects
will come through the door just because the business is in the
neighborhood.
Unfortunately, they may not come or they may not
come fast enough. Some stop pumping because of the cost. They feel they
can’t afford to implement a lead generation program, especially
one that requires an attractive offer.
It doesn’t matter where your plant is
located. You need to continually attract new prospects with an enticing
lead generator and then follow-up with those prospects to convert a
percentage of them into paying customers.
4. Get more new customers
It makes no sense to have a lead generator in
place with no way to convert some-time visitors into paying customers,
but many cleaners completely ignore this stage.
Drycleaning is one of the best industries for
repeat business you can find, so it’s almost certain that if
someone used your service once, they will need it again.
It’s not really a matter of
“if” they need it but “when” and you must
understand that your prospects will use your service when they want
you, not when you want them. Some may use your services weekly while
others may not visit for several months or more.
There are many ways to follow up, including
personal “thank you” notes, carefully worded and targeted
direct mail, newsletters, personal phone calls, faxes, email and more.
With enough prospects on your follow-up list and a solid offer, it
should not be difficult to convert a good percentage of your prospects
into customers each month.
5. Generate more sales from your current
customers
Your customer list is like gold. These are the
people who know you, like you and trust you. They are the easiest
people to sell over and over… especially when it comes to a
repeat service such as drycleaning.
If you want your customers to buy from you again
and again, treat them right. People want to feel special and important,
and they like to do business with people who make them feel that way.
Treat your customers like gold, and they will
reward you with their business in return.
