This was posted by member Kris Anderson in our membership forum. It’s a very important message I think you should pay close attention to.

(Firstly I like to say thank you to all the great people who enjoy reading my blogs. Greg Colosi teaches us that we should all keep a “Success Journal”, I guess I am writing mine here in this forum. If you have a small win or a great week please tells us about it at the forum so we all can enjoy your successes too.)

Some of you may be wondering why a few dry cleaners had a great year while 50% of the dry cleaners in general have gone out of business? It’s because we are in a Two Speed Economy which is when one group of people are still spending and even have increase their spending a little more and the other group have cut back or stopped. The dry cleaners that have done well last year have embedded themselves and focused all their time in the successful people camp.

Who are these successful people? They are the wealthy people in our communities. Why aren’t they affected by the economy? You can define a wealthy person as “someone who makes more money than they can ever spend.” And even in a “bad economy” where they make less money, but still make more money than they can ever spend. So they keep spending the same, if not a little more than last year.

Because money is not the issue to these people, they are more focused on service and quality, and that is what we are trying to drum into everyone in the Colosi Group to do; “Higher Prices, Service and Quality”. I’ll give you an example of how this group of wealthy people think; last year November 1st 2011 I increase my shirt price from $3.60 to $4.00, that’s a 10% price increase. Yes, $4.00 per shirt and I didn’t receive one complaint, nor did I loss one customer. They all stayed with me and even my shirt volume increased 10%! Why? Because Greener Cleaner had already move the whole of its business into the wealthy group of people in the economy. It’s funny, when you start as a discount dry cleaner and raise prices you get a lot of complains but as you continue the raise prices the complains become less and less as you are slowly moving into the better economy where most people only care about better service and quality.

This is all a little like real estate. When the rent goes up in an area more than the CPI, the poorer people start moving out and the richer people who can afford the higher rent start moving in. Every time the rent increases above the national average inflation rate only the people who can stay on are the wealthy. This is like your dry cleaners too, only the weather people stay on when you raise your prices above inflation each year. You keep doing this year after year until you are the most expensive drycleaner in town and only have the wealthiest people in the community as your customers. This is not the right economy to be a discount dry cleaner!!!

As always, love to hear your comments,
Kris Anderson

Most dry cleaners think they’ll attract more customers by having lower prices. Yes you might, but it’s the wrong kind of customer. It’s the kind of customer that’ll leave you in a second if they find a better offer through a coupon in the local paper.

Do you really want that kind of customer? I don’t think you do.

Tell me what you think of Kris’s post down below in the comments. Thanks!

You’ll love this article, I did!

Go here and get it:

12 Things Happy People Do Differently!

As you probably know, Steve Jobs biography came out last week–all 600+ pages of it. I finished reading it a few days ago and his ideas have been floating around in my head and I’ve come up with 5 of his principles that I think you and I could use in our dry cleaning businesses.

But before I get started, I want to warn you, that if you read this book, it’s not all fun and games. He was a weird dude. He could be nice one minute and as nasty as he was nice the next. He had a strange diet and would sometime eat one food for a couple of weeks. And some of these arcane beliefs led to his early death.

It was not easy reading, but I’m a Mac guy and I wanted to find out what was going on in this guys head. So here’s the 5 things I learned from Steve Jobs:

1. The journey is the reward.  And he’s right on with this one. It’s not the destination, but the journey that is the most rewarding part of our businesses. You and I are blessed. We are less than 1 in a 100 people that have the privilege of owning our own businesses. We determine the kind of life we want to lead. Some of you might not be doing that right now, but you can get there. I like some of my members do what we want to do every day. And we really get joy out of our dry cleaning businesses. So enjoy the journey of owning and running your own business.

2. Focus on only 5 things in your business. When Steve Jobs came back to Apple, it was only months away from bankruptcy. He got rid of every product except for 5 of them. What are you focusing on in your dry cleaning business? What few things can you give all your attention to that will make them shine. Maybe it’s only 3 in your business. Stop going after 20 different things.

3. The Reality Distortion Field. This is a made up term from some of Steve’s employee’s. He would twist reality with his products and services (because there was no such product) and convince his team that they could produce them. And because of this, his company has produced some of the most incredible products the world has ever seen.

4. Market Research. When Steve was asked about market research, he said that how was his customer to know what they wanted. I’d have to show it to them first. Henry Ford said that his customers wanted faster horses, not automobiles. They didn’t know what automobiles were.

5. The devil is in the details. Steve’s name was on over 200 patents having to do with everything from software, hardware and even the glass staircases in his Apple stores. You should be involved in all the marketing for your dry cleaner, what your dry cleaning’s quality and appearance is, and what your customer is going to experience from your business. No detail is too small when it comes to these things. I pick out the positive quotes that my route customers get on their reminder calls every week. I’m the only one that can do that. I write ALL the advertisement and communication with my customers. Get into the details.

That’s what I learned from Steve Jobs. If you want to read the book, be my guest. But remember I warned you.

This is inspiration Friday!

What other way is there to be? Would you rather be a pessimist? What will that get you? Being a pessimist will get you no where. I’ve never met a pessimist I liked. I never met a pessimist that had a successful business.

You might not be a pessimist, but you probably have some pessimistic moments (like I do) in your life. How do you rid yourself of those and keep an optimistic outlook? I’ll tell you what I do and what others around me do that I consider successful.

1. ONLY hang out with other optimistic people. Pessimists are energy vampires. They suck you dry and you have a very hard time getting your energy back. Here’s the test: if you feel energized after you’re with someone, keep them. If you don’t, get rid of them.

2. If you read the newspaper and watch the news–STOP! This might be a tough one for you. I started this early in my life and it’s normal for me. And I’ve since found out that others I hang around with do the same thing. You might start by scanning the headlines without reading them. And here’s how I look at it, if something in the news is affecting me, someone close to me will let me know. I read the sports and business sections and I only watch news on TV that has to do with that.

If you start out just doing these two things, your pessimism will start to dissipate. You’ll find yourself being more and more optimistic.

I hope you put this to work. It can only help.

This is inspiration Friday. I’m going to start inspiring you on Fridays to challenge you to reach further than you ever have with your dry cleaning business. And what I’m going to do is pick an inspiring quote and write about it. How does that sound? And I’d love your comments.

I’m sure you’ve heard someone say (or you’ve said it yourself–but hopefully not), “Oh that easy for that guy, he makes a ton of money and that’s why he can do that with his business.”

Guess what, that guy started with nothing. That guy didn’t have the cash when he started. That guy might of had the cash for this business, but he started with another business or saved the cash to get things going. So stop using that excuse!

The only place you can start is where you are. Take full inventory and find out what hidden assets and talents you have that you could use to get you to where you want to go. When I started in the dry cleaning pick-up and delivery business, I had no money. Just got divorced and I was not in a good place. The only talent I had was that I could sell. I bought some blank garment bags for about $50 and made up a simple two page brochure on my computer. So I only had my sales talent and a $50 investment to start my delivery business.

Today it nets six figures and I only spend–and I’m embarrassed to say–1 hour per week at it. I’ve got everything on autopilot. I don’t own a plant, so I don’t have to worry about that. I have 2 drivers and two other part timers. I have a bag drop going every week. My websites bring in customers every week. My referral programs brings in customers. My new mover mailings bring in route customers to. This is all done automatically.

I’m only one example of this being done in business. You can find examples of business success all over the place if you seek it out. So, no matter where you are, you can have it all. I challenge you. And here is how I look at it. There is always someone somewhere that started with a lot less than I had and had many more challenges and they made it. That always motivates me to get off my ass and get doing.

So stop whining and make it happen!

If Not, You’re Letting New Customers Slip Through Your Hands

That’s right. You are letting sales slip through your hands if you don’t have a big, bold guarantee. You should be guaranteeing everything you do. And I don’t mean the… “I-Guarantee-My-Work-Guarantee,” either. That’s what most every dry cleaning business does. It’s so over used and it really doesn’t mean anything. You need to eliminate your potential customers fear with doing business with you. You must have a guarantee that is big and bold that can do that.

What could you come up with that will eliminate the fear of doing business with you and have your customer trust their decision? Here is my Big Bold Guarantee:

100% No-Risk Guarantee

As the owner, I want you to be super-pleased, in fact, absolutely delighted with every piece of clothing I dry clean or launder for you. So every cleaning comes with our ironclad, risk-free guarantee. What does that mean? Simply this: If you aren’t happy with our work, we’ll re- clean your garment for free. Or you can have your money back. It’s your choice. Many dry cleaners don’t guarantee their work, but I do. Nothing is more important than your complete and total satisfaction. We stand behind every cleaning 100%. If you ever have any questions or concerns about our work, please call me right away.

Is this bold? Yes. Is it strong? Yes. Is this risky? Not at all. We all have to do re-cleans. This guarantee just puts it out there and let’s your potential customers (those not doing business with you yet) know the kind of dry cleaner you are.

I stole this guarantee from a carpet cleaner and according to this business owner he only get two calls a year to come back and re-clean their carpet. And he told me that no one has ever asked for his or her money back. He told me that tons of people went ahead to have their carpets cleaned who were hesitant. His guarantee took away their hesitancy and prompted them to call and schedule their carpet to be cleaned.

What should your Big Bold Guarantee be? You can steal mine! That’s right. You can use it. I give you permission.

Here is another one of my guarantee’s I use when I’m selling my route services. I have found that buttons are a “sticking” point with a lot of potential customers, so I put it right out there. You can steal this guarantee from me too!

“Broken Button GUARANTEE”

$5 dollars for your broken buttons.

I don’t know about you, but I get really mad when a shirt comes back from the cleaners with a broken button. So here’s what I’ve done: you’ll get $5 dollars cash for any buttons we miss that are broken. Don’t get me wrong, we didn’t set up this policy so that we could give away five-dollar bills–we set it up so that we would meticulously check your buttons to find the broken ones so we don’t loose the five bucks.

Will you get bombarded with $5 charges because of broken buttons? If your quality is horrible, you should. But even then you won’t. Why do you think manufacturers have all those rebates? To sell more. An industry insider told me that if everyone sent in their rebates, the companies would go broke. They do it to sell more and they do.

I get one or two a year. And I’m happy to pay for it. It lets me know if my shirt pressing quality is horrendous. You’d want to know that, wouldn’t you?

Are you thinking about changing your name? Or are you starting a route business and want to name it? Or like me, changing everything to maximize personality marketing and search engine marketing (see this stuff towards the end of this post, you’ll love it)?

With everything I’ve learned in my 31 years of starting and running 33 businesses, I know one thing for sure…your name should not be confusing to your potential customers. It should not be cute. It should not make them wonder what you do. In this fast paced society we live in today, people don’t have or won’t take the time to try to figure out what you do because you think it’s clever or cute.

Make your dry cleaners name simple so that they know EXACTLY what you do.

My new dry cleaners is going to be named, “Greg’s Green Dry Cleaners” or if it wasn’t green, it would be “Greg’s Dry Cleaners.” The name of my dry cleaners now is “Colosi’s Cleaners.” I did a survey after 5 years in business and gave my customers five choices on what they thought should be my business and it unanimously came back, “Greg’s Dry Cleaners.” I never changed it back then, but now I’m finally going to.

Let’s dissect the new name for my dry cleaners:

Greg’s: My potential customers don’t have to guess who’s running the show. I am. They know that some guy named Greg is making sure that their dry cleaning is going to turn out just fine. If it doesn’t, they can always go to Greg and find out why. And because I’m using my name, I can use “personality marketing” in all my campaigns with new and existing customers. I want my customers to feel like they know me. I want them to tell their family, friends and neighbors to use me because this guy is cool and he knows what he’s doing.

Don’t use your dogs name. Don’t use your kid’s name. Don’t use a made up name. Use your name. Your picture is going to be on everything and you want your potential customers and your customers to know who they are dealing with.

Green: I don’t think they think this is my favorite color. They know that I’m an environmentally friendly company and if that’s their thing, I’m their dry cleaner.

And the last part is “Dry Cleaners”: There is no doubt that I’m a dry cleaner. I make this very clear. Even though it’s wet cleaning, the phrase dry cleaners in my name leaves no doubt what kind of business I am. You must have the phrase dry cleaners or dry cleaning in your name. “Cleaners” is not good enough. You could be a house cleaner for all they know.

In most markets, the phrase or keyword, “dry cleaners” is better than the phrase “dry cleaning” in your name.

Why?

And I bet no one else has ever told you this. It’s because of the search engines and Google Places (Google Places is the new local organic results.) If you don’t have Google Places set up, you will never rank in Google’s organic searches, which is 75% of all search traffic.

So having the keyword phrase, “dry cleaners” in your domain name or URL is a must. If you don’t have it in your domain name, you’re throwing new customers out the door. Just by having it in your url (or domain name), your will get your listing at the top of page one on Google and the other search engines. “Dry cleaners” is the #1 term that is typed into the search engines–”dry cleaning” is the #2 search term that is typed in. When someone is looking for a dry cleaner in your town, they type in some like this: “dry cleaners your town your state” or they type in “dry cleaners your zip code.”

So it looks something like this: “dry cleaners pittsford ny” or “dry cleaners 14534.” The second most common search term is “dry cleaning your town your state” or “dry cleaning your zip code.”

Do you get this? This is big.

What if you don’t want to change your name yet and you want to take advantage of this Google Places and search engine stuff, can you still do it? Yes you can. Your domain name for search purposes only does not have to be your name. I have a website going up that’s PittsfordNYDryCleaners.com and DryCleaners14534.com.

And how do you do that? Go here and find out: http://nodoorknockingroutemagic.com/dry-cleaner-website/

So, in my new name, “Greg’s Green Dry Cleaners” covers it all. In this simple name, your potential customers and the search engines will know exactly who your are and what you do. Do not overestimate the importance of picking a simple name that says it all.

If you want to find out more about setting up a website to get lots of traffic, go here: http://nodoorknockingroutemagic.com/dry-cleaner-website/

I was recently rejected by the golf company FootJoy. It’s been a while since I was rejected. I’ve been on a roll with only success. I used to be rejected everyday. Well, this brought me back to my roots and I’m getting back to basics. This was not a good feeling, but a needed feeling since it hasn’t happened to me in a while.

Watch this video to get the whole story.

Tell me about your recent rejections in the comments below. Good to talk to you.

What should I do? Watch the video and find out:

Once You Get A Route Customer, How Do You Follow Up To Make Sure They Stay With You?

You Can Use My “7-STEP FOLLOW UP PLAN”

How do you do that? Here is what my successful members do to ensure over 92% return with their routes and 76% return to their stores. It’s easy, but most of you won’t do it. It takes some work to get the system set up, but once it’s on autopilot, it works like a charm.  Here are the 7-steps:

Step 1: Snail mail a Welcome Letter – Explain how your delivery service works or the hours of your store. Include some personal information about you, the owner. Include your picture, prices, and the guarantees you have.

"Once you put the 7-Step Plan into action, you too can be out winning golf tournaments." (It's a fake picture, but you get the gist of what I'm talking about --right?) -Greg Colosi

Step 2: Email the same thing – This means that you get their email address just like you get other info. Ask confidently and you’ll get it.

Step 3: Snail mail a short hand-written Thank You note -  Thank them for coming into your store or starting with your route. David Whitehurst, longtime member of my group has his counter people send out hand-written thank you notes every day. His new customer retention rate went from 48% to 76% when he did this.

Step 4: Video or phone call – I use my iPhone to create a short customer video and I email it to them. You can also call or have one of your counter people call and thank them for trying out your dry cleaners. Most of the time you’ll get the voicemail. Prepare a simple script that you or your people can use.

Step 5: Send out a Welcome Kit – After a week or so, I mail out a micro-fiber cloth and explain how to use it in your shower to always keep it shiny and clean. I also include one of my best newsletters and another letter explaining our dry cleaning services, Rug Doctor rental, house cleaning and other services that I broker from local companies.

Step 6: Send out a newsletter every month – You can attach to all your outgoing dry cleaning or send it out in the mail, or both. 99.9999% of all dry cleaners don’t send out a newsletter to their customers. If you don’t do this, you are missing a huge opportunity to get referrals and to build loyalty. My members constantly are getting referrals and customers telling them that they read the newsletter the moment it arrives.

Step 7: Email them at least once a week – Tell them about your deal of the month, referral program, and give them some dry cleaning tips they can use.

I do all these things and so do my successful members. Once you get this set up, it’s automatic and happens without your input.  I just back from a trip to the Dominican Republic and while I was gone everything went according to plan, without a hitch.

And one last step if you have a route, you’ve got to call them every week with a reminder. I use VoiceBlaze.com for my automatic calling. Most dry cleaners won’t do this either. They think they are intruding on their customers. Guess what, it’s NOT your decision, it’s your customers decision to decide if they want the reminder calls. How do you do that? There’s an opt-out option when they start getting the calls. If you do this right, over 90% will decide to get the reminder calls and your revenue will go up at least 15% on your routes. I have some members that got a 30% boost in revenue as soon as they implemented the automated reminder calls. Stop dragging your feet and get this going.

You do all these steps and you’ll keep most of the people signing up with you. Now get off your ass and get going!!

And if you’d like to find out more about the 7-Step Follow Up Plan, call Andrea @ 1-888-661-7992