High ticket sales are defined online as anything you sell from $3000 to $1,000,000, and above. It’s no wonder that merchant’s who run credit card processing online can consider you a high risk client if you sell products and services at these price points. Ultimately, at the end of the day, the banks are the ones liable for repayment should you default or go out of business.
So, you know there’s a lot of money to be made in high ticket sales…
How do you make sure your merchant accounts aren’t terminated when you start selling and accepting payments?
First, it’s important to understand exactly why you’d be considered a high risk merchant. Secondly, I will share with you my personal experience building toward high ticket sales that has RARELY resulted in refunds, nor has ever had my accounts frozen due to large volumes of money generated into my merchant accounts.
Some of the categories that banks consider high risk are: Business courses and coaching, education, online fitness, info products, guns and other firearms, travel and monthly subscriptions and marijuana businesses all trip a red flag with banks.
One of the best things you can do to help banks know you’re on the up and up, (as well as for yourself) is to create a business plan and make sure that your financials for your company are in great shape. You should have no, or low charge back ratios, and make it exceptionally obvious to clients who they’re purchasing from when the statement comes on their credit card bill.
Having fraud mitigation tools in practice, like double opt-ins, CVV forms to authenticate the credit card, and blocking multiple charges automatically from the same email, credit card, or countries you don’t do business with.
It’s also important to realize that if you have no, or little processing history, you’re going to be considered high risk out of the gate.
Don’t panic. Here’s where a solid business plan and building a relationship with a bank is important. Trust me, the banks aren’t out to deny people on purpose. They make their money by helping money move. Invest the time to understand what your bank is looking for and how you can comply to make it easy for them to trust that you have your business handled appropriately.
Banks are in business too, so understand that they have statistical data on your industry when it comes to chargebacks and risk.
Their job is to mitigate risk and return a profit on everything they do. Your refund rate percentage has a direct correlation to how much a bank charges you per transaction. This also means that low ticket sales with high refund rates will get you blackballed as well. The banks simply aren’t making enough to cover the losses.
Yet, it’s a great way to begin to build rapport with your bank. Starting with lower ticket sales and few or no refunds, is a way to build trust with your financial institution…and YOUR CLIENTS! Over time, you can even request a lower percentage per transaction based upon your history of profitability. Banks like working with profitable companies…and I promise you will like being profitable too, so set yourself up for success by offering massive value for the amount you charge and helping people who purchase your products and services to fully understand what they’re buying.
I’ve been selling online for over a decade now. We’ve processed millions of dollars and have never had our money frozen longer than an email or phone call to the bank inquiring about the hold. We now sell products and services from $50 to $50,000 and everything works like clockwork online. Here’s how we evolved over time, and why I believe high ticket sales, if done correctly, render the best possible outcome for you and the viability of your business.
We started small.
Our very first product offered online was a $9.97 purchase.
The advertising and build up to launch created so much buzz, that people were expecting this to be a high ticket sale.
Once we captured our audience’s attention, we followed up with email campaigns and social media communication, creating excitement for what we were going to reveal. We simply built value in continued communication up to launch day.
It was our goal to build rapport with everyone who showed interest as a way of differentiating ourselves from the competition. Once we gathered everyone on a webinar, we added so much value in the “training” (code for selling via webinar) that people easily dropped the $10 down to find out what was next.
We allowed a few weeks to pass, with follow up communication via email, ensuring everyone was actually utilizing what they purchased. Once we knew there would be zero refunds, we followed up with everyone and offered them a one time opportunity to work with us directly for a discounted price since they purchased the original product. We knew we were well under the $3000 limit of “high risk”, so we knew we could collect the money. We ALSO had amazing conversion rates from those who bought the original product from us simply because we were building a reputation for over-delivering value to our clients.
Once we made it through round two, we followed up weekly with everyone, making sure they were getting the most out of the second purchase. To us, we were simply showing our clients that we appreciated them and wanted them to get the results they sought through buying what we offered. This also kept our refund rates at a flat zero. In fact, by following up, we gained detailed inside knowledge about the issues everyone had, where they got lost or stuck, and why they weren’t able to get the results.
This is exactly what led to our high ticket offer.
People saw the value and we caught them quickly enough before they began searching for alternate solutions and asking for refunds.
We communicated this via email campaigns, letting everyone know that their struggles weren’t theirs alone, and that we were working on a solution for each and every one of them.
We invited them back on a live training, where we highlighted those who’d gotten massive results and answered the most pressing questions that everyone had. We delivered so much value on that training that we simply offered to work with people individually for a much higher monthly commitment. Not everyone took us up on the offer, but no one asked for a refund after the training either. They saw that it worked, had an opportunity to ask questions, and I believe that even if some never moved forward with us to help them get the results, they believed that what they’d purchased in phases one and two, was more than worth the money.
We went from $10, to $500 per month, to $5000 per month during this particular campaign.
We had zero refunds and patiently built our way to a very successful final result. The banks never balked at the money coming in because they were making money without giving any back. They did hold our last phase of money for 5 business days, and claimed it was their policy, but it’s never happened since, and we’ve run millions through that account since that initial campaign.
We followed a common sense approach, treated our business as if it were a real business, and took care of each client as if they were family.
This is exactly why I believe high ticket sales are NOT high risk if you conduct them the right way.
When you identify your ideal client and serve them value that far exceeds the cost of doing business with you, you breed loyalty. People that invest large amounts of money with you will continue to if you show them how much you value their business. All you have to do is prove that you’re not a fly by night, get rich quick, flavor of the day enterprise, and you can have these exact same results.
Banks, merchant account managers, clients…they’re all the same. If you build value, the sky is the limit for what you can charge. Just always make sure that what you offer is more valuable than what you charge. Make sure you SHOW and TELL each person that buys a high ticket product or service how valuable it truly is when it’s utilized as well as it’s promoted.
