Many small business owners like us have a difficult time asking for business. It’s not that we don’t want the business, but wouldn’t it be so nice if people just handed over their money for our product or service rather than our actually having to ask them for it?
And this is one of the most common ways that small businesses stay really, really small, and sometimes peeter out altogether. They don’t ask for the business, or they don’t ask for it often enough to create a successful and sustainable business.
Here are 5 easy ways that you can ask for the business that if you implement on a consistent basis will guarantee that your business – and your bottom line – will grow.
1. Ask what they want…
The #1 way to grow a profitable business is to offer what your target market wants. And the best way to find that out is to ASK them.
At least once a year, survey your target market, asking them specifically what their biggest challenges are and what products and services they are most interested in. Periodically ask your current clients and customers the same question.
Use their responses to develop your offerings and you’ll practically guarantee yourself a source of steady in^come.
2. Ask for the sale…
Once you’ve create the product or service that your target market has told you it wants, you have to put it out there and ASK for the sale.
Don’t just stick it on your website and hope people will see it. Put together a promotion plan for each product or service you put out, including email promotions, using your online networks, utilizing your affiliates, and even consider pay-per-click advertising.
Then periodically ASK for the sale again. Plan a year’s worth of regular promotions for each of your offerings and you’ll increase your in^come.
3. Ask for the order…
A simple but oft-missed tip: Make sure that on your sales page for your product or service, you ASK for the order.
Just flat-out ASKing for the order can increase your sales dramatically.
Aside: Have you ever been on a website ready to buy something but you couldn’t find the order link and ended up clicking away in frustration to go find what you wanted somewhere else? Don’t do that to your customer. Make your order link or buy button very obvious!
4. Ask for the referral…
Another way to build your business is to routinely ASK your current clients and customers to refer others to you. You can do this via a simple email that you send out periodically. You could also offer an affiliate program to entice people to refer your products and services to others for a small commission.
5. Ask for the recommendation…
Make a request of a colleague whose offerings complement yours to recommend you and your offerings to their list. Because the people on your colleague’s list already know, like and trust him/her, they are much more likely to follow his/her recommendation.
Now you have 5 simple ways to grow your business that you can put into practice today.
© 2013 Alicia Forest International | All rights reserved.
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Alicia Forest, MBA mentors women entrepreneurs on how to build a priority-based, highly profitable business, in less than part-time hours. Get her FREE series on how you can do this too at http://aliciaforest.com
by Alicia Forest, MBA
The Business Shifter™
In coaching clients this month, I’ve been reminded of many of the common blocks that come up for entrepreneurs as they grow their business. The good news is that to move beyond them simply takes a different perspective.
I’m sharing three of the most common ones below and a shift for you to consider if you’re finding you’re struggling with any or all of these blocks yourself.
1. In terms of money, you can only receive what you allow yourself to receive.
So consider how that may play out in your own sense of worth, in both the level at which you invest in yourself as well as the level at which you ask others to invest in you.
For example, if you invest in a $2500- program, are you asking your market to invest in a $2500- program with you?
On the other, more common, hand, are you asking your market to invest in you at a price point that you’re not willing to invest in for yourself?
Where in your business might there be this incongruence?
2. When you feel like you need to add another element to a program (to ‘justify’ a higher price), add more transformation instead.
You may have heard me say before that people buy based on emotion, not necessarily on logic.
When you’re writing your copy for your offer or speaking about your offer, you want to spend 90% of your words on the transformation that people will get as a result of engaging your services.
You can think of it as the transformation, or the outcomes, or the benefits, that someone will receive as result of being in your program, buying your product or siging on to work with you one-on-one.
3. “I already know that…”
Whenever I attend an industry event, I make the effort to pay attention as if everything was new, which enables me to see the holes that are present in my business. And when I find that “I already know that…” I ask myself, “Am I doing that?”
And if the answer is “yes” then my next question is “is it working?” And if the answer again is “yes” then my next question is “how can I make it work even better?”
Where can you plug a hole in your business or up-the-ante on one thing that’s already working well in your business?
I’d love your thoughts on any of the above – feel free to leave them below.
Hey there, it’s Alicia…
I wanted to share something with you that came out of my recent Online Business Breakthrough Workshop…
Through all the laughter, and all the tears (and all the laughter-through-tears 
), one thing became painfully obvious.
Deep down, too many of you are afraid you’ll never create what you dream of – not with your business, not with your life.
And well, I just won’t have that…
And I have some good news to share.
We have a tendency to make things far more difficult than they need to be. But that’s not your fault. There are just some critical things you don’t know yet – ways that you can make decisions, set up systems, follow a proven path, leverage what you already have and know – which will remove the strain and the struggle. Once you know these things, all that struggle will end. For good.
There’s cutting-edge and powerful information that I will share with you so you get the real results you want – far more easily and far more quickly than you could on your own.
When it became a lot harder to gain traction and create income online these last few years (especially for newer business owners), I became determined to figure out what WAS working, and I’ve stayed on the cutting edge of those proven and successful strategies ever since.
I’m going to be sharing with you what I know in a brand-new complimentary LIVECAST coming up in May 2014.
For the past decade, I’ve grown my $15k a year coaching practice into a multiple 6-figure business in less than 15 hours a week, while raising two small children, by staying nimble in my market and on top of what’s working right now. I’ll be sharing exactly how I’ve done it in this BRAND-NEW livestream event – and you can attend FREE as my guest.
When you join me for this event you’ll learn:
- 3 founding principles that have been the critical factors in enabling me to create a multiple 6-figure business while only working about 15 hours a week.
- My Planned Profit Path™ with its 6 Focus Points that will deliver to you the consistent cash flow you desperately desire for the peace of mind you crave.
- Two simple yet powerful visuals – including your Money Tree – that alleviate overwhelm and give you a clear path that shows you exactly what to focus on that will bring you to profit sooner. (Get your markers or colored pencils ready!)
- And more, including recent case studies and examples of clients who’ve successfully followed this path, as well as exercises to help you do the same right away.
When you attend this event and receive what I’ll be sharing with you for building a successful and sustainable business online, in your time on your terms, you’ll find that doing so can actually be quite a bit easier – if you let it.
If you’ve been on a complimentary call with me before, you know you’ll be getting 100% content, no hype, and actions steps to move you forward right away. If you haven’t, now you know what to expect. 
Just GO HERE to reserve your complimentary seat.
Cheers,
Alicia Forest, MBA
The Business Shifter™
PS: I’d be honored if you shared this page with your friends and colleagues – and thanks in advance for your trust!
Join acclaimed entrepreneur mentor Alicia Forest for an intimate workshop experience this fall to design or re-design your successful and sustainable business around your life and the things that are the most important to you.
For Alicia, it’s all about Family First. Even before she started a family with her husband James, Alicia knew that she wanted to be home to raise any future children they may have. And she also wanted to build a successful and sustainable business of her own to contribute to the financial wealth and health of her family.
Her first coaching business, Client Abundance, was launched in 2005, the same year she gave birth to her daughter Chloe, followed two years later by the birth of her son, Jackson. In that time, Alicia grew her coaching business to 6 figures while only working 8-15 hours a week and keeping her two small children first.
Today, Alicia enjoys a multiple 6-figure business while still only averaging a 15-hour workweek, taking 14 weeks vacation per year, including 11+ weeks in the summer off, when she, James, Chloe and Jack enjoy their lake home.
This is Alicia’s version of designing a business around your life. What’s yours?
And would you like help in designing it successfully?
That’s what OBBW is all about – and Alicia purposefully limits the number of attendees to a maximum of 50 so she can give personalized attention, coaching, support, and feedback – along with a dose of reality and humor – to every person in the room.
Alicia’s events, programs, and coaching have helped thousands of women (and some men too) create, redesign, or expand their businesses to dramatically increase their incomes – and often while working less than before.
OBBW is a unique event designed for both seasoned and new business owners alike that delivers an exclusive combination of insight, cutting-edge information, and business formulas and models that are tailored to the individual business owners message, market and mission.
Get the full scoop and register at:
http://www.obbw2013.com
{Summer Special} Here’s a special opportunity to create (or strengthen) the critical foundation of your online business so you can create the same kind of FREEDOM I have in my business…
For ONE WEEK only, you can get my bestselling 21 Easy & Essential Steps to Online Success System™ for 50% off.
Just visit the link below for all the details:
http://www.clientabundance.com/21steps.htm
This System is TRULY the secret to my success – as it has been for thousands of others as well. I’m confident it will be for you too.
(Just so you know, you won’t see the 50% discount until you click the ORDER NOW button which will take you to the check out page where the 50% off price will be reflected. No coupon code needed!)
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