Getting ahead of clients “drying up”

Smart Gets Paid Podcast Transcript
Episode 21

Intro (00:02):
You're listening to the Smart Gets Paid Podcast with me, Leah Neaderthal. I help women land higher-paying clients in their B2B consulting and coaching businesses, but I've never been a salesperson. My background is in corporate marketing. And when I started my first consulting business, I learned pretty quickly that it's about a thousand times harder to sell your own stuff than it is to sell someone else's. So I taught myself how to do it. And I created a sales approach that feels comfortable, makes you feel confident, and it works consistently. And now I teach women how to land higher-paying clients in their B2B consulting and coaching businesses. So whether your client contracts are $2,000 or $200,000, if you want to work with more of the clients you love, do more of the work you love, and get paid more than you ever imagined. Then you're in the right place. Let's do it together. Welcome to Smart Gets Paid.

Leah (00:54):
Hey, there, Leah here and welcome to this episode of the Smart Gets Paid podcast. Thanks so much for joining me today. So over here, it's an exciting week for my team and me because we are getting ready to start a new class of my program Signed. Signed is my program where you learn how to land more clients and higher-paying clients in your B2B consulting, coaching or service-based business. Even if you've never sold before and even if you hate the sales part, of course, I'd be remiss if I didn't mention that you can learn more about Signed smartgetspaid.com/signed. But for this class, which is starting on August 23rd, it actually wasn't originally going to start on August 23rd. It was actually supposed to start on August 3rd. We moved it to August 23rd and we did that because a few weeks before we made that decision, I realized that I was just burned out, like totally depleted.

Leah (01:52):
And I know a lot of you are feeling this way after, you know, the year and a half plus that we've had. And we are still very much in right now. And around that time, also, my wife and I were in the middle of a renovation and my business was going through some pretty significant changes and we have a toddler, you know, all of that. It was just a lot. And I've been talking about this a lot in my newsletter and my LinkedIn. If we're not connected on LinkedIn, take a second, just go to LinkedIn and connect with me. If you want to subscribe to my newsletter, go to smartgetspaid.com/future and you can get notified of all the things coming up. But all of this was just a lot and I really didn't feel like I could bring my best energy to my students who were starting this class if we started on August 3rd.

Leah (02:41):
So my team and I, we decided to move it. And that was actually a tough decision to make, but it was absolutely the right decision. And you know, of course we reached out to everyone who had already signed up and we explained it and I have to say everyone was so understanding. And over the weeks between when I made that announcement and now, I've spent that time really trying to restore myself, right? I think there are a few phases of burnout. There's identifying burnout, which I had done. But even that was hard because you know, burnout is really tricky. It's kind of sneaky because as total high-performing overachiever type A people, we first sort of blame ourselves. It's some sort of failing, you know, we can't get it together or whatever, burnout can be kind of sneaky. So identifying it is the first step. And then there's restoring, and then there's preventing.

Leah (03:34):
And I have spent the past few weeks restoring, right? Kind of repairing. This is the stuff I've been talking about on LinkedIn and in my newsletter around things I've done to sort of restore. I've been closing tabs in my life, who knew that a web browser would be an appropriate metaphor for life, but like you just have to close some tabs and I've been unplugging and spending time outside. And I told a story on my LinkedIn, something I learned from a friend of mine when I had gone through another difficult time. And at that time she told me to write down 10 things that I love to do and then just go do them. And so I've been doing that. I love cycling. So going on a lot of long bike rides and seeing some old friends which I've been able to do, and that's really helped, I feel so much more refreshed, more restored.

Leah (04:24):
And there's actually one thing that happened this week that honestly helped more than anything, which was just such a huge surprise. But before I even mentioned that I don't want to ignore the preventing part of burnout because you can sort of repair burnout, but you have to also prevent burnout in the future. But as a consultant or a coach or a service provider, I believe that you can't truly prevent burnout in the future without getting paid a lot more for the same work or even less work so that you can make the money that you want to make and still have lots of time for yourself. And I'm not going to totally get into that here. That's actually what we cover in Signed, but I just want to acknowledge that there's the repair part and then there's also the preventing part, right? But this week something happened to repair and restore, which I just have to share with you because it was actually really amusing and happened completely by accident.

Leah (05:19):
So the thing that has repaired me, restored me, refreshed me more than honestly, anything in the past few weeks was that, and don't laugh at me, but I went to Target by myself in the evening and I had one thing to get, and there was like two hours to close and I just like hung out in Target. So let me just set the scene here. So like a lot of us are living and working in the same place and my wife is also living and working, of course in the same place. And we have our toddler and the nanny and I'm so rarely ever alone. And secondly, going to Target is actually a treat. I've been living in Brooklyn and going to a city Target is like a hassle. And so, you know, you just never go. Where we live now, there's one like 30 minutes away.

Leah (06:04):
So the other night we needed diapers and I was like, well, I’m just going to go Target. You know, it's like 8:00 PM and so I get in the car, I turn on a podcast, I drive half an hour or so to Target. I'm in Target. I don't have my son. I don't have anybody with me. I have one thing to get and I just start sort of milling about Target, you know, like picking up a few random things here and there and putting it in my cart. And I texted a friend of mine who's also a mom of a young child and I was like, Hey don't be jealous but I'm at Target all by myself and she actually wrote back and we jumped on the phone. So then I'm like milling about Target on the phone. So I ended up buying my items, getting back in the car, listening to another podcast.

Leah (06:46):
And actually, I drove about five minutes longer, you know, just around the block just to finish the series and walked in and felt as if I had been at a day spa for like a week. It was so unbelievable how actually refreshed I felt doing something so mundane, like so mundane, but without responsibilities, right, without people. I'm a total introvert and so having that alone time was important. Just doing something that felt like I was doing just regular adulting without a time crunch. So anyway, I'm still sort of laughing at it that even with closing all the tabs and you know, unplugging and bike rides and friends, a random trip to Target has left me feeling so refreshed. So I'm feeling a lot better this week. If you're listening to this, I hope you also have the opportunity to do something that refreshes you too, and who knows might be something totally surprising.

Leah (07:42):
All right so let's get into this episode, the woman that you're going to hear me talk to today is a coach, but I actually don't even want to tell you what she does yet, because I want you to hear her tell it in just a minute or so. But what I want you to think about when you listen to this episode is that even though this woman is offering her services to individuals, so this is essentially B2C, just consider that everything we talk about totally applies to B2B selling also. So keep that in mind as you listen. And of course, I'm going to pull out a couple of those lessons at the end. So the call that you're going to listen in on is from a guest coaching session in my friend Megan Flatt’s coaching program. And Megan is amazing. You should check her out at letscollective.co, but she had invited me to be a guest coach and we followed the format that she follows in her guest coaching sessions.

Leah (08:33):
So it goes like this, you're going to hear about three minutes where this student sort of sets up the problem and where she's struggling. And I get about a minute or so to ask questions and then I offer advice for seven minutes or so. So I want to send out a huge thank you to Megan and her student for allowing me to share this conversation with you. So take a listen and at the end, I'll pull out a lesson or two that you can apply to your business. This episode is sponsored by the One-Hour LinkedIn Profile Power-Up, my free guide to help you turn your LinkedIn profile into a powerful tool to get your ideal clients finding you on LinkedIn. You can get your copy at smartgetspaid.com/profile. So when you're running a B2B consulting coaching or service-based business, your clients are on LinkedIn, but the challenge is how do you actually get them to find you?

Leah (09:25):
Well, it starts with your LinkedIn profile, but most business owners’ LinkedIn profiles just sort of sit there not doing anything for their business. Fortunately, there are seven simple steps that you can take to turn your profile into a powerful tool, to get you in front of your ideal clients on LinkedIn and get them coming to you for your expertise. And they only take about an hour. So grab your copy of the One-Hour at LinkedIn Profile Power-Up today and start turning your LinkedIn profile into a powerful tool to get your ideal clients coming to you using LinkedIn. Get yours today at smartgetspaid.com/profile.

Guest (10:01):
So what I do is work with women, well, moms mainly, is who I've been working with. They are super stressed and they're using alcohol to help cope. And so currently I'm doing a three-month program with them, 12-week program with them, which one week is one-on-one, one week we do group coaching and then I have check-ins twice a week with them also. And the insane thing and Megan knows this is, I haven't advertised this. Like I have my page for them to go to buy it but everything that I've done has been word of mouth, but I know that well is going to dry up at some point, but I've had the reward of it. Like I just booked two more people. I have 11 people now signed up. So I think that's where I'm struggling with, like I'm having this reward without having, this sounds terrible,

Guest (10:55):
Having to work to get people, but do you know what I mean? I'm not having to advertise and do all these things that I think I feel like I should be doing. So I think that's where I'm struggling, if that makes sense. And sometimes then too, we're it’s word of mouth, that's been coming from like friends, people who kind of have an idea, they have this problem, they're turning to alcohol in that to help them. But I feel like there's another space to reach out to people who maybe don't realize that's what they're doing it and figuring out how to reach them, to get them started on that process. I don't know. I feel like I'm just talking Leah - this is all great. Is there anything else you want to say about how you've gotten clients in the past? Guest - My coaching business has grown truly on word of mouth, like one person of another friend, this person, that person, this person, oh, you really need to talk to (Guest), she's really great. And then like we connect and we move on and I just had two more people in the last two days, which I'm completely grateful for, but I am fully aware that is not, maybe sustainable. So I know that. And then I start panicking.

Leah (12:08):
So how long have you been doing this work, in this current form? Like with this business.

Guest (12:13):
With working with the people, I'm working with for about a year.

Leah (12:16):
Okay. What's the cost of your program?

Guest (12:19):
$1895

Leah (12:20):
And how long is it? 12 weeks. So this is really just more clarification for myself, but if somebody were to ask you, how is this different than AA? What would your answer be?

Guest (12:32):
I would say that I am not a replacement for AA, that I totally support if you feel that you need that too, because community is a huge thing for me, and AA works for me. This helps them to, it catches them before they maybe hit that stereotypical rock bottom from this. Not necessarily what I say to them, but I'm like, this is to help you learn tools and have that one-on-one attention that you may need. And it also helps to bring a group weekly. It helps with the accountability which AA can help with too with sponsorship. However, what we also do is we touch more specifically on relationships where AA sponsors geared to work through the 12 steps. We also work on helping them empower themselves and their relationships and learning skills to be able to ask for help in those types of things.

Leah (13:24):
I think part of, especially as you broaden out, part of what you are going to have to pre-address is how this is different. Not maybe on the nose, not being like, how is this different than AA, but you know, really being clear so people understand where you fit versus where that fits. And I think this idea that, you know, you mentioned the people who come to you, they might be aware that something is amiss, right? I mean, everybody is generally, like nobody's being like forced into this program.

Guest (13:54):
No, like they're aware of something, just don't know how to pinpoint, like what it is for sure, but they just know that something's off for them and they're tired. Like most of the time they're tired, they're overwhelmed. They feel like they just keep going and they can't breathe. I think most of the time they get there and I think that's something that I've heard from quite a few people, like they stopped being able to know how to breathe and keep figuring out the next thing, like it's what they're using as their getaway from whatever is going on.

Guest 2 (14:24):
Correct me if I'm wrong. One of the differentiators in my mind is that maybe when people are kind of going with AA too, is it seems like sometimes when people come to you, it's, they're not sure if they really have a problem with this, you know, which is where, when they, maybe they decide to go to AA, they're like, oh my gosh, I have to get sober. Whereas maybe when they come to you, they want it maybe they want to still be able to drink, but like, oh, I need to cut back on my drinking or I need to get it under control.

Leah (14:51):
At least that's there when they come, that's true too because people might not see themselves as having an addiction, right. But they know that there's probably some stuff they need to get under control. So I think just to give all of us a wrapper, you know, when your business is built on word of mouth, you know, I keep hearing you say, I really need to do other stuff, right. This is a perfect business for word of mouth and referrals because this is a conversation, you know, this is like one friend telling another friend, listen, I don't know how to bring this up but like I heard of this woman, right? So that is not to say they shouldn't do marketing. But what this does, what we're doing right now gives people the tools to have that conversation. You know, so when we just talked on the last call about 90% of selling happens when you're not there.

Leah (15:40):
And in order to have people sell on your behalf, they have to be comfortable and able to talk about what you do in the terms that you want. If somebody says there's an addiction consultant, it doesn't help them ask their spouse for $1,800, right. So all we're doing is giving our people the tools to refer us. So I think having some language that does this is going to be really important to you continuing on the AA thing. I think this idea that you have lived this life, right, you are in recovery. It is a process and it is forever. And so, because you know, this intimately, you can talk to people like you are one of them because you are, right. You know them better than they might even know themselves. So, you know, something like using that as an entry point to maybe differentiate yourself.

Leah (16:40):
So for example, the phrase I wrote down was, we all know, or maybe I know from experience that there's more to living a healthy life than just not drinking alcohol. AA addresses the alcohol part but there's a whole life part. Guest - Which is what I focus on. But having something like that, I mean, play around with that and get to a place where it's comfortable. Because when you give that to somebody, that phrase, they can take that to their conversation. They can take it to their friend or their family member who's like, listen, I don't even want to go to AA. It's like this isn't the AA part, this is the library. So the other thing is all about, you know, when you talk about like arming people with the tools, I'm going to back it up, you work with and who are using alcohol to cope.

Leah (17:29):
That statement really illustrates the problem, but I want it to go one more step to illustrate like a promise. You've stopped with the problem. I help women who are feeling stressed and are using alcohol to cope. And I teach them tools to write XYZ on my website. I used to have, being a sales coach, I used to have a, it's like the headline on my website, this is years ago, used to say selling, doesn't have to suck. And a coach that I really admire told me, she's like, that's true selling doesn't have to suck, but what is the promise here? And when you do that, you give people a phrase that they can take into their conversations. So what is that promise?

Guest (18:16):
I teach tools to help them have healthy relationships with their family and friends. I teach them to be able to start setting boundaries to noticing triggers when they start to feel.

Leah (18:29):
I'm going to pause you for a second. I think all of that is so valuable, but it's really one step down from where we need to be. When you have a really strong sort of value statement, it earns you the right in people's attention to talk about things like relationships. They're using alcohol to help cope and I teach them strategies too, this is terrible, but like live their best life. Again, terrible phrase without the crutch of alcohol. Do you see it? It's just like, has this promise and then you sort of earned the right to keep talking. So you're in the exact place that I would expect you to be after a year because there are two phases of how clients will come to your business. There is the first year, which is like, I'm doing this thing. And then all the people who loved you want to help spread the word and maybe they want to work with you or they get referrals and all that stuff.

Leah (19:20):
And that is great and it's really easy to be lulled into a sense of security with that, that it will be always be this easy to sell. You are sort of right at that transitional phase where you are looking up and saying, I don't think it will be this easy. I mean, some people are caught flat-footed and they're like, oh shit, that's the moment that they find me because they realize they don't know how to sell, but you have the forethought to say, I see that this could dry up. Does that give you a little bit to work with? Guest - Yes. That helps a lot.

Leah (19:50):
All right so there's a lot here. And I just want to pull out a couple of lessons that you can apply to your business. Because as I mentioned earlier, even though this is a B2C conversation business to consumer, because she's selling to individuals, the things that we talk about in this call are really universal and can apply to B2B selling as well. But before I even go to that, I just want to actually call myself out for something I said in this call that as I was going through and editing just made me cringe and I couldn't believe I said it. And it's what I said, something about asking your spouse for $1,800. And the cringy part for me is just this idea that any woman would have to ask her spouse for permission or ask her spouse for money. It's just, I feel like the world's worst feminists, you know, just sort of saying that in the call as you heard, but what I was trying to say, and the larger point that again is just as applicable to B2C conversations as it is to B2B selling is that every purchase decision has stakeholders in the case of the woman that you heard me talk to, maybe in order to make an investment of data amounts and really to take a step that would definitely affect her and her family, right?

Leah (21:05):
To sort of reduce dependence on alcohol. It's a conversation, right? And because it affects the family, you can consider that other family members are the stakeholders. So no purchase decision happens alone in B2B selling, your main client has to talk to maybe the CMO or their boss or a whole committee or procurement or legal, so even though money is power, access to money is an important part of feminism. The sort of larger point that I hope came through is that selling involves not, just sort of convincing one person to say yes, but helping your main contact sell into stakeholders. And that actually leads me to my other point, which I wanted to pull out for you here, which is that 90% of selling happens when we're not there. So we think of selling, the sales part as, you know, the emails that we send and the conversations we have and the proposal and all of that.

Leah (21:59):
But that's actually a small part of it because the vast majority of the selling happens when we're not around. It happens in those conversations between our main contact and their boss or the CMO that committee, all of those other people, and those conversations happen over a long period of time. So knowing that 90% of the selling happens when we're not there, what can you do with that knowledge? Well, the first thing is, it's important to understand and find out how purchase decisions are made in a company so that you can help your main contact actually navigate that process and navigate those conversations and essentially have them conduct the sales process for you. Because that's really what's happening, they're essentially doing the selling for you because you're not there. Right? So consider that oftentimes selling isn't about selling to your main contact. It's really about helping your main contact, sell in on your behalf and to do that, you have to do great discovery in those early sales conversations to really understand how the company actually makes a purchase decision.

Leah (23:11):
If you want to learn a little bit more about that. I talk about that in Season One in the episode called “Selling into complex companies”. And once you have that information, then you can start to lead the client so that they can navigate that process inside their own company and help you get a yes. Oh, before I leave you, I just want to mention the next class of my program Signed is starting on August 23rd. This is my program where you learn how to master the sales process, sign more of the clients you want and get paid dramatically more for every client engagement, even if you've never sold before, or if you hate the sales. And I'm doing something new this time, you're going to spend 10 weeks with me learning the fundamentals of selling and then get a year of support to help you actually sell to and sign the clients you're talking to. So you're never alone in this process and you always know the right next step. So if you're ready to finally learn how to sell, if you're ready to feel more confident in this part of your business. And if you're ready to get paid a whole lot more for your work, check out Signed, starting on August 23rd, learn more and see some recent results at smartgetspaid.com/signed.

Leah (24:17):
Hey, thanks for hanging out with me. If you liked this episode, take a second and click the subscribe button wherever you're listening to your podcasts and you'll be notified as soon as I release a new episode. And if you're listening on Apple podcasts, I’d so appreciate it if you took two seconds and left a rating or review, this tells Apple podcasts hey there's good stuff in here and they'll recommend it to other listeners who might benefit from these lessons for their business. So please take a second and add a rating or review, thanks. So that's it for now. I'll see you next time on the Smart Gets Paid podcast. Learn more about Smart Gets Paid programs and coaching at smartgetspaid.com.