Operations and Marketing Strategy and Essentials to Generate more Sales | Amber Glus
Updated: Apr 19, 2022
Amber Glus is a high-level strategist managing all of the details in your business (that you often don’t like) by creating processes and systems that make your business run better. Amber strategizes your marketing so it is effective and manages personnel so there is cohesion within your company. She takes all of that minutia and makes it run like a well-oiled machine. You can be the visionary your business needs you to be! Amber also shares 10 essentials to generate (or maintain) sales in your business that you will want to listen to and apply today.
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If you would like to connect with Amber, you can jump to the show notes HERE
About Amber
Amber Glus is originally from Colorado and is currently traveling around the US with her husband Jeremy. The next phase in their adventure will be purchasing a home!
In a nutshell, Amber is a details person. She loves taking care of details and making lists. She is the type of person who makes the grocery list and organizes everything by the isles that you would walk through... because that just makes sense, right?!
Amber serves small to mid-sized businesses through marketing and operational management. She is the expert that makes your business run like clockwork!
Amber's Work Experience
For the last 20 years, Amber was a mix between entrepreneurship and employee. When she graduated from college she found this paradigm, where you can't get the experience without having a job... but you can't get the job without the experience. Amber has always been a self-starter, so she decided to start her own job - create her own experience. She was fresh out of college with a journalism and a political science degree, and her goal was to be the press secretary of the White House.
So, you know... dream big, right?
Amber always had a love for politics. She grew up with a mother who was involved in various campaigns so she had a network to pull from. She got hired using her own company and being an independent contractor to work on political campaigns, and that catapulted her to eventually work for a United States congressman and a lieutenant governor in Colorado.
Later Amber was picked up by the national brand, United Country Real Estate. For 15 years she managed the sales team nationally and the day-to-day operations. She also helped with create a market and messaging strategy that would increase sales.
Later Amber decided it was time to go out on her own again. She started as a copywriter because she always enjoyed writing and telling other people's stories, and it was a skill she could put a name and a price to.
Pivoting Back to Her Roots - Operations and Marketing Strategy
Amber enjoyed copywriting, but she couldn't shake this feeling as if something was not quite right. She took a couple of months off and spent some time doing personal development and analyzing what was missing.
What Amber realized was that through the last 20 years, in every job that she had, she had more of an operational management role. At times that meant streamlining and creating processes and planning. Other times her position focused on the overall marketing and brand strategy. That was her sweet spot.
Amber pivoted back to her roots. She went through a huge rebrand and is now offering this service to other business owners. Amber helps deal with the details that a lot of CEOs don't (tend to) like. They are the visionaries, and Amber will take their vision and build a plan to make that a reality.
Kind of when you put on a good pair of jeans, and you just know they're the right one - this business pivot was exactly that for Amber.
Amber's services suit small to mid-sized companies. Especially companies who have an internal sales team of at least one to two people, a marketer, and administer. That team can be employees or independent contractors.
Saving CEO's From the Minutia
Amber is a huge Donald Miller fan and a certified story brand marketing guide. Story Brand is a marketing and messaging framework created by Donald Miller, and Amber highly recommends that you read everything that he writes!
Donald Miller likes to say, that the problem you solve is often the enemy of your customer. It's the roadblock that your customer faces. When you come in to solve that problem, it transforms everything. So in that context, the enemy for Amber's customers is typically the minutia.
You hate...
The details that you are drowning in.
Figuring out how to streamline your processes.
Figuring out how to get more cohesion between the departments in your business, or between your independent contractors.
Putting out fires every day.
Figuring out what is best out of all the social media options.
You get tired of throwing spaghetti at the wall, and you don't have time to be the visionary and the CEO of your own business.
Once you've gotten to the point where you've hired a sales team, a marketing team, and some administrative staff, you don't want to be constantly putting on the hat of each department to make sure it is operating well.
Amber comes in as a problem-solver for all of that minutia and releases you of those details. She makes your business run like clockwork, creating cohesion in your departments.
You have somebody who understands how to come in and streamline all of your systems. Amber approaches everything at a strategic level and helps implement marketing that works specifically for your business.
All this to free you up to be the visionary your business needs.
The Essentials to Generate More Sales in Your Business
Even if you're looking to maintain your sales right now rather than increase them, this list is still an excellent resource. These can be used to avoid mistakes that could be hurting your sales.
This will be a download on Amber's website, she is in the middle of a rebrand at this current time, but it will be there soon! 1. Have a presentation that's more about your customer than your brand. If I'm a customer and you give me a presentation about the services you provide, but the first third half of the presentation is about who you are, what your expertise is, and why you're the right fit - you're going to hurt your sales. You need to flip your presentation around and first talk about your customer and what transformation they get - before you even start talking about your brand!
2. Have a pipeline that monitors where your leads are coming in and which leads are converting. You could potentially be spending money on things that aren't helping your business! You need to have some kind of a pipeline, and it doesn't have to be fancy. It can be an excel spreadsheet. But it needs to be able to tell you where your leads are coming from and which leads are converting.
3. Have a follow-up program to communicate with leads and new customers. Sometimes people do a really good job communicating to their leads because they want those sales, but then they don't have a good follow-up program to stay in communication. If you're not connecting with those existing customers at least once a month about how things are going, you could potentially be losing customers soon.
4. Create content! Creating content can be in the form of a blog, a podcast, through Clubhouse, and videos on YouTube. The good thing about creating content is it helps your customers get to know your brand. The best thing you can do for your sales team is to have some kind of content you're creating on a weekly basis. This gives a connecting point for those who are not ready to come to the buying table.
5. Have a support staff helping your sales team. Support staff can be independent contractors! They take some of the burdens off of your sales team, like creating presentations, follow-up, and online marketing. Oftentimes salespeople tend to be good at... you know.... sales! Having a support staff come alongside to help with the details they're not good at can really accelerate the number of sales that your sales team can make.
6. Train your sales team on how to promote themselves as part of your brand. So important that the vision of the company is repeatable by the sales team!
7. Create a referral program. Make sure you have a referral program for your existing customers, if you don't have one yet work on getting it started.
8. Have a great onboarding program! Make a great first impression!
9. Have a simple and clear marketing strategy. Be simple and clear about what
you do for your customer. Have a company culture that exemplifies what your company stands for. Help your employees become some of your best sales assets.
Support your Sales Team!
If you have a sales team and you're struggling to figure out why they are not producing more, hiring administrative help for them is one of the best things you can do!
Sometimes we throw salespeople into these scenarios where they need to make a sale, but they are also responsible for all of the follow-up, their own marketing, drip marketing by email, and create all of their own presentations. People tend to have very different skill sets, so teaming them up with administrative support can be a game-changer.
Getting your Systems in Place
For those working as service providers, Amber knows the feeling of trying to do it all! Everybody tells you to "jump before you're ready!" and in many cases, you have to. But if you're the type of person who likes to have a plan, jumping before you're ready might include putting a few processes in place first. There's nothing wrong with that!
That's why Amber tells those who are starting their business, to have a system! Knowing how to send your invoices before you actually have a client will save you so much stress.
Because here's the thing: If you're figuring out your invoicing platform and you're still trying to figure out your website platform and you don't have a contract ready... that's going to reflect how you do business. It's their first impression of you!
Amber believes that there's a balance between jumping before you're ready and getting everything in place. You need to have some basic things in place to avoid sending off a bad impression.
Bonsu Business Rant!
A mentor once told Amber that when you raise people up, you naturally go with them, and if you push people down you naturally go with them. She's never forgotten that. So her goal is to provide content that you can do on your own if you want to. If you can, you absolutely should! But if you are looking to hire somebody and to have a friend in the business, then Amber wants to make sure she's someone you can actually get in touch with.
Many online businesses have gotten wrapped up in this mindset that you should only do things you can scale. If something requires you personally doing something, then scaling isn't possible. For example: personally answering your own Instagram messages. People say, "you can't scale that. So don't start doing it!" or, "don't let people contact you on Voxer because you can't scale that."
And you know what?
They're probably right, that that can't be scaled.
But the business Amber wants to build involves having those things as key elements. She believes that her business will scale - through those relationships. More power to those who don't want to do it because there's no right or wrong. But in Amber's business: if you can't get a hold of her then she doesn't know why in the world you would trust her to do business with you!
So Amber is more than happy to have people contact her on social media and ask questions! Whether you're learning about your own business and you have some questions, or you're a customer who wants to make sure the person you're about to hire actually has a heart for the business itself, Amber is here for it.
Ways to Work with Amber
If you're a company that needs some help, but you can't quite put your finger on what it is... but you got the chops to grow! Amber is your person. She analyzes your business from top to bottom and gives recommendations on how you can get to the next level. This works well for those who don't need somebody in your business all the time. Once she's finished you can partner together more on a project basis when needed.
The second way to work with Amber is through consulting. Once you have your business running like clockwork, you may find that you need help here and there. In that case, Amber shows up on a consulting basis. Sometimes a business just needs consulting on the onset to get them going. The consulting role would be best for them as well.
The third way is through a retainer as a director of operations fractional role. You have heard of hiring a fractional CFO for your business - it's the same idea. Amber partners and helps manage those moving parts of your business as an independent contractor.
Connect with Amber!
Amber’s website: www.amberglus.com
Amber’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/amberglus/
Amber’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/amberglus/
You can email Amber at hello@amberglus.com
Subscribe now to her podcast so you don't miss an episode when it launches! Business Operations Simplified
You can book a time with Amber right now here: https://calendly.com/amberglus
Connect with Dani:
As always, you can find me at https://www.daniellehamlet.com/ Want to be a guest on the podcast? Email discoverycallpodcast@gmail.com. Find me on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/danihamlet/
Connect on LinkedIn at www.linkedin.com/in/danihamlet
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Before you go, one more question: Would you like to start your own podcast for your business? If that is a YES, Let’s connect and book a free strategy call: discoverycallpodcast@gmail.com.