Photo | Miguel Á. Padriñán
How easy do you make it for prospective clients or customers to spend their money with you?
That may sound like an odd question. After all, every business owner should be making the purchasing process as effortless as possible. As we all know, this is often not the case. In fact, we regularly encounter challenges that stop us from choosing a particular vendor.
Thankfully, it’s not that hard to significantly improve your sales or client acquisition numbers. Here are 4 things we can all do, to massively improve things.
1. Make it as easy as possible for people to contact you
A common mistake most business owners make, is to require too much information on their contact forms. When someone is making an initial enquiry from your website, you need their email address, name and message. That’s it. Just the most basic details so you can contact them.
Every additional piece of information you’re asking for, loses you enquiries from prospective clients.
Ask for the minimum amount of information to get the maximum amount of enquiries.
It makes absolutely no sense to have unnecessary hurdles in the way, which are reducing the number of enquiries you get. And as you know, fewer enquiries means fewer clients. Remember, you can get whatever information you need, after you’ve connected with them. At that point, it’s a lot more comfortable for the prospective client to give the information you need.
2. Be open for business when they need you
Most businesses copy the opening hours of their competitors. A better model, is to base your opening hours on the needs of your marketplace.
If you’re available when your marketplace needs you but your competitors are not, you win. Being available doesn’t mean using a call-handling firm to take details. It doesn’t mean having an AI bot on your website. It means having a member of your team available, who can provide an informed, human connection.
Sounds like a bit of a pain, right?
Exactly!
That’s why your competitors aren’t doing it. And why the opportunity to gain a huge advantage could be staring you in the face.
3. Provide flexible payment options
I’m often amazed at the limited payment options offered by small businesses. That’s never a smart move. But in the current economy it’s a very expensive error.
Thankfully, it’s totally avoidable.
In the years since the pandemic, a massive number of new payment providers have come along. It’s never been easier to accept payments. Plus, the rates are exceptionally competitive because they have to be! If you haven’t checked out how low the charges are lately, take a look.
4. Use Risk Reversal
I do this with my Pick My Brain service and people love it. It works like this. If someone uses the service and doesn’t believe it’s worth the fee, I offer them an immediate, 100% refund. It means they can hire me with total peace of mind. No one has ever requested a refund, but the offer shows how confident I am, that I will provide massively more value than they pay for.
Clearly, this type of risk reversal doesn’t work for every business model. However, if you think it could work for you it’s definitely worth exploring.
Take a moment to review the suitability of those four options for your business. Any one of them could potentially bring a significant improvement to your business.
The small business owners I work with enjoy far more sales, attract better clients and grow amazing businesses.
If you want the same, here’s exactly how it happens.