After a busy holiday season, many consultants often go on hiatus, letting their business suffer in the interim, until the snow melts, the roads dry up, and the grass is green again. If you're one who schleps product from home to car and back, that can be a good reason to slow down. No one likes hauling stuff in the snow, but when business slows down, so does your income.
Few people leave direct sales because of a full calendar. The number one reason I hear is because they can't find bookings, can't close the sales - in short, there's nothing on their calendar!
So as we enter the second quarter of the year, take a moment to examine your goals. With the year 25% of the way behind us, are you 25% of the way towards your goals? For the average consultant (if they even have goals), the answer is not quite. And most of that is due to the fact that they let their business "slip" during the first few months of the year.
Well, now's the time to get crackin' and breathe some life back into your business.
Last week at our Small Biz Super Summit, Lisa Sasevich revealed a great technique to close more business without being salesy or pushy. Lisa is the author of "The Invisible Close" and she gave some great tips about using irresistible offers to encourage your audience to make a decision sooner, rather than later. Just yesterday, Daphne Bousquet shared with us the best strategies to make more money by hosting your own events. Here are just a few ideas you can implement to resurrect your business this spring:
- Make a time-sensitive offer. Most of our companies provide us with a monthly special. That gives your hosts and guests all month to make up their mind. Give them something special for taking action on the day of the show.
- Close the party AT the party. If you hostess coach in advance, you can remind your host that you are closing the show the night of the party. Make sure she has her catalogs, samples, and outside order forms well in advance so that she can get them out and get them back to you the night of her show.
- Host your own event. In your own home, or rent a small conference room. Be your own host. If you're using social media, make it a more informal "tweetup" kind of an event so that more people will come, try your products, etc. Then have a time-sensitive offer for people that book, buy or set up a recruiting appointment with you that night.
Time sensitive offers are just one great strategy to increase sales, bookings and recruit leads. Your company can't possibly offer a new special every day - but you can. It requires a bit of planning and forethought, but if you're running a real business, you need to be planning ahead anyway.
Breathing life into your business can be as simple as a few tweaks to what you're already doing, or completely revitalizing the art of doing business. Either way, a resurrection will give you the forward momentum you need to have a powerhouse Summer. And as we roll into conference season, it's even more important to be hitting those goals!
You can do it!
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"Time-sensitive offer" is just one of the strategies I taught in my last Direct Sales 101 class, and here's what one of our first graduates had to say:
Well, I promoted to Team Leader, went from $300 in sales in January to $2700 in sales in February and $2000 in sales in March, and have 9 new shows on my calendar. I want to take the early graduation discount :>
You are, by far, the best direct sales/life coach I have ever had (and I have had quite a few!). You have helped me to cut through my fear, my husband is now on board with my "hobby" business (as he called it!) and wants me to go full throttle, and I have been able to do things for my family that I haven't in the past.... I can't wait to see what you have in store for the rest of the year.
Also, looking forward to the Small Biz Super Summit - what a lineup!
Lara Hall
Independent Passion Parties Consultant
www.LaraBHall.com
