ENTREPRENEURS! Want THE KEY to sustainable income?
Aug 05, 2021Finding ways to earn a sustainable income can be a challenging task for new entrepreneurs (and some seasoned ones, too). The idea of not making enough money to live the life we want to live can keep us locked into our fear and unable to forge ahead confidently. That being said, there is one relatively simple trick that, once learned, can most certainly keep you on the expressway to success! Literally, the one thing you have to focus on is making sure that you have a clear understanding surrounding the difference between customer service and customer experience. If that sounds way too simple to be true, let me assure you that it is not. This one step has helped a ton of my clients get amazing results, attract new clients and build their income quickly, regardless of business model or industry! Let’s see why.
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Every customer who interacts with your business wants to feel special. That’s the bottom line. If they feel undervalued, unseen or unheard, they will be far less likely to continue to purchase your service and/or product, so customer service is expected. Customer service should make your purchasers feel like they are a guest, a friend and somebody who is important to you, the business owner. Why? Because they are important to you. In fact, they are the absolute most important part of your business because without them, you have no business. Customer service involves offering a great product or service, ensuring that your order is fulfilled and delivered in a timely manner, answering questions about your service or product from an educated space and responding to concerns or complaints in an appropriate manner that helps your client feel valued and validated. Pretty basic, right? So basic, in fact, that you’re probably already doing this. You may even be doing well, but is your income continuing to grow? If not, you may want to think about where your customer’s experience could be lacking.
Customer experience is customer service leveled up. It entails everything that happens from before your first contact with a new client all the way through to after the sale. How are you gaining your clients’ trust leading up to that first interaction and how are you sticking around after the fact and showing them that you’re still taking care of them?
You might be saying to yourself, “Customer service and customer experience sound like pretty much the same thing”, but they’re not. Customer service is greeting every customer who walks through the door of your brick-and-mortar business. Customer experience is greeting them by name because you remember them from a previous interaction. Customer service is being introduced to a client for the first time and telling them it’s nice to meet them. Customer experience entails asking follow up questions that will help you to understand this client on a more personal level so that you can offer custom-tailored services and products that will meet their individual needs. Customer service is recognizing a repeat client and acknowledging that recognition with a wave. Customer experience is telling them that you’ve been waiting for them to come back in because you just got a new product in that reminded you of them and that you really feel they will benefit from. Do you see the difference? When you choose to focus on the customer experience, your clients feel important, seen and understood and that will have them coming back time and time again.
Having this level of personalized interaction with your clients will leave them loving you so much that they wouldn’t dream of supporting your competitors. The recommendations will pour in because they are excited to know you and to help spread the word about your wonderful business. They will want their friends and family to share in the amazing experience that they have had with you.
You may be wondering how you’re going to remember all the faces, names and personal details of your client interactions, but that is also not as difficult as it may seem. Every business needs to have systems in place that will help to sort through all of the details. Something as simple as keeping a spreadsheet of your client’s birthdays and sending an e-card can make a huge difference or keeping a database of past purchases for all of your clients. You might even choose to keep notes on your clients, jotting down the key points from your last interaction with them. Knowing what is happening in their lives creates a meaningful experience every single time.
There are other simple ways to make your clients feel valued, as well. Sending out thank you cards, setting up referral programs and adding value to your community through volunteering or donations are great ways to show your clients that you care and keep them loyal to your business.
So that’s that. It really is this simple to consistently build sustainable income. If you feel like you may still need a bit more guidance on how to help your business thrive, don’t forget to check out my six-week online course, “Be a Confident Entrepreneur”, by visiting my website. If you prefer a more one-on-one approach, you can also contact me to set up a twenty-five-minute consultation call and you can join my Facebook group, “Be a Confident Entrepreneur, Gain Confidence and Grow Your Income” to surround yourself with like-minded individuals who are in the same boat as you! Cheers to your success!
Check out the Referral Machine and learn free and low-cost ways to gain new clients with ease.
Video Transcript
Hey, everybody, happy Friday Eve Day to everyone, hang on one second. I'm going to check the tech, make sure everybody's working. Yes, everything's working. All right, we've got Facebook and LinkedIn and the house with YouTube and I've got Instagram up here on the camera. So if I'm looking back and forth, that's why. You guys, if you're coming to me through stream yard, be sure to give it access to your name. So I see who you are because that's it's way more fun to know who's joining me.
Today's topic, we decided to keep it a surprise just for fun. What I will tell you is if you want the key to sustainable income, stay tuned, stay here and absorb the goodness.
But first, if you're new to me and I'm new to you, I'm Tracy Beavers. I am your business and sales coach. And my passion is helping you, the small business owner, solopreneur and salesperson untangle the parts of your business that are no longer working. Find those disconnects. And through my six week online course that dives into all aspects of business and through live trainings just like this, we can gain you get your knowledge gained, you confidence so that you know that everything you're doing, every decision you're making, every action you're taking every day is going to move the needle on your income, because otherwise, why are we in business? Right.
OK, guys, if you're here live, I want you to type live in the chat. I'm so excited to have you join me live. And if you're catching the replay, I love that too. Type replay in the chat team replay. Got to love it. You can watch it on the go. Right. All right. The past couple of weeks, we've had some fun. I decided to throw in some personal tidbits about me and ask you guys to share about you so we can get to know each other better. Otherwise, I feel like I'm just kind of talking to a screen. Right. So we've shared about our first jobs what we wanted to be when we grew up. Some of us are still trying to figure it out. No judgment there. But today's tidbit about Tracy, some of you can answer this question because you've known me a very long time. What is my nickname for my husband, John? The abbreviation is S.H.H, any guesses? Some of you are going to get it all right. Some of you have it. I love it. It's smokin hot hub's. So now I want to know, do you have a nickname for you? Do you have a nickname that people call you or do you give nicknames to the people in your life that you love the most? Everybody in our family has a nickname, so I want you to post them in the chat and let us know. We don't have to be all serious about business every single week. Right. This will be fun. All right.
Without further delay, let's get to today's hot topic. I bet you want to know it's a surprise topic about sustainable income. Do you want the key? This is the key to sustainable income. And I'm certain that answer I can hear you right now is a very loud yes. Right. OK, so here it is. Stick with me. It is knowing the difference between customer service and customer experience. And you're like, what? Something as simple as that? Yes, my friends, something as simple as that. Sometimes these answers in these keys are simple. We can make them way to make them way harder than they have to be. And there is a fly buzzing around in my kitchen about to drive me crazy. So if you see me swotting like this, it's August here at July, almost August here in Arkansas. It's hot and flies tend to come in the house anyway. It's gross, but I digress. All right. So this training today is based on some conversations I've been having with my coaching clients.
They're getting amazing results, attracting new clients and their income is growing fast. And we want to make sure they sustain this right. Nobody wants flash in the pan income that comes and goes and doesn't last. That's too much work. So go with me here for a second and know that this applies to all business models. It doesn't matter if you're a brick and mortar or if you're virtual and online like me or if you're a mix of both. A customer is a customer, is a customer. And the key is making them feel like more than a customer, like a client, like a guest, like a friend, like someone who's important to you. Because they are because they give you money and they sustain your business. They are super important to you. Right. So customer service is expected. It's like the minimum bar. It's offering a great product or service. It's making sure the order is fulfilled and delivered on in a timely way, answering questions when your customer contacts you, answering the phone, that kind of thing. That's customer service. That's it. That's all there is to it. It's a low bar. It's a minimum bar. And there are businesses that deliver this daily and they're doing great. But my question is, is there incoming is their income continuing to grow? And can it be sustained doing what they're doing? Maybe. But I guarantee you, if they thought more about customer experience, it would.
Customer experience takes customer service to a whole new level. Ask yourself and make a list. Envision your client from before they meet you before that first contact. What can you do to level up their experience and wow them before the sale? During the sale. After the sale. And you've heard me say this before, that all important and key after the after the sale. Right. That's kind of when everyone's left the building. And you've got to still prove that after the after the sale, you're still going to be around taking care of them.
So let's say you've got a brick and mortar business and you might greet them when they come in with a hey, welcome in. We've all heard that a million times, but do you call them by name? Big difference. They're huge. You might remember their past purchases, but do you keep them in mind for new products that come in? And next time they are with you, you not only ask about them how they're doing, which in the South means how is your family? How's your mama? How's your dog? Right. Because that's how we are here in the south. But you say I've been waiting for you to come back in because we received this awesome new blah, blah, blah. And I thought of you when I saw it.
This, my friends, is the making of an experience. You've got a virtual business. You're not getting off the hook that easy. You can take everything I said and tweak it to fit your business model. Now, how do we keep this going through the life of the client throughout the whole time they're with you, which hopefully we mean. Hopefully it's four years, right? You want to keep thinking of ways to take that connection to the next level before the sale, during the sale, after the sale and the after the after the sale. That's the part that a lot of people miss out on.
The key to sustainable income is to have your clients love you so much they would never think about going to your competition. And they are proud and excited to recommend you to everybody they know that needs you because they want their friends and family to have that same experience. So who wants sustainable income? I want you to type income in the chat and I'm just going to check our check and make sure it's still going. Yeah. Oh, you're so funny. How's your dog exactly? My dog's great. He's asleep, as usual. Oh, my goodness. All right.
So here's some ideas that my coaching clients and I have had in the past few weeks, knowing each client by name, knowing about them personally, remembering the details. And you're thinking, Tracy, I can't possibly remember all of that. Well, yes, you can. We put systems in place to help you remember. I mean, do you want sustainable income and you don't want to rely on your memory for this? OK, so we have to put systems in place to set you up for success. I want you to develop a way to capture market events. What's a marquee event? Birthdays, wedding anniversaries, the anniversary of their new office opening.
For example, if you're a commercial real estate agent and you just help them find that new office, the anniversary of their home purchase, for example, if you're a real estate agent or a mortgage lender and you helped them get that mortgage loan and get financing to buy that. New house, right? You see where I'm going with that? Which of these things pertains to what you do? And again, you need to put systems in place to capture this earth, for example. You can easily you can or someone on your team create an Excel spreadsheet that's just for birthdays, tabs for each month, clients listed by month and day prepare all the birthday cards in a batch a month in advance. Do you think I care that my doctor's office prepares my birthday card a month in advance? I cannot. I'm just excited to get it right. I don't know when they wrote it. It could have been the day before. It could be the month before. Hopefully they're matching them and saving time. Have somebody on your team be the birthday captain and in charge of looking monthly or weekly to see which cards need to be mailed out or hand delivered. If you're a business where you see your clients regularly, I'm talking about hairdressers, massage therapists, chiropractors, personal trainers, anybody that see if you see your clients regularly enough that you know when they're coming in next in their birthday's coming up, you can deliver that card maybe with a little five dollar card gift card in it for them to get a free cup of local coffee. Oh, my gosh. You've made their day after they purchase from you.
Are you sending them a thank you card? Yes, I'm in an old fashioned handwritten thank you card on paper that has a stamp on it and is actually mailed to their home. Yes, the postal service still works. People, everybody. I don't care how old you are or who you are. Everybody loves getting a thoughtful note in the mail. Everybody, what am I? One of my other doctors does a great job of this. And it really means a lot. I mean, I went to see her and they made me a thank you card just for being a new patient. And I thought, that's really cool. Right. Made me feel very special. And I want my friends and family to have a an experience like that because they've treated me really well and they've taken good care of me. All right. So the after the after the sale, super, super important. What are you doing to keep them connected to you, thinking of you and keeping you thinking of them.
Think of your clients as your business community. You're building a community of clients that love you and that you love them and they love you. It's like your own little city. Right. So what are some ways that you can deepen those community connections in your little community, your little city? Do you see how this could create sustainable income for you? You bring in a client you love on them so hard, you connect with them so deep and they end up having such a great experience with you that they're not only going to stay with you, but they're going to want their friends and family to have the same wonderful experience and refer them to you. You bring them in as new clients you love on them so hard that and you connect with them so deep that they end up having a great experience. They stay with you long term. They want everyone to have this experience. And so they refer their friends and family to you. And it keeps going and growing and going right and expanding rinse and repeat.
It's like, OK, I'm totally going to date myself here. Does anybody remember the Fabergé organic shampoo commercial from I think it was in the eighties? Oh, my God, yes, I'm that old. Anyway, it was where the girl uses the shampoo and she loves it so much, she tells two friends and they tell two friends and they tell two friends and they tell Bobridge I had it Babaji build sustainable income right now where that shampoo is anymore. Maybe they maybe they forgot about their clients. I don't know. Well we'll look that up in the history books. So just to share with you guys my excitement about this, because I do believe it is the key to helping you build that sustainable income that you're looking for. I've got a free gift for you guys today. I'm going to be popping the link to it and sharing it with you in the chat. It has great tips and ways to do all the things that we're talking about. It's called the referral machine. And I created it just for you guys and my clients to help you sustain that income by deepening those relationships with your existing clients. So they stick with you long term and they want to send everybody that they know to you to get your product, your program, your service.
I hope these tips help you every week. And as always, I really want to know what you think. Share with me below what you think. Tell me what you'd like to learn or hear more of. It's my goal to bring value to you and be of service. And remember, being an entrepreneur is hard. I do not want you to go it alone. This my Facebook group doesn't want you to go it alone. Some days everybody wants to buy what you're selling and other days it's crickets, right? Nobody wants to know your name and nobody's answering the phone. And if you think you're alone, you are not. The struggle is real for entrepreneurs. It is a roller coaster. I'm here for you. And if you want to brainstorm, ways to sustain words are hard to sustain your business's income and see what we can accomplish together. Send me a DM or contact me through my website and let's talk about it.
You can set up a twenty five minute call with me. We can talk through what's going on. And I can find out where your disconnects are and make a plan for you. I'm going to put that link in the comments. And if you're an action taker, which I know you are, and you want to level up your income right now, the six week online course be a confident entrepreneur is always available on my website site. Six weeks, you guys have sales, networking, effectively getting referrals from your existing clients, talking about a schedule that serves you, not you, serving your schedule. It's all there for around sixty five dollars a week. That's a bargain. So I'm going to post a link for that in the comments as well. And if you're catching this on my business page on LinkedIn, on Instagram or on YouTube, I want you to hop over to Facebook. I know. Hop over to Facebook, the Facebook group, Be a Confident Entrepreneur, Gain Confidence and Grow Your Income. Search for it. Find it. Join us. Jump in.
Today, I asked what one wish I could grant for my members in my group. I've got almost six hundred members in this group. What's one wish I could grant for you and your business? And some of those wishes were fulfilled today because we're connected. We help each other. It's collaborative and supportive. It's so much fun. I want you guys to have a great balance of the week and weekend. And remember, when one of us rises, all of us rise. So I want to keep everybody let's keep cheering each other on.
All right. I'm going to go into. The comments and see if I can see them. Yes, hey, Kamisha, how's your dog, you're so funny. Yes, yes, Amy, everybody thinks that reaching out, it's hard. It's hard to know what to say. Then the follow up can sometimes be kind of weird and wonky. Let me see if there's any comments over here. Yep. All right, guys. Totally there with you. We got this. Have a great rest of the week. I will talk to you soon.
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