E22 Going back to basics: Messaging made easy

Hello, hello, hello everybody. Welcome to this week’s episode of The [00:01:00] Audacious OBM. I’m your host Leanne Woff and today we are talking going back to basics. Messaging made easy. Today I want to talk to you about marketing. If you’re running a business, part of that is sales and marketing and alot of the time we go into business because we’re good at what we do and then we get to all of the marketing, the sales, the mechanics of business and we fall over a little bit because in our heads when we start, it’s great to be able to do what we do and we’re super skilled and we know that, but then to have to learn all this other stuff really quickly so that people can actually find out about us and work with us, it’s a whole different ballgame.

Marketing and sales. It’s one of those things. And it’s one of the most important things in your business. And a big component of marketing and sales is [00:02:00] your messaging. I think that messaging has the power to make or break any sale. So your messaging is that, who are you? Who are you here to help? How do you help them?

And tell me why I should pick you and not somebody else. In a nutshell, that’s what messaging is. And it can be really creative, and it can also be really intricate. When you’re crafting messaging, it’s all about coming up with something to start with, investigating, releasing that kind of messaging, seeing how it lands, adapting it, and then repeating that whole process again.

Ongoing. Because people change. The things that resonate with people change. The people that you work with might change, you might change, [00:03:00] and with all those things your messaging changes too. The impact of that is, that it can feel really big and overwhelming. It can feel like a big deal. Especially if we start overanalyzing and we start thinking too much.

Because then it feels like we’re on a hamster wheel. Now, because this is a known fact, there are so many people out there who want to help you with this. As is with a lot of things, and every man and his dog has an opinion about how to market and how you can market right now better. It’s always, Don’t do all these things.

Do this. Do this one thing. And, I’ve tried doing that. I’ve tried doing this and it never works. And no, no, no. If you’re not doing this, you’re wrong. Or if you’re not doing this, you’re wrong. Or, skip all the hurdles and do this instead. And then we’re in this overwhelmed, [00:04:00] trying to do everything, overthinking spiral.

And you know what? We end up doing nothing. Let me tell you something, doing one thing, just one, even if it’s not the best thing, even if it takes you too long, is better than what you’re doing now. Why? Because at least you’re doing it. You’re doing it and you’re trying something. And it’s the truth.

It’s something that I have to remind myself about all the time. And just, Do one thing, just get started. It doesn’t have to be perfect. It doesn’t have to be the thing. And when it’s not me reminding me, it’s my coach reminding me. I am the queen of wanting to [00:05:00] find the very best way to do something. And it makes me fantastic at my work.

It makes me really skilled. And it also holds me back a lot because I want everything, I wanna find the best way for everything. And it’s just not practical. You can’t do that in life. So I’ll give you an example. My coach was asking me about the clients that I wanna work with and why it is that clients choose me.

And I was sitting there and I’m looking at her going, I don’t know. No, Leanne, you do know. Pick this client. Tell me why they picked you. Okay. So I started to talk and, she said to me, what are the things they actually asked you? Like, when you first had an intro call, what was it? And so I said, oh no, they picked me because they really wanted a team [00:06:00] who knew what they were doing.

So they saw my expertise and they didn’t want someone whose hand they would have to hold. They just wanted someone who could run with it and who was capable. And I kept talking and she paused and she goes, And that’s what you say. And I stopped. I was like, you’ve got to be kidding me. I’m trying to think about how to market better and get my messaging better and, had been swirling around with all these different ideas trying to find the right words.

And she was just sitting there going, you already know why. You’ve, they’ve told you. They’re your words. Just take them and put it over here. It was obvious. But for me, in my, but I want the best way. I couldn’t even see the obvious thing. Another example. So I have this podcast. Thank you for listening. And I’ve done lots of [00:07:00] presentations in different people’s communities.

Like I’ve done training and I’ve done guest podcasts and I’ve spoken at events. So I’ve done, a lot of things where I’ve been featured in those groups. And I want to be able to put all those as featured in things on my website. And so I said to my coach. I haven’t done it because I don’t know where on my website these things should go.

And it’s really silly. And she’s like, oh, you just put it on your speaker page. And I was like, yeah, I know, but I don’t have a speaker page. And she’s like, why? I said, because then it’s a whole thing. And then I have to work out what to write and what to say and what topics and call to actions and all the messaging.

And she just starts laughing and she’s like, No, you’re making it too hard. You just need three things. [00:08:00] Who it is you’re speaking to, what you speak about, and some testimonials. And then look, here’s some places that you’ve already spoken at. Job done. So stop making it a big thing. It doesn’t have to be this full blown, page.

And I found it hilarious. So in my head, I had made it this really big thing, and now it’s on my list of things that I have to do to get this page up. But. In thinking of it in just three sections, three things, say it like it is, fill the page, get it up, and then you can add to it as you go. And again, it’s me trying to find the right words in the right way, the best way of doing it, so that for whatever reason, before I do anything.

And because sometimes I get so entwined in messaging, and I can go down many rabbit holes because I want it to be amazing messaging, it can hold me back. So I [00:09:00] just wanted to say sometimes in business, in marketing, with messaging, we just need to go back to basics. And so if you want a really great way to get better messaging or just to start somewhere, think about reality.

Think about the literal conversations you’ve had with clients or people you’ve worked for and think about the questions that they’ve asked you, the objections that they had or look back at the testimonials. That you’ve been given and see what they say, see what words they use. And I actually find this one really good.

It’s when I look through random chit chat conversations with my clients. That’s where I find the gold. Because there’s no shiny parameter put around it. Just people organically saying what they really believe. Especially if you have a good relationship with your clients. And that’s [00:10:00] where your good messaging comes from.

And so it doesn’t have to be perfect. And if you’re trying to craft messaging, go back to those conversations, just like I did, and then add an, ‘Are you looking for a….?’ at the beginning. So from my example before, it would be, ‘Hey, are you looking for a super capable team whose hand you don’t have to hold to keep your business running like clockwork now?

Come talk to me. I’m for you.’ It doesn’t have to be lots and lots of fancy words if you’ve got something someone else has already said. And I really hope that this has made it a bit easier for you and that you can jump on the bandwagon with me of trying to make things more basic to get the outcome that we want instead of going into this overthinking spiral.[00:11:00] 

So with your messaging, I want you to think about who are you, who are you here to help, how is it that you help them, and tell me why you are not the person next to you. Bye guys, have a great day.

E23 You just lost a client, now what? The steps to take to get back on track, fast.

Leanne Woff: ​[00:00:00] Hello, hello, hello! Welcome to another episode of The Audacious OBM. [00:01:00] I’m your host, Leanne Woff, and today we are talking all things, you’ve just got that call, you’ve just got that email, you’ve lost a client. Doh, doh, doh! These are the steps. That you can take to get back on track fast. So this episode came about after a conversation I was having with somebody, one of my students in OBM Academy, and they’d just gotten an email that out of the blue, they were losing one of their clients.

No wait list, no pipeline. And now they’re down a client and everything that comes with that. Cue panic. We’ve all been there. We all know what that’s like, and we all know how stressful it can be. Especially if it’s unexpected. And this is something I’m actually seeing a lot right now, because some people are pulling [00:02:00] the purse strings tighter.

It’s not as easy to secure a lead as it used to be. People aren’t buying as quickly. So, in their panic state, I started talking to my student, and I said, okay, so let’s look at the things that you can do. The first thing was to review the facts. And I’m talking about the emotional impact.

Okay, so this is stressful. I feel uncomfortable. I feel sad. I feel upset. I feel angry. Whatever it is. This is unexpected. Maybe it was unjust. There’s an emotional impact. The financial impact. Okay, so now I’m down money. That’s the reality. Lose a client, revenue goes down, unless you replace the revenue.

It’s going to have an impact. This is what that impact is. This is [00:03:00] what it’s worth. Mindset impact. Okay, so I’ve lost this client. Is it me? Did I do the wrong thing? Could I have done something differently? Maybe I can’t work with anybody else now. Maybe I’m not good enough. And we go into this spiral. So I want you to analyse all those bits.

And then… I want you to set this aside for a minute. Let’s just park it. You’ll work it out. You always do. And even if, financial impact, you can’t get a new client tomorrow, you will work it out. That doesn’t mean you need to work it out this minute. And it might not look the way you think. It might be, okay, this week I’m going to buy home brand bread instead of brand bread.

You know, there’s all different ways you can do it. Doesn’t necessarily have to be business at the end of the day. You need to make sure [00:04:00] that you can cover all your bases. But we’re going to park that for a sec, because stress and overwhelm is not going to help. Then, once we’ve decided that we’re going to put that over there just for a second, we will get back to it.

We need to get logical. Nothing that you do today or even tomorrow will, bam, get you that new client. It doesn’t matter how stressed you are, how frantic you are, or how many panicked emails and phone calls you send and make, it’s not the way business generally works. You need to remain calm and clear.

It’s the only way you’ll be able to think properly and make better decisions. It’s your only way, so I want you to remember that. Calm and clear. We want to be logical as much as we can, remove the emotion. Number [00:05:00] three, we want to look back. Now, this is where we go, What caused this? Why am I in this position?

Why do I feel this way? Why did I lose the client? Now, the panic behind it, so regardless of whatever the reason is that you lost that client, the panic that you feel Is because you don’t have somebody knocking on your door saying, Oh, I want this spot. I want this spot. Or you wouldn’t be panicking.

So that panic is because you don’t have a lead pipeline. Maybe it’s cause you’ve not really been marketing. Maybe you felt you didn’t really need to. People have always just come to you, or it’s word of mouth. Or you’ve had the same clients for a really long time, and that’s great. So that’s what’s looking back.

What caused this? What marketing have I been doing? What’s my leads like? Where do they usually come from? [00:06:00] Then, I want you to look forward. Now, remembering we’ve parked your current situation to the side. Look forward. Look to a year from now. You don’t have this problem anymore. It’s resolved. It’s done.

You’ve got new inquiries coming in all the time. You’ve got a waitlist of hungry clients waiting till you have a spot. That’s your situation. Now I want you to think about why. Why might that be? What does your business look like at that point? And what’s it doing and what’s it doing well?

So once you’ve looked at that, felt it, thought about it, I want you to make a list. Make a list of all those things, the things that your business might be doing. We’re consistently building our email list. We’ve got a sales strategy. We’re connecting in [00:07:00] conversation with all different people we’re speaking or we’re, proactively asking for referrals.

Whatever it is. I want you to start thinking about what is building that pipeline for your business in a year. Once you’ve got that list of all different things, you then need to think about what’s the first, just one logical step you can take towards that. If you’ve got a list of all the things that your business would be doing to be in that situation, and you know what currently is happening in your business, we want to get here.

So we want to look at that first. That’s your new focus. The panic is not your focus. The find a new client is not your whole, all consuming focus. Your focus is let’s get some systemization, let’s get some new leads in. And this is what’s going to lead us there.[00:08:00] Number six, big warning. Do not get stuck in, I’ll just do more for my other clients, trap.

 Let’s remember, we’ve lost a client, we’re panicked, we’ve still got other clients. And by autopilot, we might just go, Oh, I’ll just work harder in here. Whether we really need to or not, I’ll just do more. I’ll just do more. And we do this because it’s our safe place. We know what we’re doing. We can execute the way we always have.

And we don’t have to stretch ourselves. This space is comfortable. And it’s also your one way ticket to going nowhere. We need to venture out outside our comfort zone. And we need to get uncomfortable, even a little bit. If you want to prevent this from happening again, if you do want to find that new client, you got to get comfy with trying new things, because if you do the [00:09:00] same thing and expect a different result, it’s just not going to happen.

I wish, but it won’t. Number seven, I want you to review the opportunity. So we’ve switched gears a little bit here. We’re no longer running away from the panic and the stress. We’re reviewing the opportunity. We’re looking forward. So I’ve lost a client. What does that mean for my day-to-day? What does that mean for my time?

What does it mean for my schedule? I still have the other client work. I know how much of my time that takes up. I know how much of my time my last client that’s gone took up. So technically… I’ve got more capacity now. I want you to measure it. I want you to actually realize how much time that is because I don’t want you to [00:10:00] unconsciously waste it.

What we want to do is prioritize that time. We want to use it wisely and we want to stay focused on the things we listed above. Let’s get this business back on track and let’s do it fast. You won’t do that if you keep wondering what to do next, what to do next. You’ll do it by doing the actions that you’ve already listed.

Then, the last thing that I want you to do is systemize whatever it is you put in place. What we don’t want is for this to be a start and stop activity. Once the panic has resided, we want to keep doing the things we’ve built in. So, if that is- Okay, I’ve now… got a plan to build my email list or I’ve now got a way to network better, whatever it is that you’ve put in place, create a system around it, because what [00:11:00] the worst thing that you can do is wait till you get a new client and then stop because you’re too busy.

But that’s how we got here in the first place. So if it is, upgrading your lead onboarding process, upgrading your sales calls, making it easier for people to buy from you. When you’re coming up with solutions for these things, think about it from a whole system perspective. What does this look like on a day-to-day?

What does, what needs to be done to keep this going indefinitely? Okay, because then you really won’t be in this position again. Each time you add one of these things to get to that future point of got a lead pipeline, it’s okay. Got a wait list of hungry clients, it’s okay. It’s because you’re doing these things and you’re doing them consistently.

And it doesn’t mean there has to be a whole lot of manual work. It might be manual at the start and then you automate it. Because we always do the [00:12:00] process, try the process, then improve it, automate it. So we want to make this as easy as possible, but still getting the traction that we need. And Before I said to you, we’ll come back to our panic.

Now you can come back to your panic and I want you to create a space where that panic has the time of day where you can step aside and go, this is really stressful, even if it’s talking to a friend, talking to your coach, talking to another OBM, whoever it is, and going, Hey, this happened. And it’s a lot of pressure, let that out, but don’t stay there.

And then also look at other solutions to your problems because just getting a new client might not be the thing that you need. It’s not the thing that’s the quickest to fix, like the quickest way to get more money might be to [00:13:00] cancel your email subscription. That’s going to get you more money than trying to reel, quicker than reeling in a new client.

So there’s different things you can do, so just be open. So I hope that this has helped you. I’m going to leave you with one final note. And that is, this happens to us all. You’re not alone. And the more practical we can be about it, and try not to get bogged down with the emotion, the easier it will be and the faster you will get traction again.

Because you’re staying in business growth mode. And that’s what you want. Bye guys. Have a great week.

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