In the coming few days I’ll be showcasing 9 different Maverick Multipliers. My goal is for you to instantly apply these to your business for increased revenue and profits. Plus, create more joy, happiness and meaning out of your work (and life).
Working with entrepreneurs in hundreds of dozens and dozens of industries and marketplaces I’ve seen a cross-section of what works and what doesn’t. There are so many hidden profit centers but I typically like to start with the easiest, lowest-hanging fruit…
Maverick Multiplier #1: Instant Revenue and Add-ons:
Each day whenever a customer/patient/client does business with you, you’re given a golden opportunity to present them with more products or services to meet their wants and instantly increase your bottom line simply using an upsell. This is the “would you like fries” strategy from McDonalds. Unless you’re offering “fries” you’re missing out on tons and tons of profit.
It’s great!
But, what’s an upsell?
Well, let me give you an example that you can relate to.
A few years ago my wife, Missy, wanted a new Honda. She went into the Honda dealership knowing exactly which model and color she wanted. Missy knew what she wanted to pay and that was it. So I negotiated with her and we got the car at the price she wanted and even got more for her trade than I expected from the dealership.
Now, comes the fun part…
Missy was given all kinds of upsells at this point. Would she want upholstery protection? How about paint sealant? Rust protection? Spoiler? Wheel Locks? Extended warranty? Alarm? Upgraded music system? Financing? Etc. etc. I think you get the point. The auto industry does a masterful job of upselling their customer. Usually, the dealership doesn’t even make anything on the actual car – but they make tons of profit with all these upsells.
Let me give you a couple more examples so you can see how this will apply to your business.
A few winters ago I went skiing in Keystone, Colorado. My friend Bart and I headed there after a marketing conference. He needed to rent skis and just as he was paying for his ski rental the guy behind the counter says, “would you like damage protection – it’s only a dollar more?”
So of course Bart takes the insurance (and boy did he need it considering we were going off 10 or 15 foot jumps that day). I’ll make you a bet all those dollars really add up!
Also, at this seminar in Colorado was the first time I met Alex Mandossian, part of his story is being responsible for millions and millions of dollars in sales via infomercials. It was amazing all the simple tweaks he added that significantly increased his company’s revenue.
The first example was an infomercial for a 35-mm Nippon camera for $19.95 with 100 free rolls of film. A good deal and lots of people called in. Now, here’s the juicy part. Every time an order was placed the operator read this script:
Operator: “Are you going to be using your camera to take pictures inside?”
Caller: “Yes.”
Operator: “Well, as a preferred Nippon customer you can get the flash attachment today only for just $10.00 with no additional shipping or handling. That’s a savings of $9.00. May I add that to your order?”
* * *
That’s it – that’s the simple script. Would you believe 60% – 80% of the people said “yes”?
It’s true! The bottom line increase was incredible because there was no additional cost of sale to reach this customer. They sold hundreds of thousands of units.
Here’s another example from Alex….
As the marketing director for one of the biggest tooth whitening toothpastes around, he found a simple, yet ingenious way to increase the sale. When callers called in to order one tube for $19.95 here’s the script:
* * *
Operator: “How many members are in your family?”
Caller: “2”
Operator: “Well, as a preferred customer you can get 2 tubes for only $24.95 today only for just $10.00 with no additional shipping or handling. That’s a savings of $9.00. May I add that to your order?”
* * *
Do you see the incredible leverage here?
There is no additional cost per sale each time a person calls in. The upsell or cross-sell is nearly all extra profit that goes right to your bottom line!
Here’s an interesting fact – did you know nearly all of the infomercials you see on TV today wouldn’t make a profit unless they continued using their upsell? It’s true. And I hope that gives you a small inkling of the power this concept could hold for your business or practice.
Let me give you another real world example from Ron Popeil’s book “The Salesman of the Century”. Ron is that guy you’ve probably seen on late night infomercials selling his “Showtime Rotisserie Cooker”, “Pasta Machine”, “Food Dehydrator” and even that stuff you spray on your head to get rid of your bald spot.
Ron has made millions on TV and one of his biggest secrets is capitalizing on using an upsell when customers call in. Here’s what he writes:
“Since we have the consumer on the phone, and she is in a receptive mood for buying the product, by offering an additional very special value that we hope she can’t refuse, we’ll add to her satisfaction and our profitability”
“So when she’s about to order, the operator tells her about our special offer: twelve different additional pasta shaping dies (types of pasta), which normally sell for $9 each by themselves, a four-way ravioli maker, and a video cookbook, all for just an additional $39.95, and no additional shopping and handling. ‘Can I add that to your order?’”
“Well, 50 percent of the people order the extra dies because they’d like to have them and wouldn’t mind the ravioli maker and the cookbook video as well. So the $160 sale is now a $200 sale, and this represents another profit margin. Of the 200,000 Pasta Machines we’ve now sold on TV, some 51 percent were with the upsell, which of course meant greater profits.”
Wow! Let’s do a quick calculation here – 200,000 Pasta Machines x 51% upsells at $39.95/each – that’s an additional $4,074,900.00 profits! Not too shabby!
You’ve got to understand the psychology behind it. Once a customer (or client, subscriber, patient, etc.) makes a buying decision they’ve already decided to buy. They have a credit card in hand and they’ve mentally gone from prospect to customer. At this point it’s not difficult to increase their order by simply offering them something else or a ‘deal’ on some deluxe version.
An upsell can work everywhere and you don’t even need anyone to make the offer.
When you head over to the Golden Arches of McDonald’s – they’ll ask you if you want to “upsize” your meal. And almost any restaurant will offer you dessert at the end of the meal. This even works great on the Internet…
On one of my first sites – Instant Sales Letters – I originally introduced an upsell that 56% of buyers take. That’s all extra profit for me with no additional cost or work after it was set up. So cool! It worked like this: Once somebody clicks on the order button on my page they are taken to another page (not the order page). On this new page I let them that today only they can become a special “Gold” member for only $15 more and they’ll get 2 additional bonuses not available in the regular package.
So, what’s happening inside the prospect’s head? They figure – heck, if I was going to spend $40 bucks on Instant Sales Letters I might as well spend $15 dollars more and get the whole shebang.
The way I present the offer is that it’s only 15 dollars more. Not that’s it’s $54.97. The $15 seems small in relation to the $39.97 they were going to spend anyway.
Here’s the page on my site that gives them the upsell.
My numbers have been quite good using this technique – as high as 68% some days. So think about my additional profit margins just by inserting this one extra page. Awesome! (BTW – Instant Sales Letters is still one of our best sellers with over $1M sold, if you don’t have it – you definitely need a copy.) 😉
Okay, I want to expand your mind even more and fill it with all kinds of examples…The next one is something I’ve used in the mail order business. It’s so simple yet extremely profitable again with zero effort. I used to sell a marketing package to help cosmetic surgeons increase their practice and on their order form we have this section:
* * *
Here’s The Free Tool Kit I Want With The Advanced Membership:
- Liposuction Tool Kit
- Blepharoplasty Tool Kit
- Laser Resurfacing Tool Kit
- Breast Augmentation Tool Kit
- Laser Hair Removal Tool Kit
- Endermologie Tool Kit
- Sclerotherapy Tool Kit
- Hair Restoration Tool Kit
Additional Tool Kits Are Only $395 $177 With Your Order
* * *
That’s it. I just let them have an option of not only getting one tool kit for free with the Advanced membership (which is a deluxe version) but also the opportunity to buy several kits now for a preferential deal. And about 15%-20% of the people will order 1, 2 or even 3 more tool kits.
This is so important. If you give people a preferential deal, a certain percentage will take you up on it.
And how about this one?
You can simply make recommendations. Have you ever bought anything from Amazon.com? I love Amazon and I buy lots of things from them – and they also show you additional items that other customers bought who bought your same item or frequently purchased together. My last purchase of a book they had 3 different categories of additional recommend items:
Frequently Bought With <Your Item>:
Customers Also Bought these Highly Rated Items:
Customers Who Bought <Your Item> Also Bought:
It works! I’ve ordered books and other things before that I wasn’t planning on.
* * *
The upsell is one of the easiest (and most profitable) techniques you can start implementing tomorrow using the tools and scripts below!
How to Make It Work For Your Business…
First, you need to think about the upsell. What will you be offering?
- Can you offer a deluxe version of what you’re already selling? What bonuses can you create, license, buy, etc. to create a deluxe version? Put something in the deluxe version that is so appealing they’ll have to upgrade (like for my marketing manual to cosmetic surgeons – they received a diskette with pre-done ads and letters for marketing certain procedures only with the Gold membership).
(Here’s an example from Demotivators.com with 3 versions of their book comes in 3 editions up to the $1,195.00 Executive version…Hmmmm.)
- Can you offer a bigger quantity of what you’re selling at a preferential price? Buy 3 get 15% off, etc.
- What else would my customer/client/patient need along with what they’re buying to achieve their ultimate goal?
Remember, anytime a customer is at the point-of-purchase you have an opportunity to do a simple upsell. If customers call you to order – your operators must have an upsell script. If your salespeople close the deal in person – they should have some kind of add-on or deluxe version they offer once the prospect has already said yes. In the mail order or Internet business you can simply put additional check boxes on the order form.
I can’t stress this enough – EVERY TIME a customer interacts with your business you need to train your staff to use the upsell. This won’t work if they only do it when they feel like it. In fact, you can provide staff with some kind of bonus based on doing an upsell.
Upsells for Phone-in Businesses
If a customer calls you to set up their service or place an order – you need to have a simple phone script in place like this:
* * *
“Thank you for your order/scheduling your service. We have a very special offer for you right now. Today we have the _______ package on special. It includes _____, ______ and ________ {mention what it includes plus the benefit of that product/service}. Plus, you’ll get _______. Normally this package sells for over $xxx but you can have it for only $xx today. And there’s no additional charge for shipping and handling {if that’s applicable}. Would you like to take advantage of this special offer? I know you’ll love it because we have lots of customers rave about it.”
Also, if you like you can do multiple upsells at the same time. Wait for the customer to say “yes” or “no” to the first one and then proceed…
“One more thing. You can also take advantage of our new extended warranty service agreement that begins after the standard ___{6 months, 1 year} warranty. It covers on-site service and parts and labor for an additional __ {#} years, for only $xx per year. Would like to take advantage of this?”
Fact is, some companies can get away with 3 or 4 upsells while customers are on the phone. And this only increases their bottom line.
You can even upsell customers into products that aren’t even related to their original purchase – like this…
Upsell Phone Script Version #2:
“While we are processing your order – would you like to hear about some additional specials we have for phone customers today only?”
<YES> – proceed
“We have savings from 25% – 66% off on ____, _____, _____ {type of products/services or name brands}. Would you be interested in hearing more about any of these?”
<YES> – proceed with special offers…
Upsells for Walk-in Businesses
If customer comes to your place of business you can have a simple point-of-sale upsell along with a script:
* * *
Deli example:
Next to the cash register – you’ll see a basket with brownies with a sign that reads: “With any lunch purchase today get a delicious homemade brownie for just $1.50 .75 cents”
Now with each purchase the cashier asks
“Would you like a delicious homemade brownie with your lunch for just 75 cents more?”
It’s that simple. And this will work for almost any kind of walk-in business.
Nail Salon:
Next to the cash register – there is a nicely done sign that reads: “Today! Save $xxx on ‘X brand’ nail polish with your manicure”
Now with each purchase the cashier asks
“Would you like to take advantage of our special savings on “X brand” nail polish with your manicure?”
Okay, but what about a professional practice? No problem…
Upsells for a Professional Practice
Brainstorm with your staff on a few preferential upsell offers you can provide. You can have multiple options. Maybe one deal is for nearly all your patients/clients. I’m going to use an example of a cosmetic surgeon – but I’m sure you can see how it will easily apply to any professional practice.
Your “everyone” deal is for every patient who comes in the office for a consult, follow-up visit or whatever. They are offered a special preferential skin care package. Normally it’s sold for $X but as a patient appreciation special for the month of March they can get for only $Y.
But, I wouldn’t stop there. I would also consider upsells once a patient has decided to have a major procedure scheduled. Maybe it’s laser resurfacing (this helps to reduce wrinkles on the face). So the script would be:
“Mrs. Jones, that’s great that you’ve decided to schedule your laser resurfacing procedure with us. I’m confident you’ll be extremely pleased with the results. Along with this procedure we also recommend a maintenance regimen of ______. Normally 6 sessions throughout the year go for $xxxx – but because you are now part of our family of valued patients you can get the entire thing for just $xxx. Would you like to sign up for that also?”
Upsells for Mail Order/Internet Businesses
If your customer is buying without speaking to anyone over the Internet or through the mail/fax you still have the perfect opportunity to provide an upsell (plus you’ll never have to worry about an employee delivering it the wrong way). Here are 2 easy ways:
* * *
Upsell option #1 – Adding a different page before order form
Upsell option #2 – Check box on the order form
Upsell Option #1 – Adding a different page before your order form
I like this option if you’re selling one main product off your website. I’ve had upsells go from $29 to $99 option and had a terrific 33.5% conversion rate. That translated into serious r additional profits I would never have seen without the upsell.
Here’s what you do to start capitalizing on this – just put an upsell page like this:
– – – – –
Special Offer
Since you are ordering today, ______ {insert date script}, you have the opportunity to upgrade to the ______ {deluxe version/gold membership, etc.}. It includes everything you just heard, plus these extras:
Bonus #1: {Description of bonus and why it is a big benefit}
Bonus #2:
Etc. {if you have additional bonuses}
You can have instant access to all of these bonuses for only $xx more if you order now.
Click here now to sign up as a {deluxe/gold member}.
OR
Click here for the {regular package}
– – – – –
Upsell Option #2 – Adding a simple checkbox to your order form
This is so simple – you can just add one more check box to your order form and you start seeing an increase in your bottom line:
- Yes! I would also like to order the Gold version which contains an additional 1xx pages of advanced information. This is a $xxx value but only $xx if I order now.
That’s it! It can’t be easier to use this upsell on your web page or in your mail order business. You simply come up with 1, 2 or maybe even a couple different check boxes people can click to get an additional product or service. Easy!
The other day I ordered a computer monitors – well right when I was checking out there was a check box if I wanted to add another 12-month warranty and also another check box for an accessory pack. Remember, this isn’t rocket science – but most people totally neglect these opportunities.
Believe or not – I’ve even seen a simple check box on an order form take a losing mail order promotion and turn it into a winner. The check box was for a $697 tape series which was only mentioned in the PPS of the sales letter. Amazing!
So your check boxes could read like these:
- Yes, I would also like to get the special _____ version that includes an additional ____ and ____. Regularly $xxxx but only $xx if I order now.
- Sign me up for the ____ month extended warranty. Includes parts and labor. Only $xxx with your purchase.
- Give me the ____ accessory package that includes ___ and ____ for only $xx. (A $xxx value).
* * *
Maverick Multiplier 1.1: What’s Next?
Another very often overlooked blindspot is the ‘Thank You’ page or process. So if you’re online you want to create a ‘what’s next’ for your subscribers or customers. Otherwise, they’ll just go back to Facebook or their email and click on the next thing that excites them. You can lead them to what’s next from a few different spots:
- Teleseminar/webinar sign-ups thank you pages
- “Early Bird” lists
- Creating one-time-offers from FREE pages to a paid offer
- Download pages
Here’s a quick example out of the Public Domain Riches product we sold. On the thank you page was an additional complimentary offer with a discount.
Immediate Follow-ups
You also have overlooked opportunities in each communication you have with customers. Remember, it’s 5x less expensive to sell to happy customers than go find new ones. Here are a few spots you can target:
- Email Receipt
- Autoresponder
- Direct Mail package inserts
Here are a few examples…
I like using P.S.’s in some of my follow-up emails that customers are automatically looking for (ie. receipts).
Or if you are mailing ANYTHING out to customers don’t overlook the opportunity to send out package inserts with your outgoing packages. These can be simple flyers, postcards or even multi-page letters, etc. I’ve even had friends insert offers for my products into their outgoing packages with a special endorsement from them at the top and discount offer. (We’ll talk even more about piggybacking inside a different Maverick Multiplier!)
There you have it. Simple ways to create more money out of the business you’re doing already every single day. Be sure to let me know how it works for you in the comments or what you think.
I’ll be showcasing the entire list of 9 Maverick Multipliers here on the blog over the next days – so be sure to sign up for updates so you don’t miss them.
And I’ve decided to do a handful of intimate workshops this Summer. The first one will be July 16 & 17th in the DC-area I’m going to work with entrepreneurs to implement these 9 Maverick Multipliers to instantly increase your profits (plus add significant joy and meaning) in your business.
Over the past 13+ years I’ve worked with a lot of different industries, marketplaces, niches, etc. and through this cross-section there are some very easy-to-implement immediate leverage points and hidden assets waiting to be ethically mined. Then after the cash surges we work on a few bigger picture things that really can drive your business in the 21st century.
It’ll be a tiny handful of people as I beta test it but you’ll walk out of there actually making back an ROI before the 2 days are up because we are going to actually do it!
If you think you want to be one of the first ones in and get private and personalized help in the first program – fill out this application:
http://maverickmba.wufoo.com/forms/maverick-multipliers-workshop-application/
Bern says:
An eye opening info. I have bookmarked it to read it again for more absorption. Thanks Yanik.
Eric Ruth says:
This is the kind of content that demonstrates REAL expertise. It’s a detailed tutorial with practical examples of how to make more money by adding more value. The kind of thing you rarely see in a free blog post. Great stuff, Yanik. Thanks.
Herman says:
Just in time..I’ve been racking my brains trying to think of a way to generate sales from my free traffic e-course apart from inserting affiliate links in each email. Now I’m thinking of a one time offer on the thank you page. Do you have a script for this that expires in say 2 days?
Yanik Silver says:
I don’t have a script we use – but I believe there are many OTO ones available
Stu McLaren says:
Yanik this was an awesome walkthrough and although I’m familiar with the upsell I really appreciated the scripts that you outlined – both for the phone and for online products.
I think often we “know” what to do but we get stuck in the execution and implementation. These scripts will certainly help – thanks man!
Stu
Yanik Silver says:
Yeah for sure! It’s also really interesting to optimize the process test different offers (as you know already) in the upsells, etc. Fascinating.
Mitch Axelrod says:
Yanik, you have a razor sharp mind, kind heart and generous spirit. I always learn from you. What you laid out here is a precise and specific game plan for money and profits. Any one of these examples can transform a business and… you have 8 more multipliers coming. I can’t wait to read them. I’m taking notes. Thanks for sharing your nuggets of wisdom. You walk your talk about money, happiness and meaning in life. Look forward to connecting again soon.
Grayson Carter says:
This is awesome. Specific examples not some vague reference to up sells. Specially true when we’ve already gone through the long process of getting somebody to buy our goods, there’s a pretty good chance they could use more of what we can offer