Offline consultants: Please tell me how my offer plan is

anyone?????

I'm not sure but $585 a month seems cheap to me for what you're offering.

Based on conversations I have with small business owners, I think you may leave them more confused with what you've written. It seems to technical for most small business owners who have barely know anything about the internet.

Most won't understand SEO, they won't know what an autoresponder is and some will still be unconvinced why they even need to be online.

Talk to them in their own langauge.

Find stats that show why being found online is so important.

Show them where they are in the search results. For many, seeing that their competition is above them or worse, they're not on the page at all, is all you need to do.

Show them keyword reports that show how many monthly visitors they are missing out on because they aren't using you.

I'm in the same camp as Mike and Kevin (Hi guys!).

It looks like you have a great offer and have put a lot of thought into it.

The problem is that most business owners' eyes will glaze over when you talk SEO, analytic, etc with them.

Focus on the results of what you will do, you can talk in generalities of how you will do it. But the primary focus should be on what the results will be, what they will see and what it will do for their business.

I also found that when I switched from a written 'proposal' like this to a more graphical/fancy 'proposal', it was easier for them to digest and understand.

Lets face it, we have become a McDonald's society. I'll have a #1 super-sized with extra pickles, hold the onions. So give them that (which you are already most of the way there with your SEO and SMART packages!)

One other thing that could use a little tweaking is the monthly charge. It seemed to be a little vague what they would be getting for the amount. I would clarify this not only so they want it, but also so you manage their expectations of how much work you will do for that money. In your SEO package, the statement says you will do the work to "ensure" they have top ranking.

Left to that statement alone, if their site gets knocked down by a new google update or a massive competitor jumping in, you could find yourself working 24/7 for a couple of hundred dollars. So not worth it.

Anyway, congratulations on what is shaping up to be a great system.

Good luck!!
Scott Voss

Thx all who have put in there 2 cents thus far. I will take you guys advice and reword the pitch so they can understand it better, eliminate as much technical mumbo jumbo that i can. I tried to keep it in simple terms and if anything seemed unclear in the interview i was just going to try and explain it more in their terms. I believe I can educate them on what SEO is and why it is so important in a few minutes or less. Just trying to focus on explaining with visual examples, will make things more clear and concise. If they can visually see that "new york interior painting" gets searched by potential customers over "1800" times per month that means they are losing out on 20,000+ potential customers for just that ONE keyword. I will try to rewrite this and post it up here hopefullly you guys will continue to lead me in the right direction!

APPRECIATE!

I personally think you shouldn't list prices on your website. They could just look at the price, click off your site and look for a better deal. If you don't have a price, they will engage you and that is where you can interact and sell them your services.

I agree with not using the upfront pricing. You need to first display all the value that your services can bring to the customer. Make them realize the potential for new business and new profits only then show the prices and by comparison to what they expect to gain the fee will seem like a drop in the bucket.

The acronym is clever but I agree with Kevin. Most small businesses won't understand anything about maybe all but ROI. It's not your job to teach them about marketing but to show them how to increase their profits. Complexity and confusion cut into your sales conversions for sure.

I deal with local business quite a lot. Not SEO but more local lead generation for them. I agree fully with the comments above. Be careful to make your offering too complex. Understand that these businesses don't have any (in 99% of the cases) understanding of Internet Marketing or the Internet per se. Keep the messaging super simple. These guys are years behind you in their understanding of SEO and IM

Many of them have an unreasonable expectation to rank no1 on Google for ALL the keywords that they think is about their business. Don't underestimate or under price your services time. Don't think you are going to get away with just very basic SEO. That's why I provide local lead generation services on a pay per performance or site rental model.

Small business want more people through the door. Your messaging should tell them simply how your service will do that. I use "I sell money making websites to small business" which means mini sites with squeeze pages that target local traffic.

I came from the offline world. Owned an offline business for 8 years.

The reason I got into internet marketing is because I couldn't understand anything they were telling me. And because I had no technical clue of what they were telling me, their price was too high.

They didn't try to ease my pain. And my pain was that I didn't appear on page 1 of google and some of my competitors appeared more than once.

If someone had just said "I'll get you on page 1" i would have perked up. That was what i wanted to hear. How they would do it was not very important.

As a business owner I did not want to do it myself or understand it. Just wanted to be on page 1. that was my pain.

they then could have stuck their finger in my wound by showing me how many leads I was losing out on by not being on page 1. If they said 100 people a month searched on my keyword, they wouldn't even have to do the math. I would have instantly known how much money I was losing.

Yellow pages don't work anymore for most local businesses. Competition is fierce and customers are harder to find these days. People now use Google the way they used to use the phone book.

Scenario: They see a print ad for pest control. they have heard good things about that company. They decide to call now but can't find that print ad. they know exactly the business they want to lookup but forgot the name of it. so they do a google search on pest control in their town hoping they'll see the biz they were looking for. But that business doesn't appear on page 1 or they are at the bottom of the page.

scanning the page for this company he wants, the person sees a number 1 or 2 listing and it draws their interest. they click on it and like what this new company has to say. they call and the company sells them on their service. They never call the company they intended to call in the first place.

Scenario 2: I'm looking to call my plumber who I've used several times and I like. For the life of me I can't remember his name today. So I google search for plumber in my town.

I don't see him but some other guy has an online coupon for $25 off...

Not only are companies losing prospects every day they aren't listed high on page 1, they are losing customers who were already looking specifically for them from other marketing. Or worse, they lose an existing customer.

man, THAT'S painful. I'm going to post that to my blog now...

My advice to you is to leavwe prices off of your site and let them engage with you. Only then can you find out their budget and tailor your services to suit both budget and goals.

What more can I say? A ton of priceless advice and experience posted above.

So just get on with it and do well. Your SMART Marketing moniker is Ok for me.

hmm thanks for all the feedback.....Now that wasnt my website it was the offer sheet i was going to bring along with me to meetings. I have one today at 1pm so all ur info helped. I did look at it differently now that you guys said that, if i do have set prices, its like selling soda or something, i will go with figuring out how much to charge after we go thru my questionnaire.

I also think that your proposal is to technical for most business owners, all they want to know is how are you going to benefit them. Show them their problems, agitate their pain, and let them know that you can fix it for them.

They get hit everyday with people trying to sell them SEO services. If you are going to successfully market to business owners for SEO services, you are going to have to stand out from the crowd.

Here is a real life example. I recently responded to an ad from a company that was looking for SEO services.

I spoke to them for a moment and the guy said, "send me your resume. We are going to look them over and call people back" Now, if I had of just sent him my resume, I would have been lost in the crowd.

Here is what I said. " OK I can do that, but let me speak to you about a few ideas I have that will help you company first".

Then I proceeded to talk to him about some things I could do that would increase their sales. Within a few minutes this guy was intently listening to every word I spoke. At that point I knew he was taking the bait, so to speak.

Now lets set the hook. So I said, "Let me do a little research on your website and get back to you with some more ideas". The guy was delighted. He told me that nobody else who had responded, had given them any helpful information.

Everybody else was lost in the crowd at this point, and I was standing out like a sore thumb.

I did a little research and called him back. I said to him that I could help them solve their SEO problems.

But that I really needed to ask him some questions so that I could understand their business better and find ways to increase their sales while saving them money. I was just planning to schedule a time so we could talk uninterrupted for about 45 minutes.

However, the guy ask to put me on hold for a moment. When he came back on the line he said, "OK I am ready, what do you need to know?"

He did this because I showed him what I could do for him in a way that he understood.

Just concentrate on showing your prospects how you can help them in terms they understand. You will get plenty of business.

Don't post your prices, as Andrew Cavanagh points out, you are setting yourself up to always be competing on price and you will be working for hundreds instead of thousands.

To Your Success,
Dale

Keep an eye out for local "mobile" marketing this is going to be huge. Both for mobile ppc and SMS texting. What deep pockets lawyer wouldn't want his "Click to Call" ppc ad poping up when a person searches for "Dallas attorney" "DWI Lawyer". Or realtor when someone looks up a house for sale they just past. Or "Dallas Pizza" mobile coupons, text 37244 for HOT FRESH PIZZA. looookout!

1. Find the pain.

2. SHOW them an instance in which you've provided the cure.

3. SHOW them what the cure looks like for them.

4. They will buy the cure.

======================

In this forum, you are among some of the most technologically literate people in the world. 99% of the world knows NOTHING of which is spoken here.

SHOW the client results you've produced. Prove it.

EG. "I engaged Client A on 4-6-2010 and he had 100 visitors and X amount in revenue. On 8-6-2010 he had 2000 visitors and XXXX amount in revenues. I know how to do this. Would you like me to do this for your business? If not, your competition probably will."

PROVE that you know how to do it and you'll have no problem getting local clients.

Charge an upfront setup cost to cover your tools/subscriptions and assets for the campaign.

thanks guys, i have my first appt on thursday morning for a auto repair repair shop, hope all goes well, and i close a sale, at least if not, a learning experience that will help me in the long run...any tips for auto repair shops??

check out these guys website, sheesh, they have work to do http://www.nolimitautosports.net/index.cfm

You want to keep it really simple. I will do these types of marketing for you - X. Whatever types you do.

For example - I do organic search results. This gets you to the top over time and these results stick. Plus most people don't look at the ads so you will get access to more customers. This will bring in more visitors and more profit.

Focus on how you can bring them more profit. All they care about is ROI. Acronyms and fancy seo-speak don't bring in any dollars.

yea there website is horrendous..really it needs to be totally redone, should i suggest this? they need so much stuff, testimonials section, make an appt section, email capture more pictures, they have no title tag. I know they are not doing crap on the inside of the business right

you know what kills me is this line "Oh yea were doing a few things for marketing right now and theyre doing pretty well and I tell ya were swamped. So i think were ok right now for advertising, i dont even have enough workers to keep up"

who woulda thought, companies satisfied with staying where there at

S.M.A.R.T.->I.E.S.

Package 3 All the above Including Everyday Sales
- How to answer the phone
- How to up/down/cross sell
- Effective USP design
- Teach how to Greet customers
- Pricing (too low?)
- Products (any missing?)
- Do they accept all methods of payment (even financing)?
- Guarantee?
- Tracking advertising?
- Do they know the client average LTV?
- Do they know each advertising source's ROI?
- A way to increase ticket amount?
- They doing follow-up on hot leads?
- They doing follow-up on every one they can? (Email or newsletter?)
- There are 37 identified personalities; different keywords and landing pages will appeal to different clients, so do they have 12+ web sites? (you may incorporate in the above) As well as each 'personality on it's own optimized email marketing/newsletter list?
- Business' best source of business is previous clients... they using direct marketing to their database of current/previous clients?
- Researched the competition and made the proper adjustments in all areas?
- Examined and fine tuned sales funnels <-NOTE: PLURAL.
- That is a taste.

That CAN raise the NET by 20-40% with 'outside eyes' seeing things an owner is too close to to see.

Agreed your prices are WAY too low. It is the real world out there. If you put 20% of a 2 million dollar biz in the owner's pocket ($400,000) think that is only worth $7,905? (The price of option 2 for one year.) If so, will you work for me? LOL.

IF you are able to deliver, make 20-30% of what you increase the net by; which will depend on the size of the company and your talent. If you cannot deliver, you will spend more time acquiring clients than servicing them. In other words, the prices should be fluid. One business cannot afford $7,905 another won't take you seriously at that low figure and hire someone charging 5 times as much with less talent.

Mark

Get away from the SMART acronym. It's already used in business for most plans. It's used for "SMART Goals" - Specific Measurable Achievable Realistic Timely

I like everything but this below. In songwriting clubs, when a persons first verse is droning on too long we say..."Dont bore us, get to the chorus".

In this case "get to the offer".

One of the most common reply's I've seen
is make sure you educate the customer
in terms they will understand.

I've been guilty of this myself. I'll start
using all the IM terms and they look
at me like I grew an extra head.

Now I use phrases like "drive more
customers", and "get in front of
buyers not lookers"

We easily spent 10K a month on line. the Ebay store alone sold 20 cars a month at 3K a pop (60K). Cars123 at $1500/mo just automatically accessed the inventory, changed the file into different formats and distributed to sites like cars.com and others to update what cars (new & used) were available. All automatically. & that doesn't count what we paid cars.com and several other 'car sites' or the person handling the Ebay sales.

Hey guys, I have a meeting with a lawyer next tuesday, I really want to land this one, can anybody give me some pointers for lawyer meetings?

Areevez,

I have been a small business owner - six of them starting back in high school - over45 years ago

After college I opened a retail store and sales people would call on me every day... one after the other.

Small business owners are busy, have little time, and want to know exactly how you will increase their bottom line. You need to get them talking. It is standard sale practice.

I am guessing you have never sold anything belly to belly, one on one over a period of time. That's okay. We all start somewhere. This your time to start learning. Run to the bookstore and get anything you can about sales technique. Some of it may be dated. Okay, it still will give you a better start.

Search online about "how to sell" and learn what you can.

The most important part of selling is returning again and again, constantly reminding them you are available. The fellow who has handled my business insurance, auto insurance, home insurance, and life insurance called on me at least once a month for two years before I hired him.

Being rejected or turned down is always difficult until you realize they are not rejecting you. They are rejecting the concept(s) you are offereing because they don't really see how it will increase the money in their wallet.

Just stay with it. You will get there.

BTW grab the free book in my sig. I wrote it for offline businesses. This will give you other things you can suggest to them that will make you sound like a genius to them.

And good luck on Thursday.
:-Don

thanks you guys for the last few posts...anyone have specific tips to use in the meeting JUST for lawyers?

Fairfax, Virginia - Best Personal Injury Car Accident Attorney Website | Benjamin W. Glass, III & Assoc. PC

Before I can offer advice... what is your experience? How many clients have you got on page 1 of Google? What about Google Places? Probably more important to a local business than regular SEO.

I would be wary of over pricing your service, any success could be very short lived.

Our rates are always reasonable and vary by industry. Recently we have been achieving what we call "carpet bombing" success!!

1. top of the page AD in adwords with a drop down attached to the ad with a "one box" Google Places listing.

2. "A" (first position) listing in regular Google Places

3. First position in SEO

4. Sometimes a few video listing further down the page.

The idea is to not only achieve first page of Google but completely dominate it.

This only works for Local business with Local markets.

You might want to get on this guys list.
Pretty sure he'd have no problem you signing up for his call

Free One Hour Marketing Call In with Ben Glass | Great Legal Marketing, Inc.

This topic is GOLDEN! Thanx a lot for it guys, I am thinking of going into lead gen business and consulting, it helped a lot.

that was a good resource link dogscout thanks for that, some good info in this thread

You will find him extremely intelligent, caring, compassionate, helpful, ethical and with his priorities in life well laid out.

He is the local GKIC facilitator and also runs mastermind group for marketing. (especially lawyers) The books in his waiting room were written by him. One explains all the circumstances where hiring a lawyer usually doesn't increase your odds of winning as well as how to DIY for those type cases.

I could go on and on, but won't.

Feel free to drop my real name: Mark Thurston. I am a client of his as well as a previous GKIC member. (the drive since moving is difficult and there is no 'good' GKIC meetings near here, though GK is only an hour north.)

Scrap all of your pricing. Put together a questionaire that gets the business owner to tell YOU how much to charge. If you have a detailed list of questions that goes into enough detail (2 hrs. or so), you will become savvy enough to know what to charge based on what is needed. You are better off tailoring a plan for each individual client.

I have my first appointment on Thursday morning to repair automotive repair shop, I hope all goes well, and I make a sale, at least if there is a learning experience that will help me long-term ... tips for auto repair