One of the oldest professions on earth is sales. It’s been around since the dawn of time. Not just the act of selling something in exchange for money. We are always selling ideas and concepts, trying to convince others to buy into the notion of what we’re peddling. But we also know that sales is hard. Whether you sell cars, life insurance, mortgages, widgets, or services, to increase sales and make money you must acquire more customers profitably.
Acquiring customers profitably isn’t easy. We all know that, right? But to stay in business this is a skill you must learn. And you must learn how to do it fast. So what does it take to pull this off? The truth? You have to dive deep into human behavior. Ask yourself this question—why do people buy things? Think about your personal experiences. When was the last time you bought something you didn’t intend on buying?
Did someone cold call you to pitch you a service? Did you see an ad that piqued your interest in a product? Or did you buy something after seeing a social media post from someone you follow touting an incredible service they received? Think back to that time. What happened and what triggered the purchase response?
It’s important for a very specific reason. As human beings we like to buy but we don’t like to be sold. We have our guard up all the time. When we see a number we don’t recognize, do we answer it or ignore it? Do we think it’s probably a spammer or a telemarketer? We are always on the lookout for “slimy” salespeople trying to sell us things, right? So how do you actually make money in sales when everyone is on guard and doesn’t like to be sold?
To understand why people buy, you must understand human nature. Biologically, in our genetic code, we are preprogrammed to avoid pain and gain pleasure. However, we do far more to avoid pain we do to gain pleasure. Pain is painful. It’s scary. Frightening. The mere thought of fsomething painful can send someone into a tailspin. It creates fear and uncertainty.
This is not a new concept. But it is a concept you should leverage in business to increase sales. There are so many ways that you can bake this pain-versus-pleasure paradigm into your sales process. This is especially powerful in attracting prospects and gaining their interest. You can use headlines and lead magnets that lead people away from pain.
The truth? People don’t trust others they don’t know. If you walk up to someone on the street and try to hand them a wad of hundred-dollar bills they would ask you what the catch is, right? You instantly think that something is off here. But if your purse or wallet was about to get stolen and someone on the street saved you from a thief, you would instantly become friends and thank that person profusely. Why? Because they helped you avoid pain.
Business is competitive. Everyone knows that, right? So how do you actually increase sales and make money when people hate being sold? It’s not just about helping them avoid pain and gain pleasure. To answer this question you must understand more about the human psyche. Yes, we hate being sold. Especially when it’s a stranger that we don’t know. What we do value over sales are stories.
Stories are the bridge you need to make money and increase sales in your business. Think about it this way. How do we react when someone we know tries to sell us something? For strangers, we might shut the door. But what happens when we know the person? To add to that, what happens when we know, like and trust the person? The chances of us buying something increase dramatically, right?
Stories are the bridge you use to get someone to know, like and trust you. Fact-telling doesn’t work. People don’t care about facts. They care about stories and results. Think about that the next time you come across something you buy. What triggered that purchase in your mind? You didn’t want to buy in the first place, but you did it. Ask yourself why.
I tell you this because many people try to go for the jugular in sales. Sure, you can pick up the phone and start cold-calling hundreds of people. You’re bound to eventually make some sales. But what if you could put your time into creating an ecosystem that had customers begging you to take their money? Imagine how that could transform your business and your life.
The best way to get someone to know, like and trust you is to use a less-invasive approach to solving their core problem. A lead magnet does just that. When you create a lead magnet, you target the prospect’s core problem. That’s also the problem that you’re aiming to solve with the thing you’re selling. Your lead magnet provides a solution for the problem. But people will still pay for implementation.
Maybe you’re selling paid ads at an agency. Why not build a lead magnet aimed at teaching people how to set up their first ad? If you’re a dentist, teach people the proper flossing technique to avoid cavities. Whatever it is, the point is that the lead magnet must help solve part of their problem. And it must be so valuable that you have to fight your inner desire to charge for it.
A lead generation funnel allows you to give away your lead magnet through a landing page that stirs curiosity. Landing pages (sometimes called squeeze pages) provide the framework for exchanging your free lead magnet for a prospect’s contact details. However, don’t worry because lead generation funnels are simple and easy to build.
The lead generation funnel only has two separate pages. The first page is the squeeze page where the free lead magnet is offered. This page has a headline that creates curiosity, an image and a call to action. The call to action allows the prospect to enter in their contact details and submit the form. The second page is the thank you page. This is the simplest form of a lead generation funnel.
The reason why lead generation funnels allow you to make more money in sales is that most people don’t buy on the first encounter. It takes someone an average of 7 touchpoints before they purchase from you. This is called effective frequency. That means they need to see or hear from you again and again before they take action and buy.
When you use a lead generation funnel and provide a free lead magnet, you can now communicate with that prospect using email marketing. This allows you to share stories and build rapport. It also allows you to share valuable information, knowledge, insight, and trainings. Each of these is a touchpoint that helps move you closer to the sale.
There is a law called the bandwagon effect. It states that when left alone, individuals prefer to follow the pack rather than divert. Think about it this way. When you see a long line in front of a food stand, a restaurant, or a nightclub, what does that tell you? It tells you that the place must be good and you want to follow the pack, right?
That’s why social proof works so well. People want to act in unison with others. And if others had a good experience buying from you, then they likely will too. That’s why you must flood them with great social proof. You can do this once you have the prospect’s contact details and you can communicate with them via email, phone, or text messages.
In sales, your offer is everything. It could either fall flat on its face or soar sky-high. When your offer is so good, people feel silly saying no to it. Think about what you’re selling and how you can make that offer irresistible by stacking in the value. Stacking the value does not mean you’re giving away free cars. It only means that you’re increasing the perceived value of the offer.
Many skilled salespeople make a lot of money by stacking valuable additions to offers. Maybe that’s a coaching call, a bonus training, a tool, or a cheat sheet they can use. Whatever you can add to give them more value will make the offer that much more irresistible. Make it so good that they would feel silly saying no to it.
Sometimes, you need to give people a reason to take action. They won’t always due it on their own. That’s where urgency and scarcity come into play. Urgency and scarcity are psychological levers that you can pull to get people to take action. Urgency is when there is an impending deadline for something. That could be an impending deadline for the end of an offer or when the cart closes on a webinar.
Scarcity is similar. With scarcity, there is only a limited supply of something. That gets people to take action. For example, your kids may have a deadline to register for school because there are only so many spots left. A college class may only have a certain number of seats available. And there could be only 10 deals for a television on Black Friday. Do you get how this makes you take action?
To get someone to buy, you have to reverse their risk. Eliminate the risk entirely by offering a satisfaction guarantee. It could be a 30-day guarantee, a 60-day, a 90-day, or whatever else works for you. Some people even have a double your money back guarantee if the client isn’t satisfied for whatever reason. That’s a strong guarantee, right?
When you can reverse someone’s risk you help them further avoid pain. Because, if something doesn’t work out for them there’s the potential for it to be painful. And we’ve had many bad experiences with products and services over our lives, so we want to ensure that it doesn’t happen to us again. But by eliminating risk, you can boost your chances of increasing sales and making more money.
Always have a strong call to action. Always. You want the prospect to be clear on precisely how they’re going to buy. And make sure you put that call to action front and center. Because, sometimes people need a reminder to buy. This is not about spamming your prospects. This is about building rapport and getting them to know, like and trust you. And during that process, make sure you continue to remind them to buy with a strong call to action.
If you’re serious about increasing sales, a strong call to action is needed in every marketing piece you put out there. What action do you want them to take? Is it clear to them? Sometimes we think it is but it’s not. Look at your communications from the top of your funnel all the way down to the bottom of it. Is there a strong call to action in every instance? If not, it’s important to bake that right into every part of the process.
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