In fact this question is probably the most IMPORTANT question you can ever ask yourself if you want to succeed in business.
I am going to strongly encourage you to STOP what you are doing right now and grab a pad of paper and turn off your phone – and close the door.

This could be the most important 10 minutes you have spent in a long time.
DO YOU MAKE A SALE TO GENERATE CASH OR TO GET A CUSTOMER?
The economy is challenging right now for many business. It’s also very challenging for many consumers.

Business is trying to generate more cash to stay in business and consumers are trying to preserve their cash with an IRON FIST.
That’s why sites like Living Social and Groupon have exploded.
It satisfies both.
But I have been reading how some successful Groupons have actually put some businesses out of business.

HUH?
How could a successful Groupon promotion put someone out of business?

Simple- Generate a lot of new customers at a loss without any way of keeping them coming back and you are out of business.

I recently consulted with an auto repair facility. They were starving for new business.
They had overhead. They had staff to pay. They had suppliers to pay.
But their bays were empty most of the day.
So after numerous calls from telemarketers from various deal sites and coupon programs they finally broke down and did a Groupon.
They had a GREAT promotion.
They got flooded with new business and 90 days later were on the phone with me begging me to
help them find a solution to their problem.
THEY DID NOT UNDERSTAND THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN MAKING A SALE AND GETTING A NEW CUSTOMER!
Let me take a step back here with you for a minute so it can make sense.
First- You need to know what you can spend to get a new customer?
Meaning if you make a 100 profit on a new customer – well if you spend more than 100 dollars to get  a  new customer you will be losing money.
Second- Here’s what most don’t understand.
If you are marketing your business properly the REAL MONEY comes from the repeat business you get from that customer.
If your customer stays with you 5 years and spends 1000 a year with you than that customer is really worth 5000.00 dollars!!!!
DOES THAT MAKE SENSE?
Ever see a company “give something” away to new customers and wonder how they can do that? It’s because of that concept that’s called the LIFETIME VALUE OF THE CUSTOMER!
If you don’t know these numbers for your business your job is to immediately find them out – -and use them when making your marketing decisions.
Ok – Now that you understand these concepts let’s get back to the question I asked and my clients issue.
YOU SHOULD BE MAKING A SALE TO GET A CUSTOMER- AND HAVE PROGRAMS IN PLACE TO KEEP THEM COMING BACK AND INCREASING THEIR LIFETIME VALUE!
The company I was consulting with had never heard of this concept.
They were simply doing a Groupon because they desperately needed some cash flow.
The deal they gave was ½ off their regular oil change and then of course Groupon took their cut and fees.
At the end of the day this little adventure cost them 3000.00 – They did 300 oil changes and lost 10.00 on each one!
Their problem is that they had nothing in place to follow up with these clients.
They were simply HOPING they would come back. I am famous for saying HOPE is clearly NOT a strategy!!!!
BOTTOM LINE: YOU NOW UNDERSTAND THAT YOUR MISSION IS NOT TO MAKE A SALE BUT TO GET A NEW CUSTOMER.
THERE ARE NUMEROUS WAYS TO ACCOMPLISH THIS. IN FACT A NEWSLETTER LIKE THIS ONE IS JUST ONE WAY!
IF YOU ARE INTERESTED IN LEARNING MORE WAYS JUST SHOOT ME AN E-MAIL AT BRIAN@profitandwealth.com and of course stay tuned to this newsletter!

FEEL FREE TO PASS THIS ALONG TO ANYONE YOU THINK WOULD BENEFIT FROM IT

OR SEND THEM TO http://profitandwealth.com/free

AND AS ALWAYS LEAVE YOUR THOUGHTS AND COMMENTS BELOW!!!!

Just the other day, I was listening to a recording of a speech by Joe Sugarman* and Joe said, “One good path to success is to learn all the proven rules and meticulously follow them.  Another path is to occasionally break all the rules, because breakthroughs come only from breaking rules.”  Resonates with me; as you know, I wrote a whole book based on breaking rules.

On one hand, I’m cautious about innovation; pioneers usually come home full of arrow; it’s often costly and time consuming…and I am always much more interested in “what works” than a new idea.  However, as Joe said, OCCASIONALLY, or I might say, <u >at carefully chosen time, you have no alternative but to be the pioneer in order to move forward and in order to stand out from the crowd.  It is, of course, the minority of times that you successfully innovate that you get noticed for, not the majority of times you successfully follow an already plowed path.

(*In case you don’t know, Joe Sugarman is a mail-order pioneer:  first to sell electronic calculators via direct-response ads, first to use 800#’s.  You may know him via his infomercials or QVC appearances for Blu-Blockers.  But his JS&A ads and catalogs preceded The Sharper Image and led in selling various electronic gadgets.)

I think the best times to innovate are when you are absolutely convinced that the conventional wisdom; the already plowed path; the crowd is wrong.  Just as an example, when I was getting started in the speaking business, everybody seemed to operate under the policy of billing clients for fees and expenses after their engagements (anything else was viewed as impolite and unprofessional), and most speakers who sold product from the platform sort of begged the clients for permission, and often sacrificed that opportunity.

Very early on, I determined that being in the banking and collections business did not serve my purposes very well at all – nor did speaking only for wages.  So I insisted on a 50% fee deposit to take a date off the calendar, balance and travel expenses paid on
site at the speech, and I refused dates where I could not also offer my materials.  At the time, peers criticized me; told companies would never accept such terms; and called ‘unethical’ by agents and bureaus.  Today, my payment policies are the norm in the profession.

Another example:  at a time when every vendor in a particular niche was offering only very expensive services requiring long-term contracts, I copied their marketing method but used it to sell a substitute product at a very small price (and quickly took in a couple million dollars) – I was convinced they were idiotically leaving a lot of motived but unsatisfied customers behind by not offering a low price option.

An interesting survey of selected, successful, profitable large corporations turned up 74% that said they’d achieve their first big success with either a unique product or a distinctive way of doing business, although this breakthrough may not have come along until they had been in business for many years.  Note the word:  first.  I also know many companies that are able to subsequently build on that first breakthrough more conservatively, to grow and stabilize their businesses.

The bottom-line, I guess, is that you gotta gamble.  You try to gamble only when you must OR when circumstances look so favorable that it is irresistible, but you got gamble.

DAN S. KENNEDY is a serial, multi-millionaire entrepreneur; highly paid and sought after marketing and business strategist; advisor to countless first-generation, from-scratch multi-millionaire and 7-figure income entrepreneurs and professionals; and, in his personal practice, one of the very highest paid direct-response copywriters in America. As a speaker, he has delivered over 2,000 compensated presentations, appearing repeatedly on programs with the likes of Donald Trump, Gene Simmons (KISS), Debbi Fields (Mrs. Fields Cookies), and many other celebrity-entrepreneurs, for former U.S. Presidents and other world leaders, and other leading business speakers like Zig Ziglar, Brian Tracy and Tom Hopkins, often addressing audiences of 1,000 to 10,000 and up.  His popular books have been favorably recognized by Forbes, Business Week, Inc. and Entrepreneur Magazine. His NO B.S. MARKETING LETTER, one of the business newsletters published for Members of Glazer-Kennedy Insider’s Circle, is the largest paid subscription newsletter in its genre in the world.  https://gkic.infusionsoft.com/go/newmifge/briansacks

SOME RESOURCES

Dan’s newsletter is the ONLY  one I wait for each month with a pen and pad in hand.
He’s giving away a HUG BRIBE just for taking it for  a test drive

http://bit.ly/Igdop1

——————–

Discover 11 Low – No Cost Ways of Producing A Flood Of New Clients
Plus some cool bonuses

http://bit.ly/K7WhKs

CLICK HERE

FIRST A WARNING THEN 2 LESSONS

Recently I sent you a few e-mails about the webinar
I put together that shows you 11 FREE AND LOW COST
WAYS TO GENERATE A FLOOD OF NEW BUSINESS.

Here’s the link to check it out   CLICK HERE

Part of that offer was for a private a one on one
Session with me personally.

Based on the response and the size of this newsletter
my staff tells me I can only do 3 more.
There are no blank spaces in my schedule for the next
6 months and it wouldn’t be fair to make you wait that long.

GRAB 1 OF THE 3 

here’s the link one last time
 http://bit.ly/K7WhKs

My staff will let you know if you are one of three
either way the little known yet effective tactics I show you
will help you get new clients regardless of what business you are in.

NOW FOR THE LESSONS — THESE ARE REALLY IMPORTANT TO YOUR SUCCESS
Anytime you are putting together an offer it must have a deadline or a reason for your
prospect to respond immediately.

Let’s face it most people are lazy or just too busy and get distracted.

HERE ARE A FEW WAYS TO ACCOMPLISH THIS WITH YOUR OFFERS

- A deadline people must respond by and then the offer goes away
- A limited quantity – ( product or service)
- A limited timed bonus
There are more but I have more to say here and don’t want this to get too long.

The bottom line is : If you don’t give people a reason to act now — they won’t

makes me think of my friend who used to say – WHY DO TODAY WHAT YOU
CAN PUT OFF UNTIL TOMMOROW!

Don’t you be that way!

———–ANOTHER BIG IDEA THAT HELPS WITH PRODUCTIVITY————-

I am putting the final touches on a time management training for my members
and clients. Here’s a way I have found to increase my own productivity with deadlines.

Let’s say I want to do a webinar and sell seats to it.
I actually create a date and time for it !!!

THEN I GO AHEAD AND LET EVERYONE KNOW!!!

Now I HAVE to produce!!!!

It forces you to produce because you have to!!!!

So put it out there and produce it.

I used to do this with seminars I had.

Picked a place and reserved it
Picked the days.
Then I would advertise it and sell seats.

ONCE THAT WAS ALL IN PLACE- I WOULD PRODUCE THE MATERIALS
GET THE OTHER SPEAKERS ETC…
Seems counterintuitive– maybe that’s why it works so well

Go ahead and try these 2 ideas and feel free to leave your thoughts
below and invite your friends to our little group!
they can go to
http://www.profitandwealth.com/free  

to join free AND get 2 special gifts

Brian

THESE ARE THE ONES THAT CHANGED MY ENTIRE BUSINESS AND LIFE!

THE TOP 4 BRIAN ISMS

Pick a niche – become the expert,
and let everyone know about it
so you are not seen as a “head
of lettuce”
BRIAN SACKS

You will need to be a whale in a
small pond and not a guppy in
the ocean
BRIAN SACKS

“I only want to pick up the
phone and have buyers
on the other end who
are already sold on
using my services
before they even meet
me. Lots of phone call is
just a sign of
‘productionitis’ and
gives me a head and
neck ache…
BRIAN SACKS

——————————————————————————————-
BTW- if you want to learn how to have buyers chasing you and have them calling you
ALREADY sold on using your services check this out

http://profitandwealth.com/webinars/2008-10-14/

or just CLICK HERE
———————————————————————

——–The most important lesson:————————
“It’s all about who is chasing
who” – Brian Sacks

Hope you enjoyed these– More importantly I hope you
Use them in your daily business and life so you can start
profiting from them!

Brian

PS- WANT TO GET MORE CLIENTS NOW?
DON’T KNOW HOW?
DON’T HAVE ANY MONEY TO SPEND?
Try these
CLICK HERE NOW

or paste this in your browser

http://profitandwealth.com/webinars/2008-10-14/

These are thoughts and ideas I have taught and used in my own life.
Some are mine- many are not!
Print them out and refer to them often!

PART 1

YOU GET WHAT YOU EXPECT AND ACCEPT !
Brian Sacks

STEP OUTSIDE YOUR COMFORT ZONE
AND YOU WILL BE ACCOMPLISH YOUR GOALS
Brian Sacks

“IF YOU ARE WILLING TO DO WHAT OTHERS
ARE NOT THEN YOU WILL HAVE WHAT THEY NEVER WILL”
Brian Sacks

“Action is the real measure of
intelligence”
– Napoleon Hill

“Formal education will make
you a living. Self education
will make you a fortune”
– Jim Rohn

“Whatever you can conceive and
believe you can achieve”
‐ Napoleon Hill

You must control the buyers. The
one who controls the buyer
controls the deal.
Brian Sacks

“Stop listening to pretend experts,
only listen to people earning
more than you”

– Brian Sacks

In the land of the blind
the one]eyed man/woman
is King/Queen

(Not sure who said this first?)
But it’s words to live by!

PART 2

“Stop listening to pretend experts,
only listen to people earning
more than you”
– Brian Sacks

“The definition of insanity is doing
the same thing over and over
again and expecting different
results”

“The path to success is to take
massive, determined action” –
Anthony Robbins

Being too accessible can actually
HURT you…
Brian Sacks

You are not your prospect
Brian Sacks

Don’t just talk about it –
be about it!
Brian Sacks

If they can’t find you, they can’t
interrupt you.
Brian Sacks

Some people watch things
happen. Some people make
things happen. Some people
wonder what just happened…

Whether you think you can or you
think you can’t, you are right

You can’t lose something you
never had

You must know your numbers!

Now in part 3 I will share the BIGGEST BRIANISMS with you so stay tuned!

————————————————————–
Need more clients NOW but don’t know what to do?
Need more clients NOW but don’t have any money for marketing?

Here are 11 Things I do THAT ARE GUARANTEED TO WORK !!!!
COPY THIS INTO YOUR BROWSER

http://profitandwealth.com/webinars/2008-10-14/

OR JUST CLICK HERE NOW

————————————————————-

Brian Sacks

I decided today to provide you with some quotes  from yours truly.

In fact – I used to present these as an entire module at my events so watch
your mailbox this week for some additional ones. They provide real world advice.

Yesterday my wife and I decided to get a new car. The lease on her car was up
and with gas prices going thru the roof we decided to get one that gets better mileage.

I WON’T BORE YOU WITH ALL THE SHOPPING WE DID– BUT YESTERDAY
SHE FOUND ONE SHE WANTED.

Now unlike most people – I LOVE NEGOTIATING !

So here we are in the dealership with the salesman and off we go.

All I kept hearing in my head was– OK- LET THE GAMES BEGIN!

Now think about what I said was the quote of the week ok?

So he asks me what we want to pay a month– I say zero!

For those of you on this list in the mortgage industry – you already realize that if you tell us what
You want your payment to be we can quickly tell you the price– No negotiation needed.

He laughs- but I say no– I am serious!

THEN I DID SOMETHING UNUSUAL!

I told him we had a car to trade- and a bottom line figure we could pay.

Here’s how I did the math.

— I knew we had equity in our car- so I took the highest number we were offered.

( BTW- he showed us the invoice and the hold back and also the incentive)

– BUT I took 15% off the sticker price..

Here’s the math

Our car was worth 31,000 and we owed 22,000 — his sticker was 43,200

I told him our figure — and said that was what we had to work with.

He immediately came down 6200.00 from his original figure.

HEY – YOU STILL WITH ME HERE????

Good- So he asked me what was fair? I said that depends on you ….

He came down some more.

Finally I told him we had 27,000 to work with

This included our trade- and cash– and I didn’t really care how
he moved the numbers around.

OH- and that 27,000 included tax- tags and anything else he could think of

We went back and forth…

Finally the general manager came out and said
look we are losing money on this deal as it is and we
are only 500 apart….Can’t you come up ?

I said no and we left …
In the parking lot the salesman rushed out to ask us to just split it 250 and 250.

HER NEW CAR IS IN THE DRIVEWAY!

I know this post has taken several twists but what I want you to take away
from it is that HE negotiated with himself.
I never quoted a price until the very end when he had come down as far
as he said he could..
Remember– he did come down even more — and continued to negotiate
With himself.

IT”S ALWAYS GOOD TO LISTEN AND ASK MORE THAN TALK WHEN NEGOTIATING!

Got any negotiation stories you want to share?

Leave them below and hit the Tell A Friend Button to share this!

This past week I got a call from someone out of the blue.
Turns out this person is a super aggressive salesperson and thought of an idea that would merge my companies programs with his.
As a strange aside he used to be in the mortgage business and knew of me and what we had accomplished.
See the motivational quote article for more on the topic of knowing as Kenny Rogers says “Know when to hold ‘em and know when to fold ‘em”
Anyway- back to this important story. His company sells signs. Indoor- Outdoor and car and truck wraps and ads. Our company is the expert in mobile Marketing and Creating Customer Capture systems so business can be found where their clients are searching for them. Over 50% of all searches are now on Mobile Devices.
When I arrived at the meeting his boss was there and we immediately got into a conversation about how business was. Honestly- his business was not doing great.
HOW COULD IT IN THIS ECONOMY???? OR COULD IT AFTER ALL WITH A LITTLE TWEAK?
So he started going on and on about the competition. About how he is selling a commodity. How he networks. How he advertises. How he gets new business.

THEN I ASKED HIM A FUNNY QUESTION- DOES ANYONE REALLY WANT A SIGN?????
Of course they do he said.
THEN I ASKED HIM ANOTHER FUNNY QUESTION- DOES ANYONE REALLY WANT A SIGN?
By now , you can imagine this guy thinks I am totally nuts?
THEN I ASKED HIM ANOTHER FUNNY  QUESTION- WHY SHOULD I GET MY SIGN FROM YOU AND NOT SOMEONE CHEAPER DOWN THE STREET?
Now – aside from being frustrated at what appeared to be my dumb questions he was starting to get pissed off!
“ WHO ARE YOU ANYWAY?”
I started explaining my backround to him. Told him about my coaching groups. Told him about some of the businesses I have built and sold. Told him about my consulting. Told him about Trackable Response and our expertise in creating Mobile Marketing Solutions.
HE STILL DIDN’T UNDERSTAND- MAYBE YOU DON’T EITHER?
He asked me who my competition was and I told him I really didn’t have any. Now that might strike you as arrogant- it definitely struck him that way, but stay with me here just a little bit longer – because there is a HUGE lesson here. One that will totally change your business.
SOME MARKETING TRUTHS YOU MUST UNDERSTAND!
NO –ONE WANTS A SIGN- They want customers and are using a sign to get them.
NO- ONE WANTS  MORTGAGE- They want a house they can enjoy with their family- and need a mortgage because they can’t pay cash.
NO-ONE WANTS  A MOBILE WEBSITE- They want more business and realize that at least half of their customers are searching for them on their mobile devices and that this number is increasing every single day.
NO-ONE WANTS  A BRAKE JOB- OIL CHANGE – TIRE ROTATION….They  want their car to be safe and they want it to continue running.
- I truly hope you are seeing my point here. It’s subtle but has the power to totally change your business.<—–

FINALLY- I EXPLAINED “THE I DON’T HAVE ANY COMPETITION “ STATEMENT!
Everyone who knows be knows that I am NOT arrogant. In fact, I hate arrogant people. Confident- yes!  But I’ll save that whole topic for another article.
Now let’s switch gears just for a second so I can explain this second point and the whole head of lettuce theme in this article.
Let’s say you want to make a salad. Money is really tight and so you go searching for lettuce at the lowest price.
After all – Lettuce is lettuce and one head is exactly the same as any other right?
THAT’S A BIG MISTAKE SO MANY CUSTOMERS I CONSULT WITH MAKE BEFORE I FIX IT!
THE BIG LESSON-– If you are in a commodity business STOP competing and change your product!
GOT THAT?
See if all you want is a head of lettuce than it’s totally fine to go to the nearest store that has the lettuce at the cheapest price.
BUT – If you are in a hurry- and price isn’t the ONLY factor than you can opt for the shredded lettuce in the bag that is already washed and ready to serve.
If you wanted a certain type of Romain lettuce for a special salad dish you are serving than price also isn’t the critical deciding factor is it?
SO LET’S GET BACK TO MY “DUMB QUESTIONS” AND WRAP THIS UP!
Yes – the sign business is a commodity business.
Yes- The Mobile Marketing and Mobile Website business is a commodity business.

YOUR BUSINESS MAYBE A COMMODITY BUSINESS TOO!
But it doesn’t have to be.
People buy signs to get customers.
People buy mobile websites to get customers.
So I helped him see the bigger picture and totally change his business model
while at the same time integrating our services.
We don’t sell WEBSITES- we customize mobile customer capture systems and other proven mobile marketing solutions to generate Trackable profits!
I developed a plan that would integrate mobile marketing into the signs themselves with QR codes and other mobile customer capture devices!
Now when he visits his customers he is offering a CUSTOMER CAPTURE SYSTEM not a sign.
Plus, he is using our services to ensure that these clients are able to be seen with a mobile optimized customer capture system when they visit the address or scan the codes.
Now instead of his clients asking what’s the price of your sign…. they are saying can you tell me more about how this works.
Now he is NO LONGER a HEAD OF LETTUCE and he doesn’t really have any true competition since they are still just offering signs!
Hope you enjoyed this and more importantly will start using some of these same lessons in your own business!
If your association or chamber or company or looking for a great presenter on marketing and/or how to profit from  mobile marketing solutions please send an e-mail to
brian@profitandwealth.com or call my office at 410-420-2343

and of course– as always– would love your comments below!

***************************************************************************************
This quote really is a good one so stop and think it thru. It goes back to the teachings
in one of my all time favorite MUST READ books. ( psycho -cybernetics by Dr Maxwell Maltz)
In fact this is something I still share with any client in my coaching group and any company I consult with. Seems so logical yet this economy has made this so confusing.
YOU MAY HAVE HAD A CLEAR PICTURE – BUT NOW WHAT?
A few days ago one of our loyal subscribers – someone who I have communicated with many times sent me an e-mail.
He’s been a hardworking person all his life. Great ethics.  Great family man. Well loved in his community.
AND……………….out of work for the last # of years.
THIS MAN IS IN HIS 60’S!
He had a vision of where he wanted to end up.
He worked hard to get there.
He did all the right things.

EXCEPT FOR ONE BIG ONE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
He has NOT accepted reality and is paralyzed at the fork in the road!

Here’s what I mean- His industry is no longer in existence.

His old way of doing business – the way he had for 30 years DOES NOT exist.
But he is just angry and placing blame … instead of moving on.
This happens to businesses I run into every day at Trackable Response.
They don’t understand Mobile Marketing and so they just ignore it at their own peril
since HALF of their clients are looking for them on their phones but can’t find them
so they are winding up at the competition.
The Yellow Pages USED to work.
The AD in the local magazine USED to work.
The good service we gave USED to be enough.
STARTING TO GET THE PICTURE?
Good because this article is starting to get a little too long so let me just tell you the 2 takeaways.
First- You must know where you are headed are you can’t ever get there.
Second- You have to be quick enough- smart enough – honest enough to know when you are at a dead end- (REGARDLESS OF WHOSE FAULT IT IS) and just accept reality and move on!
THOUGHTS? COMMENTS? — LEAVE THEM BELOW!
BTW- Am working on some cool new features for our member area so stay tuned …
While I am NOT accepting any new members yet- My staff could put you on the waiting list if you like—send an e-mail to brian@profitandwealth.com  with the headline –Waiting List and we’ll add your name.
Once we do open again — It will only be a short window  so I can continue to give our members priority  service.
OH—ALMOST FORGOT-
Do you have a group or association who wants /needs to know how to be found where their clients are looking for you? Let my office know by sending an e-mail to brian@profitandwealth.com and my staff will schedule a call to discuss it.

by Dan S. Kennedy

Test And Grow Rich

“Testing” is an ugly topic.  Why?  Because testing variables in advertising direct mail, phone scripts and sales presentations requires discipline, diligence and patience.  To get it right, you can only test one variable at a time.  This means that if you change a headline, you can’t change anything else.  Plus you have to make sure all other variables remain the same, like the mailing day or a war breaking out that has everybody watching CNN day and night or the President getting caught again with his drawers down or a hurricane hitting.

Frankly, most business people will just not go through the “detailitis” required to test – which is why it’s a very good idea to model proven promotions.  And in some cases where you’re only going to use something once or twice or you’re dealing with a very small number, it’s just not worth testing; instead, you take your best shot.  But let’s assume you’re working on something you intend to use over and over and over again in some significant quantity, so that it’s worth real effort to fine-tune it…

I have some tips for you: first of all, there’s non-testing testing – huh?  Well, I describe that in my book ‘The Ultimate Sales Letter

’ (available at http://bit.ly/I9Tdha  ), where I talk about the steps to take with a finished sales letter before you actually mail it.  Second, there’s split testing, which is the fastest way to test and get to a reasonable conclusion.  Let’s assume you have a postcard and you want to leave everything the same but test four different headlines, and you have 4,000 similar addresses to mail to.  You do “nth name testing”; that means Headline #A goes to every 4th name, Headline #B to every 5th name, Headline #C to every 5th name, etc.

So you evenly divide the list without bias among the headlines being tested.  Some media (like Val-Pak or MoneyMailer) will let you split test within a single buy.  Third, there’s testing against a control.  A “control” is a marketing strategy that already works well and you’re using it on a continuing basis – maybe it’s a series of letters you mail every month.  You have been using it long enough you know what it produces.  You have a “known” to measure against.  Now you can start trying to improve that control, ideally one step or variable at a time.

If I’m trying to beat a control, here are the “hot” variables I’ll look at closely, to see if there’s room for improvement:

1.  The offer

2.  The guarantee(s)

3.  The urgency of response

4.  The big idea or big promise

5.  The overcoming of skepticism i.e. credibility and believability

6.  The style or tone of the writing itself

7.  The look of the piece

By the way, little, very testable things DO sometimes make very big differences.  Recently I showed an example in my newsletter of a guy who just added four rubber-stamped words to the outside of his envelope, and beat his control by 300%.  I once brought a TV infomercial back from the dead by raising the price of the product.

Gary Halbert saved the Pearl Cream advertising by adding a particular bonus.  In 1984, after attending my seminar, a dentist in Sacramento changed five words on his Val-Pak coupon and went from getting two or three new patients a month to 15 to 20.  This is the sort of thing that makes direct-response advertising as frustrating as golf. (Did you happen to see John Daly miss a put seven times and scratch himself out of the tournament a few weeks back?  Ugh.)

Obviously, you can’t test if you can’t, won’t or don’t collect accurate data.  You have to code every offer, and track where every ounce of business comes from.  If you have employees who are lax about this, you must educate them about the importance, discipline them if they goof it up, and ultimately can’em if they won’t do it right 100% of the time.  I confess that I fly by the seat of my pants in my business more than I should, but I can’t fire me, God knows there are days I should.  Anyway, I can assure you: the clients I have with the best profits and incomes possess the best information about where their business comes from.

Let me switch gears and talk briefly about another aspect of “testing”.  This is actually how all highly successful entrepreneurs view everything they do…as testing.  They do NOT see things in the context of “success” or “failure” like ordinary people do, and as a result they do not become “de-motivated” like most people do.  See, most people drain all the vitality, courage, optimism and git-up-n-go out of themselves by focusing on all the things they do that don’t work out well, as a compilation of failures.

But successful people understand the powerful impact of that negative reinforcement on their own self-image (somewhat akin to the impact of pouring a gallon of toxic waste into a pint of clear water, drinking the result, and wondering why the stomach backs up into the esophagus).  Instead, they carefully organize the things they do into a series or sequence of experiments, testing options, and focusing on the ones they find that work.  And they fully expect to go through any number of experiments that don’t pan out before walking away from the lab with a winner.  This not only has practical relevance, it has profound psychological ramifications.

Just like a little tweak in thinking can make a big difference in the results of say, an ad or a flyer, a little tweak in thinking can make a giant difference in the life results experienced by an individual.

DAN S. KENNEDY is a serial, multi-millionaire entrepreneur; highly paid and sought after marketing and business strategist; advisor to countless first-generation, from-scratch multi-millionaire and 7-figure income entrepreneurs and professionals; and, in his personal practice, one of the very highest paid direct-response copywriters in America. As a speaker, he has delivered over 2,000 compensated presentations, appearing repeatedly on programs with the likes of Donald Trump, Gene Simmons (KISS), Debbi Fields (Mrs. Fields Cookies), and many other celebrity-entrepreneurs, for former U.S. Presidents and other world leaders, and other leading business speakers like Zig Ziglar, Brian Tracy and Tom Hopkins, often addressing audiences of 1,000 to 10,000 and up.  His popular books have been favorably recognized by Forbes, Business Week, Inc. and Entrepreneur Magazine. His NO B.S. MARKETING LETTER, one of the business newsletters published for Members of Glazer-Kennedy Insider’s Circle, is the largest paid subscription newsletter in its genre in the world.

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