I don't know about you, but I'm constantly bombarded with ideas on making this, and creating that. Thinking that the product will help diversify my revenue and make my business more stable. I'm not wrong. And I don't say that because I'm arrogant. I say that be it is a fact. ------------------- 👉 For full show notes to this episode & more resources for you. ------------------- Not everyone wants to create a product, I don't. I'm not looking to build a software product. I'm not looking to cr...
Jan 30, 2019•6 min•Ep. 233
Last week you learned [how to review your sales process]([https://rezzz.com/ask/how-to-review-your-sales-process/](https://rezzz.com/ask/how-to-review-your-sales-process/)), just as important as that is, so to you should be reviewing each and every project that comes through your business. Ever feel like you finished a project and felt like the weight of the world lifted up off your shoulders. Suddenly you have this sense of relief that is so strong you wonder how you got sucked into that mess i...
Jan 29, 2019•5 min•Ep. 232
As a business owner, as a salesperson, which if you are freelancing I hate to break the news here, but you are in sales, you need to close the open loops in the decision making for your leads and clients. We don’t have control over the decision-making process anyone has, but we can lead them to that decision. We can create a path to that decision that makes it easy for them to make a choice. ------------------- 👉 For full show notes to this episode & more resources for you. ----------------...
Jan 28, 2019•4 min•Ep. 231
I was asked a question on a Twitter chat I was a part of that said “A few of us are clearly uncomfortable with the idea of seeming like a nuisance. Have you received a negative response to multiple follow-ups?” Following up with someone after they’ve expressed interest in you is not being a nuisance or annoying or bothersome. Unless you are emailing them every day with “Just checking in.” If you have an email that sounds like “Hey Pete, I was thinking about your project a little bit more and cam...
Jan 25, 2019•7 min•Ep. 230
Let’s assume for the sake of brevity that you are segmenting your list at least to the point of people who have bought and haven’t bought from you. If you are like me, you are tag happy, they want to track everything someone on their list does and so they tag everything. This is great, but if you don’t do anything with the information, it’s just clutter in your CRM or email marketing platform. There really are 2 things to focus in on when you are segmenting your email list. ------------------- �...
Jan 24, 2019•7 min•Ep. 229
Are you sitting there thinking that you suck at sales? Maybe you say to yourself “I’m not confident in my selling skills.” Are you feeling like you are doing all the things in sales that the best salespeople are telling you to do? LinkedIn outreach, using tools for followup, even your [business coach](https://rezzz.com/coach/) aren’t 100%. You have the mechanics of everything in place, but still feel like you aren’t able to hit the stride or get enough clients to fill that pipeline. ------------...
Jan 23, 2019•7 min•Ep. 228
Since Feb 26 in 2008, I’ve built my business without selling on Twitter. I have no qualms about saying that Twitter is my home away from home. Without Twitter, I’m not sure where I’d be right now to be honest. I can attribute the growth of my business, my network of friends and colleagues, my clients, and you listening to this episode right now to the effort and engagement of my Twitter account. ------------------- 👉 For full show notes to this episode & more resources for you. ------------...
Jan 22, 2019•7 min•Ep. 227
This is where there’s a mismatch between the value that you have for the work and the value that the client sees in the work. As the professional, you need to close this gap through education and focus. The education is on the potential of the return on investment. That return on investment is focused on the success of the project. Focus on the success of the project The first thing you need to do is ask your client “what does success look like 6 or 12 months time?” Here’s why this is important....
Jan 21, 2019•6 min•Ep. 226
Maybe it’s the time of year where goals and aspirations are high, then reality sets in the fears, the hesitations, the mind games start to mess with those aspirations because over the past couple of weeks through email, through Twitter , and in some communities I’m in people seem to be asking this same question. How do you do the work and push past the fear of getting it out there. Things like podcasting and “going live” and just the general action of putting something into the world is scary. I...
Jan 18, 2019•7 min•Ep. 225
I’ll be honest, I’m not sure why I’ve been asked this. I’m honored, but I’m not in any sort of position to give a great answer. Simply because I’m one who studies business trends and not in that analytical type of position. With that being said though, I’d like to share an aspect of the business that I’ve seen grow and produce amazing results, not just in my business, but other businesses as well. ------------------- 👉 For full show notes to this episode & more resources for you. ----------...
Jan 17, 2019•5 min•Ep. 224
Jonathan Stark invited me onto his podcast where I unpacked being a platform specialist and how I built a productized service. I actually shared some of the fears I had along the way. ------------------- 👉 For full show notes to this episode & more resources for you. ------------------- How do I know Jonathan Stark? Jonathan Stark, author of Hourly Billing is Nuts and host of Ditching Hourly podcast invited me onto his show. We are a part of a Slack group together and as we were talking abo...
Jan 16, 2019•4 min•Ep. 223
In the last episode you learned some things to delight and create the perception of value in your business. Today you will learn exactly what to deliver that validates that perception. I get asked how to get more clients and I often say that it’s not about “more clients”, it’s about “right clients.” I stress that it’s about getting the right quality clients. ------------------- 👉 For full show notes to this episode & more resources for you. ------------------- What you need to think about i...
Jan 15, 2019•7 min•Ep. 222
It’s not about how many clients you have, it’s the quality of the client. You want to attract clients who have bigger budgets so that you can raise your rates and get out from that hamster wheel. ------------------- 👉 For full show notes to this episode & more resources for you. ------------------- Where is the money First is to know where the money is coming from. I love music, I love listening, playing and exploring new bands. I also like the design, the aesthetic of metal and hard rock m...
Jan 14, 2019•6 min•Ep. 221
I think by now you that I’m big on communication and followup is the biggest piece of communication especially early on. In episode 135, I shared 11 ways to stand out as a freelancer. And while that’s a great list and got awesome feedback, the one thing that is most often attached to that is the word “the most.” I get asked “How to stand out as a freelancer the most?” so often that it’s astonishing. ------------------- 👉 For full show notes to this episode & more resources for you. --------...
Jan 11, 2019•6 min•Ep. 220
Today I’m going to give you 3 very small, yet powerful tactics to improve your sales process as a freelancer. Quick, small, yet powerful tweaks you can make to your sales process that you can put into practice today. ------------------- 👉 For full show notes to this episode & more resources for you. ------------------- Find out how to close those who are sitting on the fence This is something that is normally best done over a call or face-to-face. It’s much harder over email. But when done ...
Jan 10, 2019•7 min•Ep. 219
During any part of the sales process, whether it’s a call, form, or email, there are critical and absolutes, when it comes to questions to ask. This is true if you are a developer, a designer, a marketer, or even a photographer. ------------------- 👉 For full show notes to this episode & more resources for you. ------------------- Before I jump into the must-haves when you think about these questions to ask, think about the end, what you are delivering and work backward from there. It’s so ...
Jan 09, 2019•7 min•Ep. 218
The internet tends to fool us. It creates this illusion that everything is a click of the mouse and we’ll be bringing in 6 figures or that if we do these 7 things in 2019, we’ll be sitting on the beach in a month sipping umbrella drinks working 3 hours a day. This isn’t truth. There’s nothing about this that is valid. If a magic wand exists, then I haven’t found one. ------------------- 👉 For full show notes to this episode & more resources for you. ------------------- I get asked plenty ev...
Jan 08, 2019•10 min•Ep. 217
With the holidays, I don’t know about you, but I still get asked about the business in a way that the person asking is skeptical that I am stable. To me, it’s a bit funny that they ask this because I’ve been in business since 2010 and often times this person I’m talking to has had multiple jobs with multiple companies over the same period of time. ------------------- 👉 For full show notes to this episode & more resources for you. ------------------- The best analogy of my point of view came...
Jan 07, 2019•6 min•Ep. 216
So excited for today’s episode, because today will be the Ask Kim show. Kim Doyal is all about content. I’ve known her from the WordPress space for years but she’s since pivoted her business to focus more on helping business with their content and the Content Creators Community . She’s coined the phrase “Everything is Content” and since I know that you struggle with finding the time to and figuring out what to write about, I thought no better person to answer this than Kim. Just like you plan yo...
Dec 21, 2018•11 min•Ep. 215
If you haven’t yet listened to Episode 207 - How to overcome objections in sales? , I encourage you to do so. When encountering a “price buyer” there’s often nothing you can do to have them come up and see the value from a cost perspective. I don’t want to beat a dead horse on what to say when this happens because I dive into what you should be doing and how to direct them down the path of a referral in that episode. In Episode 156-What do I say when a potential client says I'm too expensive? --...
Dec 20, 2018•5 min•Ep. 214
I’m going to get up on my soapbox here for a minute, so if you don’t want to hear it, scroll down a little bit. Over the past decade, I’ve run into many leads and clients that have had terrible experiences from flakey freelancers who have either disappeared, communicated poorly, didn’t deliver a project, or just didn’t set the expectations the client had. If you are a freelancer in business, please, please, do right by your clients. Be honest and don’t get in over your head. If you find yourself...
Dec 19, 2018•6 min•Ep. 213
You may have been in those projects when all is well and the correspondence is good going back and forth and then crickets. Radio silence from the client. You’ve sent a few emails that have gone unanswered. Maybe even a few calls have gone unreturned. What do you do next? There are a few things, but first, keep in mind that no matter how good the relationship is remember that you really don’t know the full story of your client. So before your brain starts jumping to conclusions, be empathetic fi...
Dec 18, 2018•6 min•Ep. 212
Last week I recorded an episode of Live in the Feast with Andrew Askins. He’s a co-founder of Krit, a company that helps non-technical founders build their idea into a product. Andrew asked this great question and I thought I’d share it here since one the episode won’t be released for another few weeks. And two, after last week’s series on being better at sales, this fits in perfectly. For a little bit of context to how Andrew asked me this, we were talking about crafting our messaging around th...
Dec 17, 2018•7 min•Ep. 211
This is the classic chicken or the egg scenario. Doing these 3 things will raise the bar immediately and have you stand out from the other 3 vendors your lead is talking with. For the context of this episode, this is for those that are just starting out, maybe still full-time and looking to go freelance. This could also be for those trying a new service or piece to their business. Maybe even niching down or specializing your business to where you haven’t had any experience in before. So many of ...
Dec 14, 2018•6 min•Ep. 210
In episode A207 - How to overcome objections in sales , you briefly learned about leaning into what they want and then directing them down the right path. Leaning in, or being empathetic during a sales process is really about giving the lead what they want. Whether they want the lowest cost, the best value, to comparison shop, etc, it’s in your best interest to give them what they want. When you think about sales, instead of thinking about closing every deal, think about how to have them leave y...
Dec 13, 2018•5 min•Ep. 209
RFPs, or Request for Proposals, is something as a freelancer or consultant you should stay away from. An RFP is a document that talks about a project and asks you to write a proposal on how to solve it. In the previous two episodes you learned to protect your sales process, and ultimately your business, by only pushing value buyers and those that give you a firm “yes” at the end of the sales call to the proposal stage. RFPs are the complete opposite of this. In short, responding to an RFP, have ...
Dec 12, 2018•8 min•Ep. 208
The most important piece of your sales process is to overcome objections and direct the lead down the appropriate path they want to be on. If you haven’t already done so, go back and listen to How to get better at sales? , where you will learn the first 2 steps to getting better at sales. Learn from every sales call Identify the type of buyer you are talking with By the end of this episode, you will learn the most important piece of sales. That is how to overcome any objection to the 5 buyer typ...
Dec 11, 2018•7 min•Ep. 207
"I'm an introvert and I don't like sales" -- "How do I close more deals?" -- "How do I get better at sales?" By the end of this episode you’ll know the 3 steps to do just that. "I get a lot of folks on the phone, but think I should be closing more." This is something that I hear quite often and it’s the wrong statement to be making. You want your sales process to eliminate leads from becoming clients. You want each stage of your sales to be a locked gate. Keeping out the leads that shouldn’t be ...
Dec 10, 2018•5 min•Ep. 206
Finally it’s landed. The #Gutepocalypse! I say that in jest because this has been the biggest anticipated release since Star Wars Phantom Menace. WordPress 5.0 is what I’m referencing here, and before you tune out because you aren’t in the WordPress space, I encourage you to stay tuned because this is not about that as much as it’s about technology and your clients. When Apple released the iPhone back in 2007, most people with a Motorola Razor said “that is huge and what would I even do with tha...
Dec 07, 2018•5 min•Ep. 205
Avani Miryala is a UX designer who specialized in the Cryptocurrency space. She’s the host of Beyond the Status Quo podcast. In this episode we discuss the reasons why finding your freelance niche can increase your revenue, strengthen your relationships with clients and create a smoother funnel for recurring business. We connected on Instagram and when she told me the name of her podcast and invited me to come on, I had no choice. It was a no brainer. If anything, I had to be a part of anything ...
Dec 06, 2018•4 min•Ep. 204
