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Use Mobile Marketing To Make More Money, Greg Hickman

Author

Wes Schaeffer
May 23, 2014

 

About Today’s Guest on The Sales Podcast

In the summer of 2012, Greg Hickman started MobileMixed.com while still in Corporate America “for selfish reasons. [he] interviewed people doing cool things in the space.”

Then he began networking, attending conferences and learning how to monetize his business. On Dec 13, 2013, he left his Corporate America gig and has never looked back.

This is his story.

Rubber-Meets-The-Road Tip

  • Greg, like many of my guests, lived below his means. With his nestegg he was able to take a calculated risk to go out on his own.

  • He was able to convince his employer of the benefits of allowing him to follow his passion to help them grow. He built his own business at night and on the weekends by being “efficient” and only taking on “good projects and saying no to the dogs.”

  • We all need to be more selective of the clients we take on. Get my “Sales Agenda” for free to see how I do it.

  • Wanna get REALLY good at taking on better clients?

  • He was commuting 45 min. He was worn out and knew that in order to leave he had to have no debt and have a certain level of income and momentum. He was getting speaking gigs and he knew he would figure things out once it got too big. “I just said yes.” (Say yes and figure out how.)

  • Selling his house was important in his transition. He bought a town home in 2010 and he saw his neighbor do well and sell it within 48 hours so he shifted his mindset of seeing his house as a long term investment and sold and now had a safety net. He was afraid of not being able to pay his bills so he got rid of his mortgage. Got a small one bedroom apartment.

Why do mobile marketing?

  • Most of your audience is connecting with you via mobile. 51% of all email opens. 70% of Facebook. 61% of podcasts are listened to on mobile.

  • We consume data differently today than just a couple of years ago.

  • Consumers will punish you by not coming back if you’re not mobile friendly.

  • 74% of consumers will only wait 3 seconds and there is a 47% chance they won’t come back.

  • A lot of people listen to his podcast from his mobile web page.

  • Greg uses a mobile responsive WordPress theme.

  • Mobile Web, SMS, Email, Some social, search (local search)

(Keap CRM now does SMS marketing.)

Avoid these SMS mistakes

  • Treating it like email and sending too much information. Keep it short and sweet. Great for time-sensitive information. 90% are read within 3 minutes.

  • Consistency and frequency – get it right. Once or twice a week is fine. SMS will break through the clutter but have important information and send it timely. Maybe announce new product early. Treat them more special than your email subscribers. Give them an Early Bird special maybe 12 hours early, etc.

  • Be careful. Big penalties if you send SMS spam.

How to do SMS Marketing

  • Mobile Coupons convert 10x better than paper coupons.

  • Have a clear CTA – Call To Action.

  • How to increase opt-ins on SMS

    • #1 is text keyword to a short code

    • Full 10-digit number is a long code (it’s cheaper but offers less flexibility and wireless carriers will shut you down if you have large opt-ins because those numbers aren’t provisioned for that.)

    • Dedicated short codes are expensive – $500 to $1,000/mo pre-paid 3-6-12 months – so get a shared short code.

    • Better interaction and opt-in rates.

    • Offer incentives. Not just monetary. Maybe better access.

    • Keep it simple.

    • Start with the end in mind. Ask a restaurant when their slowest day is. Start there.

    • Greg uses his podcast to give people instructions to opt in via SMS.

    • Then drive to mobile-optimized web page from LeadPages to opt-in. Send an MMS with video to increase engagement.

Why start a Podcast to Grow Your Sales

  • Podcasting is an authority-builder. It drives traffic to his business. There is so much more competition now.

  • There are only 20 slots in New & Noteworthy.

  • Make sure you are unique in what you do.

  • Greg talks about leaving Corporate America.

  • John Lee Dumas had $140,000 in savings.

  • Amy Porterfield had two paying consulting clients on 1-year contracts.

  • Get niched to get successful.

  • He gets maybe 500 to 1,000 downloads a day and he does two podcasts per week. But it’s a lead-generator. He monetizes through other products and even affiliate products.

  • Podcasting is still a great way to connect with your audience.

  • Jason and Jeremy from Internet Business Mastery – do an audio blog. Record yourself reading your posts. IBM Audio Blog is new and doing well.

If you need more help growing your sales, check out the following resources…