Testimonials
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Sometimes I talk to frustrated professionals:
- They need more good long-term clients but not sure how to start marketing efficiently;
- Occasionally they have an empty schedule and need more potential client meetings;
- Current clients are only getting some services offered, and could be better served with more services to improve their business;
- Not happy with the mix of clients now.
There are solutions which generate profitable new business and don’t require big budgets to start.
Here are 3.
1. Grow Your Current Client Engagements
Too often clients don’t know about your other services. A few tactics to build more with your current client list include:
- Client Satisfaction Survey (we need to ask honest questions, you need to be ready for the answers);
- Understand each client’s business better;
- Educate each client a little to open new opportunities.
2. Referral Growth
Your best clients probably know people with similar situations, and they trust you.
- Understand them enough to learn which new customers they are seeking, and pass along referrals occasionally to them;
- Teach each a little so they understand results their associates can expect;
- Ask them about issues they’ve heard about with businesses in their network, and suggest how those can be solved. And ask for a referral when you really believe you can provide solid solutions to their friends and trusted contacts.
3. Shift Client Base
Too many of the wrong types of clients can make you dread going to the office. You can slowly generate new business and “retire” those clients you don’t want.
- Analyze your contact list and network strategically;
- Build relationships in new sectors or promote different services to the new contacts;
- Demonstrate expertise over time increase your “specialist” reputation.Each of these strategies involves a simple plan for building your list, adjusting your reputation and increasing your communications. Then, more business decision-makers will understand your professional services, and learn about your specific skills. As your client base gets stronger, your practice will become much more stable.
Let’s discuss which of these strategies will build your practice carefully and profitably. Call or email today.
Here are 3 Strategies to Boost Your Client Development
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Lots of people are considering chat, webinar and other technical methods of communication, compared to sitting down with people.
In-person connection will always be better. If you can meet together relatively easily. From coffee shops to international conferences, people do connect better in person.
- You can read each other’s body language. That unspoken communication is actually more important in the early stages than the content.
- Handshakes and other brief touches do connect 2 people quickly. We still do it because it fosters trust.
Connect Humanly First
It’s simply more personal in person. Of course, if your new contact is distant, then you need to balance the potential long term value compared to travel costs.
Big business research has found that travel does payoff for high value deals. It is an investment that pays off.
Relationship Stages
Use both in-person and technology. In the early stages of a business relationship, make the connection face-to-face if possible. The technology-supported content conversations can come later, after the connection has been started by looking each other in the eye.
When you do use remote meeting technology, make sure each of the participants has enough bandwidth for high quality video, and you are comfortable with the operation. Do a little practice so there is no fumbling, lighting is good, audio is clear, background isn’t cluttered and you are reasonably positioned on the other person’s screen.
When Should I Use Remote Meeting Technology in a Business Relationship?
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Because I have focused on “Services Marketing’ it’s been important to gather information from a variety of business and professional sectors.
My training and experience is in Marketing Communications, so these topics have caught my attention:
- How do professional service providers describe themselves
- What methods of communication are used
- What results can be expected
Over time, major common methods became obvious. When you need to grow a law practice, home design firm, specialty roofing business or an I.T. services company; these are key steps:
- Main idea you want people to understand about you
- How to develop a list of contacts
- How to organize a list of contacts
- Staying in touch over time to develop relationships
- Who can be an informal partner in referrals, accountability or supplier
- Websites, brochures, manuals and other documents
- Stories, presentations and other spoken messages
- Emails, outlines of conversations and other templates to be customized
- Questions to ask to develop trust
It’s all about people talking to other people, and building community and understanding.
These key steps were put together from books I’ve collected over the years, videos online now, conversations with business coaches and my own experiences. By belonging to organizations, attending fundraisers, serving on association boards and meeting people in organized networking groups, everyone has strong ideas on why they spend time meeting others.
If you have enrolled in the course “Networking For Reputation Growth” and gained insights, then my research time was well invested. If you have ideas on your own experiences or how the course can be improved, please send me an email.
If you have questions, please ask. The answers are “no charge”. When we network, we help each other.
Research Done for the Course “Networking For Reputation Growth”
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When I worked in a business newspaper, my job was to create and sell advertising. Most of my colleagues focused on that, and kept their social lives separate.
I was new to the city so I wanted to meet more people. To do that, I started joining organizations. Within a couple of years I had more than 1 political party membership, a few business association memberships and a social group membership. These all brought me into contact with a variety of people so my network of connections was growing.
The variety of groups really helped. Two results became obvious over time:
- Lots of understanding about the whole Metro Vancouver region and the many types of businesses, cultures and non-profit groups
- Strong sales because I had more connections than colleagues who simply relied on cold calling and other standard sales practices.
My success wasn’t the result of a plan. I’m just a curious person.
However, I did learn the valuable lesson of having a diverse network, and being someone who could connect people to others able to help them.
The Connector Benefits
One of the great parts of working to become a Connector is the adventure. You can’t predict the completely new social and business circles you will be exposed to.
Relationships
When a sales person is cold calling, or a business is contacting hundreds or thousands of “prospects”, they need to work through many. Very few will become a reasonable connection.
When you are seeking to grow your network, you will be in direct contact with only a few people at a time. And only a few of those leads to a relationship.
If you have looked someone in the eye, listened to what they have to say, and made them feel comfortable, you are starting a relationship.
What To Do When You Meet New People
- Learn the specialty or strength of the new contact
- Learn their needs
- Send them a resource
- Connect them to someone who can help or connect them to someone who can
Set targets for how many significant connections you want to create
- 10 – Just to get started, learn some simple processes
- 25 – Starting to get real traction
- 50 – Work with those for a while. Get comfortable by strengthening each of those. Track results, learn to feel what’s right for you and what’s right for your better connections
- Over 50 – now you have moved into the Super Connector status. You need to be making connections an important part of each day. It works well because you understand what to do and when to do it.
Key Principles
- Give a lot, generously. If you aren’t generous, go back to selling the old way
- Listen carefully
- Talk to strangers
- Manage your contacts
- Not everyone is equal. Spend more time on the “better few”. Those are people connected into groups you don’t have, who don’t sell but do seek many opportunities.
Contact Management for Relationship Building – set up a database with calendar
- Name, contact information, company, etc
- How you 1st met or got talking
- Their situation
- Their strengths and unique skills. Learn to use tags or keywords to track many.
- Their needs. Again tags or keywords can really help.
- Create a “scoring system” based on your estimation (potential value to your other contacts, their openness and generosity, new networks they have which might have value to you and your connections)
- Score & Sort to learn which contacts are a priority
- Next Contact Date
- Who to connect them to. Try to create mutually beneficial connections
- Notes & Correspondence
Results
As you help others, you will learn who needs what. New opportunities will be discovered and an above-average diversity in your network will lead to above-average new business deals.
Your reputation will be greatly strengthened as people recognize you as a go-to person when people need something.
Referrals come to those who give a lot. Your understanding of your community will grow much more.
This will take a few years, and that is how long-term relationships grow. Enjoy!
Becoming A Connector: Grow Your Income By Helping Others
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In the next 1-2 minutes, can you see the total of all your possible deals for the next month, so you can estimate income, if you need resources and other important planning?
Get all your contacts (past customers, potential customers, suppliers, referral partners) into a simple-to-use system. A good system is one you can easily use with clear steps to follow.
Process & Questions for efficient Contact & Deal Management
Aside from contact information, you want to know a couple of key things about each contact/organization and possible deal, such as:
- Possible value of the deal
- Do you know when the decision is expected?
- Your contact is a decision-maker?
- Is this a priority to the person/organization?
- Where is this deal at now, compared to the specific stages in your sales process (1st contact, detailed discussion, quote prepared, quote delivered)
- Notes about this contact, organization and possible deal
Some of the above you need to do, and some of it can be done by an part-time assistant, in a few minutes each week. That person can keep your Contact & Deal Manager up-to-date, let you know who needs contacting and how. You focus on the real deals and get more potential deals on track. Then you can choose the right ones.
How Contact & Deal Management Can Work
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Getting new contacts and business opportunities always takes a variety of connections and tools. Effective Client Development uses a system, not just one method.
What’s Effective:
- Meeting new people through networking;
- Being easily found in online searching by people and businesses looking for answers;
- Having referral partners to tell our stories to others;
- Preparing different documents and files ready to use for specific types of contacts.
And, in the right conditions, Cold Calling is an effective first step in starting new conversations.
The Numbers Game
The downside of asking strangers a few short questions about their situation and needs is: 90% of calls are to people who don’t care. Of the other 10%, 90% have no immediate need.
The Upside:
Uncovering potential clients before they ask others and before they search. That puts us ahead of most of the competition or comparable services.
By slowly staying in touch over time, with information useful to potential clients, we start to establish our presence in their mind. We can touch on various factors a little to expand their knowledge.
We can show a little of a thorough set of services. When their need level does start to rise, we are on their radar, and they are on our radar.
Our growing list of contacts brings in people we can later connect to a referral partner of ours. We can’t serve all our contacts. However, we can deal with each quickly to uncover those who are appropriate for others. When we can connect two different people, they will appreciate new good contacts and appreciate us.
Our growing list of contacts brings in people we can later connect to a referral partner of ours. We can’t serve all our contacts. However, we can deal with each quickly to uncover those who are appropriate for others. When we can connect two different people, they will appreciate new good contacts and appreciate us.
Before We Call For You
We do our homework: what’s been effective for others like you; what’s important to potential clients; and how to work through a well-chosen list effectively.
- A custom version of the Cold Caller’s Playbook is fine-tuned for your individual business needs.
- List management
- Follow-up email series
- Measuring actions and results
This blunt instrument of Cold Calling needs to be polished before using.
Do you need new contacts to understand your differences? Let’s talk: our conversation is No Charge.
Why We Sometimes Use the Blunt Instrument of Cold Calling
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When we ask for a client critique, we become vulnerable. And the challenge is to hear the words, plus the emotions behind them. It’s so easy to choose to hear only what we want.
I recently contacted a variety of my clients and referral partners. Keeping my mind and my emotions open took a bit of attitude adjusting.
One interesting fact about the average person’s self-image: we are more critical of ourselves, compared to how others see us.
Here is some of what I heard:
“The packaging of my services you suggested wasn’t useful, however I now know what my clients want. My website is making a big difference in how people understand me.”
From an accountant who shifted his practice focus and location.
Lesson Learned
My packaging of his services was based on selling a commonly found service: accounting. What did really work was communicating the actual person, the accountant. He already speaks the language of his specific target market.
“The writing you provided didn’t really make a difference. The website is not really important”
Spoken by a very focused custom-home builder. His clients come by word-of-mouth. He was having a website developed and needed text: or so we thought.
Lesson Learned
Before we worked together, I thought people ready to spend $5 million plus on a home would review the builder’s website. The website is not significant at that level of very carefully vetting potential contractors. The photos show the types of homes he does, and that’s enough. His place in the community is the core of his marketing.
“The client’s feedback that I got isn’t targeted to the types of clients I now want to get.”
From a financial planner who has shifted her practice to retirees, away from people who want to grow their financial resources.
Lesson Learned
Getting more time to understand her future plans would have really helped more. Her expectations didn’t match the delivery of great testimonials from her current clients. I delivered what she needed at that time, however she didn’t tell me about the changes. Now she and her referral partners need new stories to tell about the effects of her services.
Most of the feedback I got was very supportive and positive. Basically, they said: “Don’t change, you’re doing things well and as expected”.
These Lessons Learned from those described here are not typical of my clients. But they are very important. To grow as a service provider, the comments I hear coming from the outliers are very valuable. While my core clients are satisfied, it’s out on the edges we can learn new ideas, evaluate them and choose the right ones.
What am I going to do with these comments?
Some of the comments I received are just people complaining, because they were asked and they feel they need to find something negative. That’s fine: it’s human. I won’t do anything with some of the negative comments.
Some comments shine the light on a system that needs improving. Those are the most valuable. If a good reliable system is put into place to avoid future comments, then it’s worthwhile.
The positive comments are very important. In addition to saying we have the right systems and resources; those words and phrases make us feel good. That’s important to feed the emotions and maintain a positive attitude.
What do people say about your services?
What lessons can you learn? Are you getting the tough questions that will guide you?
If you’d like to learn more about how a Client Satisfaction Survey works, just ask. The answers might make you squirm a little. Those are the opportunities to improve the way your team works and delivers services.
And you will probably find you’re on the right track. The positive feedback can really help navigate the changes you are considering.
How to Use Honest Feedback from Clients
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Networking in person, online or over the phone: your goal is to start new relationships.
Some new connections won’t be good value, some will be good referral connectors and some may become clients some day. Don’t pitch or push.
Good questions show people you are open and curious. As you listen to their answers, you are showing you care about them and their ideas.
Ask others about themselves: people love talking about themselves, positions, families and what’s important to them.
Don’t Worry
If you have 3-4 questions ready to ask, you will capture the respect of the other person. This is not the time to pitch your services or experience.
Listen carefully: a follow up question into one of the points said by your new contact demonstrates you are listening and will probably get them talking even more.
Use Open Ended Questions
- How has your business had to shift? We’ve seen some pretty significant challenges as our clients need to adapt?
- Are you part of the Association? I’m looking to investing some of my time. What are your ideas?
Topics People Love To Talk About
- Location and region they serve
- Recent Projects (don’t get into future projects yet)
- Range of services they offer
- Best types of projects they look for
Questions To Get People Talking
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Vocal feedback from current and past customers is really valuable. If a business or professional wants to grow beyond their current level, asking good questions to those most familiar with your organization and services works wonders.
Listening to thoughtful answers can guide you in the right direction.
Better yet, listening to emotions, pacing, pauses and more adds depth and perspective.
That’s why the use of emotional language, level of speed and other variables need to be part of the research report.
Want more information on your customers’ ideas, feelings, enthusiasm, hesitancies, generosity and other emotions? Let’s talk. Find out more from the people who have been or are now your customers. They have stories which can trigger future successes.
Research Analysis – Beyond the Words
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When the first Survey Report was given to a client, it was just text.
28 of their customers had been interviewed, great stories were captured, we learn who their preferred customers were and over 25 testimonials were given.
But the Report was all boring text.
People don’t think quickly in terms of text. In fact, they often don’t think: they feel.
Trust in a feeling. And that’s the objective in so much marketing communications.
So, when the Survey Reports started including pictures to summarize the findings, the clients learned more and we were able to communicate the preferences of top clients. And that has improved communications through a variety of forms. The clients get more of the people they want to work with.
Think about the pictures that express your clients’ feeling about your services. Use that emotion in networking conversations, stories with referral sources, emails, presentations and other business communications.
Why Pictures are Now Part of Every Survey Report
