Ways Of Adding Value To Prospects Pre Sale?

[JoeyF]

Hey Y'all.

I've been thinking lately, adding value when you get a client is easy, you just provide a great service and make sure they get everything they expected plus a little extra.

However, adding value BEFORE the sale takes place is equally important because if you don't, the sale will never happen.

What I've found is, here in the UK, trust is at an all time low with business owners not wanting to part with their money for fear of getting ripped off.

I'm talking about marketing services right now but this could really apply to any kind of service business.

Ideas that I've had for adding value to customers up front are mainly educating them but it occurs to me that it's still possible to do a little something up front for free to show them a) you care and b) you know your stuff.

- Webinars/videos/reports explaining marketing and educating them to make the buying process easier
- Help them get set up professionally on Facebook
- Help them upload their contacts to an Autoresponder and send out a mail to all of their previous customers to bring them back.
- Interview them and push out the recording of the interview to Social Media
- Create a group for business owners of a certain kind to interact and share strategies

I think at least a couple of those ideas have merit.

Anything else I'm maybe not thinking of?

I guess @Andy Black will probably have some ideas

PS does anyone else here forget to add a tag every frigging time they make a post and get hit with the 30 second window to repost? lol

 

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[HoneyBadger]

Hey Y'all.

Ideas that I've had for adding value to customers up front are mainly educating them but it occurs to me that it's still possible to do a little something up front for free to show them a) you care and b) you know your stuff.

- Webinars/videos/reports explaining marketing and educating them to make the buying process easier
- Help them get set up professionally on Facebook
- Help them upload their contacts to an Autoresponder and send out a mail to all of their previous customers to bring them back.
- Interview them and push out the recording of the interview to Social Media
- Create a group for business owners of a certain kind to interact and share strategies

In my previous position I was in sales (recruiting). The value we added was being an expert in the hiring trends of a specific niche and being able to share that information with candidates (where the market is going in terms of skills required, pay, locations... etc.). That is highly relevant to the service I would hopefully want to then sell them on (recruiting them).

I think a research/expert opinion/education session is perfect as a pre-sale value add. Reading most of your ideas you want to provide deliverables/services as a pre-sale for free? Seems odd and you may seem desperate.

 

[devine]

I, personally, don't ever do any work until I got paid. People pay to who they respect the most, and the most respected people/brands will always be those who add value without doing anything directly for you.

 

[eliquid]

Adding value for free is a very good method regardless of what others say.

There is a reason lead magnets and trip wires exist and do so well for lots of businesses that do millions+ per year.

People who only provide value/work when they are paid are limited in their abilities and think with a "scaricity" mindset. They are small thinkers.

These same people get rolled over in the bigger arena's of the world and the smarter competitors.

Who do you think is going to get more business, the real estate agent that only drives people to houses when she is paid upfront for services, or the one that drives clients around to look at houses before the sale and drops a ton of info to the prospective buyers while she does it?

Small focused example, but same idea.

The person that provides the most values generally ends up the winner in the end, even if that means some of it was given upfront with no payment upfront to build trust and get their foot in the door.

 

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[ApparentHorizon]

I can only speak for customers in the south east US, but the education part is really great.

They understand 2 things:
1. knowledge = power
2. knowledge = control

First point is obvious, but the 2nd...

If the owner knows what you're doing, and explaining it every step of the way, they're more likely to trust you. After all, you have nothing to hide, and he/she can make suggestions along the way.

 

[JoeyF]

Quick story regarding doing actual work up front. I sent out an email 4 months ago to a few business owners who were cold prospects.

I offered to give them 1 month of adwords free to show them my stuff.

I got a whole bunch of people replying back, all but one flaked.

The company that didn't flake turned out to be spending £100 per day on their Adwords without having a clue what they were doing.

It took about a week for the changes I made to half their budget while improving their results.

It was on day 8 that they agreed for me to redesign their website at £1500.

Now they are subscribed to my £500 per month Adwords management service and we're forging ahead and building what will be a very mutually profitable relationship.

So that worked out well.

The trouble is, most of the time, they flake if they don't have any skin in the game.

When it's free, they don't value it, although they're all excited at the outset.

Then you need them to do x,y,z so you can begin working on the project but they disappear or go cold on the idea.

That's why I feel it's probably best to do something like provide value via education.

My problem is, my niche, aren't very computer literate, so they tend to not really see the things i'm doing online.

It's hard to get them to pay attention to text on a screen, or watch a video.

So providing value via info and education becomes difficult, unless it's face to face, which usually isn't possible.

 

[eliquid]

Quick story regarding doing actual work up front. I sent out an email 4 months ago to a few business owners who were cold prospects.

I offered to give them 1 month of adwords free to show them my stuff.

I got a whole bunch of people replying back, all but one flaked.

The company that didn't flake turned out to be spending £100 per day on their Adwords without having a clue what they were doing.

It took about a week for the changes I made to half their budget while improving their results.

It was on day 8 that they agreed for me to redesign their website at £1500.

Now they are subscribed to my £500 per month Adwords management service and we're forging ahead and building what will be a very mutually profitable relationship.

So that worked out well.

The trouble is, most of the time, they flake if they don't have any skin in the game.

When it's free, they don't value it, although they're all excited at the outset.

Then you need them to do x,y,z so you can begin working on the project but they disappear or go cold on the idea.

That's why I feel it's probably best to do something like provide value via education.

My problem is, my niche, aren't very computer literate, so they tend to not really see the things i'm doing online.

It's hard to get them to pay attention to text on a screen, or watch a video.

So providing value via info and education becomes difficult, unless it's face to face, which usually isn't possible.

You have to start speaking their language and hitting their pain points more.

You might not be speaking the language these people understand well enough, or hitting their pain points enough.

Some of them might just be losers too, very possible.

However, someone might come in after you and do the exact same thing and hit on their pain points just a bit more and educate them more in a language they understand more and win their business.

Could that be an issue at all?

 

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[eliquid]

I just reread your post a bit more.

Do you think what you are doing on the pre-sales is scaring off the customer any?

i.e. as a busy business owner I dont care about your Facebook group or learning why something works. I just want the results.

Can you give me the results?

If you present to me a bunch of how-tos and why, and then a FB group, Im gonna bail on you because I dont have time to learn that or even understand it. I just want the result.

I buy a hammer because I want a hole in the wall, not because it's made out wood and will decrease my nailing time by 50%

 

[JoeyF]

I just reread your post a bit more.

Do you think what you are doing on the pre-sales is scaring off the customer any?

i.e. as a busy business owner I dont care about your Facebook group or learning why something works. I just want the results.

Can you give me the results?

If you present to me a bunch of how-tos and why, and then a FB group, Im gonna bail on you because I dont have time to learn that or even understand it. I just want the result.

I buy a hammer because I want a hole in the wall, not because it's made out wood and will decrease my nailing time by 50%

I've not tried any of that stuff yet, it's just ideas that I've had for giving some value up front to help the client get to know, like, trust before buying.

 

[GuestUser450]

I, personally, don't ever do any work until I got paid. People pay to who they respect the most, and the most respected people/brands will always be those who add value without doing anything directly for you.

That wasn't OP's question...

You seem to give aggressive non-answers under a false sense of superiority. Funny, I'd agree with most of your criticisms if I didn't think they were inspired by your own shortcomings.

Tip: A negative message-to-like ratio doesn't mean you're speaking hard-to-swallow truths that us sheep can't process; it means you have too many try-hard posts and not enough process-sharing contributions that help people.

 

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[Jon L]

on whether or not we should give stuff away pre-sales:
How you behave pre-sale is how you will behave afterwards. Potential clients know this, and they act accordingly. If you're stingy during the sales process, you're going to be stingy after the sale has been made.

In my field (custom software), my customers businesses depend on our ability to build a good product and support it. The only way to do this effectively is with an attitude of generosity. Does this mean that I don't charge a fair price for our work? Not at all. We're paid well for what we do. Does this mean that I go above and beyond what 's called for? Always. And this includes the pre-sales process.

 

[devine]

That wasn't OP's question...

You seem to give aggressive non-answers under a false sense of superiority. Funny, I'd agree with most of your criticisms if I didn't think they were inspired by your own shortcomings.

Tip: A negative message-to-like ratio doesn't mean you're speaking hard-to-swallow truths that us sheep can't process; it means you have too many try-hard posts and not enough process-sharing contributions that help people.

I pointed at one of the aspects (don't work for free), that was mentioned in OP's message.

And no, I don't give aggressive non-answers, I give just answers based on knowing my level of competence. You're not first to say that I'm aggressive, but well, that depends on how you see it. Thankfully, I don't need to deal with everyone.
Message-to-like ratio doesn't mean much. Many of most well-received messages on TFLF have zero value, my most liked post is a common sense. So I don't really care.
It's similar to social network likes - you can have thousands and have no business, and you can have 5 but from people who pay to you.

 

[Random_0]

Giving exceptional customer service alone adds shitloads of value.

I've stopped being as concerned about taking money off my customers. My company provides a service, so as long as their problem is fixed that's all I care about.

Taking big losses on my first encounter with a customer has started turning them in to clients.

E.g. customer pays you £90, give them £30 back and thank them for calling you.

I know you said pre-sale, but the mentality is intended before we even walk in the door.

 

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[Raoul Duke]

http://themfceo.com/sales-way-life-andy-frisella-mfceo83/

 

[Andy Black]

I just reread your post a bit more.

Do you think what you are doing on the pre-sales is scaring off the customer any?

i.e. as a busy business owner I dont care about your Facebook group or learning why something works. I just want the results.

Can you give me the results?

If you present to me a bunch of how-tos and why, and then a FB group, Im gonna bail on you because I dont have time to learn that or even understand it. I just want the result.

I buy a hammer because I want a hole in the wall, not because it's made out wood and will decrease my nailing time by 50%

I haven't read the whole post yet, but I agree with most of what @eliquid says.

I learned the hard way that business owners who want to learn what I do are NOT great clients. They aren't making enough profits to hire me, and they aren't staying in their lane. I suspect the former is a symptom of the latter.

The only thing I disagree with is that people don't buy a drill because they want a hole in the wall, but to put up a picture. But that's just me nit-picking.

 

[JoeyF]

I'm surprised at the 1-Dimensional thinking here.

Sure, people who demand to know everything you do are probably not ideal.

But what about people who are just curious and see that you've got a webinar they can learn a bit from, facebook group they can interact/network in, report they can read to become abreast of up to date strategies.

These are automatically bad clients?

 

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[devine]

I'm surprised at the 1-Dimensional thinking here.

Sure, people who demand to know everything you do are probably not ideal.

But what about people who are just curious and see that you've got a webinar they can learn a bit from, facebook group they can interact/network in, report they can read to become abreast of up to date strategies.

These are automatically bad clients?

Webinars, community discussions and other activities and events are always great, you just need to make these of high quality.
Just don't do a webinar if you don't really have a lot to say, you always need to have something in your sleeve, because you don't know which questions you will be asked.
I've participated in a lot of events and the most common problem is just uninteresting questions. People have average problems and often can't even phrase their questions properly, moreover, their questions usually don't address the problem they actually have. So your answers will leave much to be desired - you either will look try-hard, or rude, because otherwise you won't be able to answer the question properly, or will just give uninteresting answer majority of the times.
Webinar should always be at least 50% prepared, more like a seminar, otherwise it will be boring and you could only hope to be asked good questions.
I'd say, any webinars I plan will be 100% prepared, based on best questions I receive and base my webinars on the very best I have.

"Learn a bit" is not enough, this is how people end up recording hundreds of webinars that generate only so little.
Do one, but a great one, make a recording avaliable for free and it will generate you clients/customers for a lifetime.

 

[Andy Black]

I'm surprised at the 1-Dimensional thinking here.

Sure, people who demand to know everything you do are probably not ideal.

But what about people who are just curious and see that you've got a webinar they can learn a bit from, facebook group they can interact/network in, report they can read to become abreast of up to date strategies.

These are automatically bad clients?

Let me rephrase - they aren't my *ideal* clients.

Currently, my better clients come through as referrals (from happy clients, or from people who've read posts in the forum for instance).

They may or may not have read some of my content.

They may or may not recognise I know my stuff from my content.

Those ideal clients *hear* I'm good at what I do from someone they know, then want a quick chat to believe it's true and see I'm someone they can work with, then they hire me to do it.

They are too busy running their business to sit through webinars, participate in Facebook groups, or attend networking events. And the above are likely things they detest anyway, if they even know they exist.


(I'll brain dump more into this thread later when I have more time.)

 

[marklov]

Thumbs up to Andys last post....

First you need to figure out your ideal client criteria... and a prospecting system to qualify them .

Then you won't worry about not doing enough.

My ideal client needs no convincing/educating on why what we do works, little resistance to premium prices because they understand we are not consuming their cash flow just making better use of what they are ALREADY spending/wasting and turning that into profit.

These folks often already have a lot of their time eaten up by day to day activities in the background, most even prefer email and only
call us when text can't really convey what they want done, like creative stuff.

However, When we do call its mostly to have a sales guy upsell or a VA calls to
keep good relations between us to the point they don't even feel like they are being sold, it's more like a recommendation from
a good friend.

I did webinars and podcasts in my old linkedin group before I sold it off but more often than not most decision makers
would rather a service that just works without them having to tie up their schedule.

The others Enjoy the networking in the group and catching up with liked minded people
who share their difficulties than the content.

and very few really took any action.

 

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