A summary of things you should know about The Automatic Customer according to John Warrillow: Introduction In this episode John Warrillow takes a deep dive into his book, The AutomaticRead More
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]]>In this episode John Warrillow takes a deep dive into his book, The Automatic Customer, where he discusses how to create a subscription business in any industry.
In his book Warrillow provides 9 unique business models based on a simple step-by-step guide for building an online subscription based business that are designed to fit nearly any kind of industry. The goal of the book is to teach you the fundamentals of recurring revenue, how to attract automatic customers, ways to market subscription products, and the statistics you need to measure results.
This books is perfect for entrepreneurs who are technology savvy and want to own a business that allows them to work from home while building a large, sustainable income.
I think the nine subscription models are really easy for businesses to comprehend and apply to their business. We try to explain that no matter what business or industry you’re in you can apply one of these nine models to create some form of recurring revenue.
This book has three major sections. The first section is dedicated to really making the case as to why you want recurring revenue. So if you already know that you absolutely want recurring revenue than you can skip section one and go straight to section two which is the nine subscription models.
What these nine subscription models are going to do is help you think through all the different forms of recurring revenue that you might use in your business. And you can cherry-pick through those as you see one that is more relevant and less relevant. The final section is scaling up your subscription business which is all about the metrics you want.
The LTV (Lifetime Value) to CAC (Customer Acquisition Cost) ratio is the most important metric any subscription company operator focuses on and we give you a formula on how to calculate it.
The key is to find some way to create some form of recurring revenue because that is going to both improve the value of your company as well as make your business a whole lot easier and more enjoyable to run. I believe that the essence of what we are trying to do can be encapsulated in a story I tell in the book. This story is about a guy named Sonu Panda who took a different approach to selling flowers. If you think about it a flower shop doesn’t have much hope unless it’s Mother’s Day or Valentine’s Day. In this business you constantly have to throw out rotten un-bought inventory because it simply wasn’t purchased which is a big waste of profit. Sonu Panda is trying to get you to think differently about what business you are in, even the low-tech business of selling flowers. So he tried to figure out who out there buys flowers on a recurring basis and realized that spas, restaurants, and hotels actually buy flowers relatively frequently. And so Sonu went to the individual establishments and negotiated with them on scheduling a time to bring fresh flowers every two weeks so that they could get back to the business or spa treatment etc. and not have to worry about whether their flowers are fresh. With that value proposition he started H. Bloom and today there are thousands and thousands of H. Bloom customers and subscribers around the world. So really the book is trying to convey that no matter what you do and no matter what business you are in you can rethink your business to create recurring revenue.
NOTE: That was just a summary. To get the full deep dive, play the audio clip at 07:04
“Happiness bombs.” – Bark Box
I am the founder of something called The Value Builder System where we help business owners improve the value of their company. I found that business after I wrote the book Built To Sell a couple years ago.
Most of the inspiration came from me screwing up writing Built To Sell. In Built to Sell I talked about the importance of making the business thrive without you personally doing all the work. The one thing that I didn’t spend enough time on was recurring revenue and it turns out that recurring revenue has the biggest impact on whether or not someone wants to buy your business. With The Automatic Customer I wanted to kind of write that wrong and really dedicate an entire book to how a business creates passive income and recurring revenue streams that are not necessarily reliant on the owner themselves.
Small Giants by Bo Burlingham
Buy The Automatic Customer by John Warrillow on Amazon today
Visit AutomaticCustomer.com to learn more about the book and get your free e-book
Visit ValueBuilderSystem.com to learn more about John’s company and services
Follow John Warrillow on Facebook and Twitter
Download the full transcript here (coming soon)
Listen on iTunes, Stitcher , and SoundCloud
Related books:
The Membership Economy by Robbie Kellman Baxter
High Paying Clients by Trevor Crane
Unselling by Scott Stratten
Relevant advice and tips:
7 Recommended Books on Starting An Online Business
What did you like and not like about this episode? Fill out this one minute survey here.
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]]>A summary of things you should know about The Membership Economy according to Robbie Kellman Baxter: Introduction In this episode online business expert Robbie Baxter gives an in-depth look insideRead More
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]]>In this episode online business expert Robbie Baxter gives an in-depth look inside her book, The Membership Economy, where she discusses how subscription-based businesses succeed.
In her book Baxter provides an online business roadmap that is packed with step-by-step digital strategies, useful resources, and case studies of super successful dot-com companies. The goal of the book is to show you how to get the most revenue from your online product, create an engaged community of customers, place your revenue on autopilot, and create sustainable loyalty programs.
This book is perfect for entrepreneurs who already or plan to sell an online, subscription-based product or service and are not sure where to begin when it comes to building revenue.
There are a lot of books about specific types of models, there are books that talk about different kinds of trends or behavioral economics but my book really takes a broad and strategic look at what is driving this major transformational trend. My book talks about specific examples across a wide spectrum of organizational structure and I look at how those trends apply across everything in between.
I wrote this book to be read in whatever order you decide.
I want the readers to remember that the goal is no longer about the transaction being the finish line. The transaction is the starting line and the ongoing formal relationship with the customer is going to make the difference between the winners and the losers in the next 20 years.
The book is divided into four sections.
The first section talks about what the membership economy is, why it’s happening right now, what the drivers are, and gives the reader a sense of what the implications are across the social and professional landscape.
The second section is what I think of as the deep meat of the book, the most tactical section and that goes into the seven steps to the membership economy which I outline in detail. This is where you can get tidbits that you apply to your own business right away. I talk about what the implications are of the membership economy for the way you organize your company. I discuss in detail everything you need to know about onboarding. I believe that most organizations under invest in onboarding new customers which needs to happen in the first 30 days. The fourth and fifth chapters, pricing and the use of free, talk about how your members should pay and how to think about your pricing structure. We talk about the use of subscription model s but we also talk about other sources of revenue that membership organizations can layer on top of one another in order to build a robust model. And I talk about the use of free as a really useful tool for extending the reach of your organization. I talk about technology and what kinds of technologies are available for managing ongoing relationships, building loyalty, and mastering retention. I talk about the importance of a focus on the customer over the product. I believe it’s all about the customer and I go over how an organization can build out a customer success team and a culture that promotes a focus on the customer as more important than the product.
Section three goes into the six different types of organizations that are currently benefiting from the membership economy. That’s the digital natives which are subscription businesses and online communities. Then I talk about small businesses and professional services firms and then I talk about nonprofits and professional societies and trade. And finally I talk about what I call the gateway to the membership economy which is loyalty programs.
In the fourth section I talk about the specific points of opportunity in the membership economy which are the hardest spots for entrepreneurs to be successful. This is things like going from idea to startup. I talk about going from being a hot startup that’s really edgy to being a mainstream mature organization. I talk about going from offline business to online business and I also talk about going from a fixed product base pricing ownership model to an access model.
At the very end of the book I take you through very specific steps to get started at looking at your own business and get the reader thinking about where there might be opportunities to leverage the principles of the membership economy. And then I invite you to give me feedback on your own journey and ask me any questions you might have. Ultimately I want there to be a community around the book as well as the book that talks about community.
NOTE: That was just a summary. To get the full deep dive, play the audio clip at 06:15
I have been a strategy consultant for the last 25 years and for the last 15 years I’ve been an independent consultant. I have always been interested in how the psychology of the customer ties in with business models and currently run a successful consulting firm called Peninsula Strategies.
The inspiration behind writing this book was from a consulting project that I did about 12 years ago. I was asked to do a project at Netflix and I fell in love with their business model because of the recurring revenue and the quantity of data they were collecting about their customers. From that point on I really only wanted to work with companies that were thinking about those kind of issues and I felt like I needed to document my experience.
Getting to 50/50 by Sharon Meers and Joanna Strober
Buy The Membership Economy by Robbie Kellman Baxter on Amazon today
Visit MembershipEconomy.com to learn more about the book
Visit PeninsulaStrategies.com to learn more about Robbie and her services
Follow Robbie Kellman Baxter on LinkedIn and Twitter
Download the full transcript here (coming soon)
Listen on iTunes, Stitcher , and SoundCloud
Related books:
Escape The Expected by Tom Trush
Unselling by Scott Stratten
High Paying Clients by Trevor Crane
Relevant advice and tips:
7 Recommended Books on Starting An Online Business
What did you like and not like about this episode? Fill out this one minute survey here.
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]]>A summary of things you should know about The 15 Success Traits of Pro Bloggers according to Jonathan Milligan: Introduction In this episode Jonathan Milligan takes a deep dive intoRead More
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]]>In this episode Jonathan Milligan takes a deep dive into his book, The 15 Success Traits of Pro Bloggers, where he shares a roadmap to becoming a full-time blogger.
In his book Milligan provides a simple blueprint with actionable summaries of the 4 significant habits that aspiring bloggers should add to their daily routine if they want to become online professionals. The goal of the book is to teach you what it takes to achieve maximum results with your blog, how to get your blog noticed by more people, and what types of content generate the most traffic.
This book is perfect for entrepreneurs that own or plan on owing an online based business and what to know the ins and outs of establishing a popular yet profitable blog.
I was very specific in the beginning and I did not want to write another book about how to write a blog. My book is a business book first, it’s something someone can take and use as a self-development plan that you can fall into over the next couple of years.
I would say that if you are just starting out as a blogger you should read it straight through. If you’ve been blogging for a while you might be interested to jump further to the actual processes.
I would hope that the reader would walk away with the heart of the book. The heart of the book is that the best way to grow a business is teaching and serving an audience well.
At the very beginning of the book I share with you a way that you can get access to a one page colored PDF that I had designed that explains the essence of the whole book. This one page infographic is what I call The Blogger Success Pyramid. It’s got the 15 traits in a pyramid format and both my students and I use to help form and build our businesses. And so the chapters are divided into each of those traits.
The very bottom of the pyramid is what I call Tier One and it’s the mindset. The mindset is so important for us to be able to grasp the things that we need to get ahold of in order to achieve success. For many of us, we are going to act out of our thoughts. And so if our thoughts are defeating we are not going to take action. The five mindsets that I share are passion, resilience, confidence, consistency, and patience. You have got to have these five mindsets because without them you will not be able to stay with it over the long haul to achieve success.
In Tier Two we jump into what I think many people get hung up on, the habits. There are so many things to do that you don’t know where to focus your time and so I boil it down in the book to four simple keystone habits. The first habit is the create habit; this habit is to use text, audio and video to get your message out to the masses. The second habit is the capture habit which is the art form exchange of value for e-mail addresses. Building that e-mail list is so critical and so important. From there you have the compile habit and that is where you package your knowledge and perspective into products and services. And then you move into the connect habit which is your ability to connect with other people and build community with other passionate influencers.
In Tier Three we go over systems and there are three traits in this tier which are people, processes, and plans. When you get the right people, you create the right processes that you can outsource, and you put the right plans in place, you can begin to scale your business way beyond yourself.
And finally, the top tier is the Leverage Tier and that’s how you stay on top. There are two essential traits to staying on top and those two traits are learning and listening. Learning is the ability to unlearn and sit at the feet of your peers. The second leverage point is listening and that is the constant awareness of the goals, passions, and struggles of your audience.
NOTE: That was just a summary. To get the full deep dive, play the audio clip at 05:57
“What’s the ultimate result we want from all of this hard work? For me it’s not money, although I need money to live and reach my goals, it’s not fame or popularity, I find more fulfillment in stewarding the gifts Gods given me even if popularity never comes my way. The final success trait cannot be achieved as a goal; instead it’s a result of doing everything else well. It’s the ultimate gift from a lifetime of serving others, trust and authority. You are rich when you’ve earned trust and authority with your audience.” – Jonathan Milligan
I started my career as a high school teacher and both of my parents were educators and so I thought that might be where I was going to land. After about three years of coaching and teaching, I loved the kids but I found that it wasn’t the right environment for me. I had a real entrepreneurial side to me and so I joined up with a startup company that was an executive search firm. I did that for about eight years and from there I got into blogging. Over the course of a couple years I ended up getting to a place where it could replace my job and now today it’s what I do. I am a fulltime blogger and I have two blogs that I manage.
I always had multiple e-mails asking questions of how I became a fulltime blogger and so I began thinking through how exactly I could teach this to others. After running it by friends and family I boiled it down to what I considered 15 success traits.
Work Simply by Carson Tate
Buy The 15 Success Traits of Pro Bloggers by Jonathan Milligan on Amazon today
Visit BloggingYourPassion.com to learn more Jonathan’s book and online courses
Follow Jonathan Milligan on Facebook and Twitter
Download the full transcript here (coming soon)
Listen on iTunes, Stitcher , and SoundCloud
Related books:
Real Moms Making Real Money Blogging by Stephanie O’Dea
The Art of Social Media by Guy Kawasaki and Peg Fitzpatrick
The Website Investor by Jeffrey Hunt
Relevant advice and tips:
7 Recommended Books for Starting an Online Business
What did you like and not like about this episode? Fill out this one minute survey here.
The post A Preview of The 15 Success Traits of Pro Bloggers with Jonathan Milligan appeared first on The Entrepreneurs Library.
]]>For an entrepreneur, launching a startup begins with the creation of something from nothing. This creation should take into account what an individual is passionate about and this can beRead More
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]]>For an entrepreneur, launching a startup begins with the creation of something from nothing. This creation should take into account what an individual is passionate about and this can be done by listing the items and prioritizing them to help an individual remain focused on their idea.
When launching a startup, an entrepreneur must make sure that he or she stands out from the crowd especially because of the large number of new businesses that are launched every year. This is the reason that a successful launch is necessary to help an individual have a strong social proof, build a user base rapidly and improve the chances of long-term growth.
The following are five popular ways entrepreneurs can launch a startup:
The target market chosen should be an industry that is growing fast, big and profitable. The selected market can then be won by differentiation where a business gives customers more of what they want and this boosts their willingness to pay or a business that serves as a low-cost producer and charges the lowest price in the industry. When customers buy the products, the entrepreneur should monitor the changing customer needs as well as new technologies and figure out other additional products to build as well as fresh markets to conquer.
The competition should be studied through the performance of the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats analysis. A list of businesses that offer services and products similar to the one being launched should be done, a review of the marketing materials which includes brochures and ads should also be done.
The marketing tactics and strategy should also be chosen. This involves the sales as well as the marketing channels that can be used which include online, catalog or using dealers. Multichannel marketers usually achieve great success because customers like it when they can shop when and however they like.
Knowing the product’s life cycle is important because the campaign used during the introduction as well as education phase of the service or product needs to be updated as the service or product matures. An entrepreneur should monitor the marketing results carefully so as to notice any diminishing returns that indicate when to revise the service or product, alter the media message or phase out the particular offering.
This is important so that people can start signing up to receiving emails from an email list. This should be done before the official launch. Email is important because it can get people engaged as well as convert them into customers. For the email list to work an entrepreneur must get their contact list together, this can be done by downloading contacts from those on the email or from people spoken to. This data can be put in a customer relationship management system. Emailing people directly with the launch announcement is more effective than posting it on social media.
Having a large list of motivated and qualified email subscribers is important if the business is to grow. This list can be built by using list building strategies as follows:
> The list can be built with article marketing where the content is taken from the entrepreneur’s blog or website and is then submitted to article directories.
> Videos can be used to build the list because videos help to authentically connect with the people who visit the entrepreneur’s site and allows engagement in a compelling manner. Videos also allow an individual to interact with prospects better.
> Pay-Per-Click advertising can be used in list building and is one technique that can attract many ideal as well as highly qualified leads consistently.
This list dictates the number of clients and customers that sign on and this affects the income of the business.
For an individual to optimize their website, it is important that they give the right kind of information that will grab people’s attention as well as leave an element of mystery that will generate curiosity. The content on the website should be useful, link-worthy and entertaining as this increases the chance of the start-up being discovered. Assess the type of content the competition is creating and use gaps in the content as an opportunity to deliver something the competitors have missed or are lazy to perfect. Keywords should be worked into the posts and the blog optimized for the search engines.
Having a page that is a basic “Coming Soon” page, can be used to entice people to sign up. Offering a special bonus can be an effective way to get early subscribers. Make social sharing an important part of your website and lead generation plan as well.
The sign-ups should be monitored on a daily basis and this should be set up in a way that an email is received every time someone signs up. This can be used to send the person a follow-up thank-you note.
Attracting clients consistently requires that the entrepreneur’s marketing message be clear and stand out. When this message is clear, the marketing plan will be so much easier as well as less costly. To communicate regularly it is important to engage the audience immediately. This can be done by sending out emails regularly, as well as offering people something that will be useful to them with each message. This is one way to keep them signed up, and respond positively to the launch. Have email programs that will allow the set up of “autoresponder” sequences that enable the automatic sending to people a particular set of messages once they sign up.
The emails can offer sneak peeks concerning the progress of the business, industry news, fun quips and also how-to.
To launch a startup successfully, align it with relevant companies that have significant reach. With that being said, it is very important that an entrepreneur looks for opportunities in brands that will complement their product offering and provide unique value for the customers. Build relationships with people regarded as influential in the industry. This will open the business to powerful resources, endorsements as well as introductions to other key influencers in the industry.
The Startup Survival System by Kurt Won
New Business Next Steps by Ann Hawkins
Become Your Own Boss in 12 Months by Melinda Emerson
Startupland by Mikkel Svane
100 Days of Growth by Sujan Patel
The post 5 Popular Ways Entrepreneurs Can Launch A Startup appeared first on The Entrepreneurs Library.
]]>A summary of things you should know about 100 Days of Growth according to Sujan Patel: Introduction In this episode Sujan Patel takes a deep dive into his book, 100Read More
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]]>In this episode Sujan Patel takes a deep dive into his book, 100 Days of Growth, where he shares over 100 online marketing strategies that are used by top performing companies.
In his book Patel provides actionable techniques his company has used to help other businesses grow and teaches you step-by-step how to implement these growth strategies into your own business. The goal of the book is to help you improve your search engine optimization efforts, increase your lead generation results, eliminate ineffective digital marketing tactics, and much more.
This book is perfect for entrepreneurs who own an online business and are looking for an all-in-one guide for effective digital marketing tactics that will take their results from good to excellent.
I have personally weeded out a lot of strategies and tried 300 things I include in the book. This book is not a long read and each tactic and page is easy to understand and something you can do yourself.
It’s one of those books that you can jump in and out of.
The principle that I want the reader to takeaway is that you should always be testing new concepts. I layout 100 and as you read the book you will probably find a few 100 more. You don’t have to spend months strategizing and planning, you just start doing.
From the book you are going to learn a lot of how to repeat and how to implement things like AB testing your homepage. You can read all this stuff on the web but this is specifically the one thing you need to AB test. If you are thinking about how to leverage your traffic more there are things like the exit intent popup. Or if you want to build a referral program there is a simple way to get started. This book is not the end all be all but simply a way for you to start and with a successful method. The book spins around a lot of different things that are all around getting more revenue from your internet business.
NOTE: That was just a summary. To get the full deep dive, play the audio clip at 04:21
I don’t have a favorite quote but I’ll give you my favorite tactic listed in the book. It’s the first tactic and it’s just giving away a free company t-shirt. It’s such a simple thing and yes it cost money but I’ve personally made a little under a million dollars just from giving away free t-shirts from my agency.
I’ve been doing digital marketing for 12 years now and worked with hundreds of clients helping them grow their traffic and revenue. Over the years I’ve worked on a lot of different ideas that have failed and a handful of things that have worked. My concept for the book is to put together my learnings and successes in a repeatable fashion.
I wanted to make something where people can follow along. Every tip and tactic is something you can do and ideally if you did one thing a day for the next 100 days you’re going to see some exponential growth. My inspiration was to take all my learnings of how to grow a business and make it useful, tactical, and actionable.
Good to Great by Jim Collins
Buy 100 Days of Growth by Sujan Patel today
Visit 100DaysofGrowth.com to learn more about the book
Get in touch with Sujan via email here
Follow Sujan Patel on Facebook and Twitter
Download the full transcript here (coming soon)
Listen on iTunes, Stitcher , and SoundCloud
Related books:
The Predictable Profits Playbook by Charles Gaudet
Do It! Marketing by David Newman
Digital Bacon by Alex Rodriguez
Relevant advice and tips:
5 Reasons Why Your Marketing Sucks
What did you like and not like about this episode? Fill out this one minute survey here.
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