In today’s episode, I’m going to help you map your unique client attraction process and also see where it may be imbalanced and where it may be letting you down.
If you want to make attracting and converting your ideal clients simpler and easier, this is going to be a super juicy episode just for you.
Let’s dive in!
I don’t want to scare you off by using the word ‘process’ or ‘system’, but that is exactly what we are going to be working on in today’s episode of the podcast.
We can get very overwhelmed by the words ‘process’ or ‘system’, but in essence, all this is, is the step by step process through which you bring in and convert your ideal clients into paying customers.
It’s a very sexy process for us to be focused on, and hopefully the fact that it’s going to help you grow your business is enough for you to overcome any resistance that you might have to implementing systems or processes.
Big newsflash for you here: Regardless of whether you do it as a system or process, you already have a client attraction process. Regardless of whether you call it that, regardless of what you decide goes into it or where you’re focusing your energy and attention, if you are online trying to get clients and you’re doing things to achieve that, then you already have a client attraction process.
The problem is that if you don’t analyse it and look at it strategically, you could potentially be missing elements or focusing your energy and attention on parts of that process that are not the most important priority for you right now.
What we’re going to do today is actually break down what a detailed client attraction process might look like.
I want to invite you to get out a pen and paper and take some notes on what activities you do at each stage of this process.
The basic client attraction process that we use is:
1. Reach
How do you reach new people?
The things that you do to improve your reach in your business could be organic reach on social media, such as:
- TikTok
It could be your ungated content that goes into a little bit more depth, such as having a:
Woman filming YouTube video for client attraction process in business start-up
- Blog
- Podcast
- YouTube channel
- Video blog
It could also be those things that achieve reach through more passive strategies such as SEO or keyword optimisation – making sure that people can find you when they’re actively searching for someone like you.
You can also use paid reach strategies such as advertising on Facebook, Youtube, Instagram, etc.
There are a lot of different ways that you can achieve that reach.
What I want you to do is have a think about what the different strategies are that you are focused on to grow your reach and reach new audiences in particular.
I want you to write everything down and make sure that you are capturing this in the reach section of your client attraction process.
2. Nurture
Once you’ve reached those people, how do you start nurturing the relationship?
Do you provide really great value? Do you get them onto your mailing list and send them regular emails? Are you doing something to build up that trust with your audience? Do you have webinars that you run consistently?
A lot of the things that you do for reach can also have a bit of an overlap with nurture.
For example, this podcast episode is a way that I’ll reach new audiences, but it’s also a way for me to nurture my existing audiences.
Chances are if you’re reading this episode, you’ve actually known about me for more than just the last three minutes. Most people who are reading this content are actually my existing audience, and what I’m doing is giving value, developing our relationship, building a sense of trust, and helping you to see how valuable reading this podcast consistently may be for you growing your business.
There are many types of things that you can do to nurture your audience and nurture people through that process.
Emails – both automated and spontaneous – are a great one. You might have some email sequences that onboard people onto your mailing list or some follow-up emails when people sign up to a webinar, or you may do a regular newsletter out to your mailing list (as I do with the Heart to Heart newsletter that goes out every week).
You can also be nurturing your audience through your gated and ungated content, so once again through podcast, YouTube, your opt-ins, webinars and all of those sorts of things that are developing a relationship.
One of the beautiful things that you can do on social media is also nurturing your audience by showing up consistently and consistently creating that connection with your audience.
I want you to take a moment to just jot down all of the things that you currently do in order to nurture your audience. As I said, there may be some overlap between your reach and nurture strategies, but write them all down anyway.
3. Lead generation
What I mean by lead generation is where anyone who is in your audience or on your mailing list goes from an audience member to being actively interested in one of your products or services. Generally, it’s about a specific product or service, or they’re interested in having a conversation with you about working out which product or service might be the best fit for them.
Your lead generation activities and strategies are going to look very different depending on what stage of business you’re in.
As a general rule, when selling one-to-one, your lead generation activities are where you’re inviting people to engage with you one-to-one.
Examples of these lead generation activities could be:
- Sending an email out to your list asking people to reply to you if they’re interested in something
- Having a call to action on some of your content
- Running a webinar, and at the end of that webinar inviting people to reach out to you if they’re interested in working together (that would then qualify them as a lead)
Lead generation in the early stages of business (and for someone to qualify as a lead) is generally that you’re now engaging in a one-to-one conversation about how you might be able to work together.
As your business grows and as you get into the leveraged phases of business, lead generation activities may be more scaled at a one-to-many basis.
For example, when I am launching the Take Off program, one of my lead generation strategies is to promote and run the 5-Day Client Attraction Challenge because that challenge sells spots in the Take Off program at scale.
Someone can qualify as a lead, simply by signing up to the client attraction challenge. That lead is then nurtured and invited to come and check out the Take Off program. If they need more information or want to have a conversation with me, they’re invited to email me as well.
It’s a more complex lead generation process once you get to selling at scale, but overall, what we’re looking for in this client attraction process is how you take people from an audience member into an active lead.
This is usually also the stage where people start ignoring their client attraction process, or they’re not as strategic as they could be in their client attraction process.
We know that the people who are most likely to buy from you, are those who already know you, like you and trust you.
Your warmest and hottest audiences are your BEST opportunity for making sales in your business, and yet, most entrepreneurs dedicate more than 50% of their time and energy to growing their cold audiences and reaching new people, when they’re not nurturing and qualifying the existing audience they already have.
4. Conversion
Conversion is where the person becomes a paying client of yours.
If you’re just going for reach and conversion, you can be missing some of the stages of the client attraction process that are the most critical.
Those stages are the ones that are going to give you great insight into where you need to be focusing your energy and attention, and why people don’t convert as they go through that process with you.
When you have someone as a lead, you KNOW that they’re actively interested.
I’m more interested in your conversion rates from active lead into paying client than I am in the conversion rate between reach and a paying client.
You can reach hundreds of thousands of people and not make sales if you’re not generating active leads.
Again, I would love for you to jot down what the actions are that you are taking and the time that you’re investing in lead generation in your business is. And then, what are the actions that you’re taking in converting those leads into paying clients?
Conversion activities would include:
- Having a follow up system and following up with people consistently
- Having sales conversations
- Inviting people to ask questions about your specific product or service and engaging in conversation with them
- Having a sales pitch or promotion-based advertising that takes people directly to your product or service
Conversion is step number four in the client attraction process.
5. Delivery
I want to make sure that we are not underestimating the impact and the importance of delivery when it comes to client attraction and conversion.
The fastest way to dry up your client attraction and conversion is to not deliver to the clients you already have.
Delivering on the outcomes that you promise and the outcomes that your ideal client is looking for when they invest with you is an important part of ensuring that you feel completely aligned when you are showing up in your online business and being able to be energetically aligned to attracting in more people.
Think about it, when you are overwhelmed and overworked and your clients aren’t succeeding, you’re not getting results with people or you’ve got a bunch of people chasing you down for overdue work, are you really energetically open to bringing in more clients?
In most cases, the answer is no.
We want to make sure that epic delivery and making sure our existing customers are satisfied is an important and focused-on part of our client attraction process.
There you have it, the five steps of a client attraction process:
- Reach
- Nurture
- Lead generation
- Conversion
- Delivery
I want you to take note, again, of where you are putting your time and energy in terms of delivery. What activities are you doing to ensure that your customers and clients are having an amazing experience working with you as a paid customer? Then I want you to take a step back and look at the balance of your client attraction process.
I did this process with my audience on my Facebook page as part of Tashmas at the end of 2020, and the biggest lightbulb/aha moment that people had when they were doing that process with me was that they were dedicating more than 70-80 per cent of their time to reach, and less than 20-30 per cent of their time to the other stages of their client attraction process.
We all naturally believe that the bigger the audience, the better the results our business will be getting.
For most people, you are letting yourself down and really damaging your conversion rates by focusing so prolifically on new reach and new cold audiences.
Love the audience that you have. Nurture the audience that you have. Create lead conversations and convert the audience that you already have. Deliver beautifully to them, and you will see that a small amount of energy and attention will make a huge impact to the bottom line of your business.
Not only that, reach is the most expensive stage or phase of your client attraction process – both in time and in money.
For a lot of people, their biggest issue is that they don’t feel that they have the time or the money to grow their business and get the sales in that they’re looking for to create that leverage opportunity in their business.
If, in fact, all you did was stopped dedicating so much time and money to reach and started dedicating more time and money to the other stages of your client attraction process, you would fix that problem. More sales would be coming in and you would have the money to hire the team members or invest in the ads and reach that you need in order to create that scalable growth.
If you’d like more help on how to create your client attraction process and make sure it’s effective, jump on over to today’s free training, Fast Track Your Startup.
I would love for you to come over to the Heart-Centred Soul-Driven Entrepreneurs Facebook group because I think we’re gonna have a lot of juicy conversations about this podcast episode. Use #podcastaha, let me know you’ve been reading episode number 253, and I would love to know from you which stage of your client attraction process has the most energy and attention, which has the least, and what you’re going to do to bring that balance back into play.
Until next time, I cannot WAIT to see you SHINE.
