Seven Keys to Creating Predictable Cash Flow

Seven Keys to Creating Predictable Cash Flow

By Lynn McKenzie


As a soul-inspired entrepreneur (yes that's you!) is your income flow predictable, or is it left more to luck or happenstance? Must the planets align in auspicious design for you to: make the mortgage, pay your bills, and have a little left over for emergencies, never mind socking some away in savings.

This doesn't have to be so. One of the biggest mistakes I see spirit-led entrepreneurs make is failing to create predictable, repeatable cash flow for themselves. I'm not sure if they figure that "left to chance it will all work out somehow", or that they will "have to scrimp and suffer for a while until their business magically gets going", or what! What I do know is that using this business model involves giving away your power with money, AND it doesn't work.

It is completely possible (and VERY probable) to adopt a system that sets you up for consistent and predictable income, even if you're self-employed. There are seven keys that are the back bone of that system. In this article, we'll cover the first three:

1. Clearly and concisely identify your ideal clients - there are specific clients that you were meant to serve, they are the ones who benefit most from the deep transformative work you do, and the ones that you love, more than anything, to serve. When you really narrow your focus down to this particular group, your business will flourish exponentially compared to when you were trying to serve everybody (with a really broad offering). Better yet, your ideal clients will be able to easily self-identify with your work and will be more apt to flock to you.

2. Figure out how your particular brand of magic serves your ideal clients - your ideal clients have specific problems they want solved and it's imperative that you determine what they are. I'm talking about problems so big that are keeping them up at night worrying. In my own business, I can clearly hear my ideal clients saying to themselves: "I need to make more money", or "I need to grow my business fast". Once you've figured out the problem (or pain) your clients have, determine how what you do solves it and then market it to them in a "benefits" oriented way.

3. Create a kick-ass free offer - in order to get people to interact with you on the web in this day and age you must have a compelling free offer. It HAS to be hot, and something that makes your ideal clients think to themselves "I have to have this; it will help me to ______". Spend time and energy on this, at least equal to what you would spend on something you're going to sell, remember these are the people you're going to be selling to so you want LOTS of them, and to get lots of them it's got to be, well kick-ass. Once you've created it, assign a value to it, and be sure to mention the value on your website.

4. Build a database - once you've got your free offer in place you will need to have a way to collect the names of those who sign up for it. A database of sorts, my preference is 1 Shopping Cart. I like it because it's not only a database but has many functions including a shopping cart, auto-responder, and way to send out newsletters (yes, you need one of them too). To make the most of your database, the people on it need to hear from you at least every 2 weeks. If you think that's too much, trust me it isn't.

5. Create products and programs that are the answer the problems your ideal clients have - here's where you can bring in your spiritual guidance and channel some fabulous information. Information related to your expertise that will help your ideal clients solve the pains and problems I mentioned earlier (the ones keeping them up at night). You can create these products very simply as eBooks, audios, videos etc., just don't think too hard about it, just get going and create them! My motto is "done is better than perfect". If you find yourself stalling because you feel like you haven't got it perfected yet, know that is just your ego trying to keep you small. Remember, the world needs your special variety of magic and expertise, otherwise you wouldn't have been gifted with it.

6. Always be launching - I hate to be the one to tell you this but once you have your product or program ready to sell, people won't be banging your door down to get it, in fact they won't even know you have it unless you let them know about it in a BIG way. That big way is called a launch. A launch normally consists of sending out a series of emails or videos (and blog posts etc.) leading up to a free "preview call" that you design to introduce and sell your product or program. On this call you offer some great content but also offer your product or program at a reduced investment, for a limited period of time, usually with a number of juicy bonuses to entice buyers. This is pretty much how most online sales work. You can see why it's good to "always be launching" as this is where you make your money.

7. Follow a Mentor - the best investment I've ever made in myself, and my business, was to hire an impartial mentor. Someone who would challenge me to leap to places I didn't know possible, someone who had gone where I wanted to go and done what I wanted to do and could offer me first hand advice along with some tough love when needed. Looking back on the times in my life when I didn't have a mentor my business (and income) just flowed along at the status quo and more often than not that was struggle mode. When I compare those times to the times when I have had a mentor (like now and in the foreseeable future) my business is growing in leaps and bounds and I am thriving. I stretch myself daily and create awesome results for my clients and myself.

These keys are the backbone of a business system that works for soul inspired entrepreneurs. Of course you will want to use your spiritual guidance in your business but you want to be sure you're applying it to the areas of a business system that's proven to work. My coaching request for you is to use the keys above to map out your success plan for creating your predictable cash flow.





Lynn McKenzie Lynn is a certified Money Marketing and Soul Coach, Niche Breakthrough Secrets Coach, and is a member of the International Association of Women in Business Coaching. She is also a certified graduate of Coach Training Alliance. Visit http://theprosperityalchemist.com to receive your free audio: 3 Simple Steps to Making & Keeping Way More Money, Doing Work You Love While Delivering Awesome, Life-Changing Results for Your Clients.

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A Few New Updates! {Clear Your Browser Cache}

We published some updates this weekend that include:

-Select a default view for your calendar (day/week/month)
-Track your CEUs with the CEU Tracker (under Reports)
-Average Sessions per Week (Dashboard)
-Option to embed your Menu of Services in to your site (Not the whole microsite)
-Sessions search show all dates by default
-There is now a calendar/date picker on the Calendar page
-Service Sessions Report
-Bug fixes and Performance Improvements

You will likely need to clear your browser cache to access these new features!

This video shows a quick overview of all updates/features:

When It Pays to Track Referrals

Do you have a referral program? I used to offer a "refer 3 friends, get a free massage" in my bodywork business and it was a huge success. I got most of my clients from that, and I ended up so busy that I had to discontinue it. (And the surprising thing was, I didn't have to give away very many massages because while it created a ton of new clients, very seldom did 3 people come from the same referring client.)

When I ran my referral program, I used paper to track it because technology hadn't gotten caught up with us yet. This was before smartphones, Bodywork Buddy, etc. i.e. all of the tools that make running our practice so much easier these days!

BWB has always had the ability to track referrals from within each client file so you could see who they referred and who originally referred them. But now we've added a referral tree which is a great visual to quickly see all of your clients and who they've referred at a glance.

So far, it's been a big hit with our members!

What kind of referral program do you offer clients? How many new clients have you gotten from it?

I'd love to hear about your own experience with referral programs in your massage business - comment here and let me know. 🐶 Iggy wants to know, too.

Cindy Iwlew is a licensed massage therapist who has had a private practice since 1999 and cofounder of Bodywork Buddy massage software.
www.bodyworkbuddy.com

Iggy is the branch manager and helps keep Cindy on track with balancing out computer time with playing outdoors.

How to Harness the Power of Your Hours Report

I’ve been a fan of Bodywork Buddy (BWB) for a long time. Because I knew of many of the features they offered, I hopped on board on December 31, 2012. This gave me the opportunity to start fresh in 2013, enabling me to view current up-to-date reports right from the beginning of the year.

While there are a ton of features to list, one of the things I’m most impressed about is owner Cindy and Berin Iwlew’s willingness to not only listen to what their users suggest, but to thoughtfully respond with positive action.

Cindy and I have both been massage industry for a long time, about 20 years for each of us. In fact, she’s the one who originally turned me on to online scheduling, long before Bodywork Buddy began.

There were many limitations of that option and virtually no reports you could run. Many companies at that time also had programs you could purchase and download onto your computer, but you’d have to have that computer with you to schedule or add in any comments or SOAP notes.

Finding the same limitations that I did but with Berin’s prowess in programming, the Iwlews set out to give massage therapists an online solution. Not only would it have the same features as other programs, but they added in everything Cindy had on her wish list.

I loved the idea from the get-go. The only reason I didn’t hop on board sooner was that BWB required internet, which I didn’t have at my office at the time.

Today I’ll just talk about my favorite new cool feature, the Hours Report.

One feature they’ve added recently is super cool-reporting of how many hours you’ve completed in each style and session length of massage you offer. I think I was the first one who promptly ran a report and posted it on Facebook!

You can run in for the current year, any year you’ve been using BWB or a total of all years. Your most popular sessions will begin at the top and work your way down. In my case, I had a price / name change, which is why it shows 2 different items that appear to be almost identical.

When you go into your BWB back it, it looks something like this:

I had never kept track of my massage sessions before. Because I specialize in Ashiatsu and heavily promote that, I knew that my 90 minute session would be at the top of the list. Interestingly, I had no idea that my 2 hour sessions outweighed my 60 minute massages.

Knowing how many hours you’ve performed a massage can show proof of expertise to anyone else that you have plenty of experience in your field. When people ask what kind of experience I have with barefoot massage, I can say, “In the last 4.5 years, I’ve actually spent 2074 hours getting paid to do ashiatsu on my clients!”

If you have a modality that you love doing but isn’t near the top of what you actually have been doing, it’s a fantastic way to come up with a promotion so you get that service up at the top of the “hours you’ve massaged list”.

Another thing you can discover is your number of hours you average per week. Simply take the total number listed at the top of that year’s report and divide by the number of weeks so far in the current year. *Update: this is now a feature that automatically shows the average at the bottom of the dashboard. Yah, no math required!

If you’ve been with them for a calendar year, just run the report and divide by 52.  You can see trends from year to year as to how your business is growing. Or perhaps it stays steady because you have a lot of regular clients.

Whether you view this report as just a fun “thing” or you use it to detect patterns and trends in your business, this feature is a hit in my book.

 

About the author:

Mary-Claire Fredette has been practicing the art of ashiatsu for 15 years and is a Co-Creative Force at the Center for Barefoot Massage, where they offer continuing education to LMTs who want to learn the skill of barefoot massage.

She lives in Cincinnati and co-owns Affinity Massage Studio with her husband, Paul. They have 8 children, 1 turtle, 1 outdoor cat, and 2 rescue German Shepherds.