Part 2 In this section we'll cover your production, delivery and payment systems, as well as pricing. 6. Establish production systems Now that you've determined exactly what your prospects want, and that you have a large enough market of potential prospects to make it worthwhile, you now have to establish your production systems. How will you create your product? Will you create it yourself or farm it out? How much will it cost to produce? If you have developed a service, how will your service work? Will you perform the service, or will you hire others to perform it. How much will you have to pay others to perform it? Look for good role models to base your systems after. Find someone who is already providing a similar product or service in another market, and ask for their advice. Develop your systems around the best tested and proven methods available. Do you really need a fancy and expensive office, or can you work from your home and minimize your expenses? You have to make sure that you are pricing your product high enough to cover all of your costs, plus leave you with a reasonable profit. 7. Establish delivery systems When your customers order your product or service, how will you deliver it to them? By USPS mail, UPS? Will you hand deliver it? Or will you have a store or office location where your customers can come in and receive your products and services directly? How much will it cost to deliver your product or service to your customers? Again, you'll have to analyze all of your costs to ensure that you will charge enough to pay for all of the expenses. 8. Establish payment systems How will your customers pay for your products or services? Cash, check, or credit card? What will your related expenses be? How will you handle late payments, or returned checks? Will you have a money back guarantee? Today, consumers expect all professional businesses to stand behind their products and services with a solid guarantee. 9. Price it right Add up all the costs associated with your business. Perhaps you can determine what it will cost you per month. Then you can find out how many units or sessions you will have to sell each month to break even. One of the most common mistakes new business owners make, is to price their product or service too low. Then, even if they succeed in attracting customers, they lose money on each sale. Keep your costs as low as possible and test your prices to see what your market will accept. 10. Continuously test and improve The one thing you can count on when it comes to plans, is that they will change. No marketing plan is set in stone. A marketing plan is not like a picture, it's more like a puzzle that must be constantly worked on. First you try one piece, and you discover that it doesn't fit, so you set it aside and you then try a different piece until you find the pieces that fit. Marketing your products and services is a never ending cycle of testing and improving. You should always be striving to do things in a more effective and more efficient way. You should always be testing product/service improvements, as well as new products/services to sell to your customers on the back end. A final thought We see businesses continually focusing their time, effort and money on trying to sell products that aren't selling very well, while ignoring their sales winners. If you have marketed your product effectively, and it is still not selling, it probably is a loser--it just isn't what your prospects want. No amount of additional marketing or advertising is going to turn a loser into a winner. Focus your resources on selling your winners. It's a lot easier and more profitable to sell twice as many units of your winners as it is to sell any more units of your losers. This applies to services as well. Sell what sells! Click Here for Part 1 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Copyright © 2000-2023 by Joe Gracia - All Rights Reserved. All content, graphics, and HTML code are protected by US and International Copyright Laws, and may not be copied, reprinted, published, translated, hosted, or otherwise distributed by any means without explicit written permission. For Reprint Policies and Details Click Here. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 
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