Audio transcription provided to the business coach program at Thrive15.com
Clay: On a business coach trip i met this taxi driver and he had a little cooler in the back, he says, “Would you guys like a little refreshment?” And I’m going, “Sure, almost like, really?” And he’s got all these beverages back there”, he says, “Now where are you guys looking- what are you guys looking to do while you’re in town?” He has, he’s given us tourist information guides telling us how to save money on shows, he just has the whole laser show going on, and he says, “Hey, if you ever need something, here’s my card.” And he had a card that was very memorable, and my wife and I faithfully called and text him every time we wanted to get anywhere in New York, I think we called him like 2 or 3 times, and I don’t recall ever having done that with another cab driver.
He was just so pleasant, he drove like he was a sane human, his car smelled nice, he gave his beverages, it was a laser show, see, and again that was in New York where they had regulated pricing. Every other cab driver essentially has to charge the same price, and he made himself an oddity as well. So I would just say, I would really think long and hard about making yourself an oddity, but see, what tip would you have for this thriver who’s saying- listen, “I can’t change the price of my services, so what’s the best way to come up with a no-brainer offer?”
Z: I think one way that you can do that, if you can’t change the price, which I would like to talk to him about, why he can’t change the price, but that’s a whole ‘nother conversation with him. One of the little tricks is financing. You can go out there and you can reach out to finance companies and you can offer, the no-brain deal is “Hey, it’s no down and it’s 18 months, no interest.” In other words, you can make it to where people, that are doing construction. A lot of times, they’re kinda going, “Oh, how do I- I don’t have enough money upfront to pour a new driveway, yet I need a new driveway. So one of the ways you can difference yourself from make a no-brainer is through financing and you can go out there and get finance companies, and they’ll come in and they’ll do it. You can get your money. Yeah, it’s gonna cost you a point or two, it’s gonna cost you a little bit of money. But it’s probably gonna be less than if you had to discount your cement and that’s what the construction is, right Robert? He’s into cement?
Clay: Right, right, concrete. what business coach advice do we have for our friends there?
Z: Yeah, concrete. And so finance seeks a little move in there, so you can have, “Hey, no money down, you don’t have to pay for 18 months, zero percent interest.”
Clay: Local examples I can think of, some I have been a business coach for and some I have not been a business coach for like Hahn Appliance is an appliance store. Mathis Brothers, a lot of these places are offering zero money down, 18-month financing. What’s another move you’re kinda marinating on for the thriver who’s kinda feel likes he can’t compete by changing price. He’s gotta have some other move.
Z: Well, I think that if your financing is one move you can do, and another move you can do on that is like you said, I mean, you can differentiate your company by offering them, maybe some kind of gifting or some type of, they’re giving back to them. In other words, one of the moves I found that’s real successful is, “Hey, if you send me, or if you help me get some more business, I.e. you give me a neighbor, and they do it, I’m gonna knock off, you can get yours free if you help me with enough other business. In other words, for every neighbor you send me that needs a new driveway, I’m gonna give you 100 bucks.” And you kinda get them onboard on your team. So the no-brainer is for them is to try to help you get business. Say your business is, I don’t even know what a driveway even costs these days. Couple thousand bucks, let’s say. And if you flip me to another neighbor that needs another driveway, I mean, you know your neighbors.
I’ll give you 100 bucks off of yours, so if you give me to enough, then I’ll do yours for free.
Clay: You know, years ago before my career as a business coach, we were booking weddings for our wedding entertainment company. One thing I found is that a lot of brides and grooms would go out on a lot of dates for wedding planning, so I reached out to a friend of mine who runs the Outback. He’s the managing partner of one of the Outback Steakhouses in town, and I say, “Can I get a boatload of free gift certificates?” He goes, “Sure.” No exaggeration, I probably got 50 of them, and I told everybody, “Hey!”, and the guys, “Thank you for coming today to meet with our team and whether you decide to book with us or not, here’s a gift certificate for 40 dollars at Outback.” And they’re all like, “Oh, wow!”, and it kind of like, took price, and no longer made it a concern. They almost felt like they were semi-indebted to us because we gave them something nice to us. They wanted to reciprocate. It was a move.
When we come back, I want to get Jeff’s take on this, because, Jeff, you’ve been in business for a long time. You’ve obviously worked with entrepreneurs and I want to get your perspective and your experience to answer this question. And Robert, is there any more details, the thriver you could share without divulging his personal information?
Robert: Well, they do great work and so I think branding yourself in a memorable way could work really well for them, but maybe we can get into this in another segment. I think it’s also important to remember with a no-brainer, your goal is to get the customer, wow them so that they’ll be a returning customer rather than make a lot of profit on the first sale.
Clay: All right now, Thrive Nation, when we come back, we’re gonna get back into it. We’re gonna be talking more about how to change the- how to market your company effectively when you cannot change the price. How to move the needle when you’re a commodity and you feel like you can’t play with the pricing game. Stay tuned, ThriveTimeShow.com.
All right, Thrive Nation, welcome back to the business coach conversation. Green Country, Oklahomies, people listening from all over America. People downloading this podcast in other countries, people downloading this podcast on other continents, people downloading this podcast from other planets. Doctor Z, I’ve recently discovered, I was looking at download statistics, and I suspect, I cannot confirm but I suspect that it appears as though alien life forms have begun to download each and every one of our podcasts. I cannot prove it, I don’t have anything I can put my finger on specifically to point to the truth of this hunch, but so I just have a hunch and I believe the Romulons and the Klingons maybe listening to our podcasts without our permission. I don’t think they’ve ever asked us.
Jeff: You’ve got Captain Kirk right there.
Z: I don’t think they’ve asked for permission, but you know what, I see, I mean, if you have a telescope and you look like Saturn, it looks like there’s a growth in entrepreneurship up there on that planet. I don’t know, I mean, [crosstalk 00:15:03] are popping up, and a huge strip mall just went in, I think that’s what it was on the ring, on the thing. I mean, you know, it’s-
Clay: I bet captain Ke=irk would have been a good business coach. Now, if you ever have gone through, see, I would say the glass-eating process called, “starting a business”, it’s like, you’re starting a business, it’s kinda like eating glass. Now hopefully, when it passes through the digestive system, it doesn’t come out like glass, but all I’m saying is starting a business can be a tough, a tough thing. If you ever tried to start a successful company, and you’ve got to this point where you just don’t know how to price a product, it can become infinitely frustrating when you don’t know what to price it, how to price it, and so Robert, you have a live coaching client, who asked a question. Could you kinda read the question one more time there for all the thrivers who maybe, are just now tuning from other planets and this planet?
Robert: Yeah, it’s a local concrete company here in Tulsa. a business coach client of mine. They do the normal stuff, but they also do a lot of decorative concrete, and their question was, they totally see the value of the no-brainer, but their question was, “How- if I can’t change the price of my services, what is the best way to come up with a no-brainer?”
Clay: All right, so I’m gonna pitch over here to Mr. Jeff Rindt, and he is an emotional intelligence expert. Jeff, what advice do you have for the thriver out there?
Robert: Any time that you want to keep the price the same and you have to do that, you’ve got to increase customer experience somehow. You gotta engage them emotionally, you gotta allow them to have an easier way to do something, like if you try to engage a concrete salesman, he may not be real excited, high level emotional engagement, but he might like doing his job easier, or he might like being able to decrease stress on his job, have somebody that comes in and decreases his stress. He might like, and people who buy concrete might like to be able to know that they can trust that he’s gonna do a good job and so they have information about that, that they give the customer so that they know when they’re paying a price, but they can’t raise it, at least they know that they are gonna get the high experience with it, and that’s gonna increase the sales.
Clay: Now, Robert, I have four more mega moves for our thriver out there, I’m just firing them out there. Take the ones that apply to your business. IF you’re listening right now, take the ones- get out a pen, write out the ones that apply to your business. Z said financing, that’s move number one, okay? That’s a great move. He also alluded to free gifts. That’s a move, free gifts, you know, giving them something, gifting, maybe a referral, a discount if you refer. Z, am I getting that wrong?
Z: Absolutely. And the other thing too is, just like you said, if you can go in and find, get a good value or maybe some gift cards at some restaurant, and just say, “Hey, listen.” Part of your pitch is, “Let us come in and give you our pitch, and for that, we’ll buy you dinner.” You know, and one of the things is that may be to get the golden look, you have to do the no-brainer to get the golden look because a lot of times, people are kinda like, “I don’t want to talk to them because, you know, I really don’t want to- I know I need to do it, but I really don’t want to spend the money on it right now.” With the business coach clienets it is all about the golden look.
So sometimes, it’s just get that golden look so the no-brainer can maybe be to get in the door and get in their living room and be able to sit down and then you know, your close rate should be, you know, hire then. If you’re getting in there and you’re getting the golden look, you’re not closing them, that’s a different show I need to go with you on that. Sometimes that’s maybe more than half the battle, is just being on getting right in front of them and pitch your concrete.