Make first sale

Once your system is live, whether it is a site, an offer or a newsletter, you have a link you can share with everyone on the Internet.

Now, the question is about following a strategy of making your first sale.

It goes without saying that sharing your work everywhere, finding distribution channels is very important but here I’ll let you in on a different approach.

Positioning

I believe a portfolio of systems that shows your expertise is the key for differentiating yourself from competitors, be it a business competitor or a professional competitor.

Say you want to find a job as a Project Manager at a tech company. Typical company gets 20-30 applicants even if the job is not so good. It’s fairly competitive. Of course, signalling with your Ivy League credentials would not hurt but a lot more people now understand that real skills from real work is often more valuable.

Most employers do not want to educate people they hire. No, what they want is someone who can produce great work without taking up too much resources, be it time, other people’s time within the company.

Now, if the question is how to differentiate and position yourself so that your candidacy is much more attractive?

It’s simple. A person who has repeatedly shown that they know what they are doing is more attractive than the person who has not.

As Woody Allen said “80% of success is about showing up”. So getting your foot in the door using your portfolio of systems is a great way to do it.

Success without Sales

Of course selling to tens of thousands of people for every system you make is great but that’s unrealistic for most.

I suggest you measure success, and the reason for making systems, as a way of:

• establishing authority/reputation

• teaching yourself by teaching others

• demonstrating your expertise

• and only then getting sales, and getting directly paid

What I’m trying to hint here is that booking a $500 30-minute call might be a better strategy than selling a $5 system to 200 people. The trick is getting leads for $500 call from people who trust you are the person to talk to because of a portfolio of $5 systems.

Breadcrumbs Strategy

One way to think about Internet is that it’s a network of nodes, meaning it’s a space you can traverse through.

As you might recall there was a folktale called Hansel and Gretel where kids break off pieces of bread to leave a trail behind them so that they can follow it to get back home.

Breadcrumb strategy (I like to think about it as spores) is leaving your trail all over the Internet of your industry.

The task is drop crumbs so that your target customers can follow back to your home, which is your website or your system. The trick is offering a lot of value for a low cost so that breadcrumb is so attractive no one can say no.

Once someone gets your free (magnet) system or gets a low-ticket $5 offering they are more likely to convert for a higher-ticket item of your catalogue.

Breadcrumb strategy is about enticing customers with value in your industry’s Internet where clicking a link and considering your system makes sense.

Fin

The most important nugget of wisdom I ever heard is:

Making a sale is about helping your customers. You have to feel that not making the sale is going to hurt them a lot more than buying would. That way you will believe in what you sell and in making the sale.

I trust you’ll find this insightful too.