Jim Connolly Marketing

Marketing tips and ideas to help you grow your business

25 Reasons why people don’t hire you

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why wont people hire me

It’s a massive source of great frustration. You’re trying to sell a service or product to a prospect… and they just don’t ‘get it’. So let’s look at 25 common reasons why people don’t hire you. By learning why people don’t hire you, you’ll find it easier to turn things around.

Here they are in no particular order.

  1. They make decisions slowly. You move quickly. They’re still trying to process things.
  2. They make decisions quickly. You move slowly. They’ve lost interest.
  3. You’re assuming too much about what they know, what they think or what they need.
  4. They’re short term focused and you’re selling a medium to long-term benefit. Or vice versa.
  5. You’re dealing with the wrong person.
  6. You have a closing problem. Read this.
  7. They’re under a great deal of stress. Which is really common right now.
  8. You’re connecting to them using the wrong medium. You’re using email instead of sending a letter. A letter instead of a phone call. A phone call instead of Zoom. A Zoom instead of in-person.
  9. You’re using too many words to describe your proposition. This is common.
  10. You’re using too few words to describe it. This almost never happens.
  11. There are too many steps in your sales process. You’re losing them. They get half way through whatever you’re communicating, and they’re already forgetting the start.
  12. You’re using incompatible marketing ideas, approaches or strategies from a different industry. This is a huge, HUGE problem for service providers. I wrote about how to avoid the problem, here.
  13. They can see the value, they do want it, but are lying to you because they’re broke and embarrassed.
  14. Your product or service, if purchased, would force them to admit they failed in some way.
  15. You’re attracting poorly targeted leads, so they lack the need, awareness and / or finances.
  16. You haven’t given them a deadline to make their decision. Deadlines sharpen the mind.
  17. You’re confusing them, because there’s a disconnect between what you say and what they see. This is very common. The vendor says they’re professional and reliable, yet their marketing gives the opposite impression.
  18. They’re very visual and your marketing or presentation isn’t.
  19. You’re not enthusiastic enough, about your product or service, so they’re not enthusiastic enough to hire you.
  20. You haven’t demonstrated the full value of your product or service to them. So, they wrongly believe it’s too expensive.
  21. You haven’t explained the core benefits of what you’re offering, so they don’t even know they need it.
  22. They’re scared. And your level of reassurance isn’t cutting it.
  23. They’re expecting the approach or marketing from someone in your industry, to look or sound different.
  24. You haven’t made it easy enough for them to switch to you from their current provider.
  25. They don’t trust you enough, to lower their guard and let your message land.

I hope you find these examples useful.

Image isn’t everything. But it matters a lot

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New service, new product, jim connolly marketing

In business, the image you create isn’t everything.

But your image does matter. It matters a lot.

That’s because people are paying attention. Your prospective clients or customers, your marketplace and your competitors are watching. They’re looking for clues, pointers, tips and hints on how to judge your personal brand and commercial brand.

They want to know why, how or if you should matter to them.

Here’s the thing… when you take time to give them a hint, they’ll take the hint. No, not everyone. And no, not always. But a significant number of people and often enough.

With that in mind, there’s an all-important question worth pondering.

What kind of hints are you giving and are they attracting the right responses from the right people?

The easiest way for new clients to find you

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Google search, get found google, the easiest way

Image: Mitchell Luo

Here’s what we know for certain: There’s a huge difference between someone using a search engine to find your business by its name, and someone merely searching for a provider in your industry.

  • If they’re searching for your business by its name, they’ll find you.
  • If they’re searching for a provider, they will find countless pages of results. Even if they do manage to find the result for your business, unless you’re at the top of the results, or very close, the chances of them clicking through to your site is tiny. Because you’ll simply be competing with everyone else.

You could try to buy your way to the top of the search results, but it’s expensive, risky and all the risk is on you.

Thankfully, there is a far better alternative.

Searching for you by name

Here’s a vastly more effective marketing strategy. It’s the strategy I use myself, and it works in every economy!

You focus on making your business stand out from your competitors. [This article gives you a proven way to stand out with 10 examples to get you started].

You do things worth talking about, which means your name and brand spreads from person to person. So, when someone needs whatever you provide, they go looking for you – – the provider they’ve been hearing about, by name.

Your prospective clients or customers will use Google and other search engines, knowing who they want. No Google Ads, no auctions and no spiralling advertising costs.

By spending a little time and effort working on ways to differentiate your business from the pack, you can very significantly increase sales. Not only that, these sales will be more profitable as you’ll be able to either eliminate or slash your Google / Facebook advertising spend.

This approach is sound advice at any time. But it’s especially important given the medium and long-term economic outlook.

Let’s look at closing the sale

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When I started out in sales and marketing, it was all about closing the sale.

In fact, good salespeople were often referred to as good closers.

Decades later, I still see sales recruiters asking for candidates who have a proven record of closing.

Here’s why we need to be extremely careful before adopting the closing mindset, or any of the countless closing tricks and techniques.

closing the sale, sales closers

Closing for business?

The challenge with the closing mindset, is that it positions the prospective customer as little more than a barrier. A hurdle between you and the sale. An obstacle to be overcome. Little wonder so many closing techniques are based on psychological tricks.

The use of long, uncomfortable silences at key points in the sales process, for example, is used to put pressure on the prospective client. So is refusing to accept a “no” from them, by asking what they need additional information on, when they clearly just want the salesperson to go away.

In a nutshell, the focus is on outmanoeuvring your opponent. It’s them against you. A confrontation.

Here’s a very different approach, along with why I strongly recommend you use it.

Opening

I built my reputation in sales by adopting the total opposite approach. Instead of focusing on closing, I focused on opening.

Opening relationships and opening opportunities.

I found the idea of closing to be self-defeating. I discovered that you can achieve a great deal more, by opening relationships with people. This means taking time to listen to them. And then learning about their challenges and what they want / need. If our marketing is targeted correctly, we’re automatically only speaking with people who are our ideal profile of client.

When handled correctly, and preceded with effective marketing, this means there’s no need to close anything or close on anyone.

The whole process becomes a naturally-flowing conversation, where we seek to help people overcome a challenge, with the products or services we provide.

It’s a beautiful, fulfilling way to do business.

Too passive?

This approach may sound passive, but consider the people you like. The people you trust. The people you enjoy having around you. Are they pushy with you? Confrontational? No! That’s because we prefer those who respect us and are open and honest with us.

We like people who are open and honest.

We trust people who are open and honest.

We recommend people who are open and honest.

We buy from people who are open and honest.

In short, the more open we are, the more opportunities we’re open to. And yes, the more referrals we get and the more sales we make.

Enthusiasm is marketing gold dust

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Today, I’d like you to consider your answer to the following question.

Marketing enthusiasm

How enthusiastic are you about your business?

Here’s why your answer to that question is so important: People can tell almost immediately if you’re enthusiastic or not. And that matters! It matters because is has an immediate impact on how they feel about you, your business and the service you provide.

Allow me to explain.

Enthusiasm makes things happen

When you speak (or write) with enthusiasm, people feel more positively about you. Enthusiastic business owners exude confidence, which is essential. Think about it, we only hire people or buy from them, if we have confidence in them.

Someone once told me that their definition of making a sale was: ‘The transfer of enthusiasm‘. That’s a great example of just how essential enthusiasm is to the success of your business.

And when you speak with enthusiasm, people listen more attentively, too. They’re drawn in. You sometimes notice their body language change, as they lean forward because they’re paying attention. And this happens in seconds.

All these benefits of enthusiasm and more, combine to create an immediate, positive impact. In a moment, I’ll give you 10 important ways that this can help you greatly improve your results.

A lack of enthusiasm makes things happen, too

When enthusiasm is lacking people are less motivated by you. They pay less attention to what you say, because your lack of enthusiasm is talking louder than the words you use.

I experienced this recently, talking to a business owner. She was saying positive things about what she wanted to achieve with her business, yet she was clearly lacking in enthusiasm. And it sucked all the confidence and impact from her words. I honestly can’t recall much of what she said. Just her total lack of enthusiasm.

Unleash your enthusiasm

Here are 10 ways you can improve your results, by letting your enthusiasm shine through everything you do.

  1. It will generate more sales, as you ‘transfer your enthusiasm’.
  2. It will improve perceptions of you, your business and the service you provide.
  3. It will encourage the people around you. This super-valuable trait is common to every great leader.
  4. It will inspire confidence in you and what you do.
  5. It will attract opportunities that you wouldn’t have previously been offered.
  6. It will attract the best clients, too.
  7. It will position you in the marketplace, as ‘one to watch’.
  8. It will energize you and everything you do.
  9. It will motivate people to recommend you to their friends.
  10. And it will make you happier with your business, which further boosts your enthusiasm and amplifies all those great benefits, (and more)!

Okay. So, not everyone reading this is brimming with enthusiasm right now.

This begs the question…

What if you’re not feeling enthusiastic?

Think of it like this. You’re the business owner. So, you’re in control.

This means you have the freedom, starting right now, to build a business that enthuses you. A business that excites you on every level.

Remember, you choose where you work. You choose who your clients or customers are. You even choose what you charge. This means you get to decide where you work, who you work for and how much money you make.

So, if your current business doesn’t cause you to feel enthusiastic, improve it until it does.

You can do it. That’s for certain. I know, because I see it happening every day with my clients.

How to never sell based on price again

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sell based on price, fee conscious

You don’t need to sell your services or products based on price. You don’t need to waste your time on fee-sensitive clients, either.

In today’s post, I explain why and also provide you with an example of exactly what I mean.

Sort by price

One of the most common features on shopping sites, is the “sort by price” filter. It lets us see products in the category we’ve searched for, listed in price order.

The reason sort by price exists, is that the marketplace demands it. When presented with 5 or 50 options for a commodity product, the lowest price wins. This is known as the race to the bottom. Bottled water is bottled water. It makes no sense to pay more for it than you need to.

Right?

Wrong!

But what about Rob?

Rob is passionate about helping people worldwide have access to clean drinking water. He then finds a water brand, which donates money from every bottle sold, to build wells in areas where there’s no clean water.

So, Rob’s happy (very happy) to pay more for his bottled water from this well-building brand. Plus, because people like Rob know lots of other people like Rob, he tells his friends. They do the same.

Water gets sold.

Wells get built.

And people get to make a meaningful difference to the lives of those who need it.

What’s the lesson here?

Give them something else to care about

If you want potential clients or customers to stop caring about your prices or fees, give them something more important to care about. This means differentiating your products or services from the competition. The moment you do, you’re no longer offering a commodity. And customers are no longer buying based on price.

The good news?

If you’re thinking this approach couldn’t work for you or your industry, remind yourself that it works for a commodity as common and utterly indistinguishable as water. And it can work exceptionally well for you, too.