21stcenturize the small Brick & Mortars- Journey begins

[pwilliams84]

Alright it's time to document - Brick & Mortar to Digital Marketing

This thread is intended to document my journey from slow lane scripted misery to the unscripted fastlane. The facts:

• College grad - went late, graduated at 26, majored in something I didn't even care about (finance), got $30k in debt, hated it since starting in the business 7 years ago
• Did myself no favors by getting married, wife pregnant, new house, and new car all within year 1
• Further buried myself by having kids back2back - 15 months apart
• Further buried myself by following the script - a little more money each year. Started at 37k, now make 90k. Makes it that much harder to get out, and DEFINITELY makes it that much harder to get spouse on board with getting out.
• Read TMF in 2015. Saved, but ruined my life. I could never be a good employee again. Started brainstorming, met with a friend to discuss our fastlane ideas (he referred me to the book), researched various fastlane ideas only to retreat. Got caught back into the slowlane after frustrations with no progress
• Read Unscripted in 2017. Awoken again. Man this life (how I'm living it) is bullshit.
• 3/2018 - Caught up with friend from 2015 over coffee. He did it. He literally executed and it worked. I didn't. Embarrassed. Ashamed. Envious. FU moment. It could have, should have, would have been me if I just DID SOMETHING.
• 4/2018 - returned to this forum. Completed a proper intro. Working to become more involved in the community. Decided on path to take.
• Got a bit concerned, discouraged after reading a few threads about the Web design/Advertising agency space that maybe it wasn't "it". Caught myself doing it again. Chose to post how I was feeling about it: It's happening again. help...
• While I didn't get a lot of engagement out of it, I did get a helpful piece of advice - the first step/business doesn't always have to be the one that gets you there. If it alone isn't "it", then it could help lead me to what is "it". Additionally, it can free me from the corporate slavery, getting me at least partially to the unscripted life.

Following @Fox closely for inspiration. Already learned so much from posts here, youtube, and facebook. Purchased 5 relevant Udemy courses to add to my toolbox. Good God, do you know how many different practical, useful, real world things I could know by now if my $30k was spent on these courses instead of that stupid a$$ degree?

Took on a friend's business as a case study. Started running some ads while taking a FB ads course so that I could action-learn.. is that a word? dunno..if not it is now.

His business is a high ticket leisure business - $300 on low end, $600 on high end. Told me his website is useless, FB page was pointless, and that all of his engagement was on Instagram. Dissected to see that he was doing really well in the first phase of the sales funnel - user engagement, but that for the level of engagement he had it was leading to essentially no sales. He wasn't collecting any info. Just follows and likes.

Created a landing page within his own website that just isn't listed in the menus (FREE). Got him setup with email marketing platform (FREE). Set up FB pixel for future retargeting (FREE).Spent $49.52 in ads. Ran shitty ads for a couple days til I learned a little more, fixed them up some, started getting better engagement but still nothing to write home about. Ended up getting 3 leads for him, 1 extremely warm. If he closes, its at a minimum 6x ad spend, but more likely based off of customer comments to be 11x ad spend. I still don't like the ad spend/conversion. Work to be done there, but he wants to continue - go figure.

Set up the automation email within the email program - 4 emails.

1. First one delivers the offer from the ad to collect info.
2. Second one checks in to ask how they liked the offer, and asks for a quick 5 question survey so that the future content can be tailored to them, but uncovers their history/likeliness to purchase. If they fill it out, they move to another list for weekly/bi-weekly updates/product reviews/tips, whatever. If they seem likely to purchase, he calls to see when they want to schedule.
3. Third email goes to those who don't do survey. Try again.
4. Fourth goes to those who again don't take action from third email with a discount to book with a deadline. If still no action taken, they simply go to the regular marketing list for weekly updates.

My job is done on the email front. All his deal now since he's not a paying customer. I'm sure it could be done better and I will learn that in my email marketing course I picked up. It's also up to him to send out the regular emails to the people.

It's not great, but it was something. Looking forward to pushing through.

-pw

 

Dislike ads? Remove them and support the forum: Subscribe to Fastlane Insiders.

[Christian McGhee]

Alright it's time to document - Brick & Mortar to Digital Marketing

This thread is intended to document my journey from slow lane scripted misery to the unscripted fastlane. The facts:

• College grad - went late, graduated at 26, majored in something I didn't even care about (finance), got $30k in debt, hated it since starting in the business 7 years ago
• Did myself no favors by getting married, wife pregnant, new house, and new car all within year 1
• Further buried myself by having kids back2back - 15 months apart
• Further buried myself by following the script - a little more money each year. Started at 37k, now make 90k. Makes it that much harder to get out, and DEFINITELY makes it that much harder to get spouse on board with getting out.
• Read TMF in 2015. Saved, but ruined my life. I could never be a good employee again. Started brainstorming, met with a friend to discuss our fastlane ideas (he referred me to the book), researched various fastlane ideas only to retreat. Got caught back into the slowlane after frustrations with no progress
• Read Unscripted in 2017. Awoken again. Man this life (how I'm living it) is bullshit.
• 3/2018 - Caught up with friend from 2015 over coffee. He did it. He literally executed and it worked. I didn't. Embarrassed. Ashamed. Envious. FU moment. It could have, should have, would have been me if I just DID SOMETHING.
• 4/2018 - returned to this forum. Completed a proper intro. Working to become more involved in the community. Decided on path to take.
• Got a bit concerned, discouraged after reading a few threads about the Web design/Advertising agency space that maybe it wasn't "it". Caught myself doing it again. Chose to post how I was feeling about it: It's happening again. help...
• While I didn't get a lot of engagement out of it, I did get a helpful piece of advice - the first step/business doesn't always have to be the one that gets you there. If it alone isn't "it", then it could help lead me to what is "it". Additionally, it can free me from the corporate slavery, getting me at least partially to the unscripted life.

Following @Fox closely for inspiration. Already learned so much from posts here, youtube, and facebook. Purchased 5 relevant Udemy courses to add to my toolbox. Good God, do you know how many different practical, useful, real world things I could know by now if my $30k was spent on these courses instead of that stupid a$$ degree?

Took on a friend's business as a case study. Started running some ads while taking a FB ads course so that I could action-learn.. is that a word? dunno..if not it is now.

His business is a high ticket leisure business - $300 on low end, $600 on high end. Told me his website is useless, FB page was pointless, and that all of his engagement was on Instagram. Dissected to see that he was doing really well in the first phase of the sales funnel - user engagement, but that for the level of engagement he had it was leading to essentially no sales. He wasn't collecting any info. Just follows and likes.

Created a landing page within his own website that just isn't listed in the menus (FREE). Got him setup with email marketing platform (FREE). Set up FB pixel for future retargeting (FREE).Spent $49.52 in ads. Ran shitty ads for a couple days til I learned a little more, fixed them up some, started getting better engagement but still nothing to write home about. Ended up getting 3 leads for him, 1 extremely warm. If he closes, its at a minimum 6x ad spend, but more likely based off of customer comments to be 11x ad spend. I still don't like the ad spend/conversion. Work to be done there, but he wants to continue - go figure.

Set up the automation email within the email program - 4 emails.

1. First one delivers the offer from the ad to collect info.
2. Second one checks in to ask how they liked the offer, and asks for a quick 5 question survey so that the future content can be tailored to them, but uncovers their history/likeliness to purchase. If they fill it out, they move to another list for weekly/bi-weekly updates/product reviews/tips, whatever. If they seem likely to purchase, he calls to see when they want to schedule.
3. Third email goes to those who don't do survey. Try again.
4. Fourth goes to those who again don't take action from third email with a discount to book with a deadline. If still no action taken, they simply go to the regular marketing list for weekly updates.

My job is done on the email front. All his deal now since he's not a paying customer. I'm sure it could be done better and I will learn that in my email marketing course I picked up. It's also up to him to send out the regular emails to the people.

It's not great, but it was something. Looking forward to pushing through.

-pw

Congrats bro! Love the execution. One thing I would say about the concept of marketing. Almost EVERY client I’ve spoken to has said something like this: If you make me money then I don’t mind paying you.

So many business owners are wearing so many hats, that if you can bring them results, without them having to worry about another piece then you will make money. I charge 1k a month minimum for marketing, but obviously you have to “guarantee” so form of ROI.

When I started I offered clients a free website design, if they like it, then we work. So many people loved that idea, and then I worked my a$$ off to over deliver.

Hope that helps, and and good luck!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[pwilliams84]

Time for an update as there have been a couple of new developments over the weekend:

1. I cold emailed and included a link to a private youtube video that I shot offering a local business the opportunity to work together at no charge to help build a portfolio for future prospecting. I watched video about 15 times before and after sending it and just threw up the whole YOLO thing and said whatever, let's see if it works. The idea was to try to show that I was a real person and this was a genuine offer. Maybe it was weird, I don't know, but whatever - I did it.

Radio silence.

2. I messaged someone in my community who spams the hell out of our community page offering her photography services. She acknowledged my message, but never said another thing after I presented my offer to see if I could assist her for free with her website and marketing strategy. Like..you're spamming our community page wanting money...I'm messaging you because I live down the street and would like to help you for free... No "thank you for the offer, but I'm okay for now"...no nothing. We won't be hiring her for family photos..

3. My friend with the leisure business finally took action and contact the warm lead I brought him. Guy sounded genuinely interested, but did not book with him and said he'd be in touch. Oh well.

4. I saw someone on FB commenting on an article about FB advertising. The person appeared to be a business owner, so just for the hell of it I private messaged this person to see if they had experience with it and we got to chatting a bit, and just for the hell of it I through my offer out again.

He actually ACCEPTED.

This was Saturday night, and he informed me he ran multiple programs under his business and was looking for help from a marketing standpoint. He gave me the links to his sites so I could take a peek...

The first one... was quite literally...the absolute worst website I've seen in my life. Entire design = trash. I'm talking orange background with walls of text on it trash. Nothing flowed right, various sign up forms on the same page, etc. I told him we needed to schedule a call and I would review his sites and go over them on the call. He agreed.

Call was scheduled for tonight. I actually didn't think he'd follow through, but he did. It was way too long of a call - 2 hours - i know..terrible..but I got (obviously) massive amounts of information about what he does. Turns out hes kind of a shark..has spent high 5 figures on marketing over the last year through an agency and on his own and got basically nowhere with it. Said the last agency ran ads for him that point to the site and lots of people clicked the ads but it didn't convert - I wonder why...

He wanted to get right into doing ads again because he believes in his service, and so do I, but I told him he would run into the exact same problem. Told him there was no way anyone in good conscience should run ads to his site in it's current form. I went through the detailed notes of what I saw wrong, and I agreed to stick to my original offer before I knew how much work it was and would fix the most pressing project's site for free. Ugh, it killed me to do that, but I'm trying to think longer term here. This will be a great before/after portfolio piece.

He told me that if this went well that he has plenty more to be done and isn't afraid of spending money (obviously lol), so it didn't have to be a one and done thing.

Just sent out my notes and proposal to have it officially documented.

So.. it's not a "first sale" per se, but it's a big step I think.

All from a simple FB message..