Getting Clients and Keeping Clients for Your Service Business: A 30-day Step-by-step Plan for Building Your Business

Weems

GETTING CLIENTS & KEEPING CLIENTS FOR YOUR SERVICE BUSINESS: A 30-DAY STEP-BY-STEP PLAN FOR BUILDING YOUR BUSINESS

Copyright © 2007 by Atlantic Publishing Group, Inc.

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ISBN-13: 978-1-60138-044-9

ISBN-10: 1-60138-044-5

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Weems, M. D., 1977-

Getting clients & keeping clients for your service business : a 30-day step-by-step plan for

building your business / by M.D. Weems.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN-13: 978-1-60138-044-9 (alk. paper)

ISBN-10: 1-60138-044-5 (alk. paper)

1. Professions--Marketing. 2. Small business--Marketing. 3. Customer relations. I. Title.

HD8038.A1W44 2008

658.8--dc22

2008007341

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Table of Contents

Introduction

Part 1: Getting the Jump on the Competition

Chapter 1: Why Do People Need Your Services?

Chapter 2: So You Call Yourself an Expert

Chapter 3: Brand Your Business and Yourself

Chapter 4: Personalize It All: Logos, Brochures, and Web Sites

Chapter 5: Extending Your Brand to Other Areas

Chapter 6: Learn to Make Your Business Visible to All

Chapter 7: Make Your Business Stand out from the Rest

Chapter 8: Finding Your Target Market

Part 2: Start Your Business’ Engine

Chapter 9: Create a Unique Positioning Statement for Your Business

Chapter 10: Building Your Business’ Credibility

Chapter 11: Networking Is Key

Chapter 12: Forming Alliances with Vendors

Chapter 13: Learn the Art of the Article

Chapter 14: Learn to Use the Media to Your Advantage

Chapter 15: Some Pitfalls to Avoid

Part 3: Grabbing Your First Clients

Chapter 16: What Type of Marketing Should You Do?

Chapter 17: Where Should You Start Your Marketing?

Chapter 18: Marketing Success Ingredients

Chapter 19: Creating a Winning Plan

Chapter 20: Setting Goals and Keeping Them

Chapter 21: Making Contacts and Appointments

Chapter 22: Keeping Track of Your Contacts

Chapter 23: Following Up with Contacts After the Appointment

Part 4: When Clients Start Flooding In

Chapter 24: Your First Clients

Chapter 25: Customer Service Basics

Chapter 26: Keeping Your Employees Motivated

Chapter 27: The Wonder of Referrals

Chapter 28: The Beauty of Advertising

Chapter 29: Specials and Discounts

Chapter 30: Cater to Your Client Base

Part 5: Keeping Your Information Organized

Chapter 31: Software to Keep Track of It All

Chapter 32: Keep Your Business New

Conclusion: In The End

Biography

Bibliography

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Introduction

Clients are the lifeblood of any business, especially a service business. Without clients, your business will not grow, and if you cannot keep the clients you have, your business will fail. Most new business owners think that, when they open their doors for business, clients will simply flood in without much effort. This is not true in today’s business world. With competition in every market, clients have a broad base to choose from, and they can afford to be picky and shop around. So, how do business owners gain those precious clients that they need to make their business grow and prosper?

For many business owners, finding clients can be a daunting task. At first, they try all the traditional methods – business cards and fliers, advertising in local papers, marketing promotions, and so on. But, these do not always do the trick, and clients do not always respond to the traditional marketing and advertising techniques that worked ten years ago. So, business owners will turn to newer marketing and advertising venues, which can cost more money than they are really worth. Yet, they will gain clients, even if it is not at the rapid rate they had hoped. Then comes the next hard part of running a business: The business now has clients and now they must figure out how to keep them from going to their competition. This too can be a daunting task for business owners, especially if they are not customer service savvy. There are many ways a business can strive to be the best and keep the clients that they have, but sometimes these traditional ways are not enough.

This is where this book comes in. In this book are all the secrets that a business owner needs to pull in tons of clients and keep them once they come through the doors. This book will take you through all the steps that any business owner should take to ensure their client base begins to grow at a monstrous rate and to ensure they keep those clients so their business can continue to grow and prosper.

Getting Clients and Keeping Clients for Your Service Business: A 30-Day Step-By-Step Plan For Building Your Business contains all you need to know to start your business on the right track and keep it there. We have interviewed some of the best business minds out there, researched the best techniques that business owners utilize to bring in customers to their businesses, and dug into the brilliant marketing minds of the day to find the latest and best marketing strategies and information. And, we have compiled it all here, in one awesome book, to help business owners thrust their business to the next level and beyond.

Table of Contents

Part One

Getting the Jump on the Competition

Chapter 1: Why Do People Need Your Services?

Chapter 2: So You Call Yourself An Expert

Chapter 3: Brand Your Business and Yourself

Chapter 4: Personalize It All: Logos, Brochures, and Web Sites

Chapter 5: Extending Your Brand To Other Areas

Chapter 6: Learn To Make Your Business Visible To All

Chapter 7: Make Your Business Stand Out From The Rest

Chapter 8: Finding Your Target Market

Day in and day out, there are new businesses that pop up all over the map. And, at the same time, there are old businesses that go out of business. This constant state of change can sometimes cause a sense of confusion in clients who like certain aspects of a business who just shut down, and do not care much for those who have just started up. But, with all the different service businesses out there, they can easily change if they do not like the first one that they choose.

Face it, the simple reality of business is that there is always another business there to take your place if you fail. By keeping this in mind, you need to gain the upper hand over your competition when it comes to pulling in new clients. Getting the jump on your competition will help to ensure you will not only gain new clients, but keep them over time, since you are able to offer them something that the others cannot. But, there are several steps that you need to take to ensure you have the jump on the competition. These beginning steps will help to establish you and your business as experts in your area, gain a recognizable brand that clients will instantly associate with you, and make your business jump out above the competition so that clients will know you are the best around. By implementing these simple steps, you can rest assured that your business will have the upper hand.

Any smart business owner knows instinctively that they need to make their business stand out from the rest. But, most business owners do not know how to do this the right way. There are hundreds of thousands of ways that you can push your business, but not all of these ways will bring clients into your business, and most can push them in the opposite direction.

To begin to build your business so that clients will want to use you and stay with you, you need to develop a firm foundation for both you and your business to stand on. This means you need to establish yourself as an expert in your area, and you need to be a credible pillar in your business area as well. You will also need to establish a credible and trustworthy image for your business that will show clients that you are a professional and your business is here to stay and to serve them as long as they need you. By creating a platform that you can build your business and your reputation upon, you will create a sturdy foundation that you can continue to build upon for many years to come.

The first part of this book will help you take the steps needed to build the firm foundation that any good business owner and service business needs to continue to grow and prosper in today’s competitive market. So, make sure you read through and understand this area of building your business on a rock solid foundation so you are prepared to head on to the next part of this book.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1

Why Do People Need Your Services?

In this chapter, you will learn why people need your services and how to show them that they need your services. There are several steps that go into determining why clients need your services, which is one of the building blocks for a strong foundation for your business. Here are the steps that we will go over in this chapter:

Learning to identify your target clients and your target markets

Learning to identify the wants and needs of those clients and markets

Learning to offer great opportunities for investments to those clients and markets

Learning the best ways to find and show the benefits that clients will gain from your opportunity

Learning to Identify Your Target Clients and Your Target Markets

The first step you will need to take in identifying your target clients and markets is to determine which clients you want to work with. Why should you worry about which clients you want to work with, after all, are not all clients good to work with? Not exactly. When you determine which type of clients you love to work with, you will then be doing work that you love to do. In turn, this will ensure every second of your work will be the best work that you do and is one of the main ways your clients will gain respect and trust in you and your business.

When you are able to pick out your ideal clients, no matter if they are individuals or other businesses, you will be placing yourself with clients who actually inspire you to do your best. Remember when you were a teenager and you had one friend who your parents thought was a bad influence on you? They constantly told you that one person was a bad influence on you, and that one person would ruin your reputation right? Yet, another friend was a good influence on you, and made your reputation better. You probably even heard: you are the company you keep once or twice from them too.

The same is true in business, yet most business owners overlook this extremely important aspect.

Most business owners simply take any client with a checkbook that comes through their door. But, if these businesses took the time to work with the clients who are ideal for them, they would find that all the clients who cause undo stress and frustration will disappear. Only those clients who truly inspire a business owner to produce the best possible work will remain.

By identifying your target clients, and those clients who do not fit into your plan, you will be creating a special area that only caters to those clients who will help your business grow and help you grow as a business owner. Think of this step as creating a VIP area for your clients. This VIP area, or your business, is only for certain clients, those that you choose to work with. But, to truly create a great VIP area, you will need to get rid of those clients who are less than VIP status.

Sorting Out the VIP Clients

There are several authors who also preach this same theory. If business owners would simply sort out their non-VIP clients, they would have the best ones left to work with. In Book Yourself Solid: The Fastest, Easiest, and Most Reliable System for Getting More Clients Then You Can Handle Even if You Hate Marketing and Selling, Michael Port tells us to dump the duds, or dump those clients who do not fit into your VIP area.

I know you are wondering why you would dump clients when this book is supposed to help you gain them and keep them, right? Well, this does not mean you need to get rid of all your clients, only the ones who seem to drain you or those who treat you and your business with a less than desirable attitude. Ask yourself which clients you have on your list who seem to completely drain the energy out of you and end up leaving you feeling less than whole after a visit. Make a list of the clients who you simply dread dealing with and why you do not care to deal with them.

This next part may be hard for you, as it usually is for most business owners. You need to start the process of weeding out those non-VIP clients from your business. Your first step in creating your VIP area is to make a list of characteristics or behaviors that you prefer and a list of those that you do not want to deal with in your business. Keep in mind that you will have to be completely honest with yourself and honest about your clients, even if they are your friends. If you are not honest, then this will not work, and your newly found VIP status will not work for your benefit.

Now, look through this list and place your current clients on one side or the other. If you are having trouble in choosing where certain clients should go, place them on a maybe list. Your VIP clients should be those who you absolutely love to deal with, those who inspire you to learn the newest techniques, or those who make you feel that your business is worthwhile. Your non-VIP clients should be those who completely drain the life out of you when you have to deal with them, those who are less than desirable to work with, and those who make you cringe each time you hear their names.

Here comes the part that will be the hardest for most money-minded business owners – those clients who were placed on your non-VIP list are those who need to be cut from your client list. Do not panic – I know the thought of actually cutting clients from your list is not what you want to hear at the beginning of this book. You are probably feeling a bit sick at the thought of losing clients, paying clients, but it is all right.

Keep in mind that to create a solid foundation for your business, you will need to replace those pillars that do not help hold up the weight of the business. This means cutting the clients that are on your non-VIP list.

You should also remember that cutting those non-VIP clients is just as much for their good as it is for yours. The clients who completely drain you, or force you to cringe at the thought of their names, are obviously not getting the best services from you. You owe it to them to cut them and refer them to another service provider who can take better care of them.

Also, remember that you are your clients. Who would you rather have your business associated with – clients who love your business and rave about how great you are, or clients who are not completely satisfied or who are never satisfied with anything and are more likely to give you a bad referral to other clients? The more VIP clients you have, the better your reputation will become, and the more referrals you will get from client’s friends and family who have heard them rave about how great you are and how wonderful your services are.

When you work with clients who do not fit into your VIP list, there will come a point when conflict will arise between you and the client, intentional or not. Both you and the client will become frustrated with the business arrangement, and the client will think they are not getting the best service from you. They will be right too, since you will not be giving your best to them since you do not like to deal with that particular client. So, it does not benefit either one of you for you to keep them on as a client. If you keep them on because you are afraid to cut them from your VIP list, then you will end up with former clients who go out into the world and tell everyone what a terrible service provider you are.

While not all clients will be the right fit for your VIP list, they will fit onto someone else’s list. There is nothing wrong with the client, no matter what you may feel, they are just not right for your VIP list. So, you are not firing them, you simply need to find them another service provider that fits them better.

When you are ready to find those non-VIP clients a new service provider, be sure you choose your words carefully. It is easy to say what you feel, but if you choose your words carefully and truly convey that you are trying to get them the best service possible, you will come across as a truthful, diplomatic person, and not a jerk.