How Much Money Are You Leaving on the Table?
November 19, 2008 by Elizabeth Potts Weinstein
Guest post by Sandra P. Martini, The Automatic Business Coach
The majority of small business owners work their tail off. They spend thousands of dollars attending workshops and seminars convinced that the latest one will solve their problems or they’ll meet *the* client they’ve dreamed of; they spend hours upon hours working in their business wondering why the phone’s not ringing and they’ve produced information products and now wonder why they’re not “waking up to find they’ve made money”.
Do any, or all, of the above describe you?
If so, you are working hard, but not smart. You don’t have a consistent system in place to determine which of your activities are worthwhile and productive as opposed simply keeping you busy and wasting your money.
The following is just a few of the business statistics you MUST track in order to succeed:
1. Your sales — both number and amount.
How much money did you bring in this month, this week, today and what did they purchase?
How many items IN TOTAL were purchased?
For example, I offer coaching services and also sell information products for home study. It’s important to know what percentage of sales comes from the different products or services you offer.
2. Your UNIQUE website visitors.
How many unique visitors came to your website this week or month?
Note that this is not the number of “hits” which is a much greater figure. You want to know specifically how many UNIQUE people came and visited your site and any website tracker can tell you this.
3. Your new ezine/email newsletter subscribers.
How many people signed up for your ezine or email newsletter this week?
4. Your conversion rates.
Here’s where we bring a little math into the picture:
* Sales Conversion Rate: Divide your total sales number by the number of unique website visitors.
For example: if you had 100 unique people visit your website and you sold 70 items, your sales conversion rate is 70% (70 sales/100 unique visitors).
* Ezine Conversion Rate: Divide your total new ezine subscribers by the number of unique website visitors.
This will tell you how effective your website or opt-in box is with respect to getting new subscribers.
* Value Per Visitor: Divide the total money you made in a given week (or month) by the number of unique website visitors for that same period.
You now know how much each unique visitor is worth you.
5. Your expenses.
Not only do you need to track how much money is coming in, but how much is going out.
What percentage of your gross income goes out in fixed overhead expenses each month? Is there anything you can do to reduce this number without sacrificing service?
The above are just a few of the key metrics you must know in order to gauge what is/is not working in your business. Without tracking, you can’t improve your methods AND your income!
I’ve combined all of the above (and a few more) into a “Strategic Marketing Report” which my team prepares and sends to me each Monday morning - I never have to think about it and getting it on a consistent schedule allows me to make the best decisions for my business on an ongoing basis.
My Request to You
I ask that you know, at a minimum, your website statistics and, if you don’t currently know how to get this information, to contact your webmaster as most hosting sites include this as part of the package.
Once you know HOW to get these numbers, it’s time to put a system in place (whether you or a virtual assistant) to track these numbers on a regular basis so you can continuously improve everything you’re doing.
And if you’re feeling too overwhelmed to begin? You’ll want to learn more about “Strategic Marketing - Sandy Style” and having a customized strategic marketing action plan complete with systems for you to implement “done 4 you”.
©2008 Sandra P. Martini, The Automatic Business Coach & Mentor. Get Sandra Martini’s FREE “5 Simple Steps to Putting Your Marketing on Autopilot” e-course/audio mini-workshop and her FREE small business success how-to tips at www.SandraMartini.com
Photo courtesy of emdot on flickr.
Tags: business statistics, conversion rate, Marketing, money meeting, newsletter subscribers, Sandra Martini, systems, unique visitors
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