-•- HomeOfficeDigest.com Newsletter - Issue 259 -•-
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THE HOME OFFICE DIGEST NEWSLETTER
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BE YOUR OWN BOSS
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As a small business owner, you absolutely have to treat each and 
every customer right. I'm sure that many of you jump to action if
you get an email from a name you recognize, but do you take that 
very same approach if you don't recognize the name? Some of the 
biggest names in your industry don't have a name at all, but you 
might not know that if you aren't treating them with the respect
they deserve. Every time that we get an email from a new client 
we treat that person as if they're the only reason that we're in 
business. Why take that approach? Because they are! Small orders 
from clients are just as important as big ones, and you have to 
see that if you're going to succeed. Think about it in terms of 
a small restaurant. You've probably been to a sandwich shop that 
makes no more than a dollar or two on each order you make. Each 
time you visit the restaurant they stand to lose much more than 
a dollar or two, they could lose hundreds! If you aren't treated
well, or you don't get the right order, that restaurant could be
losing your business for years to come, and that could translate
into hundreds of dollars. If you multiple that amount by just ten
or twenty customers over the term of a year, that business could 
be losing tens of thousands of dollars because they didn't treat
the little fish with respect. Sure, these restaurants probably go
overboard for their big clients, but if they don't remember the 
little guys they're probably going to lose even more. Small time
business is big time business, don't lose sight of that! Treat a
new client as through they are your biggest client and you will 
be well on your way to a successful small business.

 
FEATURED GUEST ARTICLE
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8 Ways to Earn More Without Working Harder

by Marcia Yudkin

Conventional wisdom has it that there are only three
ways to grow your business:  find new customers,
increase the amount of each sale to existing customers
or get customers to buy more frequently.  But I've
seen business owners go blank when presented with
those three options.  So here is a more useful list of
ways to increase your total revenues without in most
cases having to put in more hours at the office.

1. Charge by the project rather than by the hour. 
Hourly fees are a death trap for the experienced
professional.  You get penalized for being able to
zoom right in to the nub of the problem and its
solution.  If you are good at what you do, instead
provide customized quotes for each whole project. 
Most clients prefer this anyhow, so that they know in
advance what they will owe you.  The exception is when
you can't nail down the scope of the project before
getting started;  in that case alone, revert to hourly
fees.

2. Boost your exclusivity and perceived value.  If you
emphasize that you don't sell to just anyone who shows
up at your door, but you have certain criteria for the
clients you choose to serve, people become more eager
to engage your services.  Likewise, if you drive home
the value that you provide with testimonials, case
studies, client lists and specific results you have
achieved in the past, you'll get a greater return from
all the marketing you're already doing.

3. Create higher-end, higher-priced programs and
options.  A photographer friend of mine learned that
people enjoy options to select from, and they most
like to select the next-to-most-expensive option.  So
to increase her income from framed family portraits,
she simply offered a larger and more expensive frame
as the biggest option.  Customers were then more
likely to choose the second biggest, which cost more
than the previous second biggest frame.

4. Create a repeat-billing product or service instead
of selling one-shot products or services.  Get clients
to sign on to some sort of ongoing service plan, and
you get a longer, larger return from each of your
marketing efforts.  For the photographer, this could
be a plan for enlargements tailored for a number of
holidays spread throughout the year, such as Mother's
Day, Father's Day, Christmas and Valentine's Day.  

5. Revise your current products and services for a
specialized market and charge more.  Whatever the
industry, people believe they have special needs and
therefore they will pay more for products and services
specifically for them.  By making small and in many
cases insignificant changes in your offerings, you can
increase people's willingness to pay more for your
items or your knowledge.

6. Sell related products and services - your own or
someone else's - to current and past customers.  Hair
stylists easily sell mousse and conditioner to their
clients, who want to look as great when they're on
their own as they do when walking out of the salon. 
When people buy from you, what else do they typically
need to enjoy a complete solution to their problem? 
Mark up the offerings of other service or product
providers along with your own, and your total revenues
go up.

7. Make it possible for clients to prepay and "stock
up" on your services or products.  I pay for the next
winter's fuel each summer and get a lower price per
gallon, and the fuel company gets lots more money
earlier.  Similarly, offer a slight discount for six
months or a year's worth of your consulting services,
and your cash flow can instantly improve.  

8. Simply raise your prices.  Most entrepreneurs
charge too little and are thereby earning less than
they could with every sale.  Raise the price of your
book from $17.95 to $19.95, or of your fee for
cleaning teeth from $90 to $99.  Usually there's
little or no resistance from your market.  Sometimes
with a significant raise in prices, you lose some
customers but revenues increase overall.  That's the
goal!

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Marcia Yudkin  is the author of 6
Steps to Free Publicity and 10 other books.  She runs
a private member site, MarketingforMore.com, which
supports business owners who are growing their
businesses. Learn how to avoid the most common pricing
mistakes in her free report, "Charge More & Get It,"
available from http://www.marketingformore.com/survey.htm.

DOWNLOAD OF INTEREST
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The download of interest this week is a great little program named
Pixie. Anyone involved in designing images for use on the web must 
have this program! So what is Pixie? Pixie is an easy-to-use, fast
and incredibly small utility designed especially to fit the needs 
of Webmasters and Designers. It's basically a color picker that you
use in conjunction with your mouse. When you run Pixie a very small
window will appear on your screen. Once that window appears, simply
point the tip of your mouse pointer at any color on your screen and
Pixie will tell you the hex, RGB, HTML, CMYK and HSV values of that
color. If you're a designer, you know that you can then use these
values to reproduce the selected color in your favorite programs.
Pixie will also show the current x y position of your mouse so you
can pinpoint exact locations in images to make sure you're getting
just the right spot. It's the only tool you will need for working
with colors. The best part about Pixie is that it's FREE! Get this 
wonderful image and color tool at http://www.nattyware.com before 
they realize it's too darn good to be free! I'll be the first to 
admit that this isn't a program I use on a daily basis, but when 
I find something I like online, or a specific palette that I would
love to use on one of my own sites I open up Pixie and save the
data for future reference. Why go through the trouble of saving an
entire website just to figure out a few shades? Do it the easy way
with Pixie!

 
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