Are you using Instagram Stories? Is it connecting with your customers and helping you reach your goals? Or are you confused about what to do to make it effective? Today I’m going to answer your questions about WHY you should be using Instagram Stories and HOW to make them work for you!
Today we’re diving into the tool Instagram Stories and how you can use them to connect with your right customers, build trust and make sales.
If you’re reading this podcast, thank you! You may wanna hop up above to the video of this episode as well because the video has a few extra minutes of showing you what exactly I’m talking about! You’ll find it at the top of the post.
What is Instagram Stories?
Instagram Stories is an extra feature on Instagram, where you can post images or 15 second videos from your day. They expire after 24 hours.
You can shoot them “live” from inside the app, or you can use the photos in your photo library on your phone. You can also share your regular Instagram posts (if viewers click on them they’ll be taken to your post where they can like and comment) and you can share other people’s Instagram posts, which means you can share your customers photos of your work!
Why do Stories?
What is the best way to build trust with potential customers? It’s in-person events. Customers get to talk to you, touch the product, then buy directly from you. The second-best option is live video, it is the most similar to being in-person. The potential customer gets to see how you really talk, see what you’re working on.
This builds relationships and it builds trust. And more trust = more sales.
Stories allow you to show way more than you can in your Instagram grid. Are you packing orders, getting supplies, making products everyday? In Stories, you can show that!
What do you have in common with your customers? You can share that in Stories. For example: reading, relationships, personality type, preferences, etc.
Remember: You get to decide what to share.
How do you use Stories effectively?
What kind of Stories build relationships?
Personal
Unedited
Use Engagement tools
Polls,
Questions,
Sliders
Use DMs
Use Stories to tell your Marketing Message, and then save it to “Highlights”
You may be thinking – uh, what is my marketing message? What do I talk about? I outline what goes into your effective marketing message in my free workshop “4 Foundations” and we can work together on your Marketing Message inside the Starship Program. To watch the free workshop and learn more about how we can work together go to TaraSwiger.com/foundations
I’d love to hear how you are using Instagram Stories in your business! Come tell me on Instagram. I’m @taraswiger.
I’m going to give you homework right now to put this into practice:
Take a screenshot of your podcast app as you’re listening, then open Instagram Stories, share this photo and tag me @taraswiger and add the hashtag #exploreyourenthusiasm. This is such a low-stress way to get started, you don’t have to talk to the camera or anything.
While you’re on IG, send a DM and tell me what you learned from this episode!
Thank you so much for listening and I’m wishing you an enthusiastic week!
Is Instagram worth it? How do you make sales with Instagram? I know! This is one of the ongoing questions my students have about any tool, and Instagram in particular. Today I’m going to explain EXACTLY how you can increase your sales by using Instagram.
Before we dive into Instagram, we are coming right up on episode 300, and I am including YOU in this episode! To participate, head over to my free FB group: fb.com/groups/taraswiger and the info on how to be involved is right there, pinned to the top!
Today’s question comes directly from the FB group: Does Instagram actually make sales for anyone? It seems to be just a waste of time, a bunch of content going into the void.
First of all: yeah, it can DEFINITELY feel like a waste of your time!
The good news is: YOU are in charge of whether it's a waste of time or not. It’s true! You don’t have to wait for Instagram to send you people, or for your right buyer to just stumble upon you.
Instead, make Instagram effective for your business by creating a plan and using it to find, connect with, and build trust with your ideal buyers. You will make sales with Instagram when you talk to, connect with and build trust with your Ideal Buyers.
So how do you connect and build trust on Instagram?
Identify your Right People.
Talk to your Right People on YOUR profile
Find and connect with your Right People on their profile.
Now let’s get into it deeper.
Identify Your Right People
Who buys your item? Who wants what you sell? These are your Right People. This is who ALL your marketing should be for. This will impact what photos you use, what captions you write, what hashtags you utilize, everything about all of your marketing.
This is a deeper process than just answering a few questions and it is what I do with Captains inside the Starship. So if you want to know more about your people, check out the free workshop at TaraSwiger.com/Foundations and we can work together to identify your Right People.
On Your Profile
If you’re taking the time to post photos on your Instagram, then take the extra time to make it effective at making a connection with your Right Buyer.
How?Captions.
A photo might grab someone’s attention, but captions are how your customers get to know YOU, get to know your brand and what you stand for, and feel connected to you.
Yes, you could just write three words and be done, but if you’re taking the time to post, shouldn’t you take the time to make it worthwhile? Writing a longer post (over 65 words, which is the average), it will take longer, but it will also be more valuable.
The data shows that posts with longer captions generally have higher engagement than those with a shorter caption. Engagement is when your followers interact with your post (comment, like, save or share it). And more engagement leads to more people seeing your post.
Ok, so what do you write? This is where you come back to your RIght Buyer – what is she interested in? What does she need to know about your product or your company? We answer all these questions in the Starship, so you create effective posts.
On Her Profile
How does your customer find you?
Well, she may be searching, she may click on hashtags, but the most direct way for your customer to find you is… you find her.
Stop waiting for your Right Buyer to find your photos, or to find your shop – find her!
How?
This goes back to the work you did to identify your RIght Buyer – once you have a very clear idea of who she is, you can look at who she follows, what sites she reads, what she’s into. One of the easiest ways is to look at your Actual Customers. See what they’re posting, who they’re following, what hashtags they use.
And… connect with her! Follow your customer on Instagram, comment on her posts, when she asks for a recommendation, give it! You’re not going to be SELLING to her, but you will be CONNECTING with her.
Look at who else they follow and who follows them. If that person seems like your Right Buyer, follow them! And connect.
Does this work? Doesn’t it take a lot of time?
Oh, I know, I hear you moaning now – but Tara! Doesn’t this take a lot of time? Does this work?
And the answer is yes and yes. It does take time. But you are already scrolling on Instagram. Right? You are already spending time on social media that is not building your business. I’m not asking you to spend MORE time, I’m asking you to spend your time EFFECTIVELY. As in, doing stuff that will make a change.
As for it working, listen. I don’t recommend you do only this. This is one strategy in what should be a full plan for marketing, that includes clear messaging, email marketing, in-person marketing, along with Instagram.
This is not linear. You don’t get a 1:1 result. Or even a 10:1 result. Some posts will connect with people and get 5 new followers. Some will have a strong call to action and hit someone at just the right time and generate 2 or 10 sales. And some will just build a relationship and build trust, so that when you post your newest product, your followers are ready to click over and buy.
How does this actually work?
Well, here’s the thing: I’ve actually said all of this backwards to how your customer will experience it. How it’s going to work is that you are going to go out and connect with your Ideal Buyers on her profile. Leave comments, make recommendations, answer questions. Then, she will move from her profile to yours. You will be building a profile (full of photos and captions) that connect with her so she’ll stick around, maybe click through to your products, maybe follow you. Keep posting, with calls to action that lead her to click, and she’ll click through to your website and buy when she’s ready.
As I was sharing this in the Facebook group, I had someone ask “What about commenting on a post that already has tons of comments? Won’t I just get lost?”
Yes, yes you will. For marketing purposes, don’t bother with accounts that are super big, with dozens of comments. Your comment will mean so much more to someone who doesn’t get very many.
What I’ve noticed is that people have so much resistance to this idea. They don't want to do it because they don’t see immediate results. They don’t want to comment on other people’s posts, but they want people to comment on theirs.
Why? You show people how to interact with you. If you are never in comments, no one else will be. If you never follow anyone or interact, you can’t expect anyone to interact with you.
Yes, you will do work – captions, comments, stories, that won’t get a response.
So what? You’re learning, you’re creating a library of content. You are trial-and-error-ing it. You are getting better at your marketing messaging.
And guess what?
This podcast is built on the very principles you’ll apply to your Instagram. I create content that will delight you. It takes me a LOT of time and energy to create each episode I give it to you for free. I connect with you on social media, you may listen for a month or two years, all the while feeling more trust and connection with me, until you feel ready to join the Starship and work with me.
Are all those episodes I create where you didn’t buy a waste of time and energy?
No, they were building a relationship.
But don’t forget – your posts aren’t building that relationship with ONE person, they are building it with many people who are seeing today, and people who will scroll back and read it a year from now.
If you’ve been listening for a while, and you are curious about learning more to work together, check out how we can work together in my free masterclass – 4 Foundations to a Thriving Handmade Business. You can find it at taraswiger.com/foundations
How do you keep sales going? When you don’t have anything new? When you’re not launching? What can you do to stay consistent?
Today we are diving in to making more consistent sales!
Recently Starship Captain Brenda asked: “I just launched a pattern last week and had a good amount of sales, but now what?”
I’m going to share with you what I told her.
This is the second episode in a series about reaching your 2020 goal of increased sales. You can listen to the first, which was about launching and find the Massive Launch Resource Kit at taraswiger.com/launch
Ok, let’s get into it: what do you do to keep sales going?
The answer is simple: Send another email.
Yes, if you send 3-5 emails during your launch and now it’s over, get right back into it! Send an email! Post on Instagram! Use the momentum to establish a consistency you might not have had before.
I know you're worried your people won’t want to hear from you too much – YOU ARE WRONG.
They want to hear from you even when you’re not launching. If they stuck with you through the launch, they are VERY interested. In fact, they are closer to buying now than they ever were before.
(If not, they would have unsubscribed or stop opening… in which case they won’t see your messages anyhow!)
Always always remember: you are talking to people who WANT to hear from you.
So what should you send?
Well, if you’ve just held a launch that made more sales than usual, then your products are landing in the hands of your customers – which is what you should feature!
If you’re a knitwear designer or yarn maker, you can see your customer projects on Ravelry. If not (or if no one is sharing them yet), you can ASK them to share, better yet, INCENTIVIZE them to.
Yep, offer them something for sharing. Maybe it’s free shipping code for the next 5 people who post a photo with your hashtag or you host a giveaway and everyone who posts a photo and tags it gets entered to win. Now, it’s not ethical to give anything in exchange for a REVIEW. I’m not saying to incentivize reviews, rather incentivize word-of-mouth – people sharing their product on their own social media, while tagging you and using your hashtag.
Then comment on every single one of those posts and ask the share-er if they give you permission to share it on your account!
Then you’ll have customer images and stories to post!
Be sure you also collecting customer feedback when it’s sent directly to you – via DM or email. Have a template that you send in response to nice emails. Mine says something like “Thank you so much, this made my day! Would you mind if I shared this on my social media or website? I will tag you or link to you when I quote you!” (Now, the testimonials for MY business might be private (eg, if someone shares their sales numbers, they may not want to do that publicly), so I also offer to post it anonymously, but most of you sell something people are happy to talk about publicly.
Almost every time I’ve shared this strategy with a Starship Captain, the maker or designer has been SO nervous to start asking their customers if they can quote them. They are certain their customers will not agree or be upset, but you know what? In every single case their customers have been THRILLED and really flattered. People LOVE to talk about what they love!
This has held true for product makers and service providers – tech editors, yarn shops, jewelry designers, glass artists, knitwear designers, home decor brands, life coaches, knitwear designers – your customers WANT to see you succeed and share their great experience with you!
So that is going to provide a new category of content. Every time you share a customer photo or quote, be sure you link to how to get the thing.
Another strategy that it’s easy to forget is to focus attention on your older, great products. If you followed the directions for a great launch, then you know that it takes some time and effort to really highlight what’s great and valuable about a product. Of course you should do this when you have a new product, but you should ALSO give this attention and love to your older products!
A few years ago I helped a knitwear designer increase her sales when she took a break from publishing new designs with this strategy. She was working on a book, so she couldn’t also be designing and selling individual patterns. She went through her back catalog, chose some customer projects to highlight, wrote up what customers loved about it and her inspiration and highlighted one older pattern in each email and scheduled them to go out once every two weeks for six months. She was surprised that very few of her email subscribers even knew that she had these older patterns (she kept getting comments like “I love the new design!”) and she was even more surprised that her overall sales increased, while she wasn’t actually working in her business at all.
That increase in sales happened for a few reasons:
She was being more consistent, her readers started to look forward to her emails
Every time she sent an email about a “new” pattern, it reminded people to go on and buy the pattern they were considering last month.
The consistency and large back-catalog communicated trust and reliability, which built her brand’s perceived value (a.k.a. people are willing to spend more money when they trust you)
Nowadays I would also add in schedule Instagram posts highlighting the same patterns she was featuring in her emails.
Even though you may not be a designer, please think through how you can apply this to your own business! You could feature older products, or the craft shows that you’ve done, or the retail shops you’re in, or your bestsellers.
Note what worked – do more of it.
This may sound really obvious, but take a minute to think – do you really keep track of what’s working, really working (not just how you feel about it) and then purposefully re-use it?
You can use the same strategies.
The same photos.
The same captions.
The same sales emails.
The same schedule.
Will people notice?
Not really. I used to use the same exact emails to launch the Starship every 3 months, with only a few updates…and they worked as well the 2nd year as they did the first year. Why? Because new people were seeing them every time. New people are coming to you, they don’t know what they used to do.
And if it’s the same people, they haven’t opened and read and looked at and MEMORIZED every single thing you’ve done. So try it!
You can also do more of what worked by looking at WHY it worked. Do pictures of your face do better? Take more! Are captions that are long or short do better? Do that!
You can see all of this on whatever platform you’re using – your email stats, your Instagram “insights” (you have to have a “Business” account to see them, and you should definitely upgrade in order to have access to that!).
Use those stats to shape what you’ll do next.
Keep Going
Above all, the way to keep sales going is to keep TRYING new things (and old things!), to not give up when you have a dry month. To not get discouraged when you need to step back or take a break or something goes wrong.
At the heart of this philosophy is to take responsibility – to realize YOU have a job to do to increase sales. Etsy isn’t going to do it, Instagram isn’t going to do it – YOU have to figure it out by learning and trying and iterating.
It is very easy to say, well, sales are down because of… the election, or Brexit, or Ravelry made a change. But there are businesses who thrive in every condition, in every change. Giving up and blaming outside circumstances is not the way to grow. Taking responsibility for what you can control (and letting go of what you can’t) is the way to reach your goal.
If you implement any of these strategies, let me know, I’m @TaraSwiger on IG. Be sure you come join our Facebook Group – facebook.com/groups/taraswiger so you can chat about it with other makers and artists committed to their business in 2020.
Thank you for listening and have an enthusiastic week.
What's your brand? Is worrying about it going to increase your sales? What is translating marketing on Instagram into sales?
Today we're going to talk about the difference between branding, marketing and sales, as it's related to your small business.
A few weeks ago we talked about increasing sales through marketing on Instagram and then I was talking with a Captain about being sure they were spending their time on SALES, not just on Branding. It got me thinking, there's an important distinction between Branding and Marketing and Sales, and we don't talk about it a lot. In a big a business, these three things are clearly separate, there are different people in each department. But in your small business, you're doing it all. And in different businesses, they have different weights, ….
Branding
The vibe of your business. Your brand is the answer to the question: “How do people think about your business? How does your business makes people feel?” When they see it, they know it's yours, because it's your branding. It's the visuals, the tone of voice, the kind of media you use, and how you show up.
This is super important in a business that sells commodity – in other words, the same thing as similar businesses.
For example, a comic shop sells the exact same comics and uses the exact same distributor as every other comic shop. So the branding is EXTREMELY important to help it stand out. For a shop, the branding is going to be how the shop makes you feel – the customer service, the vibe of the shop, the events and activities going on. Everything from the staff you hire, to the comics you highlight, to the way you treat customers – that's all going into the way your customers feel about you.
Now, before we dive into this, I want to be clear about something. In all areas of your business, you're going to be authentic and honest. Just because you THINK about something and decide something, doesn't make it inauthentic. I think makers get confused about this because they think: I'm going to be myself and any amount of being strategic isn't authentically myself. No no no. The goal of effectively branding your small business is to find the brand that flows authentically from you. But to also be aware of it and intentional with it.
So you're not just providing amazing customer service in your shop because it's what's your brand about it, you're doing it genuinely and authentically.
If you (or a branding expert you hire) try to push a brand that isn't who you really are, it's going to fall apart. For example, the knitwear designer Frenchie behind Aroha Knits – her business has this very beautiful, elegant, styled in natural materials and soft colors brand, and when she talks in her videos, you can feel it's all very authentic. But if I tried to pull that off? If it would be fake and be So. Much. Work. I just can't be airy and elegant and styled. My branding is bright colors and being honest and being my goofy self.
While that's authentically me, I have to actually remind myself of that, especially when I compare myself to others or I feel like maybe I should be X or Y.
A few more examples: If you're in a direct selling company, like doTERRA, the company brand stands for something already. But you have to build your own brand – not with a fancy website or anything, but through how you treat every customer, through how you sample people, invite them to learn more. If your brand is aligned with the bigger brand, and if you use the bigger brand to give you focus, you'll do better. Your brand of education and support is going to be what builds trust and creates a community.
A yarn dyer is creating a brand with every skein of yarn she dyes – the colors she uses, the yarn she uses, all of it. What also impacts your brand: the label, the shops or shows where you choose to sell, what you focus on about your yarn (is it the material? Fun? Community?)
A few things to remember about Branding:
If you're making your thing and putting it out there, you're going to have a brand. You don't have to “make” one, they occur naturally. Your brand is going to come from your IG, your products, photography, way you write your descriptions.
Since you're going to have a brand anyhow, spend a little time thinking about it. The questions I ask in my marketing classes guide you through this. You can get access to my marketing class that goes into Instagram and email in the Starship, which opens in a few weeks. Sign up to learn more at taraswiger.com/starshipbiz.
Branding is really important in a business that sells commodities, and if you want to stand out in a crowded marketplace.
Be consistent. Choose some colors, your tone of voice, and stick with it.
Brands (and businesses) evolve and change, that's ok.
Marketing
Marketing is communicating with your customers. It includes your brand (what do people think of when they think of you), but marketing is the ongoing communication of both that brand + feeling, and of the products you have. Marketing is everything that creates, keeps, and satisfies the customer.
Branding is the feeling, marketing is what you DO that creates that feeling.
Marketing is alllll the things you're doing in your business. It's putting things on sale, it's photography, it's what you post and how you say what you say. We talk a lot about marketing, but after we talk about sales, I'll give you a few examples where people get confused about if they need to focus on marketing or sales.
Sales
Sales are: HOW YOU MAKE MONEY. It's the final step in the relationship that starts with marketing, contains your brand, all of that should lead to people making the sales.
It's where you say: Click here to buy this. Here's how you can get this. Would you like to join?
You can have the best branding and marketing in the world, but if you don't follow through and focus on sales – nothing. It won't matter. This is ESPECIALLY important in the online world. All your marketing might never be seen, until you focus on sales and you get in front of people.
For a crafter this includes:
Doing shows
Sell to retail shops (you close the sale to them and they close sales to many consumers)
I feel like I've been in an intensive training school for sales since joining doTERRA. Their branding is perfect. They already have marketing figured out. The products are amazing and pure and there's research projects that back it all up. In order to share the oils, I have to focus not on marketing (which is where I've spent a lot of my time in my other businesses) or in product creation, but in sales. How do I talk about these in a way that communicates clearly? How do I educate people so that they understand how they'd use them (because I don't want you to buy something you won't use?)
These are the questions you ask yourself to improve your selling –
Do people know this exists?
What do they need to understand or know before they will want to buy?
Am I making it clear how to buy? (So many people skip this part!)
Understanding these questions has made me better at sales in every area of my business – from the Starship, to book sales, to classes.
I want to reiterate what I said earlier – you're going to do ALL of this with authenticity. People have such stereotypes about “sales”, that they think you have to leave your integrity behind. Of course not! Sales is a natural outgrowth of your brand and marketing. If you make it NOT a natural outgrowth, you're going to be really bad at it.
As I said before, just because you're thinking about it and getting better at it, doesn't make it inauthentic.
If you feel like it does, or you are thinking “I don't want to do sales”, then honey, you don't want to have a business. A business is sales.
So let's look at some examples of where people get confused about which of the three they need to focus on:
If you have started an online shop and you haven't gotten sales or traffic, my #1 recommendation is that you focus on making sales, before you worry with anything else. Get your products in front of people – go do a craft show, do a local farmer's market, approach local shops or galleries. Spend all your time on sales, and in the in-between times, post to Instagram, or start to build your online marketing. But I see a lot of makers spend hours and hours on their online marketing, which takes MUCH longer to turn into sales. So when they don't have sales after 2 or 6 or 12 months, they stop their business and say, “people didn't want what I sold”. Nope, it's that people didn't know what you sold.
The social media world has confused us by thinking a big following = a steady business. Nope. Steady sales = a steady business.
Now, if you've GOT a big social media following, you can absolutely start a business and start making sales, but my friends and students who have done this tell me that they're shocked by how SMALL percentage of their audience actually buys their thing.
If you are making some sales and you're getting real customer feedback, absolutely build an online following, but realize that a small following that actually buys is 100x better than a big audience that doesn't.
I'm pretty passionate about this topic, because I've seen so many business owners spin their wheels online instead of going out there and making sales. I have 2 businesses that earn over six figures a year, and you can see on my Instagram, I don't have a huge audience. This podcast isn't in the top 10 or even 50 on iTunes. I don't even have 5,000 email subscribers.
So why do people focus more on marketing than sales?
Sales is scary. You can be rejected. When you focus on marketing, you're just “putting it out there” and people can either opt in or not opt in. That feels much less risky.
When you focus on sales, you're giving people the opportunity to say yes OR NO. And we're afraid of hearing no.
But as my mentor told me in the first few months of my doTerra business: You have to get a lot more comfortable being rejected. Ha! Yes! Also, ouch.
So how do you know what you need to work on?
Almost always you can spend more time on sales.
If you've been building piecemeal over the last few years, take a step back and look at your branding. Does your site and Instagram and tone “match” your products? Does it make sense? If you threw your product (and tag) in a pile with others, would people know which is yours? It may be time to think through what you want your brand to be and how you're communicating that.
Everything is marketing. If you are posting online regularly, updating your shop, putting labels on your products, you're marketing. Like we talked about in episode 217, focus on your right people and on communicating clearly.
If you'd like to work on all three and get my feedback on your branding, marketing and sales, join the Starship! It opens in a few weeks and you can learn more about it by signing up at the bottom of today's show notes or at taraswiger.com/starshipbiz.
How do you translate passion into sales? Today I’m answering a question from an Instagram friend!
On Instagram, I asked for your questions and IMDCreates asks, “I am scared to ask but here goes I am a crocheter and I am proud of what I do but it doesn't seem to translate into sales how can I change this for my business?”
Sales don’t just happen, sales are a result of clear communication.
Sales happen because the person who wants what you sell, clearly understands (because you communicated it) what is special about your work and how it will serve her needs.
Remember, there are a bunch of needs: need for self-expression, need for belonging.
How do you clearly communicate?
First, understand that this is a lifelong process. You are going to get better and better at each of these steps with time, the main thing is to start working at it now, and keep paying attention as you go.
This takes time and thought the first time you do it, which is why I’ve put this in classes, so you can dedicate a few weeks to figuring this out.
Identify who is the person your work is for. Where/how does she use it? What stage of her life is she in? What is she wanting to do? (Express herself? Feel great? Be funny?)
Talk only to her – in your Instagram posts, in your shop descriptions, in whatever you do.
Get clear about how your work serves her need. In my book Market Yourself there are a lot of worksheets to help you figure out – what makes your work special, how to communicate that, and how to speak in the language of your customer. You want to be sure that you’re talking about what she cares about (ex. she doesn’t care about what stitch you use, she wants to know why you made that decision, what that stitch does for her.)
Keep her coming back. Email list. Keep communicating
Now, I mentioned that this is a lot of steps and that it takes time. I walk you through all this, along with how to translate it into email lists and Instagram, in the class Elevate your Business, which will now come with your Starship membership – you’ll be guided through:
Identifying your goal
Making a plan
Tracking your numbers and profitability
Figuring out your marketing and how to use the tools effectively
The Starship will open next month, you can be the first to hear about it, at taraswgier.com/starshipbiz.
In the meantime, you can work through some of these questions in my book, Market Yourself, and since I saw you had a Etsy shop, Ida, check out my video on three things to fix in your Etsy shop.
If you want more about marketing, here are some of the past episodes I've done about marketing your business:
Your business relies on sales. That means YOU need to get good at sales. Yes, you need to be a salesperson. But did hearing that sentence just totally freak you out or turn you off?
We have some gross connotations with that word…. and it may be impacting the sales you make and the health of your business.
Your customers don't care about the same things you care about. They don't (necessarily) want to hear about your tools and techniques – they want to know how it benefits them and how your product will fit in their life.
But how do you figure this out? How do you know what matters most to your customers? How do you figure out why they buy?
In this episode we will cover:
How to find the specific details that matter to your customers
How your product fits into their life
How to learn from your customers so you can become more effective
Got a question you'd like me to answer on the podcast?
If you think it might be time to focus on what YOUR customers care about, Craft Your Marketing might be just the class you need! We'll talk about crafting a customer path so that you can turn one-time visitors into life-long fans of your work. Sign up below to find out more about it!
How customers find you, fall in love, and choose to buy = your Customer Path.
In today's podcast episode, we talk about what it is, what you already have and how to start improving it.
A “Customer Path” is a framework to think about your marketing. Once you think through your message and your goals from your own point of view (like we do in the book), you need to shift and think about how this all fits together for your ideal customer. What do they come in contact with first? Where do they go next?
This is how you turn a casual reader (or random googler) into a customer, and then a raving fan.
What to say in your content (blog, emails, social media)
Make more sales
The good news: you already have a Customer Path! Your job, your responsibility is to make it as easy and effective as possible, both to boost your own sales AND to provide service to your customers (they want to know how to find out more!)
In the podcast I share some questions to get you started in your own Customer Path building and a list of 5 things to remember as you map out your own Customer Path.
If you'd like to build your Customer Path, increase it's effectiveness, and get clear on how you make sales, join the brand new class: From Hi to Buy: Craft a Customer Path.
You can subscribe to it on iTunes or via Stitcher(or subscribe in whatever you use for podcasts – just search “Explore Your Enthusiasm” and it should pop up!).
Your Turn!
What does your Customer Path look like right now? Are there gaps? Cliffs? Too many options?
What are you going to do this week to make it clearer (and thus, more efficient)?
If you don't know the answer to that question, sign up for my FREE marketing e-course:
“Your Right Price will be right for your Right People”
I said this in the Pricing class and a few people piped up to ask , “But who are these Right People? How do I find them?”
We'll talk about the how to find the Right People and how to make them happy in this class, but before you register for that, let's answer the basic question:
Right People = anyone you like and appreciate who likes and appreciates you.
My definition, as it relates to our crafty pursuits:
Right People = the people who love and adore your thing, the way you do it and you.
Your right people is anyone who really loves what you make.
This includes:
customers
friends
cheerleaders
mentors
partners
Not all of your Right People are going to buy from you, but even those that don't will sing your praises to new Right People.
Without a focus your Right People your business may be:
Unfocused: Which way should I go next? What should I make?
Uncertain: Will this sell? Where should I advertise?
Insecure: Will people like it? Is it worthless? Will anyone ever buy?
Focusing on your Right People can reverse all that.
When you're talking to your Right People, you can be yourself.
Because that spark of YOU is what spoke to the people in the first place, it's why they are here, checking out your thing.
When you talk to your Right People, you know what to do next.
They'll tell you what they want either directly (I want yellow!) or indirectly (yellow sells out quickly).
When you share your thing with the Right People, you'll make sales.
They will feel a sense of kinship or a recognition of awesomeness and it will *click*. Yes, this is for me.
It's not about manipulation, convincing or cajoling.
In fact, it's the opposite! When you speak to your Right People, you don't have to persuade them that your thing is right, they will feel it.
Sound awesome?
Learn how to do it in my class on Befriending your Right People. We'll cover the specific how tos of finding your Right People, talking to them, learning from them and keeping them blissfully happy.
