If You Do ONE THING Right...

When I was twenty-something I rented an apartment. The building was in a run-down neighborhood that was making a comeback. The landlord had recently bought the post-civil war era two-story building and was rehabbing it when I rented. We worked out a deal where my deposit was in "sweat-equity" so I helped him with the work.

The bathroom had originally been in the backyard, but had been moved inside sometime in the 1920's. The house originally used a coal-fired furnace but it had  been converted to run on city gas in the 1930's. The building had been originally designed for gas lighting, but in the1940's it was retrofitted for electricity. 

Each of those updates had been done by the homeowner and it was obvious by the workmanship that he wasn't in the trades, but when Norman finished HIS work the place looked really elegant. His secret weapon? Wallpaper.  Norman said "A good wallpaper covers a multitude of sins" and I guess he was right.

My friend Gerry is having a hard time making his on-line business support his family. He's a smart guy and he works hard, but after a couple years of working full-time in his business, it's not quite bringing in enough to make them comfortable.  In fact, he's losing money almost every month and robbing Peter to pay Paul.

Here's the thing, everything he's doing is ALMOST right...

His sales are ALMOST as high as he needs...

His profits are ALMOST high enough...

His advertising is ALMOST working...

... everything is ALMOST right. 

The only thing he's really not doing well at is building his opt-in list. It's only at a few hundred people after a year of working on building it up. Of course Gerry's been working on everything else too and it's hard to keep up with all the irons we have in the fire as an entreprenaur.

I offered to give Gerry a hand up one day by marketing one of his products to my list. Let's just say it made his month.  A few minutes after sending an email to my list, I told Gerry we would sell 142 of his products.

That number was a S.W.A.G.

A "SWAG" is "Some Wild-_____ Guess" but it was based on the percentage of people that had bought in the first half hour and the percentage that had opened their email up to that point. Then I calculated how many sales he would get if the percentage of sales-to-open stayed the same for the rest of the list.  It wold be 157 sales.  I then backed the number down about 10% to be on the safe side and boldly said "We'll sell 142 of them."  He said "I'll write your number down and see if you're right." 

We ended up selling 158 of them. I shouldn't have backed out the 10% and I would have been exactly on the money. (Note to self: File that thought for future reference.) Gerry told me that if he had those kind of sales numbers consistantly he would be VERY comfortable.

Nothing changed in Gerry's business except the number of people he was able to market to that day. And suddenly he could see how he could be "very comfortable".  To paraphrase my old landlord Norman... "A good LIST covers a multitude of sins"

When I was twenty-something I rented an apartment. The building was in a run-down neighborhood that was making a comeback. The landlord had recently bought the post-civil war era two-story building and was rehabbing it when I rented. We worked out a deal where my deposit was in "sweat-equity" so I helped him with the work.

The bathroom had originally been in the backyard, but had been moved inside sometime in the 1920's. The house originally used a coal-fired furnace but it had  been converted to run on city gas in the 1930's. The building had been originally designed for gas lighting, but in the1940's it was retrofitted for electricity. 

Each of those updates had been done by the homeowner and it was obvious by the workmanship that he wasn't in the trades, but when Norman finished HIS work the place looked really elegant. His secret weapon? Wallpaper.  Norman said "A good wallpaper covers a multitude of sins" and I guess he was right.

My friend Gerry is having a hard time making his on-line business support his family. He's a smart guy and he works hard, but after a couple years of working full-time in his business, it's not quite bringing in enough to make them comfortable.  In fact, he's losing money almost every month and robbing Peter to pay Paul.

Here's the thing, everything he's doing is ALMOST right...

His sales are ALMOST as high as he needs...

His profits are ALMOST high enough...

His advertising is ALMOST working...

... everything is ALMOST right. 

The only thing he's really not doing well at is building his opt-in list. It's only at a few hundred people after a year of working on building it up. Of course Gerry's been working on everything else too and it's hard to keep up with all the irons we have in the fire as an entreprenaur.

I offered to give Gerry a hand up one day by marketing one of his products to my list. Let's just say it made his month.  A few minutes after sending an email to my list, I told Gerry we would sell 142 of his products.

That number was a S.W.A.G.

A "SWAG" is "Some Wild-_____ Guess" but it was based on the percentage of people that had bought in the first half hour and the percentage that had opened their email up to that point. Then I calculated how many sales he would get if the percentage of sales-to-open stayed the same for the rest of the list.  It wold be 157 sales.  I then backed the number down about 10% to be on the safe side and boldly said "We'll sell 142 of them."  He said "I'll write your number down and see if you're right." 

We ended up selling 158 of them. I shouldn't have backed out the 10% and I would have been exactly on the money. (Note to self: File that thought for future reference.) Gerry told me that if he had those kind of sales numbers consistantly he would be VERY comfortable.

Nothing changed in Gerry's business except the number of people he was able to market to that day. And suddenly he could see how he could be "very comfortable".  To paraphrase my old landlord Norman... "A good LIST covers a multitude of sins"