Looking to double your sales this year?
Let’s be honest…
…In a magical world where you could get what you wanted at the snap of a finger, doubling your sales would just be the start.
Tripling, quadrupling, even quintupling (first time I’ve ever used this word) your sales would be something that really got you excited.
But what if it wasn’t only possible in a magical world? What if exponentially increasing your results and experiencing explosive growth in your sales was really possible, maybe not at the snap of a finger, but to do it within a year?
That should still get you really excited, because it is possible by doing the 3 things I’ll be sharing with you in this post.
Now, you know it and I know it…
There are literally millions of things you could try to do to increase your sales. Some work, some don’t. Many are just time-suckers and bank account drainers. That’s not what we’ll be discussing here.
What I’m going to share with you are the 3 fundamental things, or 3 core principles that, when applied, will work for any business in any industry and can at the very least double your sales within a year.
Like most fundamentals, they may sound basic, even obvious. But don’t let that fool you. That’s the thing about fundamentals though, right?
Don’t skim through the headlines and think that you’ve got it all figured out.
The devil is in the details.
So, let’s get to it…
Double Your Sales Fundamental #1 – Get More Customers
What did I tell you about sounding basic and obvious?
Of course getting more customers would help you to double your sales. It’s basic math.
If you had 100 customers that paid $10 each this month, that’s $1000. If you could double the amount of customers and get 200 customers next month that each paid $10, that would be $2000. Obvi…right?
However, if it were that simple, every business would do that.
So, how do you get more customers?
10 ways to get more customers:
- Offer a Free Report/Guide/Whitepaper
- Offer Samples/Trials
- Advertise on Facebook
- Google Adwords
- Blog on your website
- Offer a Free Consultation or Assessment
- Run a Flash Sale
- Search Engine Optimization
- Join Local Meetup Groups
- Publish Content on YouTube
These 10 methods will need to be tweaked and customized depending on your industry, the type of customer you want to attract, and your marketing budget.
But you can get really creative…
Sports Illustrated is a good example of finding a creative way to increase their sales.
At a time when their subscription numbers were falling and they were having a hard time finding a way to improve their numbers, their marketing manager, Martin Shampaine, came up with a wacky idea. What if they gave away a free football-shaped phone with every subscription?
That’s a stupid idea…Right?
That football-shaped phone brought in 1.6 million new subscribers to Sports Illustrated. It proved to be one of the most successful marketing campaigns ever executed in American media.
The football phone was a “premium”. It was a physical gift that motivated people to subscribe.
Think about it.
This was a gamble. They didn’t know it would work. And they had to invest in thousands upon thousands of phones before even seeing if it would pay off.
But it did.
Can you think of a “football phone idea” for your business? Can you offer a “premium” in exchange for becoming a customer?
This idea alone could easily double your sales.
Double Your Sales Fundamental #2 – Get Your Customers to Spend More
Would you like fries with that?
We’ve all heard that question…
…and the answer is always “YES”.
And why not make it a large Coke and add that extra burger for $1?
That’s the upsell my friend.
McDonald’s has mastered the upsell. To the point where teenagers taking your order (who can barely dress themselves) are able to implement the upsell strategy flawlessly with almost 95% efficiency.
So, what is the upsell?
It’s just one of many strategies that allow you to make more money per customer, or transaction, where you sell your core product or service and then offer additional products or services at the point of sale.
Let’s take the McDonald’s experience for example…
Say you go to McDonald’s with the intention of getting a $1 burger from the dollar menu. Before completing your order and ringing you up, the genius sales and marketing associate that is helping you (a.k.a. teenage employee) follows up with the Jedi mind trick, irresistible offer…”Would you like fries with that?”.
You’re thinking, “Well, it’s just $1 more, right? Ok, add the fries.”
This is followed up with, “Would you like a drink with that?”
“Yes. Make it a large Coke.” Add another $1 to your order.
Now you’re $1 meal has turned into a $3 meal. That’s triple the revenue for McDonald’s from one transaction. And can you imagine how many times they do this throughout the day?!?
What could adding an upsell mean for your sales?
It could mean making more money from your existing client base.
In other words, you wouldn’t necessarily need more customers to double your sales. You could easily double your sales by getting your existing customers to spend more.
Use the McDonald’s Method and look for ways to double, even triple, your revenue per customer transaction.
5 ways to get your customers to spend more:
- Offer a cross sell. Like Amazon’s “Other items you might be interested in…”
- Offer a slack adjuster, a super high end offer that only 3% of your potential customers would buy but would be a high profit center.
- Bundles/Kits/Value Buckets
- Subscription/Continuity for recurring sales
- Warrantees/Insurance
Double Your Sales Fundamental #3 – Increase Your Customers’ Buying Frequency
A friend of mine that works at Best Buy shared an interesting observation with me the other day…
…He said that one of Best Buy’s most valuable customer profiles is the “Gamer” (people who play video games).
It’s not the people who spend on really big ticket items like TVs, appliances, iPhone Xs, or even expensive cameras…it’s the “Gamer”.
Who’dve thunk?
But why is that? Why is the “gamer” a valuable customer profile?
Because of their buying frequency.
Of course they bought the high ticket game console. They bought the controllers. They bought accessories. They bought the headsets.
But it doesn’t stop there…
…they come back and buy a couple more video games and maybe another accessory…
…then a month later they’re back for another game and another accessory…
…and again …and again …and again.
Like a revolving door. They keep coming back and ultimately buy more than your typical Best Buy customer.
How can you setup your revolving door to increase your customers’ buying frequency?
5 ways to increase your customers’ buying frequency:
- Regular Email Newsletter (daily/weekly/monthly)
- Retargeting
- SMS marketing
- Loyalty Program – Starbucks does this incredibly well. I’m there every week.
- Coupons/Gift Cards
Again we’re focusing on existing customers here. It’s easier to get an existing customer to do business with you again than it is to go out and get a new customer.
Existing customers already know, like, and trust you.
All you have to do is give them a reason, or an incentive to come back. This is easier to implement on products that are consumable or services that can be repeated. It might take some creativity for products or services that a customer typically purchases only once.
It Can Be A Cakewalk to Double Your Sales If You Do These 3 Things
- Get More Customers
- Get Your Customers to Spend More
- Increase Your Customers’ Buying Frequency
Of these 3, getting more customers is the most challenging. It can be a challenge to convert a stranger into a customer.
Getting your customers to spend more and increasing their buying frequency are much easier to do because you’re dealing with people that already have a relationship with you. They know, like, and trust you.
It’s just a matter of deciding where to start.
Doubling your sales has never been easier. Heck, that’s just for starters…
Let’s say you implemented all three of these things into your sales strategy. What could that look like for your business?
- Getting more customers using the “Sports Illustrated Football Phone” Premium Offer – at least 3x
- Getting your customers to spend more using the “Would You Like Fries With That?” Method – 3x
- Increasing your customer’s buying frequency using the “Starbucks” Strategy – 3x
Your sales would grow at least 27x!
Multiplying your sales by 27 times in a year might seem like a lot because it is.
However, that’s the ideal situation.
Let’s say it took you a while to get started…to really get your bearings on these 3 fundamental things…
…and your implementation wasn’t stellar.
Let’s say you couldn’t reach 27x growth in sales.
A mediocre result would be at least 2x, right?
When you put it into perspective, at the beginning of this post it might have seemed impossible to double your sales in a year. Now that you’ve learned ways to implement the 3 things to double your sales, doubling your sales seems like a much more reachable goal.
You can do this.
It almost seems magical right?