Business owners in the framing industry use a variety of creative methods and expend a considerable amount of time, money and attention to generate sales leads. In addition to traditional advertising media, today’s businesses introduce themselves to prospective customers through websites, email and social networking. And well they should, because creating awareness for your brand lies at the foundation of any good marketing strategy. However, it’s not enough to just reach out to prospects; you need them to reach back. You want them to reciprocate by responding to your overtures. Ideally, you want each prospect, upon introduction to your business, to jump into the car, drive to your business and make a purchase—without procrastination and without detours or delay.

Unfortunately, modern consumers rarely take the shortest path to the point of sale. Getting a prospect into your business often involves an intermediate step: a phone call. Making a telephone inquiry gives prospects an opportunity to ask questions; assess the quality of customer service, competence and professionalism; and ultimately decide whether you’re the one they want to do business with.

In my previous column, “Turn Your Website Into a Sales Engine,” I wrote that the goal of your website should be to get a prospect to call you. A phone call is easier to achieve and gives you a second bite of the apple: a personal interaction that lets you build rapport with your prospect, provide useful information about your business and distinguish your business from the others.

That phone call also halts, at least temporarily, the prospect’s online browsing and keeps them from the clutches of your competitors.

I view every phone inquiry as an opportunity. It’s a chance to have a conversation with a prospect and to start and build a relationship. A telephone inquiry lets you sell the unique benefits your business offers and to sell yourself.

Your website may aim to get a prospect directly into your store, but the odds of it happening are stacked against you, especially if the prospect also visits the website of an always-on-sale-but-not-really-on-sale craft store and sees a coupon for 70 percent off. At that point, it’s “game over” for you because you have nothing with which to trump such a compelling offer, regardless of its veracity. But if your website convinces a prospect to call you to obtain more information, answer questions or learn about your current promotion, the outcome of the game is now within your control.

Take Charge
Now, let’s look at what you can do to take advantage of the great one-on-one opportunity a telephone inquiry offers.

When you receive a phone call from a prospect, you must be ready to effectively handle the call. Your primary goal, of course, is to get customers and their frame-worthy items through the door of your business. However, to make that happen, you’ll need to reach two secondary goals: building a rapport with the prospect and taking control of the conversation.

Building a rapport will come naturally as a result of the conversation, especially if you take time to include some small talk.

However, making a new friend is just half of the battle. You must also take control of the conversation. Taking control lets you—not the prospective customer—determine the direction and length of the conversation. Fortunately, with practice, you can fairly easily take control of a conversation. You need only ask questions; then, you’ll be the one driving the bus.

In any dialogue, the person asking questions is the one in control; the one answering the questions is not. You needn’t be pushy or rude to take and retain control. Instead, develop a habit of ending your portion of the dialogue with a question that encourages your prospects to talk about themselves or the items they want to frame. Controlling the conversation also lets you steer the discussion away from price.
The best questions to ask are those that help you get your new acquaintance into your store or gallery. Preparation makes that goal easier to achieve. Develop a list of standard questions that you can rely on. Here are a few to get you started:

• Where will you be displaying the artwork?
• What is the decor in that room?
• Do you know where we’re located?
• Can you come in now?

These questions are easy to work into almost any conversation, and they help you achieve your objective.
Keep in mind that someone is going to be in control of each conversation; if you’re not in control, the prospect is in control. The one question a prospect always wants to ask is, “How much will this cost?” That question is the one that you can’t and shouldn’t answer over the phone. Simply be strong and get them into your store or gallery, so that you can make a sale.

When you do get a question about price, explain briefly that pricing depends on a lot of variables, including the mounting method, glazing options, degree of required preservation and display options. The existence of all those variables makes it impossible to answer that question over the phone. Promise that you’ll provide an exact quote when the customer comes in.

Avoid mentioning the size of the piece the customer wants framed because he or she probably knows the dimensions of the artwork and will expect that information to be enough for you to quote a price. Also, avoid discussing the frame itself because this question, too, may lead to another pricing question: “What’s the cheapest frame I can buy for this piece?”

After you rattle off all the variables that affect price, follow up with a question of your own to retake control.

Open the Door
Clinch the deal by asking for a commitment: “Can you come in now?”

When a customer says, “Yes,” let him or her know where your shop is. Give directions that might bypass a competitor’s location.

Conclude the call by recommending that the caller ask for you upon arrival. It doesn’t matter whether you’re the only one there; it puts a potential customer on a first-name basis with you and lets that would-be client know that he or she has a friend in the business.

After ending the call, write down the name of the person you spoke to. It’s also good to keep track of your conversion rate—that is, how many prospects show up after a call. These techniques are amazingly effective, and they can make a dramatic difference in increasing your income.

Selling is possibly the most overlooked and underdeveloped skill in our industry. It’s also part of your job, so learn to do it well. Improving your sales skills and those of your staff can pay off in a big way. Because the sales process often starts with a phone call, include these tips in any training program.

When your website does its job well, your phone will ring more frequently. How well you handle each opportunity to speak with a prospect often determines the success or failure of your business. Be a guerrilla. Learn to sell. ◆

Paul Cascio, the Guerilla Framer, is the lead instructor for The American Picture Framing Academy (pictureframingschool.com). He also provides business and sales training and consulting. Contact Cascio at pdc@pictureframingschool.com.

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By Paul Cascio,The Guerrilla Framer

When I first joined the framing business more than 25 years ago, I had to advertise in the Yellow Pages directory. It was a necessary evil for anyone in a service business. The Yellow Pages directory was the Google of its day. There, consumers searched for services, such as plumbing, transmission repair and, yes, picture framing. The less frequently consumers needed a service, the more important it was that the company have a commanding presence in the Yellow Pages, the place where consumers let their “fingers do the walking.”

Local telephone companies published the Yellow Pages, and those companies enjoyed a virtual monopoly. Sure, there were other wannabe books, but they were, for the most part, worthless. If you wanted your phone to ring, you needed to have an ad in the Big Book, as the telephone company liked to call it.

According to your Yellow Pages sales rep, the bigger the ad, the better—especially if you also opted for the magic of red ink. Advertising in the Yellow Pages was expensive, and if the ad didn’t produce the results you wanted, you couldn’t modify it. If you didn’t pay, you would lose your telephone service.

My first ad, a quarter-page masterpiece in the Hartford, Connecticut, directory more than 25 years ago, cost more than $600 a month, and it was a fixed expense for the term of its 12-month contract. The good old days turned out to be not so good.

Fortunately, the Yellow Pages directory is now mostly obsolete. Today, your prospective customers use search engines, such as Google, Bing and Yahoo, to seek out and compare service providers. Your Yellow Pages ad is now your website or, more specifically, the landing page of your website.

This month’s column examines ways to maximize the effectiveness and visibility of the first and most important page of your website, the landing or index page. It examines methods of improving search-engine optimization (SEO), or page ranking; avoiding common mistakes; and converting website visits into sales.

Improving SEO
Having a website is worthless if your prospective customers never see it. Your objective is to bring qualified traffic to your site. A high page rank with Google places your business at the top of the list when someone in your area conducts a search for the services you offer.

You shouldn’t worry about those potential customers who search broadly for “picture framing.” It’s OK if Google lists your site on page 372 of the results for such a broad search. The people doing those searches may as well be spitting into the ocean and will have to narrow their search criteria to get more useful information.

Your focus should be on the person whose search criteria includes additional keywords that identify your town, neighborhood, area code or zip code as a way of filtering the results. By focusing on localized searches, you can be the leader of the pack when it comes to search results.

Being at the top of the list of search results is ideal, but as long as your website appears in the upper portion of the first results page, or “above the fold,” to use a newspaper term, the user won’t have to scroll down the page to find you. I consider any listing above the fold to be a prime position.

Achieving Prime Position
It’s relatively easy to get prime position for localized searches. There are typically few frame shops in one part of any town or zip code. The key to success is to include searchable information, such as the neighborhood, town, zip code and area code in as many places on your website as possible and to include that information in the metatags—the behind-the-scenes info that search engines often use to decide page rankings.

Always include this information in your website:

– Title. Use a long title that includes lots of searchable information as part of the metadata.
– Description. The page description is important not only because it enhances your page rank, but also because the first few lines of the description often appear in the search result. You can use it to convince prospects to visit your site.
– Keywords. Keep in mind that using too many keywords could actually hurt your page rank. Google’s ranking system is a well-kept secret, and the company periodically changes it. Conventional wisdom suggests limiting the number of keywords to a maximum of six to 10. Separate keywords by commas, and the keywords should include your company’s general location and the words “picture framing,” “custom” and “art.”
– Header. Work your location info into the headline of your website; for example, use a header such as “Orange Park’s Favorite Picture Framer.”
– Body. Include as much searchable info as possible in the body text.
– Image Names. Consider renaming images to include your zip code or town name.
– Alternative Text. Use alternative text for situations in which the image is unavailable to readers—either because they have turned off “images” in their web browser or because they are using a screen reader due to visual impairment. Providing an alternative allows all users to access the same information, even if they cannot see an image. Some web browsers show the alternative text when the mouse cursor hovers over an image. As a side benefit, alternative text may enhance page rank for the searchable terms that identify your location.

Although it’s impossible to know exactly how Google, Yahoo, Bing and other search engines determine page rank, include information that identifies your location in as many places as possible. This approach gives you the best chance of achieving a high ranking whenever someone conducts a local search. After you maximize your chances of attracting prospects to your website, the next step is to focus on what to do with them once they’re there.

Primary Objective
The main objective of your website is to produce sales. However, if your business is a retail store or home-based business, you’re probably not directly selling products or services from your website. Therefore, the goal of your website should be to get customers into your store or to call you.

Unfortunately, most framing websites don’t achieve these goals. Most landing pages are nothing more than electronic business cards. With a bit of effort, however, you can make your site into an engine that repeatedly produces new customers and generates sales.

The key is to design your landing page as if it were a Yellow Pages ad. Despite being just keystrokes away from the competition, your landing page must convince visitors to end the search and choose you. And you want them to consummate the decision with a telephone call, which will give you an opportunity to get a verbal commitment for a face-to-face meeting.

Where Are You? How Do You Get There?
A good Yellow Pages ad included not only an address but also, when necessary, a map. The landing page of your website should include a map and written directions or a link to a Google Maps or MapQuest page with your location prelisted as the destination. Placing this information prominently on your landing page can help bring prospects directly to your store. A photo of the exterior of your store can also be a helpful navigational aid.

Next, make it visual. Picture framing is a visual business, yet many framers have a website that primarily includes only text—which is neither visual nor appealing.

A one-page website that looks professional and inviting is all you need to capture prospects. Later, you can add more content to your site. It’s a good idea to offer useful information, such as picture-hanging tips. However, the landing page makes the all-important first impression. Make sure it looks good before you spend time adding more pages.

Don’t Derail the Sale
The Google search that brings prospective buyers to your website also provides easy access to most, if not all, of your competitors, which invites comparison shopping. Naturally, it’s in your best interest if the shopping ends with a visit to your website.

Encouraging a phone call offers the most consistently valuable outcome, and it’s what you should strive for. A phone call does what a web page can’t: It creates a personalized experience. A phone conversation gives you a chance to build a rapport with your new prospect and an opportunity to separate yourself from the competition. It also allows you to answer questions and address your caller’s concerns.

If you effectively handle the call, your prospects will no longer feel the need to call other framers. Their search ends with you and with a promise to ask for you by name when they arrive at your store. Because of this rapport, you almost ensure a sale even before you end the call. When you actually meet your prospect, both of you will feel more at ease because you’re already familiar with one another.

Without that telephone conversation, distractions and nearby competitors can prevent even a well-intentioned prospect from arriving at your store. There’s no reason to rely only on the power of what visitors see and read on your website. A telephone conversation personalizes the experience and strengthens the prospect’s desire to do business with you and only you. Near the end of the conversation, be sure to ask, “Can you come in now?” Confirm an appointment, and you’re almost certain to make a sale.

Make the Phone Ring
Encourage customers to call by prominently placing your phone number in large type near the top of the page. Include some inviting words of encouragement, such as, “Call us with questions.” Consider displaying your number as an image rather than text. This approach can help reduce the number of telemarketer calls you receive.

Consider adding a call-me button, which immediately connects you to the prospect’s phone. A number of companies provide this service for a fee, but Google Voice users can get it free with Google’s Call Me widget. When a visitor to your site clicks on the call-me button, Google immediately calls both your phone and the visitor’s. In just seconds, you’re connected, giving you a chance to turn a website visitor into a customer.

Don’t use your website as just a business card; turn it into a sales engine with the techniques and strategies that made Yellow Page ads effective. Exploit these techniques and you’ll find that the next time that prospects let their fingers do the walking, there’s a good chance that walk will end with you.

Paul Cascio, aka The Guerrilla Framer, is director of the American Picture Framing Academy (pictureframingschool.com), where he conducts training workshops and seminars for new and established framers. Contact Cascio at pdc@pictureframing school.com.

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By Tara Crichton Picture framing at its simplest is a craft, and, if you reduce it even further, it is a business. I’m not fond of the business side of framing. The business chores I must perform every couple of months have become the bane of my existence, and I can’t wait until the bottom line of my business allows me the luxury of delegating them to someone else. There is good reason that I didn’t become an accountant.

You would think that, after years of repetition, the possibly monotonous labor of cutting frames, glass, mats and backing would cease to thrill. And, although they don’t make my heart beat faster in avid anticipation, they provide a feeling that is less like a new love and more like a good marriage. There is a more solid, steady feeling of satisfaction with every step that brings me closer to a job’s completion.

My craft demands sterile perfectionism—perfect joins, clean glass and smooth surfaces—and I base my art on that perfectionism. It is like the canvas that a painter uses when realizing a masterpiece. It provides those details that the customer sees and those they don’t, and it thus makes or breaks the artwork.

At the very least, mats should have the smallest possible overcuts, glass should be free of dirt or fingerprints, and frame corners should be tight and touched up so that the seam is virtually invisible. The superior materials and methods that preserve and conserve are also crucial. All my work is for nothing if shoddy workmanship undermines the superficial appearance. For example, paper mats can fade and discolor, cardboard backing acids can denature the art, and masking tape can dry into powder. Some performance art uses materials that rot and decay as a statement; picture framing is not that kind of art.

It takes time and skill to achieve the invisible perfection that showcases the customer’s art and makes no effort to take center stage. The frames, mats and glass are the paints of my art. They are the means of building depth, scale, intensity and volume.

The sum of these skills becomes gloriously greater than the parts. The frame and mat you choose create the art’s focus. The matting and frame width can give the art more visual weight and significance. Dark colors reinforce this effect, attracting light and more vividly contrasting the artwork with its surroundings. The matting color you use reacts with the colors in the art, causing them to either recede or advance. White or creamy mats, on the other hand, are the exceptions to this rule. They provide the best way to create a visually open area around the art that stays neutral as long as you find the right level of white.

Using colors that are the opposite of a main color in the art has an interesting push-pull effect. Such opposites include red and green, yellow and purple, and blue and orange. Use that optical effect with caution, though. It’s a bit like putting a juggling act in your show; make sure the main attraction can hold its own. You can mute the effect by using grayed-down versions of the colors.

There is sometimes no reason why something works or doesn’t work. Listen to what your trained senses tell you. If what you are laying down doesn’t seem like the perfect combination, keep pulling and keep putting options down. Pull some frames that you are sure won’t work. On the other hand, a “wrong” frame can suddenly and mysteriously look incredible, and finding one is among my secret joys.

Inspiration is the main motivator that elevates my craft beyond drudgery. Artists become inspired and fall in love with their subjects. My love affair with texture, which I’ve written about before, is still going strong. Although that type of love doesn’t die easily, I know that I have to love my client’s art more. I can’t put together all my favorite things, regardless of how it works on a watercolor, intaglio print, family photo or golf shirt. It’s difficult to frame all the disparate objects your clients bring to you. You can get caught up in the technical details and lose the spark that makes the entire project shine. This inspiration doesn’t live in a vacuum; it is something you have to work to maintain.

We are so lucky to live in a time during which the internet lets us keep in touch with what is happening around the world. I’m a bit backward in the social-media world. Although I love Pinterest, Instagram and Flickr, Facebook doesn’t interest me at all. I want to know what strangers are doing and what inspires them.

Inspiration is contagious. I get inspired watching fashion shows on vogue.com or documentaries on Netflix. I also love flipping through home-decor magazines while waiting in line at the grocery store. Trade shows are an invaluable opportunity for framers to pick the brains of other industry professionals. You don’t have to steal their ideas; they will give them to you. The well-thought-out displays of framed art with new mouldings and products are bound to get your artistic juices flowing.

For me, picture framing is everything that bookkeeping is not. It is passion and craft, paint and sculpture, creativity and practical application—all wrapped up together. There is an art to great picture framing that is fulfilling and rewarding to produce, and the rewards come from customer loyalty. There is magic in becoming inspired by art and creating the best possible artistic method of framing to preserve and enhance it. Tara Crighton has worked in the framing industry for more than 24 years and is a graduate of University of Guelph with a double major in fine arts. She has worked in every aspect of the framing industry including retail, wholesale distribution, OEM and art direction. She now owns and operates a gallery just north of Toronto.

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