You Can't See "out there" What You Don't Already Know: ATSuccess Week 3 - Feb 2014

Quietly continuing our work on generating the engine of your business - a sales letter that will appeal to your chosen niche. You can jump in any time - and now's a good time - to be energized into creating a captivating appeal to your students. Click here now and join us all. *** On Being in Musicians Niche When You Are Not A Musician Musicians are the ideal niche for Alexander Technique teachers. If you can position your Self there, you are in the place of ease for your business, providing you are smart about it. It's not necessary to play, but why not start taking some lessons? It will enhance your ability to appreciate their challenges, and help you find ways to teach them creatively. If this will be your niche, 10 years from now you could be a musician. It's just your mind that says not. On How To Win Over 40 Musicians in A Group Improve the sound of their music - that, more than anything else, speaks to musicians. So give practical demonstrations that involve them playing before/after. Trust your work to shine through - it will if you are not trying to make it shine through! The other thing that can wow a big group is simple body mapping stuff. Violinists need to know the arm starts just below the neck, and it is OK to raise their shoulder (arm!) with the bowing arm; pianists need to map the fingers and move from the true location of the joints. I am sure you have a load of those things - in a group setting it gives everyone something to do that is transformative without your touch. You touch them with words and concepts. Improved sound and clearer understanding: these are the session attributes that will sell them on AT. On Finding A Headline for Your Sales Letter Headlines take time - they are as big a project as the sales letter itself because a it's job is to reflect the contents. Quite a job. I take out a blank piece of paper and just keep writing and writing different headlines until something emerges out of it. Keep asking your unconscious to give you the headline that will really hook people. And keep talking to those people - often the best headlines come from the mouths of the people you seek to attract. Hang out with them - ask them what they want? Collect information. Be a sponge. It will emerge. And when it does, you'll be so pleased. You'll have something for life. What Can You Claim For AT? A general guideline: every time you make a claim, back it up by some kind of proof. Proof can vary a lot depending on the medium you are "claiming" in: from rigorous to positively loose (a scientific study to an anecdotal story). Providing the proof is commensurate with the claim, I feel free to say that. On Mentioning Alexander Technique in Your Sales Letter At some point it's an advantage to bring Alexander Technique into your conversation. Once your readers have an interest and fascination for the way you are solving their problem, it is a plus to be able to start mentioning this unique and mysterious thing you use to make it all work. Like the secret formula that others can not duplicate. And it has such an interesting history! It becomes more like: "Come and look under the hood to see how I do what I do." Impress them with how long you trained, who has endorsed it - things like that. There's definitely a time to sell them on AT, but just never at the start! Never as your primary service. It's the feature, not the benefit. Solve the problem, don't teach the Technique. On Building A Solid Ice Floor To Your Business Oh my, thinner ice? Well, focus on the nexus and you will succeed. The nexus is when you, or your agent, website, flyer (or whatever) is in direct contact with a potential client or customer. How much of your day is spent at the nexus? That will show you where you will be in 3 months time. Stay. In. The. Nexus. On Sharing Links That Are Restricted on Facebook Just make a direct post by cutting and pasting the link you like and adding your personal comment - it's better that way anyway, and the person who originally posted the link doesn't "own" it. If what you wanted to share is actually private comment intended for friends, then Facebook stopping you sharing it publicly on your Page is exactly what should happen. Problem solved. On Facebook Pay per Post Boost Don't use Facebook's Pay per Post - the Advertising manager offers more precision if you're going to spend money. There's better ways to deploy your money. Anyway, that's the advice I've been getting on my Facebook course with Keith and Perry. I will pass along once the SL stage of my posts is done. On Why Alexander Technique Is Still So Obscure Yes - you've nailed it. Explaining what we do is the rub. It's reminds me of my great-grand aunt who once asked me timidly "Jerry darling, what's a computer?" and it was SO HARD to explain it to her. Our work is like that. Internally we get it, but to explain that to others creates a huge gulf, not one that we have figured out yet. My insight is that you talk about the activity, not the primary co-ordination. People get activity movements, they don't get primary control, in the same way they don't get that proprioception is significantly more potent than eyesight. It is so obvious, they forgot to include it in the 5 senses. Touch is not the same. AT is like that, so obvious and everywhere - how can you point to the thing that everybody is seeing every day? It's invisible to people. You can't see "out there" what you don't already know. My Personal Facebook Group [NOTE: The second half of to-day's blog contains posts from my ATSuccess Group in Facebook. They contain personal or specific information that is inappropriate for public scrutiny. You can join the group by becoming a member. Participants of this Facebook group enjoy the protection to express things privately. It gets interesting. Trusting each other with this way creates the context to take risks. In ATSuccess no-one cares where you trained, they only care you succeed.]

*On Crafting A Guarantee I like that Constance - simple and conditional. Reading both Aniko and Jennifer's guarantee stories, I realise that crafting your guarantee conditionally is a way to give it teeth. When you take time specify your requirements to give a refund, it signals a genuine intention to do so. People will feel you are serious about giving them a refund, and they like reading that. It reassures them. I didn't have that in my post, so I add it here. *On Creating A VIP Product It's inspiring Jennifer - for years I have had a similar idea for BodyChance offering a VIP service where we go out and video you for a day, make a report and offer a program to manage your situation, all costing thousands of dollars. It's important to understand - which I am sure your mentor Elizabeth Purvis has taught - that many people do not buy by price. That is not their primary consideration. Rather, they want to feel exclusive, they want to know they are getting the best. The fact that you play professionally at premier locations as a musician is a pivotal factor that justifies a much higher price point. You have serious credibility. And yes, I agree your price point can go higher. $2,500 would barely pay for a weekend away for some folks. And they are doing that often. It's a funny thing - but often the higher the price goes, new people will consider it (when they would not consider the low price). You've got to ask - where are they? Parents of little Johnny? Aspiring graduates of Music Programs? Facebook could help here. Anyway, thank you for reminding me. My ADHD self wants to run off and say to everyone at BodyChance "Hey you guys! We need a VIP program in place!!!" I'll resist that for now - already got two major marketing campaigns in my lap right now. Don't need a third. But thanks - it's back on my To Do list for BodyChance. *On Reconstructing A Sales Letter Hey - great work in getting this done Susannah. First off - work on the headline. At present it doesn't really grab you, or show a clear benefit. I guess "recharge" is a benefit - is that going to really grab people? Also, go through the language and make sure it is easy enough to take in. This sentence for example: "Often mainstream cardiovascular fitness programs are based on a paradigm of performance rather than function and health" is a little circuitous - can you make it plainer? Also, add in some sub-headlines like "Are You Bored With Your Current Workout?" so there is a story to be read via by sub-headings only. Also, I'd move at least one of the testimonials to the top. Students are usually better - and more convincing - at selling your program than you are. As for it being too long? Heavens no. Too short! *On Sales Letter Feedback That sounds right Cecile - but it would be good to use your pause and let others who are Yoga students read it and tell you how they responded. Just don't hear them as "experts" and immediately change it all because of one little comment. Know what I mean? Be very, very careful who you listen to. You are listening because you are changing it's tone, but is that your tone you are changing it to? Fine. Just asking... *On Using Other People's Marketing Picking up on Jann's remark that her marketing piece was "burrowing heavily from you all" I want to declare: this is standard practise in marketing! Many direct marketers collect "cheat sheets" with examples of effective, powerful marketing and simply re-word and re-engineer it for their own market. There are so many famous headlines which, once established, are repeated again and again by other marketers. One famous example is "Corn gone in 7 days or your money back." Heard me use that one in a slightly different form? "Back pain gone in 24 lessons, or you money back." 24 lessons - BMJ study, right? I guess in the literary field this would be called plagiarizing - but that concept does not exist in this field. You take whatever works, and your market is going to differ in some way, and success will be dependent on your ingenuity in knowing what to copy, not the fact that you do copy. Interestingly enough, not even Shakespeare made up his own stories - he copiously copied other works. Bear this in mind, and by all means use each other's insights in your own market. That's the culture here - I though it best to be explicit about that. *On Radiographer Flyer Impact That's better Angela. CPD still jumps out - I am assuming that encourages people to join? You are thinking of it as a benefit, but strictly speaking this is a feature, not a benefit. You need to articulate what is the benefit of doing THIS CPD course? Why is your CPD course better than (hundreds?) of others? You need an unambiguous benefit statement to be quickly seen on your flyer. (Next time around, don't fuss now). Second thing that jumps out is you with the skeleton and Alexander Technique Level 1. Do all radiographers know Alexander Technique? Do they know why it is good? Do they know what it gives them? If so, then great; If not, you just lost a bunch of them. *On Writing A Regular Blog Terrific Annie - you have no idea how creative and exciting your writing can be. Forget about who reads it for now, just create the structure (see today's blog) that has you do it without fail in a regular fashion. How can you engineer a system for making that happen? *On Focusing Energy It's not about "what" you write - it's the "how" you are directing your energy. We get the benefit of your thoughts, but we don't give you money. Maybe you get a charge knowing we are all reading you, but all the time you are spending composing messages to interest us is less time you are spending energy composing messages to interest people who might come to your lessons. The focus of your writing skills - which are voluminous and clever and intelligent - needs to be there, not here. This is a place to ask questions more than a place to share stories. Share stories on your blog - it will do you more good. *** Anything to add? A new thread? https://www.facebook.com/groups/ATCSProMembers/