Make Sure Your Big Night Kicks Butt
Issue #2214
- WEALTHY: What does "the world’s finest risotto" have to do with your business idea? (Charlie Byrne)
- HEALTHY: Can you blame a bad mood on your food? (Kelley Herring)
- WISE: James Taylor on regrets
ALSO IN THIS ISSUE:
- 4 ways to flatter your customer into a sale Michael Masterson)
- An irritating "filler" word to drop from your writing (Don Hauptman)
- It’s Good to Know… about the destruction of art in India’s history
- More Indian words to add to your vocabulary
How Much Money Can YOU Make By Copying This “Mistake”?
How did Vicki Smith accidentally “hotwire” the Internet and turn it into the goose that laid the golden egg?
Well, imagine a huge fortress with steep, heavily defended walls and a great big, drawbridge to get through. Inside that fortress is the huge pile of wealth there is to be made on the Internet. Now imagine trying to scale those walls with no equipment and never having done anything like it before. That is what many people try to do…
But what did Vicki do? By mistake, she got “lost” and wandered around the back of that fortress and found a “hidden” door which lead straight in. A solid gold door which opened up a gateway to riches…
It’s an opportunity which really does work, that anyone can follow and put into practice quickly in just an hour of your spare time from home.
Read about Vicki’s good fortune here…
- Patrick Coffey
"In between what might have been and what has come to pass / A misbegotten guess alas and bits of broken glass."
James Taylor, "Long Ago and Far Away"
Make Sure Your Big Night Kicks Butt
Sometimes valuable marketing lessons turn up in the most unusual places.
Take, for example, the movie Big Night.
When I first saw this film back in 1996, I was mostly interested in the gastronomic delights it largely revolves around. But when I watched it again this past weekend, it reminded me of perhaps the single most important Early to Rise marketing principle.
Set in a 1950s blue-collar New Jersey town, two Italian brothers, Primo (Tony Shalhoub, playing the chef) and Secondo (Stanley Tucci in the role of the manager), head up a failing restaurant. Meanwhile, just down the street, Pascal’s, another Italian restaurant, is thriving and packed every night.
The difference?
Primo thinks he knows better than his clientele. After all, he can make the world’s finest risotto. But his customers don’t want risotto. They want spaghetti and meatballs.
And yet, despite the empty seats every night, Primo won’t give in. He rails against Pascal, his declasse, pasta-peddling neighbor.
"Do you know what happens in that restaurant every night?" Primo yells. "RAPE! RAPE! The rape of cuisine!"
He dreams of changing his ignorant customers. "Give people time. They will learn," he tells Secondo.
Secondo knows better. "This is a restaurant! This is not a f***ing school!"
Even their competitor, Pascal, tries to clue in Primo on the key marketing principle he just doesn’t seem to understand. "First, give people what THEY want. Then, later, you can give them what YOU want," he advises.
I won’t give away the ending, but suffice it to say that Primo never gets it.
So what if you are thinking of starting a new business or introducing a new product line? How do you find out what your potential customers want so your "dining room" will be kicking butt instead of standing empty?
The answer is simple. By testing.
If a salesman’s mantra is "ABC - Always Be Closing," your mantra as a marketer and business builder should be "ABT - Always Be Testing." ETR experts such as Marc Charles, Paul Lawrence, and Wendy Montes de Oca write about this frequently, but it is well worth repeating.
If you are marketing an information product online, testing is easy and inexpensive…
- Write a strong sales letter for your product’s "landing" page and a series of small keyword ads that you can test. (Or hire a copywriter to do this for you.) The keyword ads will link to the full sales pitch on your landing page when someone doing an Internet search clicks on them.
- Test your small keyword ads on pay-per-click (PPC) search engines like Google, Yahoo!, and MSN and analyze the results.
- Test new keyword ads and headlines, and maybe a couple of different sales letters on a couple of different landing pages.
- Once you know which combination of ad/headline/sales letter works best, run with the winner.
- Expand the list of relevant keywords in your campaign based on your winning combo, and an increase in sales will follow.
If you don’t get a good response, you may be suffering from "Primo’s Syndrome" - trying to sell risotto that no one wants. So start over with a different product. Don’t let your ego convince you that you can teach the marketplace what it should and should not buy, or you and your ego will soon find yourselves in the poorhouse.
If you are selling a hard product instead of an online information product, there are plenty of small-scale ways to test how appealing it will be to potential customers. For example, you could offer it on eBay or on high-traffic classified ad sites like CraigsList.com, Sell.com, or ePage.com. Or you could rent space at a local flea market and see how much interest you attract. Or you could sell it on a consignment basis at a few shops.
Another way to test a product idea fairly cheaply - whether it’s an info product or a hard product - is via a direct-mail promotion. You simply send a sales letter to a small, targeted sample group of qualified prospects (people who have bought similar products at similar prices). If the results are promising, you then roll it out to a wider market. (You can learn direct-marketing basics by searching ETR’s archives and reading articles we’ve published on the subject.)
The point is, you don’t need an office, you don’t need fancy computers, you don’t need a business plan. And you certainly don’t need to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to launch a business… only to find, as Primo did, that no one shares your vision or taste.
I’m seeing a wannabe entrepreneur make this potentially fatal mistake right now, not three blocks from the Early to Rise offices.
His idea is to open a gourmet food store in a new development that’s being built - a block of charming condos with retail stores planned for the ground floor. For six months, I’ve seen the "Coming Soon" sign in his window. And every day, I see him in there… working on the floor or the cabinets or the shelving.
I’m guessing here, but he must have put in at least $50,000 worth of time and materials by now. Meanwhile, this neighborhood has zero street parking and is likely to have very little foot traffic for a long, long time. Many of the already-built storefronts stand vacant. I wouldn’t call it a ghost town, but it’s not exactly Times Square either.
Perhaps, somehow, his store will be successful. If so, good for him.
Heck, I’ll be there on opening day - buying my fresh buffalo mozzarella and Parma prosciutto and sun-dried tomatoes and a baguette or two. But I’ll come back only if I like what I get and the prices are fair. I don’t want mediocre goods marked up 300 percent simply because they’re being sold in a "gourmet" shop - and I don’t know anyone else who does.
I’m hopeful. But I’m also worried. Because I’m thinking this would-be-business builder does not know what I know after living in this area for seven years: Two similar stores in similar locations have failed.
Did he try selling his goods at the local Green Market last spring? Will he offer some uniquely beneficial service so that folks like me will go out of our way just to come to his store? Did he do a test mailing to local residents to see if they have any interest in what he’s doing?
I’ve not seen it, but I hope for his sake he’s done some kind of testing. I hope he knows what Pascal, the smarter restaurateur in Big Night, knew: "First, give people what THEY want. Then, later, you can give them what YOU want."
Test, test, test… and listen to what your marketplace tells you.
Remember (as Secundo might have crudely put it) that you’re running a business, not a f***ing school.
[Ed. Note: Charlie Byrne, ETR’s Editorial Director, is on the board of experts of the Internet Money Club, ETR’s new Internet business-building program. The program is entirely sold out - but you can click here to get on our waiting list.]
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4 Ways to Flatter Your Customer Into a Sale
Yesterday, I told you about my experience buying a rug in India. Betu - the rug merchant - used 5 sales and marketing techniques to sell me an $8,200 rug that I hadn’t planned on buying. One of those techniques was to flatter me the minute I walked in the door.
To use this technique effectively, follow Betu’s lead. Say things to your customer that are:
- Fresh: Avoid the cliche. Say something that has a similar meaning but in a new and different way. Making your expression unique will make it stronger. It will seem more personal and more spontaneous.
- True: Effective compliments come from genuine perceptions. If Sally looks like she’s gained 30 pounds since you last saw her, don’t tell her she looks thinner. (Yes, she will be pleased to hear it. But, at the same time, deep down inside, she will recognize that you are trying to manipulate her and she will trust you less.) Find something you can speak honestly about and emphasize that. (Your skin looks fantastic! Are you having some sort of treatments?)
- Specific: Any sort of communication is more effective when it is specific. Flattery is no exception. Betu didn’t have enough information about me to make his flattery very specific, but if he’d been able to add details, the effect would have been even stronger.
- Grand: When it comes to flattery, exaggeration is a virtue not a vice. So long as your compliment is rooted in truth, the stronger it is the better it will work. Flattery, after all, is a blatant appeal to the ego. And the ego, as Freud said so many times, has no capacity to set or even understand barriers.
[Ed. Note: Get Michael Masterson’s insights into becoming successful in your business and personal life, achieving financial independence, and accomplishing all your goals on his new website. You’ll find updates on all of Michael’s books, news on upcoming ETR events, Michael’s blog, and room to send in your comments and questions. Check it out today.]
A Mood-Boosting Mineral
Can you blame your bad mood on your food? New research says yes. That’s because soil levels of selenium - an antioxidant micronutrient involved in over 400 biochemical functions - are greatly depleted. And because foods grown in that soil are coming up seriously short in selenium.
Selenium is required for the proper function of the thyroid, which plays an important role in mood and behavior. As a result, people with a selenium deficiency may have an increased risk for depression.
A recent study published in the Federation of American Societies for Experimental Biology Journal found a connection between mood and selenium intake. Men who boosted their intake of dietary selenium to 220 mcg daily felt less anxious and more energetic, pleasant, and confident. And those with the most selenium in their blood felt the best. What’s more, the men in the study who initially had the lowest moods saw the biggest improvement.
Put a smile on your face and get your fill of this mood booster. Brazil nuts are the richest food source of selenium. In fact, just one Brazil nut - if you buy it shelled and crack it yourself - averages 100 mcg. (A Brazil nut that you buy already shelled averages 12-25 mcg.) Other excellent sources of selenium include button mushrooms, shiitake mushrooms, cod, shrimp, snapper, tuna, halibut, calf liver, and salmon.
[Ed. Note: Kelley Herring is the founder and CEO of Healing Gourmet and the author of the new e-book, Guilt-Free Desserts: 20 All-Natural, Fail-Proof, Low-Glycemic Desserts Just in Time for the Holidays. Learn more about how simple lifestyle choices can improve your health by reading ETR’s free natural health e-letter.]
The Language Perfectionist: A Word That Actually Isn’t Needed
By Don Hauptman
This is the first in a series of tips on how to avoid common mistakes in grammar and usage. Follow this advice and your writing will be clearer, more powerful, and more persuasive.
The word actually is routinely misused. Here are a few examples I found in the media:
- "It sounds simple but it was actually difficult and expensive to fix."
- "Blaming society actually absolves everybody."
- "Portable home video cameras were actually introduced in the early 1980s."
In each case, the word is intended as an intensifier. The writer or speaker wants to convey the message "I’m not exaggerating. This is the truth!" But it’s actually (see what I mean?) superfluous. With rare exceptions, actually is unnecessary, redundant, and an irritating "filler" in both writing and conversation.
[Ed Note: Don Hauptman, a direct-response copywriter for more than 30 years, may be best known for the space ads he wrote with the classic headline "Speak Spanish Like a Diplomat!" He also writes books and articles on language and wordplay.]
It’s Good to Know: The Destruction of Art in India’s History
When the Muslims conquered India in the 12th century, they damaged many beautiful carvings of human figures on Hindu and Buddhist temples. They did it because, at the time, their religion banned the depiction of the human form in art. As a result, we have the words deface and iconoclast in the English language.
To "deface" (dih-FASE) is to disfigure. Literally, it refers to ruining the face (usually the nose) of a stone figure.
An "iconoclast" (eye-KON-uh-klast) is someone who attacks traditional or popular institutions or ideas. The word is ultimately from the Greek for "smasher of religious images."
An Opportunity To Skyrocket Profits In Your Business
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Anthony Robbins says, "One idea Jay gave me in the first hour increased our company’s marketing effectiveness by more than 100%."
If you want to start making a ton more money and have a clear, direct path to real prosperity and business wealth, you owe it to yourself to look into this program.
- Patrick Coffey
More Indian Words to the Wise…
Inspired by Michael Masterson’s trip to India, we’ve been featuring familiar words that have their origins in India: mogul (Mughal), bungalow, jungle, pajamas, khaki, pundit, and cheroot. And there are lots more. So let’s finish up "India week" with this list of words - some of which may surprise you…
- dungarees (from the Hindi for a kind of coarse cloth)
- bandana (from the Hindi for "tie dying")
- shampoo (from the Hindi for "massage")
- bangle (from the Hindi for "glass")
- chintz (from the Hindi for "shiny, variegated")
- dinghy (from the Hindi for "float, raft")
- cummerbund (from the Persian for "waist" + "band")
- cheetah (from the Hindi for "tiger/leopard")
- loot (from the Hindi for "plunder")
- catamaran (from the Tamil for "tied wood")
[Ed. Note: Become a more persuasive writer and speaker … build your self-confidence and intellect … increase your attractiveness to others … just by spending 10 VERY enjoyable minutes a day with ETR’s new Words to the Wise CD Library.]
Michael Masterson
Copyright ETR, LLC, 2007