- WEALTHY: 3 things you need to know about customer satisfaction (Bob Bly)
- HEALTHY: The bad breath/good health trade-off (Jon Herring)
- WISE: Sam Donaldson on meeting deadlines
ALSO IN THIS ISSUE:
- The ETR "connection" (MaryEllen Tribby)
- A small gesture with an unexpected dividend (Michael Masterson)
- Add "rubicund" to your vocabulary
The Early to Rise 2006 End-of-Year Blowout Sale
What are your resolutions for 2007?
To increase your salary by $15,000? To finally start your own profitable online side-business? To locate an incredible real estate deal?
Whatever your dreams, hopes and aspirations may be… ETR is here to help!
As 2006 comes to a close, we’ve compiled a dozen of our best success programs into a year-end blowout sale with our lowest prices ever… so there’s no better time for you to start making your dreams come true in 2007 than right now.
This offer ends when the New Year begins, so don’t put it off and risk paying more a few days from now. Act today and you’ll get the best deal we’ve ever offered, guaranteed.
Stop by our ETR 2006 End-of-Year Blowout Sale now.
- MaryEllen Tribby
"Call me a braggart, call me arrogant. People at ABC (and elsewhere) have called me worse. But when you need the job done on deadline, you’ll call me."
Sam Donaldson
What’s the Hurry?
By Bob Bly
One of the facts of life for a freelance copywriter like me – any writer, in fact – is deadlines. We live with them. They’re always looming. And they never go away.
Ask anyone you know who’s ever worked as a reporter or editor for a daily newspaper.
"I feel sorry for you," MB, a contractor who specializes in kitchens and bathrooms, told me the other day when he saw the pile of work on my desk.
"Why?" I asked as I happily clicked away at my PC.
"You have all those deadlines," he answered.
I stopped typing. "Don’t you?" I replied.
"No," said MB. "We just take on a lot of remodeling jobs, and we get to them when we get to them."
"Don’t you have schedules in your contracts?" I asked.
"Sometimes. But no one expects us to stick to them. After all, we’re contractors."
MB is dead wrong in thinking he doesn’t have deadlines … or that his customers don’t care about his slow turnaround. I know, because I am one of his customers. He is remodeling our master bathroom right now.
He told us it would be done in June … and the job is still not finished.
Is my wife steamed? Don’t even ask. And, frankly, so am I.
The point?
Every service business … every business, in fact … is deadline driven. If you don’t think yours is, you just don’t realize it yet.
The instant you promise to do something for a customer, he is waiting for it to be done or delivered. Even if there is no contractual deadline or agreed-upon delivery date, your customers want what they have ordered – the sooner, the better.
The longer you take to deliver, the more impatient and irritated they become. Dissatisfaction increases with the delay.
If there’s no deadline in your contract … or oral promise to deliver by X … that doesn’t mean your customer has no deadline. It just means your customer hasn’t told you about it.
Not asking for a timeframe – and agreeing with it – is negligence on your part … and an invitation to disaster.
Now, your customer may not himself know what his deadline date is. But there will come a time when … if you haven’t yet delivered … he will suddenly wake up, angry that you are taking so long.
He’ll be annoyed … and feel ignored … and call you every other day until the job is done or the merchandise is delivered. And even then, he’ll complain to his colleagues and friends about your company. ("Their quality is okay, but their turnaround is slow, and customer service is terrible.")
So my advice is simple …
First, if there is no set deadline – either written or verbal – volunteer to set one.
The deadline should be not only a date, but a specific time of day. ("X will be delivered on or before January 15, 2007, no later than 3:00 p.m. EST.") If you do not specify a time, you will get a call first thing in the morning on the 15th from an annoyed customer asking "Where the $@#$@ is my stuff!"
Second, don’t miss your deadlines.
If difficulties arise that will cause you to miss a deadline, let the customer know as early as possible about the problem – and ask for an extension. Do this the instant you have an inkling that a delay may occur. Don’t call the customer the day before the deadline and tell him you won’t make it.
Third, set generous deadlines up front.
If the customer wants it in two weeks, ask for four weeks … and then negotiate a three-week turnaround. Then make every effort to deliver earlier.
If the customer expects it in 14 days and you deliver in 15 days, you are late – and he will be irritated. But if the customer wanted it in 14 days, then agreed to a 21-day turnaround, and you deliver it in 15 days, you are six days early – and the customer will be delighted.
Make this your motto in business: "Under-promise and over-deliver."
This goes for service, quality, price … and deadlines.
[Ed. Note: Bob Bly is a popular Early to Rise columnist, self-made multi-millionaire, and the author of more than 60 books. He is also the editor of ETR's Direct Marketing University: The Masters Edition - a program to help you start your own successful direct-mail business.]
Jump On Now and Make 300%… Before Wall Street Discovers the Stealth Market in Uranium
Thirty years ago, the biggest energy giants walked away from millions of acres of land with proven uranium reserves… land that wasn’t worth exploiting when prices hit rock bottom. But one company grabbed the best of that land for as little as $1 an acre.
Now, with the price of uranium skyrocketing, the value of those reserves has increased more than 1,300%… yet you can still purchase this company’s stock for pennies on the dollar.
But you’ve got to jump on this now before Wall Street discovers the stealth bull market in uranium. Once they do, this stock is going to POP. Get the full story here.
ETR Insider Report: The New Synergy Between our Website and E-Letter
By Mary Ellen Tribby, ETR’s Publisher
In Message #1923, my colleague and good friend David Cross told you about our new, soon-to-be-launched Early to Rise website. Not only will this be a valuable tool for our readers, it should also increase our visibility in the online marketplace by optimizing our site for search engine placement. That will increase our conversion rates so others can benefit from the advice in Early to Rise.
(By the way, in January – and all year long – look for essays by our Internet experts sharing specific tactics for search-engine marketing. They are sure to make a difference in your business.)
But I have yet another surprise for you. We have also redesigned our e-letter. Yes, the ETR e-letter that hundreds of thousands of people read each day is changing. Of course, it will still include cutting-edge and thought-provoking content. It will still feature the experts you have come to know and trust.
So why are we changing a good thing?
The answer is simple:
First, we wanted to make reading ETR easier for you. And we are doing that by making a few design changes – for example, using optimal line length. We are also adding a "Printer Friendly" button, because we recognize that you may need to take some ETR information with you or share some content with others who may not be as Web savvy as you are. All of our past issues will now be more easily accessible. And wait until you see Sunday’s Week in Review issue!
Second (as every online marketing expert can tell you), in order to maximize your conversion rates, there has to be a recognizable connection between the look/functionality of your website and your e-letter. Here’s why …
Imagine spending thousands of dollars on your Pay-Per-Click search campaigns to attract your potential reader/customer to your website. He takes the next step and opts in to receive your daily (or weekly or monthly) e-letter. But if the first e-letter he receives looks nothing like your website where he was first introduced to you, he may have no idea the message is from you. He thinks to himself, "Who is spamming me?" And instead of staying with you and giving you that chance to bond, he opts out. Worse yet, he might even report you as a spammer.
ETR was guilty of creating that kind of confusion … till now. Everything you get from ETR is going to have the same "look" – one that you will instantly recognize as coming from us.
Tell us what you think of our new website and e-letter design on Speak Out, ETR’s readers’ forum.
Onions and Garlic … "Powerful" in More Ways Than One
By Jon Herring
If you’re like me and enjoy the taste of garlic and onions – and you eat them often – you’re doing a lot more than adding some flavor to your meals. You could be adding years to your life.
The allium plants – particularly onions, shallots, and garlic – have been used as food and medicine for thousands of years. And modern science has confirmed that these pungent vegetables are some of the most medicinally potent foods we can eat. Hundreds of population and laboratory studies have shown that they have strong anti-bacterial, anti-viral, and immune-boosting qualities.
Onions, shallots, and garlic have also been shown to reduce inflammation, lower cholesterol, and normalize blood pressure. And a large Italian study, recently published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, shows a strong inverse correlation between onion and garlic consumption and cancers of the mouth, esophagus, breast, ovaries, kidneys, and prostate.
So whenever you have a chance to slice a shallot for your salad, put an onion on your sandwich, or press some garlic to go with your mixed vegetables, do it!
Notes From Michael Masterson’s Blog: How Sid Got a Free Ride in Vegas
By Michael Masterson
Sid, my 87-year-old accountant, told me a great story yesterday.
About 30 years ago, he was in Las Vegas on vacation. He became friendly with some local guys he was playing craps with. They invited him to play golf the next day. At the third tee, they were joined by an older guy that Sid’s new friends seemed to know. He suggested they play for money. Sid was reluctant but agreed. The stakes were something like $10 and $20 a hole.
[Ed. Note: Read the rest of this article on Michael Masterson's blog.]
- Michael Masterson
You Can Import Goods From Overseas For Pennies On the Dollar!
It may have been hard in the past for small entrepreneurs to import cheap products from countries like China, but things have drastically changed.
For example, In 1986, total trade between the United States and China was $7.9 billion. By 2005, this total has reached over $170 billion, making China the United States’ third largest trading partner.
You can’t believe how easy this is. With the right information, you just find products that cost a couple of dollars each and sell them for 1000%+ mark-ups by the thousands with your own Internet sites.
Please click here to read this urgent report.
- Patrick Coffey
Word to the Wise: Rubicund
"Rubicund" (ROO-bih-kund) – from the Latin for "red" – means inclined to a healthy, ruddy complexion, often associated with outdoor life.
Example (as used by Edmund Morris in Dutch: A Memoir of Ronald Reagan): "Rubicund from his cocktail, big, broad, lustrous with power, he exuded what Walter Pater called the ‘charm of an exquisite character, felt in some way to be inseparable from his person.’"
Michael Masterson
Copyright ETR, LLC, 2006
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