How do you attract more profitable clients for your Service business?
When I work with service professionals of all types (Physiotherapists, Accountants, Business Consultants, Coaches, Trainers, Photographers etc.) – the number one question that comes up is “How do I get more clients?”
Ok, the question is usually a little more nuanced than that – people ask it in different ways:
“My business has been going for 12 months now – but I need to make my income more predictable – how do I get more clients?” OR
“I’m so busy – but I just seem to be making ends meet. I’d love to be able to make more money from the clients I have – how do I do that?” OR
“When I look at the clients I have – I love working with half of them, they just seem to give me energy – and the other half? Well, lets just say that I’m wondering how I get more clients that I love working with!”
Do any of these questions sound familiar to you? Have you wondered about the answers recently?
I have found that critical pre-requisite for business success as a Service Professional comes down getting the following right: Attracting More Profitable Clients.
The 4 Levels Of Attracting More Profitable Clients.
In working with Service professionals over the past 10 years – helping them to grow their client list – I’ve noticed that there are 4 distinct levels (or milestones) that most seem to go through. Of course, some people get stuck (or just too comfortable) on a particular level – but it gives me the greatest kick to work with someone who wishes to drive their business all the way to the level that:
- Offers the most value for your clients
- Is most profitable for you
- Makes you the happiest!
In the following Four Levels – I take the example of a service professional who works with an appointments book to allocate their paid time with clients (e.g. a Physiotherapist or Coach) – but I have found this model is just as applicable for other professions (e.g. graphic designers) who work without an appointments book. I have also labelled each level in terms of a measurable outcome for your business.
Level 1: Your number of clients increases month-on-month.
The vast majority of my clients have been in business for at least 6 months and are normally stuck on a plateau when they first get in touch. They have a certain number of loyal clients who love what they do – but they just can’t seem to get their appointment book past the 50%-60% full level.
They have tried formal advertising to get the word out. They know they are very good at their job – and get results – but it just seems to take so much time to grow the business. Sometimes it even feels like things are going backwards.
When we sit down and examine what they are doing to grow their client list – a version of the following problem always comes up:
PROBLEM: Not enough of the type of people with whom I get the best results have heard about me from a trusted source.
In this case it usually takes 6 weeks -4 months to get momentum going on new calls and enquiries. It rarely involves traditional advertising!
Notice the words I have underlined in the “Problem” sentence above. We work on each of these items as follows:
- Type of People: Who is your target market (NOT your product)? The more specific this becomes, the easier it becomes to go where they meet and network – and let them know of the pain you address and the benefits they will see when they work with you.
- Best Results: If you concentrate on the conditions and clients with whom you get the best results – your confidence will come across and you generate a lot of success stories to share with potential clients.
- Heard about me: I have found that potential clients need to hear about you 2 or 3 times before you will register as someone who can help them with a problem. For example, someone they trust may mention you – THEN they see someone online mention the results you achieve – and THEN they see a flyer with your contact details or a workshop you are conducting. “Suddenly”, you register in their minds as someone who can help when the time is right.
- Trusted Source: This is the golden lever. Think about it, when you buy an intangible service – one you have never bought before or have been stung on – how do you decide who to trust? Most of us look for a recommendation from a friend or family member – someone we trust. For this reason you need to realise that most of your future business will arrive on referral from your current happy clients – not from traditional advertising.
So, that’s the first level – we work together on each of these until we get momentum – your client list is increasing month-on-month.
Level 2: Your appointment book is 75% full for more than 6 weeks in a row.
This is very similar to Level 1 – just a little further down the road. I have found that when your client list is 75% full – you can clearly see:
- Whom you love working with
- Where you get your best results
- Which services your clients really value (and what you might charge more for).
When I work with Service Professionals at this level – we continue with many of the strategies and approaches from Level 1 – but there is more of a “shake-out” in your client list. You start to lose the “less than ideal” client on purpose. You actively go after the people you love to work with.
Your strategies focus on attracting more profitable AND ideal clients.
However, a lot of service professionals get stuck at this level. The trap is settling on being “just busy enough” with “just enough clients” whom you “just about like working with” and with whom you make “just about enough money”. In my experience, more than 50% of service professionals are stuck at this level.
Level 3: You have a waiting list in place for more than 6 weeks in a row.
This is the gold standard for service professionals – the evidence that you have made it. People are happy to wait for your services.
When people are happy to wait for your services – a whole new set of options open up. Options such as:
- You can become very selective about your client base.
- You can experiment with increasing your prices.
- You can provide services to your clients in ways that they don’t just have to wait for face-time with you.
Level 4 (optional): You are selling other products and services (not just your time) to a happy client base.
I wrote “optional” above as most service professionals consider this step optional. However, I think it is mandatory.
This is a level that many service professionals never reach. Sometimes they are too busy, or just consider it unnecessary. I have found that when my own clients follow the correct steps in Levels 1 to 3 – and build up their authority with case studies and examples – they often have a lot of the groundwork complete for developing and selling other products and services.
However, I am not aiming to persuade you of the merits of this Level at the moment – that conversation arises when you make it through Levels 1 to 3 – sometimes sooner.
So, that’s it – the Four Levels of Attracting More Profitable Clients – all with built-in success measurements. As I mentioned previously, this is a ready-to-use system for service professionals who sell their time through an appointments book. We use a modified version of this framework with other service professionals such as accountants, graphics designers, trainers, photographers and business consultants of all types.
In future blog posts we will look at specific tactics and strategies that have been used to drive your business successfully towards – and beyond – each level.
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Question: Which level is your service business at the moment? Where would you like it to get to over the next 12 months?