In the first part of this series, we discussed growing your business by bringing in more customers. The post today will talk about making more sales without necessarily increasing the number of your customers!

To understand this strategy, it is pertinent you understand why people buy anything. You see, customers don’t buy products or service; they buy end result. They buy a product because it is a means to an end (they want). For instance, someone who buys a book doesn’t really need the book, but the knowledge in the book. Or the product could be body cream, but in the customer’s mind, the end result is a smoother, fresher, youthful, and more beautiful skin.

If you recognize this, you can always add products and services that help customers achieve their end result more completely, conveniently, and efficiently and in the process get them to buy more from you.

The hard part is getting customers to know and trust you to make that first purchase. Once that is achieved, you simply need to let them know how you can give them more of what they want.

There are basically two techniques that can help you deliver greater benefits to your customers while increasing your revenue and profit at the same time:

Cross selling

This is offering your customers the opportunity to add related items to their basic purchase from you. Items that when combined together will increase the level of satisfaction or significance of the ultimate result more completely.

 I once worked in a Christian bookstore. Whenever a customer bought a bible, it was customary for me or any other sales attendant to ask the customer whether he would like to buy a bible cover to protect and prolong the life of the bible. Not only that, it would also be suggested to the customer to buy a bible marker to mark his favorite parts of the new bible. That is cross selling. The bible is the front end product while the bible cover and the marker are back end products.

However, key to successful cross-selling is to focus your efforts on meeting the customer’s needs, rather than simply pushing more products and service. In the bible store example, the customer would definitely benefit more from buying a cover to protect his bible. And a bible marker would enhance his study of the bible; while the store will invariably make more money from the customer.

You have probably been cross sold too. Have you ever bought a camera phone? You may have picked a reasonably affordable one of say N15000, but after adding memory card, car charger, and case, you ended up spending N18000.

This simple strategy works because people hardly hesitate in situations like this. They are already there to buy something, so buying more is an easy next step. Once a prospect has made a purchase, he is in “buying mode”    

This strategy can work in all kinds of business. That pepper seller on your street is another good example. You buy a N200 pepper from her and she offers to grind it for only N50 naira. Even if you have a blender at home, you sometimes allow her to grind the pepper because her doing so would save you the trouble of washing and cleaning the pepper (which she will do at no extra charge)

So, you can—and should make use of cross selling to make more money from each customer. Offer your prospect a related product or service when they make a purchase.

How to come up with cross-selling opportunities in your business

Action steps

Step 1

Identify where your customer goes before he or she buys your product or service and offer complimentary product or service your customer is likely to buy anyway.

For example, if you run a music training academy, be sure to sell equipment necessary to perform the task you are teaching (keyboard, piano, trumpet, violin, music manuscript etc.).  If you cannot directly sell this equipment for one reason or the other, form an alliance with a provider (for a share of the profit).

Step 2

Find out where customers go or what they need after they buy your product or service. Using the music academy example, once they have gained mastery of a musical instrument, some of your students might want to monetize their newly acquired skill. Thus, you can offer brokerage service where you link schools and churches that are in need of talented musicians with your recently graduated students.

Up selling

This is simply increasing the value of what a customer buys from you. It is offering your customer a slightly different product from what they thought they needed if the different product will satisfy the customer more completely, conveniently and efficiently.

A few years ago, we needed to change the water pumping machine in our house. The intention was to replace the bad (surface) pump with a newer one of the same type. At the machine sales store, the salesman asked me a couple of questions about the depth and location of our borehole, and based on my responses, he advised that a submersible pumping machine will be more suitable for our house than a surface pump. He gave a couple of reasons while this was so. Thus, rather than buy a N14000 surface pump as I planned, I ended up buying a N27000 submersible pump.

The key point here is to understand your customers’ needs and that you are genuinely giving them something that‘ll help them better achieve the satisfying end result they want.

“Dozen price,” “three for fifty naira,” “super pack”:  these are all popular parts of our lexicon but more importantly, they are a great example of upselling a customer on the quantity of the purchase.

This strategy is effective because people are willing to buy more than they ordinarily do when given the option or incentive; just try offering four for the price of three, or buy three and get one free, of almost anything and you ‘ll see customers that typically buy just one item going for the higher quantity.

Essentially, this strategy is about acquiring new customer at a break-even or slight loss and making substantial profits on back-end repurchasing. It is a way of increasing your clients and profits merely by shifting your focus from trying to make a huge profit on the acquisition of a new client to making your real profit on all the repeat purchases that result from those new clients.

My optometrist utilizes this strategy very well. Hers is one of the most modern optometrist practices in Lagos. She charges less than 500 naira for eye test. This 500 naira entitles you to an array of tests that sometimes lasts up to 30 minutes. N500 I believe is less than what 30 minutes of such a highly skilled professional is worth. She however is not stupid. Take my case with her for example. My first eye examination revealed a tiny reddish stuff in my left eye and to treat this she readily recommended an eye medication which I promptly bought from her for N1200. Furthermore, my original reason for contacting her was my worsening long sightedness which was confirmed by the test. Her prescription was a corrective glass which of course was available in her office and which needless to say, I bought from her for N9500. And every two years since then I have been going to her for new glasses!

Another good example of this are the GSM companies. A SIM card is sold for 100 or less. It is doubtful whether these companies make any profit from the sale of SIM card but this is unimportant. Where the GSM companies make real money is in the selling of airtime. Thus, it makes sense for MTN or GLO to sell SIM for 100 naira to get new subscribers on its network since this same customer has the potential to spend thousands of naira on recharge card in the long run.

If your business is listed on Mocality, well, congratulation! I say congratulation because Mocality has already provided you a platform to execute this strategy and, here I am talking about “Special offers”. This is a place on Mocality home page where listed businesses showcase products and services they are offering at specially reduced and discounted rates.

However, remember, the goal isn’t to just cut the price of the first purchase. The goal is to make that first purchase so much more appealing that people find it harder to say “no” than “yes.

Note however that this strategy is only suitable if your business or practice is one that has a high probability of customers coming back, again and again, to repurchase from you the same or different products or services.

If you want your business to thrive, you must be able to provide answers to the following questions:

• Who are my customers and potential customers?
• What kind of people are they?
• Can and will they buy?
• Am I offering the kinds of goods or services they want – at the best place, at the best time and in the right amounts?
• Are my prices consistent with what buyers view as the product’s value?
• Are my promotional programs working?
• What do customers think of my business?
• How does my business compare with my competitors?

Market research provides us answers to the questions above.

AFFORDABLE RESEARCH

Conducting valuable market research requires specific skills. That is why most big organizations outsource their research tasks to market research firms. But a small or medium size company with budget constraint can conduct research in creative and affordable ways. For example, you could engage students and lecturers of a nearby university to design and carry out projects. This is a win-win situation; the students gain experience, lecturers extra income, and the firm get fresh set of eyes to solve problems at a fraction of what research firms would charge. Or you could develop the competence yourself! It is possible.

And if you are a really, really  small business, it is understandable if you are intimidated and unnerved by those high sounding survey, focus group, statistical analysis…. But you need not be, you could still gather some kind of market insight within your resources. For example, an informal focus group is easy to arrange. Just buy meat pie and coke for a few prospects, customers and friends, throw in some provocative marketing questions, and listen to the enlightening replies! 

There are other cheap or even free ways you can gather intelligence about your market. If you are a shop owner for example, the minute a customer walks into your shop, you could engage him or her like this

“Hello, is this your first time visiting us?” this opens the door to so much knowledge.

If the answer is “yes,” and this is his or her first time, you can proceed to give a tour or talk and you can ascertain where the customer came from and what drew him or her to your shop.

If the answer is “no,” you can thank him or her for coming back in and talk about the customer’s previous experience and buying preference.

If your business is listed on Mocality, the information obtained from this research can enable you derive even more value from our range of free business tools. For example, you can send personalized follow-up SMS (at no cost since Mocality already gives out 800 free SMS monthly to all businesses listed on the directory!) the customer thanking him or her for visiting your shop and because its personalized, the customer will appreciate it even more.

This post aims to explore ways you (as a business owner) can insulate your business from any negative effect of the increment in the fuel price.

Move your business online

An obvious implication of fuel subsidy removal is the increment in the cost of transportation. You move from one point to another—home to work, office to supplier’s , to and from client’s office….and the fuel price increment mean you spend more on these trips.

The internet provides you an opportunity to reduce the number of business trips you make and ultimately the cost of running your business.

• Get a dynamic website if you don’t have one. And if you do, make the best use of it. A website is not supposed to be a traditional business catalogue, rather, it should serve as another office where present and prospective customers can view and even experience your offerings.
• Review your website. Does it present your business in the most appealing way in terms of copy and aesthetics?
• Is it dynamic? By this I mean does it allow you to update the information on it as often as it is needed.
• Take advantage Mocality business directory. Listing your business on Mocality provides you with an array of free business tools that can help you reduce business trips. Free business tools like 800 free monthly SMS, mobile business cards, free contact storage etc. if properly used are capable of reducing your business trips sometimes by as much as fifty percent.
• Also, social media provide other windows of doing more (mostly for free) for your business online

You might need to change that power generating set

Another area where the removal of subsidy will impact you as a small business owner is in the amount of money spent on buying fuel for your power generating sets (since you cannot depend on the non-existing public electricity).

There are a couple of things you can do to lower expenses on fuelling power generating sets:

1. Buy another generator:  this might be a wise thing to do especially if your present generator is an old (model) fuel guzzler. The latest models of generators in the market are a whole lot more fuel efficient than the older models. True, this might mean capital investment and this is why you need a sort of cost analysis. Determine how many liters of petrol you use per day on the average. Multiply this by the current price per liter of petrol to get an estimate of how much you will spend daily fuelling your current generator. Get details of fuel consumption of newer models from the dealers. This analysis will help you decide whether to get another generator or not. Check Mocality for generator suppliers
2. Buy a diesel powered generator: diesel burns a whole lot slower than petrol and since the cost of petrol and diesel is attaining parity, you should seriously consider changing to a diesel powered generating set.
3. Consider Solar power

For non-essential items like outdoor lighting it is advisable to look into solar powered lights, the short term investment can usually be paid off in a short period of time with the savings on electricity.

Apart from helping you cope with the increment in fuel price, following some of the tips highlighted above will help your business become more efficient

We thank all of our agents on the street whose  diligence and commitment are instrumental to the enviable success we have achieved so far. A very special thank you to the business owners; your warm reception is most appreciated.

The year 2012 will be a bumper year for businesses in Nigeria. Of course, there would always be challenges (subsidy removal, epileptic power supply…..) but if you are available online, or a  “mocalitized business” you will be well prepared to confront and even benefit from those same challenges!

In addition to our free listing and numerous freebies, we are turning our blog, (blog.mocality.com.ng) to a verifiable business building portal where you can get the latest SME news, trend analysis, tips, templates etc. 

Towards the end of last year, we started getting inundated with enquiries from businesses wanting to advertise on our site. We could not accommodate those requests then and it was hard for a lot of people to understand why. The answer goes straight to the heart of one of our business principles: long term business success only come from giving REAL value to customers. We have been working tirelessly to ensure that our advertisers and other partners get REAL value from patronizing us and this, we are happy to announce we can now give.

The next few weeks will see the launch of our paradigm shifting paid services. These services are designed to provide you with the highest return on your marketing investment. 

Thanks once again for your support, we look forward making 2012 a great year for your business.

Yesterday, I was with the executives of a trade association in Lagos and one question they all asked me was: why should their members list on mocality.com. In other words, what benefits does a business derive from listing on Mocality directory? The answer to this question is what this blog post is about.

First, what is Mocality? Mocality is an online business directory that connects businesses with their potential customers. We enable businesses connect conveniently to their customers and offer information users the most detailed and accurate source of information in Nigeria. Our aim at Mocality is to be a go-to source of information on local businesses that is accessible from both mobile phones and PC.

Now to the question, why should you list your business on Mocality? The reasons are numerous and stated below are some of them:

1. Listing on Mocality is free and I mean absolutely FREE. Businesses do not pay to get listed on our directory.
2. Not only is listing on Mocality free, it also comes with loads of FREEBIES for business owners! All businesses listed on Mocality have access to a range of free business tools such as 800 free SMS monthly, free mobile business cards, free secure contact storage, , free mobile sites (with maps).
3. Listing on Mocality exposes your business to highly qualified prospects that are more likely to patronize you. The reason for this is not farfetched, searches on our directory is keyword based. Let’s say you are a dentist in Ojota and you are listed on our site. When someone types the query “dentists, Ojota” on our site, your business comes up in the result. Now, a person who searched for “dentist Ojota” is more likely in need of the service of a dentist and by coming up in the search result, you stand a good chance of being contacted by this prospect.
4. Listing on our directory exposes your business to a global audience. Because people both home and abroad are increasingly using mocality.com to search for local Nigerian businesses, listing on our directory gives you exposure to this global audience
5. Editing control. The moment you list and claim your business on our directory, you have access to your listing. This means that you can edit and update your information on your own anytime.
6. Listing on Mocality is the most cost effective way to acquire new customers.
7. Provides your business visibility on search engines. Because all listings on our directory are optimized for search (design to be visible on search engines like Google and Bling), listing on Mocality directory provides your business the fastest route to search engine visibility

Okay, we have touched some of the reasons why listing on Mocality is a smart business move for you. The next question is why shouldn’t you? And to the best of my knowledge, the answer is none!

Mocality brings you accurate information about the businesses around you, when you need it and where you need it most. We literally bring information to your fingertips on your mobile, PC or tablet.

We are here to help you find information conveniently in your locality, bye-bye to the days of driving round Lagos with its well-known traffic looking for a great hair salon, the nearest ATM of your bank, a mechanic workshop that won’t rip you off, that designer that can make the snazziest dress in town or where to find your favorite cheese cake!

Mocality has been a resounding success in Kenya and received a fair amount of press.
Our Agent program (where we pay members of the public up to N200 to add a business) is also live now, so if you would like to earn some extra cash sign up!

More exciting announcements will come your way in the near future, so subscribe to this blog, follow us on twitter or Facebook.

We are constantly making improvements to the website, mobile site and handset applications, and we LOVE your feedback, so please send us a mail on support@mocality.com.ng or use the web form here.

We look forward to making Mocality the Largest business directory in Nigeria.

Warm Regards

Team Mocality.