Getting Raw Ep #27 Amanda Bracks

Welcome to Getting Raw. It's Richard Mark Toutounji. Today I'm with Amanda Brax. Welcome, Amanda.

Thank you.

Amanda's very nervous here sitting on the couch, so we have to be very nice to her. So I wanted to start— you've got a lot of things happening, and I've got a stopwatch here because when Amanda starts talking, That's

right, we could go for hours.

You've got a lot of knowledge and a lot of skills and you've got a new book that's just come out, Customer Acquisition: 465 Ways to Gain and Retain Customers. And you just told me before that if you want to know anything, it's all in here. So you pretty much put all your years in here, have you?

Yeah, I just got asked a question today, why 465? And I said because that's every single thing I know so far. So obviously there's a lot of learning ahead, but there's got to be something for everybody in there. there about how to gain customers and retain them obviously in their business to grow.

And you've got heaps of things in here like I just saw a lotto or something in there.

Yeah, there's fun things, there's lotto, there's ways to network, there's things to do for their Facebook or how to work with the media. You know, an idea might be how to work with a celebrity or a prominent person in your area. So there's multiple, multiple channels of ways to gain customers.

And so tell me a bit about your background because I mean everybody knows you in the industry I think and you really focus You focus on gyms, on studios, on getting clients into the door. How did you get this niche and this easy ability to do that?

I think my passion comes from sport. I used to play a lot of touch football and I love sales, you know, I just love selling. And so when I was 23, I wrote to all the gyms in the area when I finished my uni degree saying, hey, I love selling and I love sports, do you have a job in your facility? Now imagine if that happened these days where the biggest employment The biggest employment hole at the moment is salespeople in the fitness industry. So I was writing around saying, you know, and luckily enough I got 2 interviews. And the place that I decided I wanted to go to, they made everybody feel so welcome when I watched them walking in the door. They made me feel welcome as an interview person. So I thought, this is the place I want to be. So I was in sales for 3 months, was promoted to sales manager 3 months after that, club manager another 3 months after that, and then grew the Vital Health Club from 1,800 members to 4,500 plus 300 PTs a week. And it was Australia's number 1 health club. Yeah, we won all the awards. It was fun. We had a great culture.

Yeah.

And it was an amazing experience, amazing journey to be on for 10 years while I was there.

10 years?

Yeah, yeah. So, and then during that time, George Holman, the owner, also opened a direct debit company. So I had the experience of traveling around Australia and consulting and helping other studios, personal trainers grow their income through direct debit. We sort of revolutionized payment in the fitness industry and made fitness affordable for people.

Well, that's a huge industry now, isn't it? Yeah. Direct debits and that sort of stuff. Yeah, it was awesome. So it was a great

Then after that, I thought I'll do something different and got into aquatics and worked with some leisure centers and found the same principles for fitness sales applied in the leisure centers and grew those guys. You know, one center, we went from 40 members to 2,000 in a year and just all the principles apply across. Now I'm doing customer acquisition in different industries and again, the same principles apply. We're working with hairdressers, web designers, marketers, international and Australian companies and helping them grow their businesses too.

So the 465 Ways pretty much goes in any industry? Any industry. Service-based industry, do you think?

No, products, definitely retail. You know, I had a bit of a Facebook moment last night with retail where I didn't get served. 18 minutes I was standing at a register in Myer trying to find someone so I could pay.

So you could pay?

So I could pay. So I thought, you know, and then in the same breath I got an email saying whatever it was, 600 jobs cut in— oh sorry, 1,600 jobs cut in the retail sector in the last 6 months and 650 retail businesses closed in the last 6 months. And I just don't think they try hard enough. I mean, there's other factors that go in there, but definitely not trying hard enough when you've got to stand at a counter for 18 minutes

That's a long

time. That's a long time.

Especially when you want to pay for some good stuff.

That's right.

So I guess what do you— I mean, all the strategies in here, but sometimes people get a book, right, and they go, yeah, this is all great, but you have the skills and they don't have the skills. How do you go about that when people say, yeah, these are all the skills you have, but Amanda, you're so much better than me. I can't do this, I can't do that. What do they have to do to overcome if they're not good at these things?

Right, so the way the book's set out is actually it's written— there's quite a bit about implementation on it because obviously as a business coach, I've known that that's a big issue. I've given people ideas and in a month they haven't done them. So there is that implementation process that they need to go through. So in the book, every single idea has got a box next to it. So when people read the book, they tick off all the ideas they want to do, and at the end they turn it into a to-do list and then forward that into action. So it's not a book about ideas, it's actually a book about—

Action.

Action. So things have how to get it done, there's scripts on how to get it done, what to do, what to say. So it's actually a bit more forward into the action process.

Yeah, I'm going to give away 2 of these. We're going to put this in our Friday catch-up. We'll give away 2 of these, signed as well.

Yeah, lucky.

Okay, so what have you seen, I guess, in the fitness industry? You've been involved in it so long. You've seen all the changes that have taken place. Where do you see the big issues for when personal trainers or gym owners are saying, I can't get enough clients in the door? What are they really doing wrong?

Okay, so the answer would be that especially in the fitness business, you guys have all got clients out there saying, I'm not losing weight. But you know it's because they just— they will lose weight if they're either eating better or exercising more. So unfortunately, with people with weight loss, their body tells a story, not necessarily the words. And the same applies with personal trainers and fitness owners to me, that I just look at their balance sheet, and their balance sheet just says that they're not doing enough. So if they're not making enough income, they can't tell me that they're doing everything, because unless they're doing 465 weights consecutively, I know they're not doing enough.

Busted.

So really, it comes to— I've got a saying that goes, if you If you want more, you can always do more. Well, you can always have more because you can always do more. So, you know, there's always—

So they don't work hard enough, basically.

They just don't do enough.

Do you think some trainers or gym owners are barking up the wrong tree in their strategies and their approach? Would everybody succeed if they do it in 465 ways?

Yeah, what they do is they just put all their eggs in one basket and say, okay, well, I've done— this month is my Facebook campaign. And then, oh, that didn't work. So it needs to be a combination of— I've got a theory, they need to use the word and, not instead of. So this month it's a Facebook strategy. Next month it's the Facebook strategy and a referral promotion. The month after, it's Facebook strategy referral promotion, and we'll get our lead boxes sorted. So at the end of the 12 months, you've got 12 campaigns going at one time, turning all these wheels and just filtering the business.

Imagine if you actually use 12 proper campaigns out of here properly, you've still got hundreds filtered out.

That's right. Isn't that wonderful? So the thing is, I guess with the campaigns in this book and the ideas, some things are going to appeal more to other people. So you just got to find things that you really love doing and they might appeal to you. So if you're a morning person, you may love to grab the bananas and stick a flyer around them and give them out to people at the train station or whatever. And there's a whole lot of ideas that, you know, some people don't like to get on the telephone and then other people do. So there's telemarketing scripts in there and, you know, there's definitely something in there for everybody. But the fact is that you just got to use the word and instead of instead of.

I love that. So just keep adding, adding, adding.

Yeah, adding campaigns.

What have you seen the biggest, you know, let's say you've been working with a club or a gym, what is the biggest mistakes you've seen someone do or like the biggest waste of money someone's done in regards to marketing? So we can learn from it obviously.

It's totally marketing for ego.

Marketing for ego?

Yeah, like, I've got this best ad, this is my fantastic ad, you know, I designed it, you know, it's got this wonderful picture on it I picked. You know, it's nothing about you, it's about results. So, you know, it's about what works. They just do things that appeal to them, not necessarily the consumers. They don't understand who the people they're talking to are. You know, I got approached the other day to run a campaign for a company that I work with about a yellow envelope. You know how they put all the little thousands in?

Oh yeah, they put a thousand in there. Yeah, an hour on the phone.

just telling me that this was the best thing. This is a high-priced company. I'm like, the moment you have Mercedes and Tag Heuer advertising on an envelope, we'll go on it as well. So I think people don't understand the consumer, who they're actually talking to. So, one, leave your ego at the door when it comes to marketing and actually think about who you're talking to and then design campaigns to speak to those people. Yeah, it's more about the results, not so much about how good your artwork is.

How good your artwork is.

The funny thing is, though, in America, the advertising awards are actually nominated not necessarily the best ads when it comes to results. They are the most creative and the most outgoing and generally they're not necessarily the ones that—

The ones that work.

Yeah, it's just that is about ego so it's quite ironic how we reward that.

And it is true sometimes you have the best-looking website, best-looking flyer but it actually doesn't work.

Yeah, so change it immediately. It doesn't matter how much money or time you've invested in it or your ego, change it. If it's not getting results, you need to change it. A bit like the diet with the customer or the exercise routine.

And you recommend tracking everything that you do or what's your process on that?

Great, great question. So for 12 months, I set And I sat there, and can you imagine with 4,500 members, we're probably bringing in about 1,500, 2,000 new members a year.

Yeah.

I was sitting there tracking every single person. If it wasn't written on the form through the data, I would go and hunt them down and hunt out their paperwork. And if that wasn't on there, I would ring the customer and say, how did you find out about us? And for me, I did that and I actually got every single dollar down. And then I went into a different program where I thought, okay, well, I'm going to just run it based on the income I generate that month. I don't really care. And that to me was far more successful than worried about the dollar because really, especially today, If I put a letterbox flyer in the mail now and it's got a QR code on it, go to the website.com, ring the 1300 number, or even they could go on the website and find the address of a place and walk in. How do you know? You just don't know. So whatever I did that month, if it makes income and it's a great result, Yeah. I do the exact same thing the next month after, whether it's a bus shelter or a letterbox drop or whatever. That combination obviously works. And it is a combination that really gets a result, not necessarily one campaign. As long as they're all the same and they're saying the same message, it really works.

Simple. You've got to track it though.

You definitely need to track it totally. So if I spent $20,000 for the campaign that month, I want to be bringing in obviously a return of $20,001. But anyway, definitely got to track it. I actually track it as a campaign, not necessarily individual breakdown. So I break it down, but overall, if it was successful, then I run the whole thing again.

Good advice. Where do you see the future of marketing or fitness in the next, say, year? Like, where should we— the marketers out there, where should they really be aiming for and getting behind and pushing behind, you know, is it— what sort of marketing, what's happening there?

Okay, so down back to a couple of different channels. Firstly, obviously, your readers and viewers will know that definitely online marketing, which you're an expert in, is important. I think it's 96% of people will Google first before they actually walk into a business, I think it is.

Yeah.

96%, 97%.

Around that, yeah.

So online SEO is probably critical, I'd say. But then you also need to drive people to those websites and to start searching for Google too. So I think there's a massive market for direct mail because— So direct mail still works When's the last time you got a direct mail piece in the mail addressed to you?

Oh, not for a long time.

Right. So that and telemarketing and the combination of this, you just cannot lose the latest technology, which is Facebook, SEO, Google Places. I'm 100% for that.

Google Places, yeah.

Yeah, but totally, definitely Google Places and the videos and the YouTube. I love all that stuff and it is drawing— I put a video on and in a week it got 2,000 hits on it, which I was pretty happy with. So definitely that drives branding and business, but I think there's a little snippet of direct mail coming back. Again, when's the last time you received a piece of direct mail? Or when's the last time somebody left a message telemarketing? Hi, I'm just from the local gym. Not that terminology, but we're just offering community members a 7-day trial. Come down and try us. My number's blah, blah, blah. Because again, you're the standout. You're the only person on that voicemail leaving that message because telemarketers don't leave messages.

That's a good point. Telemarketers don't leave messages. They just leave numbers and that sort of stuff. So you think leave a message versus no leave a message.

Yeah, and use the word local. So we're just your local butcher. your local hairdresser, with your local fitness provider. You know, come down, try us out. Everybody wants to support the local business.

And do you find you get calls back?

Totally. So I actually did this myself last year, and at 11 o'clock, I was about to— I called for an hour in front of staff, and they were looking at me like, haha, it doesn't work. And I was like, I'm going to do this. And I thought, I didn't have any appointments. And then the next 20 minutes, I made 11 appointments because people actually rang back after 12. Now, it's not a time thing. You know, I could have given up at 12 o'clock and said, oh, calls don't work between 11 and 12. But you just got to— it's just non-negotiable. You sit there and ring, ring, ring until you get an answer.

I really think that, you know, out of everything we've just spoken about, it really does come down to actually just persisting. Yeah. And there's no rules. I mean, the secrets are in here but the problem is you've got to use them, don't you?

Totally, and finding out what's worked. You're right with the tracking. Like I would be on YouTube almost daily making sure that the videos are consistently getting hits, you know, and analytics with Facebook and Google are amazing and fun.

Yeah.

And working out what works and what doesn't and it's amazing the posts that work and what doesn't, don't. Oh, it's amazing when sometimes

Facebook, we post things like— we'll put a lot of effort into a video and then people like a motivational quote, a single picture.

Yeah, I find the most human things really work. Like the other day I said, oh wow, I haven't brought lunch since I've actually been given my Vision S key, you know, and I think we had 50 people like it in an hour because the customers could relate to that, you know. But then when you say broccoli is full of vitamins or whatever, they don't really care. It's just funny what they like and what they don't like.

It is about being personal though. I think online you've got to be personal and people want to see the And that's

the same with— totally online, same as when you do your telemarketing out, you know, just keep it simple. Like, I probably haven't got the best grammar. The way I present myself is—

You've got passion.

But it's about just making people feel comfortable. You just talk to them like a friend, like a mate, you know, and they feel relaxed on the phone, like, do I know you? You know, and that's why they buy off you and they engage with you, because they want to come meet you because you're friendly.

So,

yeah, try it with sales and acquisition. You've got to sort of make it not so polished and make sure that it's just the way you talk to a family friend or I

think that's a very good piece of advice as

well.

Maybe one more question I can give for you. In regards to what you've done, like, have you had a big mistake that you did do in your career that you thought, I shouldn't have done that?

I know this sounds really corny, but I cannot remember of one. But I'll tell you what other people made mistakes on. I've made mistakes on, but because I try and get that brain and twitch it into a massive learning opportunity, for me, any mistake that's been made in here has been a fantastic opportunity.

I know,

it does sound a bit corny. I think we've got to cut that bit, but—

That's what everybody says when they say it's not a mistake, it's a learning, which is good. That's what we want to know. We want to know what the learnings are.

Yeah, so for me, my mistake, well, look, probably my mistake or my biggest challenge would have probably been managing staff properly. And I've probably made some regrets about the way I could have been a bit more compassionate. And since having a child, I've found that I'm actually probably a better manager. So that's probably my biggest mistake. You know, if they didn't seal their 50 sales for the month, they were gone. Whereas now I'm probably a bit more compassionate and a bit more coaching. As you learn and grow as a manager, I've probably acquired my skills better, and so I'm a better manager, obviously. That's probably my biggest mistake. But with staff— with clients, I think the biggest mistake is that they just probably do not invest enough in marketing. Like, when people say, oh, I don't have $300 a month to market, I think, well, you might as well shut your business because seriously, if you're not marketing, how does anyone know you're around?

I like that. I like that point because really it is about if you've got a business, you're going to have to put some money into your marketing. If it's online, if it's print, if it's radio, if it's telephone, if it's your own time, if it's finding someone. I think that's a good point because I think a lot of trainers especially may not say, okay, I actually need that money for marketing because they might be full of clients and they go, okay, I don't have that extra money for marketing. So it's ad hoc stuff.

It rains and they've dropped 20 sessions because it's been raining and they haven't been doing direct debit or something like that and their clients aren't bringing in any income or December, I don't feel like training for 6 weeks.

What should people put back into their marketing generally? Like what percentage of their revenue should you really put back into your marketing dollars?

The smartest guy that I worked for, George Holman, said to me that if you make a dollar He said to me, I don't care what you spend. So what I do is— it's hard because people allocate $16,000 this month, this year to marketing. I'm like, well, hang on, would you allocate $30,000 if you made $10 million? So it shouldn't be a limit. It should be just money out, money back in, money out, money back in. But obviously there needs to be some scope for expenses and stuff like that in there. But I just want to change the mindset of the viewers that it's about making money, not necessarily about saving money. So when I go and coach a business, I don't even want to look at their expense sheet. Yeah. I don't care how much they spend, I can always make them more money. But there also is a way that you can cut expenses too. I do look at that as well, but I'm really focused on making more money. So when it comes to spending money, as long as you're getting a return, then it's the percentage of return that I look at is what you want as a— so if I want to spend $300, what percentage of return do you want from that $300? It's just a different way to look at

it. Well, Amanda, you're a valuable asset and valuable informational skills and that sort of stuff. We could talk all day. Obviously you could talk all day.

We will.

And it wasn't that hard, was it? It was pretty easy.

Really good.

Cool. Thanks a lot, Amanda.

And hopefully everybody can get the book in the next couple of days.

Yes, get the book. And we're going to run— we're going to have 2 giveaways. So watching the 2 giveaways, we'll have them on the Friday catch-up and maybe what we can do is they can send in some of the best marketing tips they've done. Best marketing you've ever done.

You can share them.

And we'll share them on our Facebook. Send that in and the best one will get the 2 copies, signed copies from Amanda. Thanks, guys.