394 – A New Way to Get First Time Customers to Buy Again with Monica Sharma-Patnekar

Gift is Unwrapped,

episode 394.

It's that core loyal customers who are gonna buy from you

again and again that are going to be the more profitable

customers. Attention,

Gifters, Bakers,

crafters and makers.

Pursuing your dream can be fun.

Whether you have an established business or looking to start one

now you are in the right place.

This is Gift Biz Unwrapped,

helping you turn your skill into a flourishing business.

Join us for an episode packed full of invaluable guidance,

resources, and the support you need to grow your gift biz.

Here is your host Gift Biz gal Sue Moon Heights.

Hi there,

and thanks for joining me here today.

It's just a few days away from Halloween,

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The trick is to employ the strategy you'll hear about shortly

and the treat is what you're always striving for.

More sales,

we'll get to all that in a minute.

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Okay, remember the trick I teased about at the top of

the show?

It's about how to turn first time customers into repeat customers.

Although you'll naturally have a small number of people by again,

you can do so much better if you don't leave it

up to chance.

Why put energy into this effort?

According to outbound engine,

it costs five times more to convert a new customer than

to get additional orders from a past buyer.

And if you're able to get just 5% of your first

time customers to buy again,

listen to this,

it can increase profits anywhere from 25 to 95%.

How's that for a treat on the show today?

Monica's going to lay out all the details.

You'll hear about the difference between your ideal customer and your

real customer.

And then step by step how to turn them into loyal

fans who buy more from you and go on to tell

their friends about your products too.

Stay tuned.

This is a strategy you most likely haven't heard before and

it doesn't cost any money.

Just your time.

So open your Halloween bag because we're about to give you

a delicious sweet treat Today.

It's my pleasure to introduce you to Monica Sharma Pater.

Monica is a digital brand marketing and strategy professional.

With 17 years experience building global brands,

she's worked across multiple business sectors and with startups to Fortune

500 companies.

Additionally, she's been hired by Google to coach their premium partners

who work with e-commerce businesses.

Monica is Dutch by birth,

an Indian by Heritage,

global by choice in education,

a creative thinker,

a dancer,

a chi fanatic,

and the mom of two girls.

Monica, welcome to the Gift Biz on Wrapped podcast.

Hi Sue.

Thank you for having me.

I am so excited that you are here and we're gonna

get into a topic in a minute that is really important

for people to understand about their business and focus on.

So when I saw that you were looking to be on

the show,

I was like,

Yes, we have touched on this a little bit,

but we've not dived in.

I'm gonna keep everyone in suspense about what that is because

I'd like you to share with us your motivational candle.

So this is something that I've been doing for the seven

plus years I've been podcasting and it's such an interesting way

to learn more about you besides just through the intro that

we just did.

So if you were to create a candle that was all,

yours speaks totally,

Monica, what would it look like by color and a quote

or a saying?

So it would probably be yellow love,

bright colors.

And my quotas saying,

Well, that actually changes by season.

So currently I'm in a season where what I'm using a

lot is a bene brown quote.

Courage is when you know there is a chance you can

fail, but you do it anyways.

Oh yeah.

Because so many people won't start because they're afraid they're gonna

fail. There's this dream out there that just keeps going and

never has the chance of even being real because people just

stop themselves.

Yeah. And it just gives us a permission that it's okay

to be afraid as well.

And that's normal.

I think sometimes we say we're always telling our kids or

somebody or the other don't be afraid,

but it's okay to be afraid.

It's just that we choose to take the action despite being

afraid and still move on.

And it's been a big reminder for myself.

It's big reminder I'm using with my girls as well and

it's really been helping me in the last few months.

Is there something you can share with us,

like an example that you can tell us about?

Ooh, let me see.

So recently I think it was,

I would just finished a large project.

I was working up with a client on a freelance project

and there was a decision I had to make,

which meant that I was only gonna work with certain type

of freelance clients and which where I was only gonna be

able to charge a certain rate.

But that meant really clearly that I was gonna be earn

certain time for a little while and I may not have

a few clients for a little while.

And I was really,

really scared.

It was like I'm taking a wrong decision,

being irresponsible,

what does that mean?

But I've decided to move ahead anyways with that.

And that was just a quote that really helped me at

that moment when I read it to say,

Okay, you know what?

Sometimes you have to take those decisions and it's okay to

be afraid about it.

It's normal not knowing what's gonna happen next.

Yeah. And we often talk about being fearful and jumping into

starting a business,

but the fact is this fear factor and being courageous is

something that never goes away.

Like you always have to call on it again and again.

I mean I've been in business now corporate life,

my own businesses for a long time and I thought at

some point,

Oh, you'll just nail it.

Like you know,

you'll be so confident with every single thing,

but it's not true.

You always have to just decide,

you know what,

I'm gonna try it.

And some things work,

many things don't.

But it's the only way you can make progress is by

not being afraid of failing,

Not being afraid.

And that's how you learn what works and what doesn't work

and making the right choices going forward.

We've all learned lessons from those things and I think that's

what we need to remind ourselves and that it's okay to

make those mistakes and grow slowly and that not everything will

work in the first time.

Yeah. And it's okay to be afraid and uncertain in the

process. And I think you can look at your actions as

experiments. This is something you're gonna try and you're gonna see

if it works.

And if it does,

great. If it doesn't,

all right.

You've learned something to your point and so you'll try it

from a different angle or do something different.

Yeah, and that actually reminds me of another quote I use

a lot with my girls as well is you never lose,

you either win or you learn.

There You go.

I love it.

You win or you learn,

maybe both.

Cause when you win you'll also see what's working.

Exactly. All right,

love it.

So talk to me a little bit about how you got

into the business that you're doing now.

Give us a little of your story.

I think the red thread of my entire career,

I've done a master's in business major in marketing,

went into the marketing and strategy and brand profession in my

corporate career with Fortune 500 businesses,

pure brand management,

launching new brands as well as managing heritage brands,

moving into strategy consulting and global marketing.

But then 10 years into that I was like I was

itching to start my own business.

I quit when I had my second child and started my

own online store bringing handmade curated products from India in the

home accessory space here to Europe.

I continued to freelance at the same time,

but I realized that actually it was an old dream I

was chasing.

So this was something where you learn it was an old

dream I was chasing.

And what my heart was really in building brands,

something I continuously did.

The only thing what I decided to do at that time

is to to niche down to both smaller business owners and

scale-ups versus the bigger corporates because I love to see the

action that people are taking immediately,

the results that they're making,

which takes much longer in the corporate space.

And something I noticed a lot around me with all the

businesses I was in the networks with is there were just

a key foundational things that were,

I found were constantly missing,

which was really related to your customer and your brand.

And that was what my strength is and what I'm great

at and what I'm passionate about.

So that's where I decided to just niche down and focus

on that.

I love that you've niche down to startups and the people

who are scaling.

I have had a similar experience,

although I think from a little farther back,

cuz I'm a little bit older than you are,

but I worked also with a lot of corporate brands and

you again seem to think that they've got it all together.

Their systems are totally tied up and perfectly executed in all

of that.

And you end up seeing that when you're behind the scenes

and you really know that that's not the case.

And I also have always found,

and you talked about this a little bit already,

is that things take forever to happen in corporate where smaller

businesses, even if you're a one man show or one woman

show I should say,

and you've got a small team,

you can move so much quicker than corporations.

So together with the fact that the big brands don't always

have it all buckled down,

I'm not gonna say nobody does because they've probably done business

with you Monica,

but some of them are buckled down but many of them

aren't. And also things take so long it's like moving a

boulder. These are two areas where as small businesses we have

so much of an advantage over the big guys.

We just need to know what to do and how to

use it.

Exactly. And I just love seeing the impact cause it's not

just impact on their business,

but when I work a lot of female entrepreneurs to seeing

the impact it has in their life,

that's what really inspires me.

The change that I'm helping them make because it impacts them

to get into even as one person business owner into a

leadership position in their business,

but also impact on their family the time they have for

each other.

And it's just so inspiring to see that kind of effect

that I'm having on people.

Yes, for sure.

Okay, so I alluded to this a topic that we haven't

really dived into in depth before and this is one of

your specialties,

Monica. And that is how to take a first time customer

and make them a loyal customer.

So often all of our energy is getting new customers,

getting more exposure to our product from people who have never

seen us before and not remembering that those people who have

already opened their pocketbook or pressed the buy button are way

more likely to buy again,

have already experienced what hopefully has been a beautiful product experience.

And through the whole sales process,

everything has been so smooth.

Of course these are the people that we should be talking

to more and focusing on.

Absolutely. Why don't we do that?

It seems so obvious,

but the natural thing is always get more,

Get more,

get more customers.

Yeah. Because I think that's how everyone thinks that they need

to grow their business obviously.

And I think what we need to remember,

it's going to be a combination.

It is,

you have to have new customers coming in to keep that

growth, but it's that core loyal customers who are gonna buy

from you again and again and who are gonna bring others

with them.

Like I say to the party to buy from you as

well that are going to be the more profitable customers cuz

you need to spend obviously to bring people in,

but as they buy from you again,

that's what's gonna really allow you to build a long-term sustainable

business. And that's what sometimes we forget it costs more actually

to bring in a new customer than to keep an existing

one A lot more.

Do you know what the number is?

How much more?

I forgot the exact number but I know it keeps changing

with the online World.

Yeah, but it's significant.

It's significant.

It's like 3,

5, 7 times more.

I mean it's not just even double,

it's more than That.

It is more than that.

I'm gonna research and see if I can find that and

if I can I'll add it into the show notes here.

But that's always been the case.

You know,

way back in my corporate life when retail,

there wasn't even online in the very beginning when I started

it was also the case.

So this is a solid baseline issue with businesses.

It always takes more to attract a new customer versus to

keep the ones that you have.

Exactly. Yeah.

And the other thing is,

and I think this is based on the business that you

have, Monica,

you may be able to tell me more on this.

You're always gonna have some people who will fall off.

So naturally there will always,

you know,

even if you have a loyal customer base,

there's always gonna be people who will fall off for whatever

reason. And so you always wanna keep filling your base,

but the focus should be on your current customers.

I'm gonna even say first,

would you agree?

Absolutely a hundred percent agree with that.

Of course it's gonna change as per the business you have.

How often is your product one that there's a need to

buy it more often?

Does it have one where you can only need it once

a year again or you are not gonna buy a TV

every year for example.

Things like that will obviously affect it,

but the more you can build that relationship and keep them

and even if your product is not something they need to

buy as often,

but if you build that relationship they will talk to others

about it as well.

Which is also a slightly cheaper way obviously to bring in

new customers.

So absolutely focus,

especially in this current environment.

I say there is nothing like focusing on your current loyal

customers or help them become loyal and give them what they're

looking for.

Yeah, and we're gonna get into a little bit of your

advice on how to do that,

but I just wanna make one point about referrals.

I feel like referrals,

and think about this for yourself too.

So any product that you've been referred to,

your friend has said,

Oh my gosh,

you should try this product.

It's so great.

I feel like that if you think of like a football

game, the ball's already at the one yard line.

All you gotta do is carry it over the goal line.

Yeah. Because you've already made so much progress just by a

friend referring a product.

So, so much value and a benefit to you.

Like your sales will come in so much faster if you've

got all these potential customers at the one yard line,

they just have to get over.

I know.

It just saves you so much more energy and action that

you have to take just from in terms of more,

you know,

the cold,

warm, and hot leads.

They're coming in already as a warm lead.

So you just need to make them like super hot at

that moment.

Exactly. Super hot.

All right,

so for repeat business and referral business,

it all goes back to deepening a connection and a relationship

with your customers,

right? Right.

Is this the best place to start?

We're not talking about converting prospects to sales,

we're starting right at the customer point,

right? Focusing on our customers,

Right? Absolutely.

Focusing right on customers though these techniques will also help you

with the prospect,

but I always focus first on your Customers.

Okay. All right,

wonderful. So we've got a group of people who have purchased

from us,

we might not even know them,

they may just be a name that has come through because

it's been a sale online.

Yes. Well that's where we actually start.

That's the point.

Which is what the,

one of the biggest things I have noticed with anyone I

work with or even speak with,

I call it real over ideal.

We are all out there trying to make these ideal customer

personas and ideal literally means something made up in your imagination

if you look it up in the dictionary.

So people are drawing out these personas on paper without really

knowing who these people are.

So I say get to know who your real customers are

first, which means having conversations with them.

Literally that's how you make actual customer persona is through actual

conversations with them.

You can call them interviews if you want,

but sounds too formal.

So I always say having this real meaningful customer conversations with

them, reach out to them,

pick up the phone and get to know them.

That is the starting point.

Wait, pick up the phone,

actually call somebody.

Well yeah,

obviously we email them first and make appointments and you do

video calls or calls or you do face to face if

they live in the same city.

I don't care.

But it has to be an actual conversation,

not just a survey going out because that's the only way

to really speak.

You know,

just think about when you speak to a friend,

you're not gonna just nail them a few questions and see

how they're doing.

You speak to them to get to really know them.

It's the same way with your customers and you have to

know who's buying from you to be able to attract one

more of them,

but also to be able to serve these people much better.

Right. I love this idea.

Like who would think,

pick up the phone and actually talk,

Right? I mean it's just think of any company on this

earth that has been super successful and didn't know who's buying

from them.

Right? I'm thinking this through here.

You would do this with your customer when they first interact

with you,

the first purchase,

something like that,

right? How long into your business can you do that?

If you're just starting,

you may only have a handful of customers,

right? And as you grow,

hopefully you're gonna have many more customers.

Yeah. That are gonna come in all the time.

So how do you work this through as you're growing your

business? Yeah,

so I mean if you've never done this,

of course it's a great place to just start.

And I would speak to both the customers who've just bought

from you,

but some who've already been buying more often and that also

gives you good idea of the differences and commonalities.

But otherwise,

this for me should be an ongoing process in your business.

Getting to know who your customers are as your business changes,

your growing,

your business is growing,

your products are evolving,

your customers are also evolving,

the economy is evolving,

the markets are evolving,

there are other choices coming in.

So as long as you stay on top of that and

keep this as an on ongoing process in your business that

every month you speak to a few customers,

you're always gonna be on top of what's really happening and

what they want and they're gonna be able to reach out

to those customers for ongoing feedback as well.

Okay. So in the beginning you can talk to everybody because

you have a smaller number of customers and then as you

get bigger,

maybe you make a goal for yourself,

you wanna talk to three to five customers a week or

whatever it is.

Even if you start a month,

I think that's a great place to start.

Yeah. Just you know,

and then depending if you have a team in place or

are you still,

you know,

sole business owner,

it's a little harder.

So keep it per month.

How many you'd like to speak to.

Do you have a team in place?

You can put a process in place where they speak to

customers a certain time after they come in and make their

purchase with you for example.

But just keeping it an ongoing process that you constantly know

who your customer is,

who's buying from you,

why they're buying from you,

what are those triggers and barriers along the journey for them

as well as.

So when things happen like we are now,

I see so much uncertainty in people's minds.

Whether it's the algorithms changing or the markets changing.

My only feedback always is please just speak to your customers.

They'll tell you what they need.

Right. And not everyone that you reach out to will be

willing to speak with you either.

So don't worry about that.

You know,

your goal is just to get in contact with customers so

that you can learn more.

I love what you're saying here,

Monica, about your real,

the true person,

which is what you're getting at,

versus what you thought was the ideal customer when you first

started. You know,

cuz you have to put something out there to start with,

but who is actually really buying your product.

Exactly. So let's take this down a little more granular.

Someone makes a purchase,

let's just say online for now.

Okay, someone makes a purchase,

how do I reach out to them?

Yep. Email you'll have gotten either,

depends on how they sign up with SMS or email.

But emails usually the easiest.

Write to them a personal email.

Make sure it doesn't go through the automated email service providers

so that it really,

they know it's really coming from you.

Write to them an email and just reach out to them.

Say, Hey,

I've seen you've made your first purchase.

Or somebody who's been with you longer seen you've bought very

often. I'm always trying to work and improve my business to

able to serve you better.

I would just love some feedback and some,

a little bit of your time to speak to you one

on one over call or video call,

whichever works for You.

Would you be interested?

And when would be possible?

So write something in your tone of voice that sounds like

you, that's heartfelt and genuinely is really like,

I'm looking for your help to grow my business so I

can serve you better.

So you're doing it for them.

Right? Okay.

So very personal,

just like you would talk to anybody or communicate with anybody

one on one.

But you're saying don't make it an automated email even if

it's personal.

No, I've noticed the you can do that,

you can send out automated emails as well.

People will respond but you'll have a higher response rate when

it's personal.

All right.

And you might also wanna target in,

let's say you've added a new product to your lineup.

So you might wanna target people who have purchased that product

specifically too.

So you might have certain questions,

This is great for research of all sorts.

I think This is great for everything that was at any

stage of business,

you are actually,

you can keep using this add,

especially when people haven't done it before.

I always say,

okay, like choose a certain segment and then send an email

out from your email services provider,

but then pick out a handful where you say,

I really wanna speak to these and send those personally for

example. So you can always do a combination.

Cuz depending on how big your list is,

it may be impossible to reach out to everyone personally,

but therefore you can always do a combination as well.

But people love helping and you'll see the,

if they have the time they're gonna respond.

Especially with small business owners,

I've noticed there is this common link or some desire that

people have to help you.

So don't be afraid as well for,

you'll be really surprised how much people love helping other people.

Yeah. And they feeling noticed.

If you reach out specifically,

then that customer is like,

gosh, they see me,

they recognize me and they really value me as a customer.

I love this idea,

Monica, of talking one on one with a customer,

but now we've got them on the phone or video chat,

What do we ask them?

Stay tuned.

We'll be back with detailed steps of what to say in

these calls after.

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So okay,

yes, obviously the common introduction,

get to know them,

make it a friendly conversation like you would with anyone.

Don't make it feel like you're gonna be questioning them on

something really serious.

And then I have four buckets of questions that you ask

them. So we start with the demographics,

right? You just wanna get to know who the person is.

Obviously it's not the most important aspect,

but it will help you with a lot of online targeting

and other things that you do.

Second one is desire.

This is one most people will skip on.

And for me this is one of the most crucial ones.

Then we have the do and then we have delight.

Oh, I'm excited.

This is interesting.

And I have a really awesome link I think,

where you can download this so that if you are not

able to catch up one and write it down,

you can download it as Well.

Okay. So I'll put that in the show notes for this.

Okay. All right.

So let's talk about each of these in detail then.

Demographics, it's the basic,

basic. It can be age lifecycle,

life stage,

sorry, if it's a business,

it's a lifecycle.

But as a person it's a life stage.

You're and you know,

married single with kids without kids.

I would always say think about the things that would be

relevant for your business,

right? Is some clients I've worked with,

they really want to know if people are a homeowner or

not of their renting for example,

especially in the home accessory space.

Others would love to know.

They feel like the kind of car you own tells a

lot about you as well.

So you can choose the elements.

These are the factual information about the person that can just

help describe who they are.

Okay, so in this one I would imagine like we don't

wanna feel like we're taking a census.

No, right?

You know,

everyone is a little bit uncomfortable with revealing some of that

information. So I'm thinking that you could talk about it just

in a conversation.

Like obviously you kind of know the life stage based on

if you're in a video chat,

you know,

you can tell approximately ages,

certainly you know,

younger versus older,

you'll know if they're a family,

if they've got kids in the back.

So I'm feeling like in that very beginning,

if you're talking to them,

it doesn't have to be what's your age,

what's your,

no, but you just,

Hi, how are you?

Where do you live in the country?

I'm in so and so just comfortable conversation,

not question,

answer, question,

answer, right?

Absolutely. Shit that needs to be an open conversation.

You just ask them to start telling them a little about

themselves. I always say introduce yourself a little bit first so

they feel they know you as well.

Then you ask them,

and I actually have a technique there called story probing.

So we,

after the four buckets,

we can touch on that which will help in how to

ask those questions correctly as well.

Okay. But just open conversation.

But the checklist,

you can have it with yourself so you know what areas

you wanna cover.

And if you feel some questions are more sensitive,

you can always bring those at the end and say,

just to end up the conversation,

do you mind sharing with me?

And then just make sure you have,

And by that time they're usually more comfortable sharing things with

you as well,

Right? And I'm thinking you could also give them the reason

why you're interested in knowing I wanna know more about my

customers so that I can match new products that I'm creating

along with your lifestyle or what's important to you at the

time or whatever.

So that they understand why you're asking these questions.

Absolutely. Okay.

Alright. So demos that's kind of easy but a little more

challenging to get and maybe you only say,

you know,

targeted on two or three of 'em,

those are the ones you really wanna get.

Anytime you speak to your customer,

you need to focus on the couple of questions in each

box that you think are the most important and will help

you and the rest.

You know,

if you're having a general conversation like we are doing,

we kind of slide into different directions as well based on

what they're saying.

And you have to leave the space and room to do

that as well,

Right? Desire.

Tell me about desire.

Desire. So what we're always trying to get into is what

I call the customer desire insight or the human insight,

whatever you wanna call it.

This is their needs once in desire.

This is what your customer is longing for in life.

What they are looking for.

It's like this end state that they're working towards.

It's not the solution that you're providing yet.

It's not what you're doing with your products yet.

This is really about them.

What's going on in their life,

what's makes them happy,

what are maybe the struggles,

what are desires that they have?

And especially in the lifestyles kind of space.

I think also,

especially with people who make handmade products,

you'll see you're not really always solving a problem as a

you fulfilling a desire.

What is it that they want and what's going on in

their life?

Get to know them still as a person on a slightly

deeper level before you dive into things that are all immediately

and directly related to your product.

If you've not known them ever before,

how do you get them to start talking like that?

So, okay,

so we'll jump ahead.

This is where I use my technique called story proving.

So just think about it.

If somebody suddenly,

even especially when you ask a kid,

why most of the time they're like really stumped.

It's the same with adults.

It's so difficult for us to sometimes explain,

we end up rationalizing,

like we know that majority of customer purchases are subconscious.

It's, it's based on feelings and that's what you're trying to

get to.

So therefore I always say is ask stories.

Don't ask the why questions.

You have to ask them stories,

you have to ask them things that have happened in their

life. You can't ask people to predict the future cuz nobody

can. So it's really using stories as a basis to get

to know somebody.

So you invite them to talk about a moment that they

really remember and they'll tell you a little story about it.

And what that reveals is usually the most amazing.

Interesting, Okay.

This one feels a little challenging to me,

I have to say because I just feel like someone that

you've never known.

I don't know that they'll tell you a bunch of stories

that don't have anything to do with their product,

but maybe you just kind of,

it's available and you weave it in as the conversation flows.

I mean all of this has to just be,

every conversation's gonna be different.

Some people will talk to you probably longer than you have

time for and other people won't.

So you just have to go with the flow.

But the intent is to try and get that second level

of the desires in,

right? Exactly.

And this is the one that most people struggle with.

So it's really normal because you've not done this before.

Obviously I've been doing this for years.

So the first time,

the second time it may feel a bit uncomfortable,

but you'll be surprised at again how much people tend to

open up.

And it's also about how you ask,

Like I say,

it's how you ask that questions.

And if I'm gonna ask somebody,

Are you happy?

Well that's gonna be really strange,

right? Yeah,

no closed ended,

no, yes,

no questions,

right? No,

but if I'm asking or say,

okay, if somebody says I'm happy,

say why are you happy?

It's really difficult for people to describe that.

But instead ask like we've all been through difficult time last

year with the pandemics and anything happening.

So you can use that as an inroad for example.

And just ask something like,

you know,

just tell me about a recent moment that really made you

happy. When you ask that people will certainly describe a situation

the other words might not and which gives you then a

chance to pick up things from that and dive in.

And what happens is with stories,

stories are memorable.

Stories bring out emotions.

People will therefore,

instead of just what makes you happy and people will list

things, they will tell you about a genuine situation that happened

in their life actually made them happy.

And that will give you an idea of what's truly important

for them.

Cuz that's what they remember to tell you about.

So it's really about asking the recent moments and ask them

to tell you a little story about different things.

Okay, so I'm trying to put myself in this place doing

this and here's how this could work for me.

Okay, let's say make candles,

which no one's surprised that I bring this up as the

example cuz candles are like my all time favorite thing in

life. Let's say I'm at this question and could I say

to the person that I'm talking to,

You know,

one of the things that's really important to me is that

you get an experience out of my product that I'm intending.

Like the,

I'm wanting candles to just fill your life and make you

happy and make you comfortable,

you know,

all of that on a deeper level.

What are other things or what's happened recently where you've just

been happy apart from candles in my product and all of

that. What other things make you happy?

Could that be a way of doing like kind of grounding

the question?

Yes. The only thing what you're doing though here is you're

already prompting them with a certain direction,

what you want to achieve with your candles.

Whereas what you want to know is what does your candles

def actually really do for them?

Okay, So could you say something like,

I'm wanting to understand over and above that the candles are

beautiful and smell good,

What other experiences do you have with candles or something like

that? So I'll give you a very concrete example what you

want to know?

What Yeah,

I need a concrete example for sure.

Clearly We are moving into though is the next box already

because the desires is more general,

right? Understanding their life.

And the questions now we're moving into do and do is

the next box where how do they behave?

Whether they're doing within your industry sector,

the kind of products product category that you sell.

Okay? So in your case you wanna know what does candles

actually mean to them or your candles specifically.

So I would literally ask them,

okay, you know,

tell me a little story or a moment where you recently

used one of my candles.

Tell me about that moment.

Literally, it feels really vague,

I know,

but you've gotta wait and see the response that comes out

of that.

And that's when you realize,

and that's when people start telling you,

they'll tell you about a moment that they actually use your

candle versus what you think they would've used it for.

And then that gives you the opening to dive deeper because

then you can go into more specific and standard questions that

you wanna ask.

But this gives you a moment to really say,

okay, so somebody may tell you,

I for example,

Oh I like my candles every night before I sleep for

15, 20 minutes for example.

That tells you immediately what I'm using it for.

And that that moment is really important for me cuz this

is the one I talked about.

I may use it for more things,

but this is the one that really stuck with me.

And I'll tell you what I,

I have this whole ritual that I follow follow when I

do that.

So, and that's what people will open up with with you

and then you dive in based on what they're saying,

you can dive in deeper into the various aspects that they

talk about.

And that's why I call it story probing.

Cuz you're probing further into it based on what they say,

but you wanna keep it as open as possible in the

beginning. And once they talk to you more,

you can always go to more specific questions down the funnel.

Okay. All right,

got it.

I think I actually am getting this now.

So that's all still under due,

right? We had demographics,

we had desire,

we had due.

And then the last one is delight.

Delight is what makes them truly happy about the experience of

say, shopping with you or competitors or alternatives.

What will they even tell others about buying from you?

So this way,

you know,

the whole experience that they have,

you've gotten to know who this person is,

what are their real needs in their life right now,

and how does candles,

in your case,

candles specifically fulfill that for them and then therefore what makes

them happy in the whole shopping experience that they have.

Okay. Alright.

And so then what do you do with all of this

information? Once you've had your conversations and you've had multiples,

right? What do you do with all of this information?

Then you've got some great stories,

you've probably learned a little bit more about your product in

terms of how people are using.

It started to really be more clear about who your real

customer is.

So now you have all this information,

how is this valuable to us?

What do we do with it?

Well, while you obviously pull out the red thread that's coming

out across all of them,

and you will find those,

you pull out those red thread and keep doing these going

forward in your business as well,

right? And that's when you use it to really define what

you stand for as a brand.

Now you know where your customers are,

you know what your product is.

So how does that there fulfill those desires and those experiences

that they're talking about?

And what I use there is called the benefit ladder,

which is,

so most people focus a lot on what we call the

features. So the candle smells good,

the colors,

what it is made of,

but what we wanna say,

what does that really mean to the customer?

So we go into the benefits and you have different steps

within the benefit ladder,

and there's also a lot of research that shows that the

more benefits you can offer on different runs of the value

ladder, the more loyalty you build with people as well over

the longer term.

And what that means is,

so you have functional benefits,

this is what does my product actually do candle?

Well, it lights up my space or it smells great,

that's what it does.

But then you have the emotional benefits.

How does it make me feel a candle?

I feel super relaxed and cozy when I like my candle

so emotional and then transformational,

therefore, how does it change my life?

I'm gonna stretch it here a little bit,

but say,

well the more relaxed I feel every night before I go

to bed,

the better.

I'm, for example,

doing my work the next day.

The more relaxed I'm with my children,

the happier my life at home is or the better sleep

I have.

Things like that.

And then you get to your societal benefits.

So therefore what does that do for society?

And that kind of comes back and links to your purpose

that you're trying to achieve with candles as well,

for example,

which is,

well, you know,

happier moms mean a happier society,

for example.

I'm doing very vague ones at the moment,

but I hope that gives,

I'm trying to keep it broad so that people can understand

how this would work for them.

And then this directly links to your messaging,

to your content,

to everything you're putting out there,

the ads you're putting out and the stories that you've gained

from the interviews can literally be things you can pick out

and tweak a little bit and use also in all your

content. So whatever messaging you're doing out there in your content,

your website,

your emails,

the ads you're putting out,

that's where you'll end up using all of this.

Yes. Oh my gosh,

perfect. This is so perfect because all right,

so the end result of all of this going through the

four Ds of the interview,

capturing the information,

then establishing your benefit ladder of,

again, four sections,

right? Functional,

emotional, transformational,

societal, all circles back to understanding your brand in terms of

who's actually being attracted to you and who uses it.

And then once you know that,

then it's what's the messaging look like for your business?

Because the stronger and the more keyed in your messaging is

you are going to attract more people who align with what

your product is naturally attracting and then they're going to buy

it more and tell their friends.

Is that right?

Absolutely. And if you combine the benefit letter with also what

makes you really different,

what's makes you unique,

what you're basically answering is,

who's my customer and why should they buy for me in

simple terms?

And that's what you then use.

So you make building that irresistible brand,

that empathizes with your customer,

it captivates them,

it inspires them.

And then he'll also will keep converting them ongoing and building

that long term loyal relationship with the content that you keep

putting out to Them.

Perfect. I love this so much and I had no idea

that this was going to be so timely because two podcasts

from now,

we are gonna be talking about how to take what you've

learned and make those words colorful and impactful and uniquely you

aligned with your brand.

So stay tuned for that podcast episode.

But this Monica,

where we're talking about is the first step because you don't

need to create words against your ideal customer.

You wanna create the words and experiences and all the messaging

to your real customer.

Real customers,

yes. Oh no,

this is like magic.

It's back to foundations.

I can't say that enough.

Back to foundations sort of just trying to put content out

there and just testing.

And this will be more educated testing that you can do.

You have the words,

you have the benefit ladder,

and you can communicate at different stages.

We always say you bring people in on emotions and you

urge them to buy and convert them on more facts.

So what happens is when you're starting broader with emotionals,

the stories,

the feelings that you're putting out there with people,

that's when you're bringing them in.

And then the closer they get to actually converting and buying

from you again,

that's when sometimes they need facts to rationalize that decision,

you could say.

So it works together.

So it's not that the features are not important,

they play a role in the funnel as well.

But remember that you bring people in on emotions and yours

to buy,

in fact.

So use that interchangeably.

And that's why the ladder is so important.

You've got your features,

you know what the functional benefits and then the emotional and

transformational. So depending on what stage your customer's in,

you can use different things to communicate with them.

Fabulous. Okay,

as we're winding down here,

we know the whole strategy,

we know the understanding,

we know the details behind all of the different steps.

What should somebody do right after they're done listening to the

show? What are the three action steps that they should take

to get this in play to start moving?

Cause you know how it is,

everyone can hear like,

this sounds great.

And then we get back into our business and don't do

anything. So what are the three things we should do coming

off of this podcast?

Well, first and foremost,

reach out,

go to your list and reach out to a few customers

and ask them for time to interview them and get that

booked and planned in literally even to make it easy.

Let's just start with three.

If that's all you can do at the moment,

just get three done.

And from there,

I'm sure you're gonna end up doing more.

Write your questions in the meantime while those being are booked

in, get your questions that you really want to ask them

in those four buckets.

And I have a very handy download for that to remind

you what those buckets are with a checklist under each D

so that you also know what are the kind of things

you wanna be focusing on and you have the questions,

then interview them and get the red thread out of those.

Okay. And define red thread again.

Explain what that is,

The commonalities and that you will find across the different interviews

for those different buckets.

So in terms of demographics,

roughly what do you see,

what kind of person they are?

It could be that the demographics are not the most important,

like I said,

but then under desires and due and delight,

what are the commonalities you see in terms of what their

needs and ones are,

how they're behaving within your product category,

where they're making their choices,

what are their triggers and barriers along the journey and what

really makes them happy when they do those,

make those purchases.

Okay, perfect.

Perfect, perfect.

All right,

three, everybody.

1, 2,

3. I want you to go and find those three customers

and seriously don't cheat.

So don't just call your friends to do these interviews.

Cause you're doing this for a goal,

right? Like maybe it's one of these people is someone that

you know,

but just to get in the groove.

But really what I think you want are people that you

don't know.

And that's one of my rules actually when I work with

my clients.

Oh, you're not allowed to interview any immediate friends or family

unless you are a hundred percent sure you can convince me

that they've actually been your genuine customers and not just buying

to support you.

And the reason being is I've noticed that really close family

and friends,

they're two extremes.

They can either be so supportive that they wanna tell you

anything negative at all.

They feel like they'll be hurting you if they are telling

you things that which probably could genuinely help you or the

other way they can be so critical cause they feel they

need to help you,

that they get too critical.

So you wanna really get to know from your genuine customers

who are a little more removed from you.

Those will give you the best insights.

Right? And I think the conversation is already slanted to what

you're saying,

but you already know each other,

so there's preconceived ideas on both sides already.

But that could be like a practice one,

right? Monica?

At The practice.

Go ahead do It.

Yeah, That doesn't count in those three.

Oh, you're tough.

Okay. And so you've mentioned this download a couple of times,

and the best thing for me to do is just put

it in the show notes.

Is that the way to do it?

Yes, that's The best thing.

And tell us one more time what's included in this download

so people remember why they should go and get it.

It's my desires over demographics framework.

So it will actually show you these four D's that I

talk about.

It's like a checklist.

It will explain you what the four D's are again.

And under each you'll have like four bullet point kind of

checklists, so you know the type of focus topics you want

in each of those boxes.

So you've done a lot of the work for us.

So once again,

no excuses.

You can definitely do your three easily.

Okay. All right,

wonderful. Share a little bit more about your company business with

Monica. So business with Monica,

I basically help creative and conscious product-based retail,

e-commerce entrepreneurs better know how to communicate and connect with the

real audience so that you get out of that vicious cycle

of Facebook ads or content and just not converting and work

from a more focused vision that you have for your brand

as a whole.

So you do more one-on-one into a deeper level as we've

been doing here,

or just take it further and more handholding of what you've

shared with us here today?

Yes, lots of handholding.

I work one on one with my customer because I go

so deep with them.

That's harder to do in a group format.

So I have either through a six week foundational mentorship or

people who want more support over six months,

but work one on one and literally through this whole process

of really getting to know a customer,

defining your brand,

what that means even for your product portfolio.

And then define looking at your numbers and defining pro strategy

using the knowledge of your customers.

There you go Across the customer journey to make sure that

you have a plan of action in place.

Love it.

Because if you don't know your customer,

you might be working off of something that is then a

total disconnect from the people who are actually buying your products.

And I think a lot of us could be guilty of

that. I won't say our but could be unknowingly guilty of

that, right?

Yeah. And that's one thing I wanna give.

Don't think that you've been doing everything wrong as business owners,

that's what we do.

We get started somewhere and we start with some ideas we

have and that's great.

But now take that the customers that are coming to you

as a the next step to say,

Okay, I wanna get into the next stage of my business,

next growth stage.

Let me get to know who my customers are and then

take it from there.

And I've seen this time and time again with all my

customers that everybody always had this thing in their imagination where

the ID client was.

And they were always surprised once they spoke to them in

truly getting to know them.

Oh, that's good information because I think a lot of us

feel like we have it locked in.

We know who our customers are.

And so if nothing else,

this will be validating that what you're thinking is accurate or

time to change what reality is versus what you were thinking

before. Yeah,

and this from an idea they have themselves,

which is great,

but you can't build a business just selling to yourself and

nobody is gonna be like you exactly like you.

So you really have to get to know.

So if you're not your own customer,

get to know who the ones are actually buying from You.

Monica, this has been really insightful and inspiring and interesting.

I'm very excited about this.

You've shared with us really how to identify and know for

sure who our customers are and then also how to start

enhancing that relationship so that they will be repeat customers and

tell everybody else about your business too.

Yep, exactly.

Let's keep growing that business and build it into a long

term sustainable one.

Wonderful. Thank you so much for sharing today.

I really appreciate It.

And thank you for having me.

Turning first time customers into loyal repeat brand fans.

It's so obvious,

but most people don't do it.

Do you accept the challenge of trying it out?

Only three people download Monica's guide on the four types of

questions to ask your customers@businesswithmonica.com

slash gift biz unwrapped,

and make those calls.

Yes, it will feel unnatural at first,

but as with everything you'll get in the groove,

then do it every month,

maybe even more than three.

And see your order counts go up and up.

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I wanna make sure you're familiar with my free Facebook group

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It's a place where we all gather and are a community

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I got a really fun post in there that's my favorite

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I have to say,

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