MBA2675 Q&A Wednesday: How Do I Sell More Without Spending More?

0:00Do you want to increase revenue without spending another dollar? Well, did you know that 5 % increase in retention can boost your profits by 25 % to 95 %? That's not a typo. Emails still deliver$36 for every dollar spent. If you're ignoring your list, you're stepping over money, really. The average car abandon rate sits around 70%. Fixing that leak beats buying more traffic every single day of the week. and a 1 % price increase can lift profits at around 8 % with stable volume. Tiny change, outsized result, and adding authentic reviews can spike conversions, especially for higher priced items.

0:43We're not talking about theory. This is the tightening the bolts and go faster episode for you. No extra fuel required. We're going to fix an issue that Tom has on today's Q &A Wednesday. He asks the question, how do I sell more without spending more? Let's get into it.

1:08Welcome back to the$100 MBA show. I'm your host, Omar Zinhome, where I deliver practical business lessons three times a week, Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, to help you start, grow, and scale your business. Real quick, if these episodes help you in any way, hit the follow button on this podcast app. It helps us to keep bringing you practical business insights three times a week for free. Thanks. Today's episode, today's playbook is a near zero budget lever that you could pull immediately to start seeing some results. You're going to spend nearly no money to make these things happen. You're just going to make a few changes with what you already have.

1:48Our aim today is to convert more of what you already get. we're going to raise effective price without being expensive. We're going to still live in the same place in the mind of your buyers. So they don't feel a big difference, but it's going to make a big difference for you. And number three, we're going to extract more value per customer. Number four, we're going to react faster than the competitors. Number five, we're going to let our customers sell for you. Number six, we're going to resurrect the dead. We're going to resurrect leads that have not engaged with you or even previous buyers.

2:21Number seven, we're going to remove the fear with risk reversal. Number eight, we're going to make clear offers, not louder offers, offers that just make more sense for your customer. Number nine, we're going to partner instead of paying. And that's all I got for you. Nine things, right? No, we're going to get into the details of each one of these things. And I've weaved the data. I've weaved some examples in today's episode from my own business, the$100 MBA, as well as the software company that I built over 10 years and exited, Weaponar Ninja, and a few of my stories from my own father who was in sales, in business for years.

2:59So I'm going to share everything I know to help you make more with zero additional spend. Because sometimes it's just fixing a few small things that make all the difference. and I've experienced this over the years and it's time for you to experience this and start reaping the benefits. Number one, we're gonna fix the leaks before you buy more water. Stop spending money when you are not maximizing on what you already have. Let me give you an example. If you have 1 ,000 people see your offer, 1 ,000 people go to your landing page and 2 % of them buy a$200 product, that's$4 ,000. Pretty good, right?

3:40But what if we improve to 3 %? No new traffic, no extra traffic. The same thousand people go to your landing page, but instead of 2 % convert, 3 % buy. You're looking at$6 ,000, a 50 % revenue bump just because you increase conversions by 1%. This is the beauty of math and compounding, okay? When you run the numbers, it's outstanding. So where do we look first? Where is the free, cheap areas we look first to make sure we can increase conversions and reap the benefits of this beautiful math. Number one, car checkout friction. I can't tell you how much time we've spent on this in all our businesses, because when you have fewer fields, when you have a guest checkout options, when you have clear total price, when you have trust payment badges, so they understand that this is a secure checkout, there's so much you can do in checkout that can just reduce the friction to get people to get over the line and buy.

4:40You also want to do a clarity check. A stranger should understand what it is you're selling, who's it for, and what it does. And what happens in the next five seconds. You need to answer why now. You need to nudge them with simple little things that will make a big difference, like a simple deadline. How many of you have bought movie tickets online? I just bought a pair of movie tickets at our local cinema. And the first thing you see when you go through that checkout is a timer. You already got eight minutes and it's counting down to go through checkout so you can get these seats. That's on purpose.

5:17The site is trying to encourage you to check out. Do not leave this site because then you're going to have to go through this whole process again. And maybe your seats will be gone. This works. Why? Because the average cart abandonment hovers around 70%. 100%. Small fixes moves mountains, okay? I'm telling you right now, let me give you a story, an example. In my early days of running Webinar Ninja, my software company, we shaved our checkout from 14 fields to six fields. We made it super simple. Any information we didn't need for them to check out, we removed. And then we then collected it later once they became a customer.

5:56And we did it in the onboarding process. We were getting the same traffic, but higher take rate, a higher conversion rate. And it felt like finding money in an old jacket. Next, let's talk about raising your effective price without raising prices. What does that mean? You can increase your average order value and profit with packaging. This means you can keep the prices of your products and your offers the same, but you can increase how much each customer spends with you by bundling offers. It also could be done with packaging, how you offer your offer. Let me give you an example. Good, better, best tiers.

6:35This is tried and true. This is industry standard. This is best practices. You anchor value with what your customers can see, value that they actually value, things that they actually want, and let customers select. Do they want the starter? Do they want the pro? Do they want the expert? Let the customer select and you'll see a natural migration to the middle or the top. When you only have one price, it's just one option. They don't even value that offer because there's nothing to compare it to. And this is where a packaging and anchoring helps. Even if you just have two choices, you get this or this.

7:11And the difference in price maybe is insignificant in the customer's mind. Maybe like$200,$260. Oh, I'll pay$260 if I'm going to get a whole of this extra stuff, more value. For a lot of people are value driven. and you would never make that additional$60 per customer if you didn't have the tiers. Another version of this is annual plan switching at checkout. Now, if you have any kind of membership, any kind of subscription, you should offer monthly and annual plans and if you want, even buy annual plans. What you want to do here is you want to make it very lucrative, very attractive for your customer to go annual, to go longer, right?

7:49Give them two free months. You're going to make money in the long run. Why? Because they're going to have a less likelihood of canceling if they are annual versus monthly. Why? Because they're on monthly, they're making a decision to stay with you every single month. 12 times a year, they're making the decision. Should I stay with these people? Am I using this thing? Should I cancel? Maybe next month. Next month comes around. I haven't used it yet. Let me cancel, right? Annual plans, they're making this decision once a year. So you have a better chance of keeping this customer. It's worth the discount that you offer.

8:20You get higher cash collected up front so that you can invest into your business. You get lower churn, meaning less customers leave because they're not making this decision every single month. By doing an annual prepay, meaning they pay the annual up front, it reduces a lot of cancellations, like I mentioned, but also it allows your customer to be invested in what they're buying. Why does this work? Well, price sensitivity is often about context. Think about it. people are only really price sensitive when they don't feel like they're getting enough for their money. But if they feel like they're getting a lot for their money, regardless of the price, then it reframes the value.

9:02Remember, a 1 % price lift equals around 8 % profit lift on average. So you want to increase that money being spent as much as possible per customer. Let me share a story because this was incredibly powerful for our business. We did two things when it came to this topic in our software company webinar ninja that just changed our growth tremendously one in the checkout process you know you have that toggle monthly annual we made the annual price the default so when they went to the pricing page it showed the annual price it made it clear this is annual and we also broke it down and show them this is how much you are paying per month but you're paying up front for an annual but the breakdown of how much you're paying each month versus if you go monthly, the price would increase.

9:48Why does this actually work better? Because we found that people are really motivated by loss aversion. Number three, increase LTV with simple, honest upsells. What you want to do here is increase lifetime value, how much money your customer spends in the total lifetime of working with you. You heard this a million times when you went to a fast food restaurant. Would you like fries with that? Would you like fries with that is not evil, right? It's genuinely helpful. Like, yeah, I'll have fries with that. It's just a suggestion, right? And that's what order bumps are or upsells are. And they're just happening in the digital world, right?

10:25A good example of this is like adding a workbook template or an onboarding call. And they could just add it in checkout. Post-purchase upsells, meaning that if they already bought, you can send them an email and say, hey, would you like a deeper dive workshop? Would you like VIP support? Would you like an implementation service to help you get a result faster, right? Maybe another option is after seven days, you can have an email with a relevant add-on based on what they bought. Okay, so this could be like even not just right after they bought, but maybe after they've used the product or maybe after they've been a customer for a little bit.

10:58Number four, speed to lead wins deals. What do I mean by speed to lead? If you reply to any inbound lead in five minutes or less, you are dramatically more likely to qualify and convert that lead if you waited hours. Faster replies correlates with higher close rates. That's just called the facts. Very easy, no budget tool is just to have a autoresponder set up in your email or in your already established customer support tool where it just says, hey, got your message. we're going to get back to you as soon as possible. You can have a Zapier integration where you can easily just get a Zap to get a text message or get a Slack message or whatever message to alert you or somebody on your team to have a human follow-up.

11:45My dad sold cars for a living and back in the 90s when people were buying cars they would go to a dealership they would go walk around and the other salesman would just kind of like judge the person as they walk in is this worth approaching this person? My dad didn't do any of that. He never kind of judged anybody. He was just the first person to greet people and just ask them some questions and listen to their response. He was a fast listener. And an equation that really worked for him was speed plus curiosity equals trust. If you approach somebody at the dealership, you know, as they walk in and say, hey, welcome to our dealership.

12:23We're so happy to have you. Want to take a look around? Let me know if you have any questions. In the meantime, can I get you a cup of coffee? Low pressure. But number one, welcome them. Let them know, I got your back. I'm here to help you. I'm here to answer questions. And then when that gave them enough time to kind of go away and get some coffee, and that gave that person, the customer, a few minutes to look around, look at the cars, and he's not going to go anywhere because, or she's not going to go anywhere because they know that he's getting a cup of coffee for them. Get him a cup of coffee.

12:51And then as he hands them the cup of coffee, you know, ask them a few questions about, you know, why are you looking to buy a car? What do you not like about your current car? All that kind of stuff. getting curious, that builds trust quickly, and that closes sales. Number five, activate social proof the right way. Reviews, testimonials, case studies, these are not decoration. These are conversion monsters. They really help you convert big time on your sales. Spiegel Research Center did a whole study on this and found that reviews actually make a meaningful lift in conversion rates. Now, this is what you could do right now to make this a reality for you so you can start seeing more money coming in.

13:32Email past buyers and ask them the question, what almost stopped you from buying and what happened after you did? Turn it into a three-sentence testimonial. This is going to be huge at checkout. Add a face, add a first name, and a context, like the role, their company, who they are, even where they live is some context. Authenticity beats some vague praise by a nobody and a no face. Sprinkle as seen on media logos if you have mentions in articles, in publications. Number six, let your customers sell for you through referrals and referrals in disguise. People trust people. Recommendations from friends, from family, they rank far above ads.

14:17So you want to use this. Ask specifically to your customers, who are the three people you know who would benefit from the result? Don't say, do you know? Ask who you know. That's a very good way to phrase it so that they're thinking about people rather than yes or no. Give them everything they need to recommend you. Give them a how-to, a tiny copy and paste blurb, a video, an image, something that they can forward to a friend and say, hey, this is what I just bought. This is what I just experienced. You're going to love it. reward outcomes not attempts so when somebody comes through and says hey i heard about you through mrs or mr so and so there's nothing wrong with rewarding that customer that did the referral number seven win back and resurrect campaigns selling your existing audience is the ultimate no budget growth move dormant subscribers still working on x is an email i always send next trial but no buy.

15:17What made you hesitate? Anybody that's tried your product refunded or whatever, ask them the question, what made you hesitate? You can send them an email and just ask them to reply. Very simple. Past buyers, since you bought my product, right? You want to ask them. Most people want this next product. Here's how it helps you. Okay. So if you have a value ladder, meaning you have one product here, next product, next product, you want to walk them through the ladder. We want to get them through that value ladder and just say, hey, you bought this product. Most people that buy this product, then graduate and buy this product.

15:49And this is how this product helps you. Make sure you make it clear how that transition happens. Number eight, remove the fear, risk reversal. People hesitate because of risk versus reward. They feel that they're scared to buy because what if it's not a good fit? What if I waste my money? What if I feel like I'm wasting my time. You want to have a clear guarantee and you want to make sure it's iterated more than once. You want to put it on the sales page, in the checkout page, in your FAQs as much as possible. Clear. We have a 30 day money back guarantee. If you don't get X outcome and you're not happy, email us and we'll refund you.

16:27No forms, no hoops, no questions asked. Try before you buy elements are really good. These are trials. These are modules. These are sandbox accounts. These are demos. These are the first modules free kind of thing. This is a good way to ease them in price anchoring assurance. So for example, if this doesn't save you at least X amount of hours or X amount of dollars, you don't pay you get a refund sounds very appealing. Like wow, okay, I have this is a no brainer guarantees reduce perceived risk and you want to pair them with a strong onboarding. So refund odds stay low, you want to make sure that not only do you want to reduce risk before they buy, but after they buy immediately, let's increase the chances of them being successful with your product or your service.

17:09So that way they have no buyer's remorse. Number nine, we're almost through this guys, clarify your offer. Most marketing problems are actually positioning problems. Let me explain. You want to say less, but make it unmistakable. For example, a headline, you want to make sure the outcome is in plain English that anybody at any level understands this launch your first course in 30 days step by step clear I know what I'm getting subheading for who it is and proof right like used by 7 ,000 creators and includes templates and coaching that makes it easier for you to get started right CTA what happens next save your seat for this workshop or buy now and start building your course.

17:58If your pitch takes paragraphs to understand, people assume your product takes months to use, or it's going to be complicated and hard to implement. Number 10, partner instead of paying. Co-host trainings with people in your space that have the same audience, but they're not maybe your competitor. You can guest on other podcasts, right? Do a little mini podcast tour and be a guest on podcasts that have the audience you're looking for. Early on in my days of Webinar Ninja, I did a lot of webinars for other people in my industry. My friends, zero ad spend, big trust lift, immediate buyers, because I was borrowed credibility.

18:36They would introduce me to their audience and they'd be like, hey, this is Omar. He's a webinar expert. He's going to show you how to run a webinar. And they trusted me immediately because they trust the person that invited me. Okay, I want to give you a little bit more. So we're going to go through a lightning round of tiny tweaks, but big upsides. I'm going to go rapid fire. Here we go. Payment plans, same total, slightly higher. Unlock buyers who can't do a lump sum today. So break up things into payment plans. So for example, if your course is$2 ,000, break it up into three payments or five payments or four payments of 500.

19:06Next, add most popular badge on your plan that you want your customers to actually pick. Maybe the middle plan. On your FAQ page, make sure you're answering real objections like objections of time or difficulty or support or a refund rate? Risk reversal. Is this for me? These are the questions you want to answer in your FAQs. Post-purchase survey. What almost stopped you from buying is a great question to ask after they buy. Mine that gold, okay? Fix that next leak that you might be stopping people from buying. This person went through, but maybe another person will be stopped in their tracks because of this reason.

19:42All right, action plan. I'm serious here. I'm going to give you a seven-day action plan. So the next seven days, you're going to increase your conversions, make more money without any spend. Let's go. Day one, you're going to go through what's called a clarity pass on your sales pages, your headlines, your subheadlines, your CTAs, your FAQs, everything. Make sure it's super clear and very easy to understand. I love the concept of copywriting. Speak like a caveman. Click here, buy now. These are short, clear terms. Day two, add three of your strongest testimonials with specifics, with faces on your sales pages, on your website, in your checkout.

20:18Day three, simplify checkout. Make it as simple as possible. Minimize the steps, minimize the forms they need to fill out. Add an order bump if you want. Make it simple for them to sign up without having to have some sort of account or anything like that. Day four, turn on your annual plan option at checkout. Highlight the savings they're gonna have. Day five, create a four email win back for dormant leads, leads that haven't done much for you or bought anything in a while. Day six, draft a clear guarantee and a rapid onboarding checklist for your buyers. Remember, risk reversal plus onboarding equals happy customers that stay with you forever.

20:55Day seven, ask 10 happy customers for three referrals each. Give them a copy and paste blurb so that they can send it to their friends. You don't need to spend a cent. You just need a little bit of effort, a little bit of hustle and you'll increase your conversions, you'll increase your LTV, you'll increase your referrals, you'll increase your average revenue per customer, all that kind of stuff. Before I go, I want to leave you with this. Look, I love great marketing, but what I found in my decades of experience in business is that the fastest way to sell more without spending more is to become the company that feels better to buy from.

21:32What does that mean? It means It's faster to respond, clearer to understand, safer to try. It means easier to say yes to. Okay, this is a feeling. You have to also understand that customers will feel even more confident when you're proud enough to ask for a referral. Do that and you'll make more from what you already have than you thought was possible. Thank you so much. I wanted to give you everything I knew on this topic. If you've got a question you want to ask here on Q &A Wednesday, just go ahead and ask it. Just submit your question over at 100mba.net slash Q. If you found today's episode helpful and you want more practical business lessons to help you start, grow, and scale your business, the best thing you could do is subscribe to this podcast.

22:17Hit subscribe or follow on your favorite podcast app, the one that you're using right now, whether it's Apple or Spotify or wherever you listen to podcasts. By hitting subscribe, you get our next episode automatically and it's the best way to support the show. It's absolutely free and it's a way for you to commit to growing your business. And now that you've subscribed, I'll check you in the next episode.