Recently I shared three powerful ways to follow up. But sometimes the methods alone don’t help you get the job done.
That’s when you have to ask yourself, “Do I have a system in place to follow up with hot prospects?” Without a system, it’s easy to let the follow up tasks fall between the cracks.
Follow up can be time consuming, especially when there are several calls back and forth if you have trouble reaching a prospect. That’s not a good thing because a hot prospect can get cold while phone tag is in play.
Or, for some business owners, you put off the calls because there are so many other things on your to-do list. You tell yourself you’ll get to it, but that just doesn’t happen. Even though follow up is a top priority, things get in the way.
There is one way to make sure you don’t get caught up in phone tag and the follow up calls get scheduled. Put a system in place. Scheduling of follow up calls with potential clients is a great item to delegate and it frees you up from wasting valuable time.
Work with your virtual assistant (or hire one) to set up a system for scheduling your follow up calls. Your assistant can play phone tag while you focus on income generating tasks. And then of course, you will be the one adding value, showing that you care and possibly closing the sale during the follow up call.
Another aspect of this system is to require the potential clients to call you. When your assistant sets up the appointment, have part of the process be that clients call you. If they are interested, they will come to the call and that is another way to free yourself up.
Your Client Attraction Assignment
Do you have a system in place for following up with hot prospects? You do now! Talk to your virtual assistant to delegate the scheduling and you can focus on the closing the sale conversations to bring in that low hanging fruit. Sweet!
Now, if you’re just starting out and trying to fill your practice in the FIRST place, then follow a step-by-step system that feels easy and authentic to you. The Client Attraction Home Study System™ gives you the most important things to do to set up simple, solid systems, so that you consistently fill your pipeline and continually get new clients. It’s all step-by-step, not a big mishmash of things. So, you do step one of the system, and when you’re done with that, you move on to step two, and so on. All the tools, scripts, templates, and examples are handed to you on a silver platter. Easy. You can get it at TheClientAttractionSystem.com.
If your target is female entrepreneurs, that is great news. Why do I say this? Because they are an easy group to find! If this group is your ideal client, I’m going to share a variety of methods to help you reach women business owners.
1. Visit Women’s Associations
In general, entrepreneurs like to gather and so do women. That’s two strong reasons why women entrepreneurs are an easy group to find. There are so many associations! For example, the National Association of Women Business Owners (NAWBO), eWomenNetwork, National Association of Professional Women (NAPW), and National Association of Female Executives (NAFE) to name just a few. And new organizations are cropping up practically every day. Check out the groups in your area and attend a variety of meetings to see which ones will serve you best.
2. Become a Regular Fixture
After you attend a range of events and choose the ones offering you the most potential ideal clients, it’s time to become a regular fixture. You want to be seen and be known there. To strengthen the relationship with the groups you select, you can do any or all of the following:
- Sponsor special events
- Speak to the groups
- Become a board member
3. Speak to Other Women’s Groups
You can’t attend every women’s networking event because there are just too many of them. But to reach more of your ideal target, you can speak to groups where you are not an active member.
As you know, I often talk about how speaking to prospects is a great way to build the know-like-trust factor. It also gives people a firsthand experience of who you are and the type of expertise you share.
4. Hold Seminars that Appeal to Women Business Owners
Choose topics that you know will appeal to your target audience. Women love to learn, which is demonstrated by the fact that they purchase 75% of all self-help books. You may have to adjust the event titles and topics until you get it just right, but that’s part of the marketing process.
Holding your own events allows you to establish yourself up as an expert and the problem solver women business owners need.
Your Client Attraction Assignment
Is your target women entrepreneurs? If you answer yes, I recommend that you take some time to think about how to further identify them. The clearer you get about your ideal clients, the easier it will be to find them. You might want to qualify them further with these additional characteristics such as:
- Income
- Geographic area
- Business type
- Years in business
- Number of employees
- Problems that need solving
There are many other ways to identify your ideal target in my Home Study System as well.
If you’re just starting out and trying to fill your practice in the FIRST place, then follow a step-by-step system that feels easy and authentic to you. The Client Attraction Home Study System™ gives you the most important things to do to set up simple, solid systems, so that you consistently fill your pipeline and continually get new clients. It’s all step-by-step, not a big mishmash of things. So, you do step one of the system, and when you’re done with that, you move on to step two, and so on. All the tools, scripts, templates, and examples are handed to you on a silver platter. Easy. You can get it at TheClientAttractionSystem.com.
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I’ve helped so many hundreds of people over the years deal with non-ideal clients. You might ask what does that have to do with attracting more clients? Well, when you have a practice full of non-ideal clients, it actually makes you not client attractive.
Think about what it feels like to have a heart sink client. You know, when you look at your calendar for the day and see that person’s name and your heart sinks to your stomach because you just don’t enjoy working with him or her.
Heart sink clients are not going to recognize that working with you is essential. They are not somebody who will get great results from working with you. Their resistance is a drain on your energy.
I don’t know about you but I’ve taken on some clients over the past 12 years that were not my ideal clients. Between you and me, that’s usually when you’re taking on somebody for the money―even though your intuition told you not to. Unfortunately, sometimes we put the money before the ideal relationship.
So, imagine that over the years I’m talking to these non-ideal clients on the phone and it’s laborious. It’s hard work. I can’t imagine having a full practice of those types of clients. It would make me non-attractive because I would be resentful and upset and tired.
Conversely, when I talk to an ideal client, I’m psyched to get on the phone. I do great work with them, they get great results, they tell others, they write in testimonials; all of that good stuff. At the end, I hang up the phone and my reaction is, “Yes! That was awesome!”
When you have a day full of those types of clients, you get more and more energy throughout the day as opposed to less and less energy. So you ideally want a practice full of ideal clients.
So, what do you do with those clients, who, deep in your heart, you know you don’t want to be working with. You know they’re not your ideal. How best should you handle that?
Well, here’s how I’ve done it in the past. The first thing to do is take personal responsibility. Assess the situation. Why did you let that client in? What happened? What were the red flags that you didn’t pay attention to? You don’t need to necessarily take personal responsibility with them but it’s important for you to figure out what happened so that you can avoid doing that in the future.
The second thing that you want to do is set boundaries. I have a client right now who was in our Gold program and is now in our Platinum program who had clients calling him on his cell phone at all hours of the day and especially at night. I said, “Oh, no, no, no. You’ve got to set boundaries with your clients and make sure that they know what the rules are.”
So if you don’t want somebody calling you on weekends and late into the evening and expecting things to be done within two seconds, you need to educate your clients as to how to work with you. Setting boundaries with that client may prevent you from having to fire that client. You can just say, “Hey, this is how I would like to work.”
Number three is when you get new clients, celebrate them and then send them a Welcome Packet with policies and procedures explaining how you work with them. I believe that everybody wants to know what the rules are. We think we don’t want rules but we actually do because then we know how to behave within the parameters. So send them a Welcome Packet with policies and procedures so you’re both on the same page and they’re no miscommunications later.
Now, let’s say that all of those things have not happened or didn’t work, what do you do when you have a client that is just more than heart sink and you can’t live with them anymore? the past when I saw that a client was not doing their work or it was a drain on both my energy and theirs, I suggested taking a pause by saying, “It seems like you have a lot of work on your plate. Why don’t we put a pause button on our coaching and come back when you’ve implemented everything.”
Well, they were delighted because they felt like they needed to implement and do things. But guess what happened. In the majority of cases, they never came back which was then a lovely way of saying, “Hey, let’s take a pause and let’s not work together” without anyone being offended.
Another way when you really need to communicate that the working relationship has to end, is to say, “Listen, I have the nagging sensation that I’m not the right [insert your title] for you.”So for me it was something like, “I keep thinking that I’m not the right coach for you. I really want success for you,” which I always do even if it’s somebody that I am having a hard time connecting with. I always want success for them.
Saying, “I want you to get great results. I don’t feel like I’m the one providing this for you.How about if I help you find somebody else?” is a nicer way of saying, “Hey, it’s not you; it’s me.”
Lastly, if you want to do the right thing and do things in integrity, don’t just leave them hanging. If you can, help them find another resource. Help them find another you or perhaps a book or program that would replace working with you.
Your Client Attraction Assignment
Take these steps to weed out the one or two heart sink clients in order to make room for more of those yummy, ideal, high-paying clients that you would want a full practice of. Make it your goal, over time, to achieve a full practice of ideal clients. When you do, you have more energy, you’re more confident, and you feel like you can charge more money because the proof is in the pudding.
You’re clients will get great results and you become more client attractive.
