Why Getting More Clients Can Feel So Hard
I was talking with a client not so long ago and she said something to me that really stuck with me:
“Getting new clients always feels like such a struggle. It seems like I’m either trying to get in front of people who are too busy to talk or once I do get them interested, getting them to say ‘yes’ and pay me is another struggle.”
“Is there an easier way?”
Does this sound like something you’ve said?
First of all, I can relate. I’ve done more than my share of chasing after prospects feeling like Elmer Fudd running after Bugs Bunny shouting, “Get back heaw you wascally wabbit!”
It is so not fun.
Second, and more importantly, the answer is YES, there is an easier way. The keys are:
1. Know your customers’ pain really, really well.
2. Talk about their pain and the results your product or service deliver. In that order.
3. Don’t talk about how you do it in the most general terms.
4. Understand how your customers make purchase decisions, especially in terms of what they need to make a decision and how long it takes for them to make a decision.
My experience shows that making prospects aware of the problem and keeping them aware of the cost of the problem helps keep the need for your solution top of mind. It’s human nature to forget pain as quickly as possible or to put up with pain because “it’s not so bad.” In too many cases, it takes a full blown crisis to get people to take any kind of action.
If you get the pain factor down, the next point is to talk about results and stay the heck away from getting into how you get results. It’s so tempting to go on and on about your really cool, proprietary process but the truth is your prospect doesn’t care. They just want to know “do you understand my problem and have you helped people like me solve it.” You will also get the prospect bogged in minutia and give me lots of reasons to nitpick and object.
Finally, and probably most important. It takes time, sometimes a lot of time for people to be ready to buy. It takes repeated demonstrations over a period of time for them to feel confident enough to say “yes” and write the check.
If you work with the way your prospects go through the buying process, it will a lot less like a struggle and more like time and effort well spent.
Get My RSS Feed