The Top 3 Places You're Leaving Money On The Table (and how to get it)

on the table. Who wants to leave money on the table, right? And so we have the perfect guest with us today. Mustafa Husseini is with us from Persio to talk about how— what are the, the 3 places that you, we collectively, all of us business owners, probably leave some money on the table, and more importantly, how to fix it. Mustafa, so great to have you here on Cash In On Camera to talk about this. Um, what is the biggest problem that, that you're seeing right now in the business world, in the entrepreneurial world, in terms of finding paying clients. What is the biggest problem that you're seeing with that?

Um, first of all, thanks for having me, Cheryl. Uh, great to see you, and I look forward to our conversation. And biggest problem I see is that a lot of business owners spend a lot of time and money to find new customers and to find customers, and what they do is they don't follow up with those people. Right, so they, they go at great length to, you know, uh, to go find a prospect, find a qualified lead, and then once that person comes in and they, they, they engage in a way or two, they just leave that person hanging in the air and they do nothing with them to engage them and follow up with them. And then the second problem that we see is that they, they have an existing list of prospects, customers, and whatnot and they ignore that list while spending a lot of time and money out there to find new customers. So those are a couple of big problems that I see happening every day, all day.

So really it's about acquisition that people are paying so much time and attention to acquiring new people and focusing only on that, whereby there could be a gold mine of activity and business opportunity or even clients that are sitting, lying in wait. And so you have a story behind how Persial came to be as a result of making that observation. I'd love for you to share that story.

For sure. So I ran a, a digital agency from 2010 to 2018, and we offered A to Z marketing to our customers, and along with coaching and consulting our customers on what needs to be done. And so the story is that every time I ran out of cash or customers or appointments and referrals or whatnot, I would pull my hair out for a few days and worry about it. And then, and then I would come to my senses and realize that I actually have a list of customers and prospects and leads that I haven't been in touch with for a while. So I would pick up the phone, make a round of calls to all the people that have expressed interest in what we do, and/or existing or even past customers And on the day of or shortly after, we would get appointments, referrals, cash introductions on the day of or shortly after. So this really— and we were getting great conversion out of, uh, all the calls that we were doing. And we kept doing it. And, um, um, and then we started teaching the process and how it works in Simple Marketing Formula, which which was one of the courses that I was teaching. And then the last module— so in there I was teaching how to create a simple marketing plan and your marketing strategy and to simplify everything. Then the last module was always customer retention. So we went through how to find customers, how to convert them, and how to— last part was how to keep them, the process of retention. Then I'd be like, guys, here's the script, here's the process. If you pick up the phone and use this script and are modified to your liking, you're going to start seeing results today. And nobody would do it.

I knew that was where that was going to go. No one was going to do that. Why? Because it means— you just said it— picking up the phone. People don't want to pick up the phone.

People hate picking up the phone. And it took me a long time to realize, because I do it and I do it naturally. Like, my preferred way of communicating is either face to face or or talk to someone so I can hear their tone of voice, they could hear me and, and the rest of it. And so long story short, we kept— I kept teaching it and nobody was doing it. Then we're like, what if we do it for you? You know, what if we manage it for you? Everyone's like, hell yeah, do it for me. And so we— which led to us starting a call center specializing in follow-ups and customer retention.

Yeah, I love that. And we're going to talk about the 3 biggest, the 3 places that businesses leave money on the table. It will be part of this conversation. But it's important for us to understand the backstory of how this came to be and how you became so focused on really on referrals and retention. And coming back to this idea of acquisition, yes, you do need to acquire a new stream of people coming into your fold, right? But don't ignore the people that are already in your existing database. And that's really what you specialize in. So I, I love that. And I think that a lot of people can relate to this idea. And I've had many, many coaches over the course of my time as a, as a student, as an entrepreneur myself, who've always said pick up the phone. But yet we don't want to do it. And I think it's because we have a fear of rejection. What do you think it is that, that keeps people from wanting to pick up the phone?

So a few ideas. One, they have that fear of rejection. Two is the number one objection that I hear all the time, which to me is a big myth, is that people say, I don't want to bother my customers, or I don't want to bother people. And the other one that I hear all the time is I don't want to be salesy or pushy. And then to each, my response is, look, the person— somebody reached out to you and they say they have a problem. And you obviously have a solution to their problem. So if you reach out to help them fix that problem, you're not really bothering them. You're actually— you're, you're helping them, which is part of my follow-up philosophy, is that, uh, let's say, uh, someone shows up to a doctor's office and says, 'Doctor, I'm dying, help me.' And the doctor says, 'Oh, I don't want to be pushy or salesy.' How does that sound? Like, the guy showed up and he's asking for help. Go in there and help them, right? You, you can't say, oh, I don't want to bother you. Like, you're dying, am I bothering you? You're like, no, no, no, you're not bothering me, just, just get in there and help me out. So, and so if you're, if you're following up, if you're staying in touch in a friendly and nurturing way, you're not bothering them and you're not being salesy. Now, um, there, there is a fine line, I think, with between being salesy and pushy and bothering people. Like, you don't want to be calling them 20 times a day and, you know, um, bugging them. But if you just do it nicely in a, in a calm, relaxed approach and manner, I don't see a problem with that. We, we've never had a bad experience with that.

Yeah, I love that. It's a great philosophy to have, and I think that more businesses would benefit from adopting philosophy. So I would love to start— let's dig into the 3 biggest places that you're seeing where people are leaving money on the table. Let's go through the list of 3. What is the first place that people are leaving money on the table?

So the first place is people spend a lot of, a lot of time and resources and money to bring people onto their website or to a landing page. And then what happens is, is a portion of those people opt in and they, they, they they engage with your content, but a big portion of those people engage with you. And so what you could do is, um, you could track those people through Facebook Pixel or Google's remarketing or retargeting system to follow these people around on Google's or Facebook's network to show them ads and bring them back because maybe they got distracted. And you know, our attention span after COVID is now probably about a second, right? Like, we're thinking about something, the next split second we're over, over on another screen or another app, and we're just gone. So we just need to consistently stay in touch with those people to bring them back. And on those platforms, I know that it costs less to follow those people around and bring them back and be like, hey, we lost you, seems like you were interested in this, message or in this issue that you were experiencing and you wanted to fix it, come back and let's talk. So that's the very first place that people just spend a lot of money and they just let those people leave, uh, without engaging further.

I just want to— I want to dig on that a little bit more too, because I think that people don't really realize the true value of websites today and that they're really behaving differently for businesses than they were you know, even 10 years ago. And to your point, it's like, yes, you can drive traffic to your website or to your landing page, but not everyone will interact with it. Do you know what percentage of people, you know, land on a, on a, oh, your typical website but don't really do anything and then they're gone forever? I know it's a high percentage. I just can't remember what that percentage is right now.

You know, it really depends on the offer in the industry, but the 80/20 principle rules everywhere. Let's say that between 5 to 20% of people will engage with what you have to offer, but a good 70 to 80% probably will not engage, which they could be— what if we stay in touch and if we show them through different messages and through different stories and whatnot to bring them back?

Yeah, that retargeting piece is a key component. So that's number one. Yeah, what is the second place that people are leaving money on the table?

So the second place is when the people engage in the opt-in and they engage with you and they're now part of your list, then what happens is people talk with them maybe once, maybe not even once, and then those people are not followed up with, right? They showed interest, they expressed, uh, they engaged in your content in a way or two. They maybe downloaded something, maybe opt into a webinar, maybe, uh, watched a video or whatnot, and now they're on your list and you're waiting for them to reach out and hand over some money, right?

So we're waiting, waiting and waiting and waiting for that to happen magically.

Nobody is calling me to hand over some cash. And so people usually leave those people, um, you know, and do nothing with them. So their, their needs are not met, their challenges are not fixed and solved and resolved, and so they just, they just sit there experiencing pain of some sort. So that's the leads. And then the third place, which is probably the most important place, is not following up with their existing customers. And so most businesses that I've been dealing with is that What they do is they only pick up the phone and stay in touch with their customers when needed, when they have to, and/or when their payment fails. They pick up the phone and say, hey, your payment failed this month, do you want to update your credit card? And I've, I've had that story happen to me, and that is when, like, I, I, I have a vendor that I've been with them for God knows how long. And basically the only time I hear from them is when the payment fails, and sometimes that credit card maxes out or whatnot, so they just pick up the phone. So what could happen is you could stay in touch with them, you could, uh, have a conversation about how things are going. Are you happy? Are you not happy? Is there anything else that we could do for you? And that's a big question. Maybe there is other products or services that you could provide and deliver to them, upsells, which is— and then it's a lot easier, probably 50 to 70% easier to sell to an existing customer or a past customers versus selling to a brand new person that has no clue who I am, right? And then the other piece that people leave a lot of money on the table from their existing list is asking for referrals. You could ask your existing customers, who do you know that is having this pain or this problem that we could help? And so those are a few places where people— can I leave one more bonus, bonus one here?

Bonus away, I love it.

All right, uh, another place where people mostly don't even think about is their past customers. What you could do is you could do a past client reactivation campaign. Call them up, see where they're at, reactivate them and bring them back. And even if they don't come back, you can still ask them for a referral. Maybe they're not qualified, maybe they, they're, you're, they're done with your service, they don't need your stuff anymore, but who do they know that may still need your products and services? Yeah, so there's a lot to the tune of, I think 6, 7, 8, 9 figures on the table depending on the size of the business and what they do. And so there's a lot of money being left on the table.

One thing that occurred to me as you were talking about following up with, you know, existing customers is even if you don't have something in the moment that serves that person based on that follow-up or, you know, wherever they're at in, in their business or whatever it is that you do, is that don't you also gain a lot of intelligence and knowledge and wisdom from having those conversations and reaching back out to them that could inform what products and services and opportunities might be available to you to further serve them?

For sure, for sure. So depending on how you formulate your questions in the campaign that you're running, you could ask questions about the quality of service, how happy they are or they're not, and get some critical customer feedback that could help you improve your process, make things better, come up with new products and services, adjust your, uh, adjust a lot of things. So that's also— you're absolutely right, it's another thing that could be done, and we do focus on that as well.

Yeah, I love that. Well, this is, this is great. I mean, you're right, uh, website landing page opt-ins, your leads and your existing customers, you know, the referrals, um, providing more solutions to their problems, and even past clients are all places that we, you know, if we were to really be honest and look at our businesses, there are opportunities just sitting there in wait. And you've really brought them to the forefront for us today, today, Mustafa. So thank you so much. One thing that we do on Cash In On Camera is we have a little segment called Stop Marketing Like It's $19.99. So I would love to know from you, what is a tip, a tool, a tactic, or some type of technique that you're using or Prosciutto is using to market themselves effectively today. It might be related to what we're talking about or unrelated to what we're talking about today.

So I'm all about relationships. I am. That's probably considered an old school.

No, I love it. I think that's what I do is appropriate for today.

Yeah, I mean, I mean, business is all about relationships. Most people get most people that I talk to say they get a lot of their business from referrals and word of mouth and introductions and whatnot. So you've got to manage and nurture and, uh, your relationships, right? And you got to engage with your partners, with your list, with your people, and stay on top of mind. To me, the easiest way to do it is picking up the phone. And I know people just hate to pick up the phone But can I share a tip on kind of how to overcome that?

Yes, please do.

Yeah. So I think it has a lot to do with your belief system and the way you look at your products and services. Now, if you, if you know, and you believe that you are providing value to your customers through your products and services, and you know, it's, it's, it's, it, it, fixes a need and a challenge or frustration or whatnot, and you know you could fix their problem, then you should have no hesitation about reaching out and, and offering help. Now, you could also just pick up the phone, have a friendly conversation, and don't even bring up sales. Don't even bring up your products. I'm just saying hi and see how things are going. What's going on in your world? A lot of times you'd be surprised how often people will thank you for thinking of them and calling them up and staying in touch. Because here's a fact: a lot of human interaction and human touch is missing these days because we're doing a ton of digital stuff. So when you add that human component to your, to your marketing mix, first of all, it kind of helps you, um, stat seperate yourself and differentiate from your competition. You're like, here I am, you know, I'm actually talking to you. It's not like, talk to this chatbot and, you know, respond to this email. And so, and then when you have a friendly conversation, at the end of it, somewhere, sometime in there, they'll be like, you know what, I actually need to talk about this and that problem. So not every call or not every transaction or interaction um, should be about sales. Sometimes we just have to care about them as a person, and then they will tell you if they have a need for your products and services.

Yeah, and I think you, you touched on an important part, which is the touch points. You know, it's multiple touch points. It's not just creating an automated funnel and hoping and waiting. You know, it's like, oh, I just created the funnel and now I'm waiting for everything to fall in my lap. It, it really is about relationships, and relationships are not built through a funnel. Per se. So I love that. I think that's— you're right on with that. And I think that the idea of, again, building network and connections and relationships is going to be— is so important now, but it's just becoming ever more important as we go forward as well. So fantastic. How do people get in touch with you at Persio and maybe even to you personally, Mustafa?

So if you go to fixmyfollowupproblem.com, you can book an appointment with me and have a chat with me. You could also download the, uh, the blueprint and the step-by-step process for Simple Retention Formula like you're sharing on the screen. Get access to that. That's actually the process that we follow.

Nice.

To basically, uh, stay in touch, follow up with our customers, and, um, uh, which one call it, get referrals and the rest of it. So the address is persiana.com vq. And so, uh, that's where you could get the, uh, the blueprint. And if you go to fixmyfollowupproblem.com, if you want to have a chat and see what we could do and explore the possibilities, you could go to— go there.

Yeah, well, I love what you're doing with your call centers and how that really came about quite organically, in the sense that you had to solve your own problem, and then you went, wait a minute, and other people started getting interested in what you were doing. And then lo and behold, there it is. And that's what you do now is you have these amazing call centers that do the follow-up for businesses. And it's really brilliant. So, fantastic. Thank you so much for coming on Passion on Camera. Really appreciate your conversation today and your tips on places that we're leaving money on the table. And if you have got to— maybe you need to go back and rewatch or listen to this one more time. Make notes. And then look at your own system and say, okay, where are the gaps for me and where could I be spending more attention or trying to fix, plugging up that hole in your business? So thank you, Mustafa, for coming on today.

Thanks for having me and I appreciate your time and being here.

Thank you.