Category Archives: Dating Advice
With Net Promoter Surveys, Grow Your Company Without Spending Big on Marketing
They can help you learn valuable insights from existing customers — and increase sales.
4 min read
This story appears in the November 2018 issue of Entrepreneur. Subscribe »
Q: What’s the best way to ignite stalled revenue, especially if you have a limited marketing budget? — Mike, Colorado
Mike, I think a little dating advice might be what you need. Many years ago, after my wedding, one of my single friends jokingly asked, “How many women do you have to date before you find your wife?”
I responded by saying, “It’s not about how many girls you date; it’s about how many dates you have with the girl.”
Related: 8 Steps to Manage Your Customers Through Change
Obviously, marriage is something you build to over time with one person. But I like to think of business (and revenue) in much the same way. If someone likes your business or product, your only reaction shouldn’t be Let’s find another customer. Instead, ask yourself, How do we do this again with the same customer?
Brand loyalty is the reason today’s biggest businesses win. Trillion-dollar behemoths like Apple and Amazon add to their customer bases all the time, sure, but they’re also excellent at driving repeat purchases. They’re not dating their customers; they’re marrying them. If you can do that — maximizing the lifetime value and revenue per customer — then you’ll have achieved two of the most important things in business: You’ll grow, and you’ll gain insights that will make it easier to find new consumers (and to do it for less money).
So, how do you start? One of the best ways is through net promoter scores. Net promoter begins with a simple, often free-to-create email survey you ask your customers to fill out. (If you want to increase the likelihood of a response, we recommend incentivizing your consumers — something as simple as giving away gift cards or discounts is an easy value proposition to encourage higher response rates.) The initial question is straightforward: “How likely is it that you would recommend our company/product/service to a friend or colleague?” Customers are asked to rank you from 1 to 10. Those who rank you 9 to 10 are known as “promoters”; those who score you 0 to 6 are “detractors.” (A 7 or 8 score is neutral.)
Related: 10 Innovative Ways to Excite Your Customers
After this initial question, the opportunities are numerous. From your promoters, you can figure out why they love your business, what messaging was effective and what they want more of. Detractors can help you understand where you’re missing the mark, what made them unhappy and even spot potential trends (psychographic or demographic) among unhappy customers.
Then the real fun begins. Cross-sell other products or offer discounts to your promoters with the expectation of converting at a higher percentage, because you know these people are believers in your business. You can also use their responses to fine-tune your sales techniques to attract more people who are similar to your biggest advocates.
Related: 10 Tactics For Increasing Your Customer Lifetime Value and Loyalty
Likewise, you can win back the detractors. Were they unhappy? Yes. Can you go the extra mile to show them they matter and earn brand redemption? Absolutely. Because now you know what went wrong.
Either way — and we usually recommend tackling both audiences — you’ll be armed with valuable data and insights, a better relationship with your consumers and more sales fueling your growth. And you can achieve it all on a very limited budget.
Moving Furniture When Single Is An Empowering Nightmare
When I was in my 20s, when all it took to cure a hangover was a single serving of Easy Mac, there seemed to be an abundance of humans around. There were roommates and uncoupled friends who just “showed up” always willing to lend a hand. But when that crew starts to partner and reproduce, anyone who’s single is easily forgotten when it comes to casual, day-to-day hangouts. How far in advance did you book your last dinner with a married friend? Therefore, filling a single woman’s world with people, or her living room with furniture, becomes a task, not an accident.
Olivia Munn's Dating Advice From Jamie Foxx Is All About Self-Respect — VIDEO
Feeling down about dating? Been staring at your phone waiting for someone to text you back? Wondering when you and the person you’ve been seeing are going to make it official? Well, guess what? Celebrities have all of those same insecurities, too. A few months into a new relationship, Olivia Munn got dating advice from Jamie Foxx, which she revealed during an appearance on Busy Tonight on Tuesday night. Foxx had some wise words for his famous friend, and they ended up teaching her a powerful lesson about self-respect.
Munn and Busy Philipps, actor and host of Busy Tonight, go way back. They’ve worked on a few projects together over the years, but one project, in particular, led them to Foxx’s house.
“It was such a magical afternoon,” Philipps said of collaborating with Foxx that day. “But you and Jamie, have you worked together, or are you just buds?” the host asked.
“We met at a party through our agents, and it was at the Super Bowl,” Munn explained, “and he just became like a big brother to me, immediately. He’s been such a great friend.”
The 38-year-old actor then went on to describe a time when her “big brother” gave her some really sage advice. Munn had been secretly dating another celebrity for a few months, she explained, but they hadn’t discussed whether or not they were exclusive yet. At one point, they both ended up at the same party, but Munn got bummed out seeing him flirt with other girls.
Busy Tonight on YouTube
“I was feeling like, so depressed,” Munn told Philipps. (Been there.) She was so upset, in fact, that she had decided to leave the party early. Foxx was also there, though, and figured out what was going on right away. He said he’d call her in the morning — which he did — and his advice to her came in the form of a voicemail.
Foxx’s voicemail, as Munn recalled it, asked:
“Did you come out here to be somebody’s girlfriend? No. Did you come out here to be somebody’s wife? No. Did you come out here just to date this guy? No. Did you come out here to be an actress? Yes. Don’t you ever, ever let me see you cry about some guy like that ever again. Don’t you ever let some other guy make you feel like that ever again … I never want to see you let any man make you feel that small again.”
Jordin Althaus/Busy Tonight
Damn straight. That is the truth. Foxx’s advice was totally legit, and definitely something that everyone should try to keep in mind. “It was so sweet and he was just so earnest,” Munn told Philipps of her friend.
While Foxx’s wise words did help Munn in the moment, she admitted that she still slipped up from time to time when it comes to guys. See? Celebrities are just like us. Nobody’s perfect, of course, but if you’re dating someone who makes you feel small — well, just imagine a very angry Foxx leaving that voicemail on your phone.
