SFR 158: The Pre-Purchase...

My focus is shifting from, "what should I have customers do post-purchase" to "what should they do pre-purchase?"

 

Cue drum roll, cue lights; it's time to grab that tux and dig out that little black dress because - TODAY, your product is about to get the Hollywood Treatment.

 

I'm about to drop some gold here - so settle down and take notes ;-)

WHEN OVER-DELIVERING IS A BAD MOVE

 

Recently I've been focusing on the small tweaks that you can make in your customer onboarding that create BIG effects.

 

There this time that I built  86 funnels (x2) for a promotion that Russell was doing for one of Stu McLaren’s products called Tribe.

 

When somebody purchases Tribe, they are given a step by step path to help them go through the program without overwhelm.

 

Let’s think about that for a moment…

 

Have you ever bought an online course and been so overwhelmed by the amount of content that you didn’t know where to start... or even worse, decided to ask for a refund?

 

Providing a massive amount of content often makes us feel great because we feel like we're over-delivering. However, bombarding a customer with too much information can actually freak them out - causing them to utter the dreaded “refund” word. (*gasp*)

 

Your customer is not looking to be overwhelmed; they're looking for a solution.

 

Since I launched my product, I've been thinking a lot about the concept of onboarding and success paths. I've been trying to figure out the most effective ways to hand-hold your customers into being successful.

 

There was a membership area that I built. It was by far the best members area I've ever created in my entire life. The problem was that it contained 200 hours of content.  It was packed with value, but it was just too much for most people to handle.

 

People were coming up to me saying: “I gotta quit my job to watch this! I'll never get through it." It was way too much stuff.

 

People felt so stressed that they started asking for refunds. If they didn't have time to consume all the content - they wouldn't get the result - so they asked for their money back. Not good, right?

 

So I started to create success paths that show customers exactly where they should start and what they should do if they want to achieve a certain result.

 

Your kind of giving your customer permission to focus on just one thing and holding their hand along the journey.

 

Creating a Success Path is a super effective way to increase customer satisfaction and reduce refund requests

 

We’ve just talked about the importance of a post-purchase success path for your customers… but what about before they purchase? What happens there?

 

Is it possible to create a pre-purchase success path to help you increase sales? The answer is a definite YES!

 

PRE-PURCHASE THE HOLLYWOOD WAY

 

Think about how Hollywood releases previews way before the movie gets released.

 

Can imagine what would happen if Hollywood didn't release previews? I mean, think about that. Our brains wouldn’t be pre-framed and loaded with anticipation. We wouldn’t look forward to the release dates and arrange to go to the movies with friends. A movie release would just slip out without much of an event.

 

It's like being really excited to go to a party or vacation. Sometimes, the most exciting bit is the anticipation and planning beforehand.

THE BEST PART OF YOUR VACATION ISN’T WHAT YOU THINK

 

A 2010 study published in the journal Applied Research in Quality of Life, found that planning or anticipating your holiday often makes you happier than actually taking it.

The happiest part of your vacation actually happens before you even begin your holiday

 

How does this work?

I have a favorite story that explains what’s going on in our brains when this happens, so let me share it with you quickly…

THE WARM/ COLD EXPERIMENT

 

There was a college class who were told that they would have a substitute teacher for the day.

 

Right before the substitute teacher came in to teach, the students were handed a biography of the teacher. However, there were two versions of the biography.

 

Both versions were completely identical except for one word.

 

One version said that, most students found the new teacher to be a very “warm” person,” The second version said that, most people him to be a very “cold” person.

 

The biographies where split equally between the students - Half the students were pre-framed to expect the teacher to be warm and friendly, while the other half expected him to be cold and aloof.

 

What happened next was fascinating...

 

At the end of  the class, they surveyed the students to see if the professor should continue teaching.

 

The students who were pre-framed with the “warm” biography said that he was incredible and that they enjoyed the class.

 

Conversely, the students who were given the “cold” biography  answered that they didn’t enjoy the class and didn’t want the professor to continue to teach.

 

It was exactly the same person teaching exactly the same lecture - but students the responses were wildly different depending on how they’d been pre-framed!

 

That’s nuts, right? It was exactly the same person teaching exactly the same lecture. On the surface, the students were in the same room having the exact same experience, but how positively they responded depended on the pre-frame that existed in their head.

 

Isn’t that fascinating?

 

As a marketer, I started to ask the question:

 

What can I put in place to pre-frame and  build positive anticipation for the purchase of my product?

 

I started to look for a way to boost levels of anticipation and to create “an event” around the purchase of my product?

 

So here’s what I’ve been doing…

 

CREATING A PRE-PURCHASE EVENT

 

• Before people attend my webinar, I have a product that they can purchase which helps me to recoup my ad cost.

 

 

As soon as somebody buys that mini product - I have a system set up that sends a message to my phone telling me who it is and I send them a quick personalized message.

 

Bloop. It sends straight back over to their email, and they get a personal message from me inviting them to come and watch the webinar. It's super effective.

 

1. We have a program on my funnel called “Deadline Funnel” and when ...