Invent It, Sell It, Bank It!: Make Your Million-Dollar Idea Into a Reality (34 page)

Another time I had a “Today’s Special Value” that wound up being on the same day as the last twenty-four hours of the countdown to the Iraq War. Everybody’s eyes were glued to CNN, not QVC. The programming was set; there was nothing I could do. As you can imagine, that was a hell of bad day.

Be Prepared for Anything!

Live TV can set you up for all kinds of hilarious situations. The trick is to stay on your toes and roll with it. I’ve had a liter bottle of seltzer water explode in my face; an electric can opener that wouldn’t work; I’ve burned my hand on a molten hot butane lighter. And during the only blackout in QVC history, I was selling live on air. As luck would have it, I was selling magical floating water candles. They came in quite handy that day.

Another time I went to Dusseldorf to sell on QVC Germany. I got to the studio and I saw the name of the show I was going to be on, called
The Schmuck Galerie
. Oh, my God! It turns out the German word for jewelry is “schmuck.” Then I saw on the screen that the name of the product is the “Ohrring-Aufbewahrungs-system.” I thought that was hilarious. That first appearance on QVC Germany went well, and we were invited back with other products, eventually getting a “Today’s Special Value” for my full-length mirror jewelry cabinet.

Everyone on the program wears an earpiece so we can hear the callers, but since I don’t speak a word of German, when I’m selling on QVC Germany I wear two earpieces when I’m live on air—one in one ear for the callers, and one in the other ear for the translator who tells me in English what the callers or host is saying. So, one time, I was kicking off a “Today’s Special Value” at midnight; there’s a huge amount of money on the line. I start to sell, and in one ear I hear German. Then I hear the translator’s voice in my other ear … in
German
. I have no idea what anyone is saying. For fourteen excruciatingly long minutes, I winged it. There was no way to let anyone know something was wrong. I kept talking in English: “This mirror jewelry cabinet is fabulous because you store 350 pieces and it all hangs! And isn’t it fabulous—it has an antitarnish lining!” I’m sure the audience
and everyone in the studio thought I was nuts, for surely I wasn’t responding correctly to anything the host was saying.

Amazingly, the product sold. That just goes to show you how much television retail relies on the demonstrability of a product. What you say is extremely important, but what you do on the air is almost more so.

Keep Things Exciting

An important aspect about TV is that you have to keep things fresh and new. People will get bored if every time they tune in, the channel is always selling the same ten items. So once you’ve built momentum, get ready to mix things up—not with your demonstration, but with your product itself. Maybe you could add features or offer a better deal. My line of jewelry organizers have been on QVC for sixteen years, and they’re still going strong as ever because I tweak them to keep them fresh, even as I preserve everything that has made them such classics.

I did the same thing with my no-mess cooking utensils that hung on the side of the pot so they wouldn’t mess up kitchen countertops. The set included a stirring spoon, a slotted spoon, a fat gravy separator, and a ladle. After two years, however, we could see sales starting to slip a little. So what did we do? We made the heads larger, and we developed a pasta fork and a spatula. Everyone loved them and started requesting a nonstick version. And then we went back to the original set of four and made them in the larger size, but kept them at their original price. In this way, we were able to maintain the concept that everyone loved and was doing great for us, while making the product feel new.

You have to constantly think and be creative. Adding colors to a product is often a great move for TV. If the home cook who loves red accents in her kitchen suddenly sees that those cool
no-mess cooking utensils that used to be available only in black are now available in red, you have a good chance of finally making that sale. Playing with colors and expanded product lines reveals yet another advantage to television: brick-and-mortar retailers may not have the space to keep that many colors and SKUs, whereas on TV you can show as many as you like.

THE RULES OF SELLING ON A HOME SHOPPING CHANNEL:

1.
No overselling
. That means no hard pushing. An infomercial sell is often exaggerated. They will show videos of people shaking their heads in dismay over whatever problem the product being sold is supposed to solve. It always looks stilted and fake. QVC promotes a backyard fence attitude of selling. Though we do film video footage, it is simply to show the item in action in its natural environment, and not in dramatizations. When pitching your product on a home shopping channel, you should always sound like you’re just hanging out at home explaining to a friend or neighbor why you’re passionate about your product.

2.
No pressure
. Infomercials usually come with calls to action. “Pick up the phone NOW and you’ll get two, plus a carrying case!” On QVC, there are no throw-ins or add-ons if you dial in. You get whatever is advertised. The only thing that might influence a consumer to buy sooner rather than later are the numbers appearing on the screen announcing how many items have sold and how many are left.

3.
Talking points
. Make sure to get out your talking points and demo the benefits and features you planned.

4.
Video
. Use videos to supplement your demo. Before and after videos are particularly useful for demonstrating your product’s problem solving capabilities.

5.
Clean
. No swearing if you ever want to be invited back on air.

CLEVER AND UNIQUE CREATIONS

For two years I’d come on the air for the usual seven or eight minutes given all products on QVC. All along, however, I had my eye on the prize: my own hour-long show. There are two types of shows—branded and generic.
Generic
shows represent all types of different products from different companies.
Branded
shows represent several products, but they are all from the same brand. There might be a Dooney & Bourke hour or a Philosophy hour.

My goal was a Lori Greiner hour. I was told that to qualify, I would have to invent seven to nine items that were consistently successful every time they went on the air. At QVC, as I’ve shared, a successful product is defined as one that earns all the dollars per minute for that hour required for a reorder. With every new invention, I’d pray that it would work well enough to get me a little closer to my goal of one day getting my own show. If you sell on QVC you’re constantly meeting with your buyers, and as we would talk about the products and strategize, I was always hoping that eventually we’d see that I had enough products earning enough sales to get me that special hour. But it wasn’t just about the numbers; I also needed to establish that I was a big enough brand that could carry an hour-long show.

In my third year, I got it. It’s called “Clever and Unique Creations by Lori Greiner,” and I still have it to this day, multiple times each month. For me, selling in that hour was so much more
fun than the eight minutes I was accustomed to. It also proved a great way to build my brand even more. A show makes you a destination, giving your customers a dedicated place to find you and your products. In addition, it ensures that you can get a lot of feedback from your customers, which is wonderful because then you can make sure to take their needs and wants into account as you create more products. I adore the QVC followers and customers. I would not be where I am today without them and their support and dedication. They have made what I do for a living truly gratifying.

It was around the time that I got my own show that my travel schedule meant I was away from home almost more than I was home. Dan, a CPA, had been doing my accounting all along, but when the traveling became too much, he quit his job and joined me full time as VP so that we could spend all our time together. The business had grown so much that we were financially secure enough to no longer worry about losing his income. The business was getting exciting and he wanted to be a part of it with me. I was president, he became vice president. In addition to taking care of the books, he also took over the shipping and back-end operations. I continued to handle the product creation, manufacturing, selling, marketing, all legal, and running and driving the company. We couldn’t be happier; we play to each other’s strengths.

BEHIND THE SCENES

When the QVC audience tunes in to see you and your product, they would probably never guess how much planning and hard work went into getting ready for that show during the months, days, and even the hours just before you appeared on air. It’s something that new entrepreneurs always find surprising, too.

For example, a typical day for me on QVC might start at 8 or 9 a.m. if I’m lucky—sometimes I can have several of my hour shows within a 24-hour period (a “Today’s Special Value” is the toughest schedule, representing about 36 hours of no sleep). Unfortunately, you can’t just set the show up and leave it until your next airing, because other people are using the studio. It takes us three to four hours to set up for each show, so we’re going to be working hard all day.

QVC offers all on-air guests a stylist to do their hair and makeup, but I do my own at home because I’d rather use the extra time to help my team set up and talk with the host and the QVC production team. Typically I’m always rushing to get dressed. I push everything to the last minute. In fact, my team has taken to telling me that I need to be somewhere a half hour earlier than I really do so as to make sure I’m out the door when they want me to be.

I consider many things when picking out my outfits—no wild patterns, no crazy color combinations, no supershort skirts, no jeans, and so on, per QVC guidelines. I try to be attractive and stylish, but not distracting. I’m representing my brand—the main event is the product.

If I’m going to be presenting a product that I haven’t done very frequently, or that’s relatively new, I often watch a recording of the last time I presented it on air to see what I liked in the sell, what worked or didn’t work, and what I think I could do better. It’s a good refresher. (I’ve sold some products so many times I could sell them in my sleep!)

The decision about what I am going to sell today was made months ago. I’ll have a general overview for the quarter, and then as we get closer to the shows, QVC’s buying and planning team will tell us what’s going to be in each hour. So then I know which
six to seven items to prepare for. A combination of the new and the existing bestsellers make up each hour show.

We plan weeks ahead of time for how we are going to demo the brand-new products. I used to do it all myself; now I’m lucky and I get a lot of help from Coop, my director of marketing, broadcasting, and social media. I usually start out with a vision in my head of how the demo should go. However, there are two essential elements you always need to emphasize:

1. Your product’s features

2. Your product’s benefits

You’ll hear those two words discussed all the time at QVC. Your product’s
features
are all the things it is and does. Customers need to be able to see those to know if the product is something that might be useful and whether it is appealing and to their taste. But equally important are the
benefits
of those features. Why does someone need this product? It will make her or him more organized. It is more convenient. It will clean the home more thoroughly. Whatever you are selling, you have to continually point out how the features and benefits of your product will make a consumer’s life better.

Aside from the product’s features and benefits, we put together all kinds of visuals to help explain why the product is great. Products we’ve sold before are propped and stored in a warehouse, but the new ones need a lot of planning. Several weeks before the show, my team and I select which props will help us convey on air everything the product can do. How will we demo this? How will we demo that?

We will also film support videos a few months ahead of time.
You’ll see these lifestyle support videos run two or three times during the live on-air sell. Everybody makes them. A video can escalate your sales by as much as 20 percent, if not more. They help people see the product in action in the right environment, not just in a studio. Take, for example, my favorite luggage, my deluxe weekender bag, which I designed for myself. The lid is a flap into which you can snap a toiletry bag; and when you open the bag up, you can hook the flap onto the telescoping handle so you can see all of your toiletries and cosmetics. It’s got a lot of neat, patented benefits and features other bags don’t have.

In the studio, I can show how it unzips to reveal the toiletry case snapped inside the lid. But it also has 360 degree turning wheels and fit into a plane’s overhead compartment. You can see some of this in the on-air demonstration, but some of the benefits can’t be demonstrated in the studio. These you can put into the video. My producer, Doug, and I filmed this particular video on a special set where we had access to a real section of a plane. We were able to film the bag close up, show someone putting it into the overhead compartment, and display how the wheels turn so you can easily maneuver down a narrow airplane aisle. We also went to a hotel so we could film someone rolling the bag past someone else in a narrow hallway. These kind of live-action lifestyle shots are invaluable.

Usually people hire someone to film the videos for them, but as you probably guessed, I like to be part of the process. I create a video for almost every item I sell. I think it’s important. I’ve been working with Doug for fifteen years. We try to shoot two to three products in a day to make the most of the house or other location we rent and the models and videographer we hire. It’s important to make the most use of your money. While the shoot is laborious, I find editing to be really fun. I feel like it helps me tell the story about my product. Doug can do the editing right
on his PC, so he comes to my office and we sit and do it together. We watch the raw footage, I pick my favorite shots, and we put it together to tell a story.