When Your 7 Figure Business Becomes A 5 Figure Business

Throughout 2009 I witnessed a business phenomenon. It wasn’t hyper growth, it wasn’t technological breakthroughs in Twitter and Facebook. Nor did it have anything to do with new slick offers that work online and offline.

No, the phenomenon had to do with once largely successful companies going from 7 figures a year to doing 1/10^th of that one year later.

It would be easy to point a finger and say it was the economy, the Wall Street issues or that the consumer ran out of credit.

The simple fact is this, business changes and when it changes it changes quickly. If you don’t change quickly then you will become road kill.

I can speak to this in my own business.

Last year at this time our typical customer was a start up that had generated maybe $100,000 in sales, offered up coaching or membership site. Or they had a new idea they wanted to test out.  These customers paid us anywhere between 1,000 to 2,000 a month for lead generation.

Today, our typical customer is someone who is already doing 7 figures (or was doing 7 figures consistently) who has a proven program, offering or service.  They have some online presence but have not really perfected a system of getting leads online and converting them into long term customers.

This customer takes a long term view and understands that investing in the growth a business takes time and money. And they are willing to invest in both.

They are willing to test many different new ways to get in customers and realize that when something doesn’t work, it’s not a failure/end of the world, it’s just part of the process.  They don’t just need leads, they need perfected conversion systems that convert the leads into buyers. Plus someone to set up and manage the statistics of how a program works, whether it’s successful and what is the return on investment.

The great thing is this customer is willing pay $8,000 to $15,000 a month for our services and willing to sign a long term contract (one year or more) to accomplish this goal.

As you can see our typical client changed and they changed quickly. If you would have told me a year ago that our business/customer focus would change so much, I’d laugh at you.

The reality is, in our current economy, it is easier to sell a high end product/service vs. selling one that inexpensive. We can service our clients better, get more involved in their business and give them results based on statistics vs. theory.

It was a huge mind shift for our team. There have been and continue to be long lonely nights of wondering if we made the right move, but we are seeing proof.

We have to learn to deal with more ‘Nos’ vs. the ‘Yes’. Our sales processes have had to change. (More on that later) Most importantly our service offering has had to become quick, streamlined and more service oriented.

It takes us longer to convert a lead into a customer but it is much more gratifying in the end.

You might be asking yourself how this applies to your business. Well if you business is down, you might be in a niche or industry that is dead, dying or rotting.  It is in those places that we find the hidden rich veins of new businesses.

Ask yourself what has changed, where is the business going and most importantly what does the customer need now more than ever.

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