In today’s episode, we’ll talk about what to do when your offer isn’t selling.
We’ll look at it through three different lenses, and will get quite practical.
Grab a pen and paper, or listen along and bookmark this one to come back to. Let’s dive on in!
It can be really heartbreaking and challenging when you feel like you have something that is going to change people’s lives – it’s an amazing offer at a really juicy price – but you just cannot seem to convince anyone to invest in the outcome.
We can be so challenged by a lack of sales. It can feel like you just hear those resounding crickets when you talk about your paid products or services.
But there is no such thing as failure. There’s only feedback.
If your offer isn’t selling, that is a form of feedback! You can use a very structured review process and look at this through three specific angles.
I’m going to help you understand why your offer isn’t selling and how to take action to ensure you’re selling.
If you’ve been listening to me for more than 10 minutes, I have a “not so secret” 3-part marketing plan:
- Reach: How many people are you actually getting in front of?
- Conversion: How many of those people are becoming paying clients?
- Mindset: What energy are you bringing to it, including thought processes and feelings?
We can look at your offer through these three lenses to see where you need to be focusing your attention, and where you may need to make changes so your offer starts to sell.
Sexy, right?
1. Reach.
So let’s talk about reach first and foremost. The biggest piece of feedback I have for most people is this: You haven’t shared your offer enough.
People will come to me freaking out, saying, “I had this amazing offer. I spent the last two months putting this package together. I’ve worked on my messaging, I’ve hired a copywriter, I’ve created the most amazing sales page, I’ve got all these brilliant photos. It is so juicy. And I haven’t made any sales.”
And when I ask how many times they’ve shared it? The answer is…drumroll… ONCE.
Listen. Even if you put it out there to a mailing list of 5000 people, you cannot guarantee that it will sell the first time that you talk about it!
I’ve been guilty of this myself. Even recently!
When we had to move the Heart-Centred Business Conference to 2021 because of Coronavirus and the pandemic, we made the decision to put the Heart-Centred Business Conference as a virtual conference on the existing dates in June.
We put the sales page together and I said to everyone, “My gosh, great news. The Heart-Centred Business Conference is going online, you can buy tickets to the virtual event.”
And we had a super early bird launch, and I talked about it maybe four times.
Annnnnnd we sold 12 tickets.
I was so disappointed in that. I wonder, how many people heard me talking during one of those four times and had an interest, but then never saw anything from me again, and completely forgot to buy their ticket? I’ll never know!
So we need to reach as many people as we can, particularly those that are ideal for this product or service. And not just reach them once – we need to reach the same people over and over again.
Marketing studies have shown that people need to see something six times to take action on it. Whaaat?
In this day of superfast scrolling through the internet, and being overwhelmed with all the white noise out there, it’s looking like we might want to say things more like 10 to 12 times in order for people to take action on them. So we need to get better at stopping the scroll, we need to get better at reaching people.
Yes, we want to reach more and new audiences. But we also need to remember to reach the same people over and over again.
If you haven’t got a strategy that gets your offer in front of your hottest leads and clients more than six times, maybe it’s time to review your promotional strategy and address the reach.
Let’s say that you have a new VIP offer you want to share with people. And your call to action is for people to book in a free conversation with you about whether this is the right fit.
If your goal is to get three to five people to have a conversation with you about this VIP offer, you want to be sharing that VIP offer at least 10 times.
So think about all of the spaces where you could share it more than once. I’m not saying copy and paste those same words 10 times and throw them all over Facebook – that’s not going to work for you either! Actually, the more duplicate content that you have on Facebook, the lower the rate of that content anyway.
Instead, write out 10 different promo posts for that VIP through 10 different angles, or focusing on 10 different features, or 10 different benefits, and then go and share those consistently for the next four weeks.
If you were to do that and share it 10 times over the next four weeks, the odds of you having someone book in a sales conversation with you are wayyy higher than if you just copy and paste the same offer once a week for the next four weeks. Make sure that you are doing the right things to get the reach that you need to give this offer a chance.
2. Conversion.
Now, if you feel like you’ve got the reach part nailed, then the next step is focusing on conversion.
And if you have reach but are not converting, chances are it’s because of the value proposition.
While value proposition can mean a bunch of different things, ultimately it means how valuable is that thing to the prospective client? And how aligned is it to their priorities?
Whilst you might think it’s really valuable for me to look after my health and assess the mineral content of my bloodstream and take supplements to boost my minerals, if that’s not attached to a specific goal that is a priority for me, the chances of you convincing me to do that are actually pretty slim.
A lot of people make the mistake of thinking they can convince their ideal client to change their priorities. But the easiest way to get conversion and sell your products and services is to attach to their existing priorities.
As a small business owner, one of my priorities is business growth. So if you can convince me that having this mineral mix in my in my drink each day is going to help me be sharp and more vibrant, and therefore make more sales in my business, you’ll have a much better chance of making a sale to me. (By the way I just made this example up. Please don’t send me angry letters saying I told people that minerals would grow their business!)
So get really clear on who your ideal client is and what your niche is. What is her priority or his priority? What are the top three things that this person is focused on making sure they nail every single day?
If you can link your product or service to those existing priorities, you will have a much better chance of converting than if you don’t. Trying to convince people to change their priorities before they are ready, willing and able to buy will only stretch out your conversion process and purchase time, and will make it more difficult for you.
Now, I actually have an entire previous podcast episode dedicated to maximising conversion, but for most people, their offer is not selling because they haven’t gone deep with that value proposition.
Often, the reason why they haven’t gone deep with the value proposition is because they haven’t niched specifically enough. Or it could come down to not being very clear with messaging and having deeply resonant messaging for your ideal client that speaks to what’s going on for them right now.
Ultimately, having that value proposition really clear is going to be the best way to improve the conversion of the service or product you are offering.
And, a final little shout out to connection as well! We are more likely to buy from someone that we know versus someone who is a stranger.
One of the first things I do to help people increase conversion is make sure they use their name and photo consistently. That is a quick and easy shift that really does have an impact on conversion.
For example, if you are running a webinar and you don’t have your photo in some of the slides, please add your photo, because people buy from people and they want to know who you are. They need to connect your voice and your face. And that creates more connection for them, and therefore they are more likely to convert.
If you’re in Facebook communities, and you only ever share those perfectly manicured photos of you that you got taken three years ago, and you’re not sharing real photos of who you are right now, that can create disconnect for people. That can often reduce your conversion rates because people have this sense of distance from you.
Connection is the number one way to maximise conversion.
Need more conversion help? Watch episode 176 next!
3. Mindset.
The third part of our three-part marketing plan is mindset. I know a lot of people that just copy and paste their offers into Facebook groups each week, and they get someone else to write their copy for them. They’re not particularly excited about what they’re doing.
That energy is palpable when we read what you’re putting out there – whether it’s an email, your sales page, or in your offers. Are you actually coming at this with a positive, high vibe mindset? Or are you coming at this like, “Oh my gosh, no one’s ever going to buy from me, I can’t be bothered today, but I’m desperate for the sale. So here’s my offer.”
When it comes to mindset, I also think that desperation is palpable, and with all of the recent events in the world, (I’m not going to talk about it in detail), I didn’t just see panic buying around the world. I also saw panic selling.
People were worried if they didn’t make the sale now they were going to have a cash flow crisis in the coming months. And that desperation and panic came through in their offers and emails, regardless of whether their words specifically said it or not.
I truly believe your audience can pick up on your vibe regardless of whether you’re convincing yourself everything’s fine or not. So I would highly recommend that if you don’t have a consistent daily mindset practice, that you build one now.
Having the tools to feel you are coming from a space of abundance and trust and belief rather than a space of fear or limitations or poverty makes a real difference. It also makes a difference in your messaging and whether your offer is selling or not.
Take a moment to really tune into whether you truly believe in this offer.
Do you truly believe in the value proposition of this offer? Do you truly feel like you are high vibe, feeling great, everything’s cool? Are you coming from a space of abundance and bringing joy to your work right now? Or is there something that’s kind of a niggling, not-so-awesome feeling for you right now?
It’s worth investing 15 to 20 minutes to tune into what that is, and use your mindset practices to clear it. You can package it up and tie it in a bow and put it aside for later if you don’t want to work on it right now. But there are so many amazing tools and modalities and practices out there. Experiment with some and find the one that works for you to do consistently.
I share all the time that I journal every day. I tap every day, most days. Each day as I start to work, I write down my income goal.
Those things really do help me to tune into how I’m feeling right now, so that any of those niggling thoughts coming up can be cleared before I start my workday. I know this contributes to the effectiveness of my offers and my posts.
Alright, so you’ve got three layers that you can review your offer through and decide if there’s an area you need to improve on to get it selling.
If reach and conversion are areas you’d like to focus more on, and you do a lot of selling on Facebook, (or if you’d like to), I actually have a free resource for you.
It’s my Zero Dollar Facebook Marketing Plan.
This is a free training that helps you to make more money from Facebook by getting better rates and better conversion.
Until next time, I cannot WAIT to see you SHINE.
