My ORM / 7878 Journey Thread

[1337WuLF]

I received a call from a company that I sent letters to, 2 years ago (yes, when I first started).

Wow that's crazy man!

I got a call months after my first mailing, so these letters definitely do sit on desks for a while I think.

I am a little concerned about the number of businesses that are even still in business. I was chatting with H0BB5 on Skype, and he said that around 1/3 of his prospects didn't actually recieve the letters because they've either shut down, changed names or location. Which has me thinking. Maybe it might be a good idea to call each prospect up with a private number to check to see if they are still in business. It could save you some money at 70c - $1.40 per letter!

 

[BHopkins]

There might even be a service that does that already...Not sure but I could imagine one that telemarketers use.

 

[fullyniche]

Awesome ! Really I'm happy to see this. Please keep update your success journey.
Best of your luck

 

[originalposter]

Wow that's crazy man!

I got a call months after my first mailing, so these letters definitely do sit on desks for a while I think.

I am a little concerned about the number of businesses that are even still in business. I was chatting with H0BB5 on Skype, and he said that around 1/3 of his prospects didn't actually recieve the letters because they've either shut down, changed names or location. Which has me thinking. Maybe it might be a good idea to call each prospect up with a private number to check to see if they are still in business. It could save you some money at 70c - $1.40 per letter!

There might even be a service that does that already...Not sure but I could imagine one that telemarketers use.

I guess one could always outsource this part easily, and have the person call and ask in a casual way

"Can I speak to ____________ please?"
or
"I would like to know your opening hours? Mr/Mrs.____________ is there right?"

This will help determine if the business is still alive, and the perhaps even if it's the same owner / if you got the owner's name right etc.

 

[Everz]

I like to see stories like this. I bet in a few years if you keep at it with this attitude you'll have a big company with employees and a solid business with the experience to back it.

 

[1337WuLF]

I guess one could always outsource this part easily, and have the person call and ask in a casual way

"Can I speak to ____________ please?"
or
"I would like to know your opening hours? Mr/Mrs.____________ is there right?"

This will help determine if the business is still alive, and the perhaps even if it's the same owner / if you got the owner's name right etc.

Perhaps even: "I'd just like to confirm that your address is still _______" and if you're really bothered, you could ask to speak to the manager / business owner and tell them that you're going to be sending them a letter within the next week or two regarding their online reputation. So they're expecting it.

Outsourcing is a good idea too.

 

[1337WuLF]

Just a bit of an update for you all:

I just called my client (the vet) to discuss his ORM. He hasn't recieved any reviews yet and his funnel has hardly recieved any views.
I told him that he needs to push it onto his customers and ask them to do it for him as a favor and that it helps his business improve. I found out that he was just stapling the flyer to his newsletter, which isn't good enough. He said he's going to be more pushy with it.

We discussed other aspects about his online presence and I told him he needs a new website (it's very dated). He then went on to ask me about how he can get his website to rank higher in Google, we discussed that and I told him that he should really update his website if he's serious about SEO and improving his online presence. He agreed to a website redesign as well as SEO after the site has been completed!
:toilet:

 

[originalposter]

Just a bit of an update for you all:

I just called my client (the vet) to discuss his ORM. He hasn't recieved any reviews yet and his funnel has hardly recieved any views.
I told him that he needs to push it onto his customers and ask them to do it for him as a favor and that it helps his business improve. I found out that he was just stapling the flyer to his newsletter, which isn't good enough. He said he's going to be more pushy with it.

We discussed other aspects about his online presence and I told him he needs a new website (it's very dated). He then went on to ask me about how he can get his website to rank higher in Google, we discussed that and I told him that he should really update his website if he's serious about SEO and improving his online presence. He agreed to a website redesign as well as SEO after the site has been completed!
:toilet:

Congrats on the upsell! That's exactly what I experienced with a few of my clients also. Not only its very profitable, but it also strengthen the relationship even more.

You've officially became his 'go to' guy for any web related services now.

 

[1337WuLF]

I have been getting some callbacks today from the letters I sent out this week.

One of them wasn't interested since I couldn't remove the reviews. He said he already had a review funnel system in place with another company.

So far 4 of them are promising. Two guys have said they will go ahead and the other two still want more information. I don't want to count my chickens before they hatch though.

I'll let you guys know how it pans out. I'm expecting some more calls next week as well since it's Friday.

 

[cottonwolf]

keep them hitting my good sir

I have been getting some callbacks today from the letters I sent out this week.

One of them wasn't interested since I couldn't remove the reviews. He said he already had a review funnel system in place with another company.

So far 4 of them are promising. Two guys have said they will go ahead and the other two still want more information. I don't want to count my chickens before they hatch though.

I'll let you guys know how it pans out. I'm expecting some more calls next week as well since it's Friday.

 

[clophipitu]

My style is to give the customer a sample by creating a new Yelp account and posting one of their true testimonials as Yelp seems to rank high. I can do this even quicker with Google+. Could anyone recommend any other high ranking sites please?

I offer 2 price plans. Annual or for just a little more, lifetime. This has been more effective.

 

[scienceguy]

Have you found originalposters site to work good for you? Which version are you using?

Does it allow you to show people Yelp, as that isnt show on his site?

 

[1337WuLF]

Have you found originalposters site to work good for you? Which version are you using?

Does it allow you to show people Yelp, as that isnt show on his site?

Yeah it's working great so far!

It does support Yelp, but I steer clear of Yelp.

 

[SPQR]

1337WuLF, I seem to have missed it but are you targeting businesses in your area? Or do you deliver the physical goods (flyers, etc) via mail?

 

[1337WuLF]

1337WuLF, I seem to have missed it but are you targeting businesses in your area? Or do you deliver the physical goods (flyers, etc) via mail?

I am working with businesses all over my country. Yeah I deliver the physical goods by mail.

 

[scienceguy]

I am curious why you steer clear of yelp?

For most businesses yelp and G+ are what I find to be top ranking.

 

[1337WuLF]

From my previous batch of 280 sent out, so far I have made one sale. I have 3 others that called back from this batch that seem promising too, so I'll let you know if any sales come out of them. I also still need to call them all up.

From those 280 letters I have received 10 responses, which is a little lower than my first batch, but still good enough to be worth while imo.

I've revised my letter with some help from my telemarketing friend who works in SEO sales, so it will be interesting to see how that effects my conversion rate on my next batch of letters.

I am thinking about also including some package options and information in the coming batches, but I think I'll hold off on that until I test out the new letter. I don't want to change too much at once and not know what is positively / negatively effecting things.

I'm working on getting together 200 quality leads for my next batch. I'm hoping to find around 20 - 40 of those leads who are advertising on Google. (This means they have a budget for online advertising) For those ones I will be placing dice inside, the rest of them will not be recieiving dice. This helps me cut the cost of mailing down.

This time I'm also going to be calling up each lead to try and find out the business owners names. I think this will be helpful towards the chances of getting my letters opened, as well as when it's time to call them up.

 

[1337WuLF]

I am curious why you steer clear of yelp?

For most businesses yelp and G+ are what I find to be top ranking.

Yelp is not as popular thankfully in my country. And I don't like Yelp personally.

 

[scienceguy]

Yelp is not as popular thankfully in my country. And I don't like Yelp personally.

I don't blame you!

 

[1337WuLF]

I don't blame you!

It's a very clever and nasty extortion business model they have themselves from the looks of it. I refuse to work with them in anyway because of what I have read about them. Best to steer clear imo.