Change Of Plans

Firstly let me tell you that I’m not the type of guy who calls people out, who names names or anything like that. So I’ll never share the particulars but I’ll share enough for you to enjoy this quick story. 

Early this year I was working with a weight loss / fitness business who had a few studios across Sydney and they were expanding into a new location. When we connected they said they needed two things.

The first one was “urgent”, they needed to quickly fill up numbers in the original studio in Sydney. 

The second task was less urgent but they wanted to have lots of clients ready to come in and try the new studio that was opening in about a month’s time in the eastern suburbs of Sydney.

Cracking The Marketing Code

So ok, no problem. I knew that if I could crack the code for the first studio, the process to get clients for the new studio would be the same.

• That’s one big secret for marketing as a side note here. If it works, it works. 

The first thing I do with any marketing plan or strategy is to stop, sit and think (I’m usually already sitting down so I can skip that step). Spending a few minutes to think through options and likely paths is very underrated. Most businesses just decide, act and start posting things on Instagram.

I drafted a marketing message that I believed would work, I shared it with the client on our next call and all was ok.

After the first trial and testing phase results were good, I can’t remember how many clients were brought in but there was a good number. The client called me and asked if we can double the budget. You might think that was great news for me but I’ve been down this road before. Today’s results aren’t guaranteed to be next week’s results and from my view.. we were still in the early testing phase of this campaign.

I declined the doubling of budget even though it would have also doubled my fee, the client was ok with that after I explained my point of view. 

What happened next was interesting. 

Remember I’m telling you this story because it was one of the turning points, one of the pieces of straw that broke the camel’s back. It’s why I wanted to move more away from providing a range of marketing services to clients in this “one for you, one off service” arrangement.

I received an email from the boss’s assistant that said something like this:

“We saw a copy of your Ad, we don’t like it. The grammar is not correct and there is a spelling mistake. We need you to change it.”

This is not all that surprising in itself… I’ve heard this before from clients. 

Quick side note: Most people don’t know what type of language, what type of image and what type overall Ad works. They are watching their competitors post beautifully designed images and artistic videos with clever captions. I can tell you from experience: 

1. 99 times out of 100, “clever” Ads don’t work. 
2. Over designed images and videos scream “this is an Ad” and peoples Ad blindness kicks in and they skim past it. ESPECIALLY if you’re advertising on social media.

I just try to create Ads that return customers and not worry about looking good. Looking good comes second to getting results.

When creating an Ad it’s critical to think: Am I trying to:

A). Get customers. Or

B). Win a graphic design competition?

When you’ve been focused on hitting the target that is “getting customers” the type of tools you use get more specific as you realise what gets customers and what doesn’t get customers. 

Back to the story, my client came across my Ad and said they didn’t like it and they wanted it changed.

The spelling error they found yes I admit, it was a typo that I missed, apologies. But the Ad was working and getting lots of customers even WITH the spelling error in amongst the text. 

If The Ad is Working, Should it Be Changed? 

If you’re a top 200 or 100 company, like a bank for example, and you run an Advertisement that has a typing error in it then maybe yes, you can imagine all TV stations and online media pointing that error out – but hey, free advertising. When there is shareholders and share price value involved, yes I understand the company needs to be more careful and probably correct typos before they go live.

However when you’re a local business who is trying to get new customers and you release an Ad that starts getting new customers and it’s working well, if you then:

• Notice a typing error.
• Or you get tired of seeing the image in the Ad
• Or if you want to change the colours or anything…

You 100% should not touch it. 

There’s nothing like the frustration of making a small edit to an Ad, reloading it and the momentum is lost and the results plummet.. I’ve done this. It’s annoying. 

I’m here sharing these lessons with you so you can fast forward your business’s growth. I only comment on things I’ve personally done. 17 years has taught me some things, not that I’m smart, it’s just because 17 years is a long time. 

In short: NEVER touch an Ad that is working.

If the Ad you create has a picture of a donkey playing basketball and it’s bringing in new and extra customers, keep that donkey Ad live and running until the customers stop flowing!

My reply to the client was a polite version of “no, that’s not a good idea. It doesn’t matter what we think. It matters what the clients think, and the clients are loving it and responding to it! If the goal is to get new clients the Ad is achieving that goal.”

The client pushed back and said no they didn’t want it running and so the Ad was turned off and changed. 

Now you may be thinking that I was annoyed, but I really wasn’t annoyed. How can I describe the feeling? It was more like “here we go again?” Combined with “why am I even surprised anymore?” With a big serving of “I need to stop working on these kind of campaigns’ smothered all over the top like chocolate topping on ice cream!

As a business owner, have you ever decided that you would no longer do a certain type of job? Of if you’re not in business yet, it might have been one day you decided that you would never spend time with a certain friend again because…. Whatever. They’re negative, they expect you to buy the coffee every time you meet or they just have non-stop drama or whatever! It’s a similar feeling.

I remember years ago I said “ok that’s it, i’m not doing any job that is under $200”. That was a long time ago but I remember that moment. 

Maybe you’ve done something similar? Yes? Maybe it was a dollar amount or maybe it was a type of job or service that was often just too much trouble for what it’s worth? It’s a good feeling isn’t it, when you decide to move up a level.

The question I had to ask myself was:

“what service can I provide that will get the results and how do I make clients know that they just need to follow my method?”

I used to provide a much wider range of marketing services to clients but I decreased it to a handful and now the next evolution is happening where it’ll be one main service, a “done for you” type of service.

It was important for me to not decrease the amount of services or decrease my work, it is about:

1. Providing the right service to clients. Based on my experience and not what they are asking for (sometimes clients want something they have heard about but it’s not correct or not a good fit for them). And:
2. Being able to offer a guarantee of sorts. Meaning “let me do this and i’ll guarantee the results”. 

I’ve been working on how this would work, what it would look like, how I would roll it out and all the other small details that’ll go into it.

What I can share with you so far is that:

• It’s most likely going to be a five or six week program and completed in small groups.
• There will be a 2 hour live session per week (approximately) for me to teach the principle and then implement that principle for each of the businesses. I don’t want the business owners I work with to go and create it by themselves, I need to direct it. Tell them yes, no or what else they need to do (remember I’ll be guaranteeing results so I need to direct them). 
• Therefore it’s not going to be for businesses who don’t want to take direction. I’ll need to leave them to do their own thing without me (exactly like the fitness studio example I just shared with you earlier).
• To begin with, I won’t be able to accept start up businesses into the program. I might offer a second version for startups later so they can use my 17 years experience and take my marketing map and launch their new business but I won’t be able to guarantee the results because the business isn’t running and proven yet.
  • I’m thinking there would still be a live support component to this. So I can review their plan and say yes, no, etc, but it would be bigger groups and less time to perfect each little detail for them.
  • Therefore, if you’re starting your business and would like a program to work through like this just watch this space for now (join my email list!)
• There will be a lot of things I’ll need to give the businesses in the program. There are certain parts of this need to be there and there’s NO POINT in me saying:
  • Go and get X
  • Go and set up Y
    • It’s just much easier and more accurate for me to provide it, for me to do it.
    • This will be technically easy for the people going through the program. The tech stuff will be done for them.

That’s a bit of what I can share so far.

STICKING POINT

I’m at a bit of a sticking point now and I’m still thinking through what’s the best way forward with this. How do I filter the right people in and out of this program.

Think about yourself in your own business. If you were going to guarantee something like this you’d probably need to make sure some certain things were in place right? 

I don’t have a set answer for this yet so I’ll spend some more time thinking through this. 

I am excited for it! It’s going to give me the opportunity to produce my best work which means the people and their businesses going through this will get the best possible outcomes. It’s exciting, it’s occupying a lot of my daily daydreaming but that’s a good thing. 

If you’re interested to hear more about this here are three things to do right now:

• Bookmark this website. Save it to your favorites, come back and visit to see what’s new.
• I send emails to my past and future clients about official announcements like this so join my email list. Just enter your email address here on this website and then check your inbox in 2 minutes for the confirmation. 

Ok that’s a wrap for this one. I encourage you to cut something out of your business or personal life too that has proven time and time again to be a headache.

I’ll be back on again soon to share an update with all of this or something else that’s worth sharing. 

I hope you found this valuable. I trust it was worth your time to read through this. If you got something out of it, share it with a friend or business acquaintance now.

Ok bye for now but talk soon.

Craig.