I have created a new and improved version of K Money Mastery which is called, Mastering Book Publishing!
I just got back from attending the Traffic & Conversion Summit in San Diego, California about two weeks ago. It was an incredible event! I met a lot of really amazing, successful internet marketers and also learned a lot also. If I don't make an extra $100,000 this year in my business, then shame on me, because the information and content was top-notch. In this video blog, I wanted to share the biggest thing I learned from attending the Traffic & Conversion Summit that is applicable to ANY business on the planet, offline or online.
Watch Part 1 below:
(Click here to watch on YouTube)
Watch Part 2 below:
(Click here to watch on YouTube)
Creating A Sales Funnel For Your Online Business
One of the biggest topics that was covered by Ryan Deiss and Perry Belcher at the Traffic and Conversion Summit was the importance of building your sales funnel for your business. Although I got MANY take-aways and big “aha's” from the event, I found this to be the most important thing for any business to maximize it's revenue. Ryan Deiss talked about the 5 parts of the funnel, which are explained more in details below.
1. Lead Magnet
Every business needs to collect “leads” or potential prospects, before you can even consider selling anything. While you can send traffic or visitors directly to your product page, it's more beneficial to develop a relationship with them first and provide value, as then those prospects will be more likely to buy stuff from you in the future. This is where the Lead Magnet comes in.
A Lead Magnet is a free, ethical bribe to get someone to opt-in to your e-mail list or newsletter. This is a small chunk of value that provides instant gratification, delivered immediately. It's often an ultra specific solution to an ultra specific market. Preferably, it should promise one big thing and speaks to a known desired end result.
The lead magnets that I currently have for my business are the following:
Free Video Reveals Exactly How I Make Over $8400 Per Month Selling Kindle Books That I Didn't Write
Based on what I learned from the Traffic and Conversion Summit, I can definitely improve what I currently have. It's also useful to have multiple lead magnets that you use in different ways, to get people into your sales funnel. For example, for my Mastering Book Publishing I'm creating more lead magnets of valuable stuff that I'm giving away that will help get people in the door and learn more about me.
For ProjectLifeMastery.com, I'm re-doing my lead magnet based on a survey that I sent out recently to my followers, so that it'll be more targeted and valuable to them. You'll also see that I have my lead magnet available on the sidebar and below each blog post. I also recently installed something called OptinMonster, which is a pop-up that appears when people exit my blog for the first time (you only see it once) that invites people to enter their e-mail to get access to my Life Mastery Toolkit. So far, this has been huge for my business and has improved my conversion rate by 10%.
The bottom line is that EVERY business needs a lead magnet. You need a way to get your prospects information so that you can begin to create a relationship with them. If you have a retail store, you could ask for your prospects e-mail and enter them into a survey to win some cool stuff, which is also a lead magnet. If you are McDonalds, you can send visitors on the internet to enter their e-mail address onto your website so that you can begin to send them coupons or build a relationship with them. It works in almost EVERY instance.
With Kindle Publishing, I have many lead magnets set up within my Kindle e-books that I teach in my course. If I have a book on dating advice for men, then I'll create a squeeze page using LeadPages that will offer something for free to help them meet women. The lead magnet could be “Free Video Reveals How To Approach A Girl And Get Her Number In 3 Minutes!” and then have people that have read my Kindle e-book head to that page and enter their e-mail address. Now they are in my sales funnel and there's an opportunity to build a relationship with them, provide value, and begin to make money from them by selling other stuff deeper in my sales funnel.
2. Tripwire
One thing that Perry Belcher said at the event is the following:
Today is the hardest time ever to get people to part with their money for the first time. It's also the easiest time to get the money after the 2nd, 3rd and 4th time.
This is very true. These days, most people are very skeptical to buy things online. That's why you need to offer them something inexpensive that they can easily buy, which helps them begin to trust you more and build a deeper relationship with you. You are also establishing the relationship of them buying from YOU. Once someone buys something from you one time, it's much easier to get them to buy more stuff from you. That's why the Tripwire is so important – it must be an irresistible, super low risk offer that converts prospects into buyers. It has to have a high perceived value, as well as high ACTUAL VALUE, so that it's a positive first transaction for your prospects. It also has to be useful, but somewhat incomplete so that it can seamlessly lead into the core offer.
Dopamine is released when people buy stuff. They immediately feel good. They often want MORE of this and it can be addictive to consumers.
An example of a Tripwire in my business is my Kindle Money Mastery e-book on Amazon. This is an e-book that I sell for $2.99 that has a lot of valuable information in it in regards to Kindle publishing, but is also incomplete. It has a high perceived value (and actual value) with over 78 reviews and is an impulse buy for people. The purpose of this e-book is primarily to get people in the door and to establish a relationship with them. It then seamlessly leads into a lead magnet (the free video), which then leads into Mastering Book Publishing program.
Every business needs an inexpensive offer to get people accustomed to buying stuff from you. I personally need MORE of these in my business, which I am working on right now, as it's so important. If you attempt to sell someone on something too expensive right out of the gate, then it won't convert as high as if you have them buy something inexpensive from you first.
3. Core Offer
When it comes to the Core Offer, the biggest takeaway I received was that you always need to be testing and optimizing things with it. You need to be improving and testing things religiously on your sales letter, as little changes can make a big difference. I now use Visual Website Optimizer to test different headlines, colours, prices, exit page, etc… A little change can boost your conversion rate by 5 or 10%, which can be a lot of extra revenue.
4. Profit Maximizers
Profit Maximizers are essentially ways to offer more products or services to your existing customers. It's a way to further monetize each customer and get more of a long-term value from them. This can be an up sell, cross-sell, slack adjusters (events or consulting), bundles and kits, value buckets, line extensions, or recurring billing. The Profit Maximizers must be something that adds MORE value to the customer and helps them further along in their path. For example, a simple one after someone buys your product could just be “Need help? Let me help you apply everything and set up your online business”, which is essentially coaching. There's so many people that buy stuff but are too lazy to apply it, so providing extra help for customers can be an easy up sell that a lot of people would take you up on. In my case, I've had many people that have purchased my Mastering Book Publishing course decide to work with me 1-on-1 so that I can help them make even MORE money from everything and actually apply it and be accountable.
If you visit Amazon.com, they are masters at Profit Maximizers. Usually when people go to Amazon.com to buy something, they often end up buying a LOT MORE STUFF than they had originally planned. This is because Amazon recommends more products to them and offers them more. Very brilliant idea. Amazon tests this so much that they know what they are doing with it. When you go to McDonalds, they ask “Would you like fries with that?”, which is an upsell that makes them more money. EVERY business needs to do this.
In my case, I have an upsell for my Mastering Book Publishing course called Full Disclosure membership. It's a recurring billing membership, where you get access to more advanced lessons, interviews with Kindle publishing gurus, live book reviews, Q&A videos with me, as well as access to our Facebook community. I make sure to add more content and provide lots of value every month to the members area and group, and so people stay on board with it as it helps them make more money on Kindle.
I'm currently working on developing more Profit Maximizers in my business, which are a few projects I mentioned in my 2014 goals. I'm working on developing some softwares that will help people make more money from their Kindle books, as well as some services that can help people also. The reason why I came up with these Profit Maximizers is I noticed some problems that are yet to be solved for my customers (and for myself), and so I figured I'd take the liberty to find a solution to them. If you can provide a solution to peoples problems and it meets their needs, then it's an easy sell for them.
5. Return Path
At a certain point, if your prospects aren't buying from you (usually after 90 days), then Ryan Deiss mentions that you add them to something he calls “The Bucket”. In the bucket, you are essentially being an affiliate and promoting other products that can help them. After 90 days, these people likely aren't going to buy from you, so it's worthwhile to see if there is something else out there that they will resonate with.
The key to making this ENTIRE process successful is to continuously be adding value to your prospects and customers the entire way through. You MUST put their needs above your own, ensuring that you are looking out for their interests. If you fail to deliver on something or sell them something that sucks, then they will lose trust and relationship with you, and will likely never buy from you again or listen to you.
However, if you continue to provide value and help them, then they will be more likely to trust you and buy more stuff from you. It's a very delicate balance. I believe one of the reasons why I've been so successful with my blog is because I provide SO MUCH VALUE for free to people, spending hours putting out these videos and articles for free, which means that when I do offer a product or service, people are more likely to buy from me because they trust me and I've already helped them so much.
This sales funnel was the biggest thing that sunk into brain after attending the Traffic & Conversion Summit. Of course, there's many more things, but then this article would go on forever. I'll work to summarize some of the other lessons and takeaways that I got from it, but for now this is the biggest thing that is still fresh in my mind.
I also think it's the most important thing and EVERYONE needs to optimize their sales funnel fully in their business to get the most out of it. Finally, if you ever get a chance to attend these types of internet marketing events, then you absolutely should. The information and value you will get can be powerful and really help you grow our business. You can also meet a lot of amazing, successful people that will inspire you.
If you want to get access to the entire Traffic & Conversion Summit notes, click here.