Trust is very hard to come by in the global business world.
If you have established a bond of trust with past clients,
make the most of the effort you have put into building that
trust. Let your clients hear from you often. If they don't
hear from you, they'll be hearing from your competition.
And your competitors will be more than happy to harvest
your low hanging fruit.
Visualize Low Hanging Fruit on a tree for a moment. The Low
Hanging Fruit is riper, and because of that, easier to
pick. Here is an example: In Michigan, we like to go apple
picking in the Fall season. Dozens of families flock to
their cider mill to get warm cinnamon donuts (now I'm
hungry), cold apple cider, and ripe apples. With our
baskets in hand, we naturally go after the low hanging ripe
apples, because they are ready to be picked. And think of
your warm prospects, those that have already expressed an
interest in working with you, as a ripe apple. Ready for
the picking.
Yet, many of us focus a lot of our time and energy on the
harder-to-reach apples or prospects. We spend a lot of time
working on far-fetched clients, friends, or family members
that are not ideal. What we really could be spending our
time on is developing high-trust, low-tension
relationships, and closing the deal with people who've
already said they'd like to work with us but haven't been
turned into clients yet.
Starting today, you're going to change that by putting more
focus on Low Hanging Fruit, while you continue to make your
business more client attractive. From now on you will have
a Low Hanging Fruit chart above your desk at all times, in
a place where you can refer to it several times a day. You
can create it in MS Excel or write a list by hand. Either
way it should have several columns. 1. Name 2. Business
Name 3. Phone Number 4. Time Zone (for your global clients)
5. Email Address 6. Language Spoken (you'll need this
column for your ethnic clients) 7. Referral Source 8.
Client's Particular Concern 9. When to Contact Them Next
If you have a Palm Pilot or a day-planner, then put this
list in there as well. Go through your mental Rolodex,
day-planner, Palm Pilot, cocktail napkins and sticky notes
to see who has expressed interest in working with you over
the last 6 months to a year, but hasn't been converted into
a client or patient yet. You'll want to list all of these
prospects on this sheet. This can also include those who
you met with for an initial consultation but who never
signed up, for whatever reason.
This will be one of your more important documents you'll
use for getting clients, and you should plan on using it
until you can afford CRM (Customer Relationship
Management)software. This method of keeping track of people
who are closest to becoming clients (and then taking action
to follow up with them regularly, using different methods)
is somewhat deceptive because it's so simple.
The bottom line is that when my clients use this SIMPLE low
cost list, they report that they convert more prospects
into paying clients. When they stop using this list,
prospective clients slip through their fingers. Hint Hint.
----------------------------------------------------
Kim Schott, created the Keys to Client Communication System
to help struggling self-employed professionals master
Client Attraction Marketing while increasing their revenue,
and taking more time off. Signup for our FREE eZine ($107
value) by visiting
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