Episode 3-66: Infrastructure Upgrades: Goals For 2020

Hey, what’s up everybody? Alex Branning here. Welcome to 2020. Today I’m talking about infrastructure upgrades, goals for yourself for 2020. In this podcast episode, I’m going to use a fun analogy of building a highway and show you how when you construct your infrastructure well, you set yourself up for some pretty amazing growth in the year 2020, including making more sales, bringing more people in, and setting up a foundation for your future. Let’s dive in.

So as I was looking around my town up here in Redding, California, I could not help but notice some of the major changes that have been happening even before I got here. My wife and I moved up here almost three years ago, and we can see a certain part of town where it was thriving before the 5 freeway was extended to come up through Redding. So there was a highway built out here, and it had a huge impact on how travelers come up into Redding.

I was looking around and looking at, because we pass through the parts of Redding that are just thriving and crushing it right now, and we pass through the parts where the freeway where people used to have to go on kind of a roundabout way if they wanted to go up through Northern California through Redding. They had to take a different freeway through, and so that area of Redding had a lot more traffic before.

Some businesses in the old part of where people used to travel are still thriving. Some, though, you could tell they were dependent on a steady flow of cars that came through, and without, they didn’t make adjustments basically and now they’re in trouble.

So we can see that a lot with our own business, right? We can look back and say, wow, I should’ve made adjustments sooner. Or we know friends with businesses that have failed. We also know people that have adapted and changed and are still thriving even though the conditions around their business have changed.

And it got me thinking about infrastructure. It got me thinking about building a highway to the Redding group and what does that look like? Well, when I look at infrastructure, when I hear about the changes that were made, the first thing that people talk about is the enormous expense in building the infrastructure, building the highway, and that for us, as business owners, that investment to get people in, that highway so to speak, is our lead generation methods, right? That is the expensive part of our business. We need leads. We need a highway for people to come in, but it doesn’t just start with building a highway for people to find us. It doesn’t start with just building a road in. We need to also make sure there’s places to stop along the way.

Those places to stop along the way it looked like lead magnets. It looks like offers for people to exchange their contact information for more information about us and what we do, or that maybe they’re exchanging their contact information for discounts, coupons or webinars, other educational opportunities. But we need to make sure that as people are passing through our business, whether that’s on Facebook, LinkedIn, Google, networking events, et cetera, we’re giving them a reason to stop along the way.

Once we’ve got their attention, then we need to capture their attention so that they come back. It’s all about the presentation. One of the things that I noticed when I look back at the old Redding. It’s funny that I say that because it’s not actually that old, but one of the things that I noticed is that the businesses that seem to be thriving are the ones that made adjustments in how they present themselves to the residents of Redding.

The businesses that failed, those really depended on tourists. They depended on people driving past their business all the time. Without that, they had no other lead generation. There was no consistent customer base. They died because there wasn’t a constant flow of fresh people passing through.

What we need to do is we need to capture the attention of our customers so that they come back. We need to embed in their minds who we are and how we can help them.

So one of the other things that we have to do, and this is what the businesses did that are still thriving, we need to remind them about us, right? It’s all about a followup system. For us as business owners, that includes things like sending emails on a regular basis, putting cards in the mail, whether it’s postcards or newsletters or things of that nature, making sure that we pop up while people are browsing on their computer or phone with retargeting ads, new offers, et cetera. Because if you don’t remind them that you exist, then even though they may have had a great experience the one time they passed through, they’re not going to come back. Life is busy, you know? And it’s not that they’re not loyal, it’s just that they’ve simply forgotten about you with the everyday things that are happening in life.

And so if you do not put yourself back in the conversation with follow up, then you will be forgotten. And it’s not the fault of the consumer. It’s your fault for not putting yourself in front of people.

Then last but not least, we need to not only remind them that we exist, but we need to give them a reason to come back. And those are things like upsells or cross sells. Those are things like new ways that you can support and serve their business. It may be a referral, right? You may be reminding them about you and having them come back into your world by a referral that you’ve made that can help their business, whether it’s another product or service that could help them or whether it’s somebody that could use their business, but it’s all about bringing them back into the fold. The more that they see you as a resource, the more they will come back to you.

So as you’re planning out your 2020, and many of you are getting started on this, you’re working on your plans and I love it, remember your infrastructure upgrades for 2020. You need a lead generation method, preferably multiple lead generation methods, but start with one that is working consistently. Then you need to make sure that there’s a place for your new leads to stop along the way as they pass through. Make sure there’s some offers where they’re exchanging their contact information for something from you. Capture their attention so that they come back. Make the presentation solid. Some of you may need some design work done on your websites or some new ads. Remind them about their experience when they met you or when they first did business with you. Set up a good followup system, and lastly, get them to come back again with a new offer, with a cross sell opportunity of some kind, maybe a referral for them so that you’re solving and addressing one of their pain points.

Build your infrastructure, build a business. Have a great day you guys.

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