Discover the three biggest lies or myths about marketing your service-based business, that coud be damaging your business and keeping clients away.
If you feel like you’re doing everything ‘right’, following all the advice and still struggling to get clients, perhaps you’re believing and doing one or more of these…
There’s so much false information out there, probably in every industry and on every topic and while I don’t profess to know everything about marketing, I do know a lot, through my studies, 20+ years of professional experience, through nearly 5 years of having my own business and through helping a lot of clients figure out why their marketing isn’t working and turning it around.
I wanted to address 3 of the biggest lies I think women service-providers get told about marketing that I see and that I hear/experience from my clients.
Are you buying into any of these lies?
#1 Give your best stuff away for free
Have you heard this one? It goes, give them your best tools, advice, practices etc for free to draw them in and demonstrate how amazing you and your work is, then they will be hooked and will instantly become a client, because they will want more.
This one is particularly prevalent in the ‘life’ coaching industry which is now incredibly competitive with more and more people giving more and more stuff away for free, trying to compete for attention.
I’m sorry to say but it’s not really true.
We all know ‘content is king’ and that you do need to demonstrate your expertise, skills and amazingness through sharing free stuff. But what most people do with this advice is to give it all away without any strategy behind it.
They get burned out, exhausted, don’t make any more money and feel crap about the unfair exchange that’s happening. They’re giving sooo much and not getting anything in return. It’s draining and totally unsustainable.
Giving your best stuff away for free will NOT necessarily have potential clients signing up in their droves.
Why?
Firstly, because why would they pay for anything when they’re getting so much for free?
Secondly, if you’re giving it away then you’re not valuing it, so why would they?
And thirdly, because many people are simply consumers, with so much free information available, they just shop around and consume it all, thinking that’s all they need to get the result they want. It’s not.
There is a of course a way to share free information, tools or whatever, with a much more positive outcome for you, that leads them towards becoming a client.
It’s your job to show them the gaps in their knowledge, the reason why they are staying stuck where they are. You need to show them the way out, the pathway to the solution to their issue.
You’re actually not helping them by throwing free stuff at them because they won’t be getting the results they really want.
So it backfires on them AND on you!
#2 Share from your heart and the money will follow
This one exists in my specific area of authentic marketing, and particularly affects ‘spiritual’ businesses like tarot readers, reiki practitioners, light workers, channellers etc and essentially tells people that all they need to do is show up and share their passion, their why and explain what their thing is all about and their ideal clients will be drawn to them.
You may think that this does work for some people, you can see them doing it and they seem successful, therefore this must work, right?
Well, not quite.
The people that do this and it works for, are probably doing a lot more than sharing willy nilly from the heart and hoping for the best. I can tell the difference a mile off. They will be doing it strategically too. Otherwise it doesn’t work past a certain point.
Before you jump in and tell me I’m a hypocrite… I’m not saying to NOT talk from your heart – absolutely not, I’m all about authenticity and feel-good marketing. Do talk from your heart, BUT you need to bring your heart and hara along too!
Using your head means you will have a strategy behind it, you will understand what causes people to buy or not buy and you will share things in a way that leads potential clients to buying (or being nurtured towards buying later) which best serves you AND your ideal clients in the long run.
Your hara (if you don’t know the term) is an energy centre deep in your belly, you may know it as your lower dantien (from Chinese philosophy) or your shakti or womb space (from different women’s work). Using your hara gives you presence when you speak or write, it brings you confidence in who you are helping you to share from your unique voice and charge what you’re worth and it helps to create an emotional connection with your audience.
It’s your job to take them on a journey from where they are, to where they want to be, to connect with them logically as well as emotionally and to ensure they have the information, the desire and the motivation to buy from you, if you’re the right fit.
When you just ‘share from the heart’ you’re not doing that.
#3 Just tell them what you do and how amazing it is
This happened to a client of mine, her hypnotherapy school told her she’d have clients queueing up and all she had to do was tell them about hypnotherapy and how brilliant it is.
Of course, she didn’t have them queueing up at all.
I think this message it quite common among wellbeing practitioners who follow this advice (or don’t know to do it any differently) and then struggle to get enough clients. I see it all too often.
Sadly, it makes them think they don’t need to learn about marketing at all so sets them off on the wrong mindset from the start. Most get into their new career from a place of passion, often because it’s something they were helped by, but don’t have a clue about marketing or business (and they need to).
They’re so passionate about their modality, which then gets exacerbated by the same message from their training ‘school’, that they’re left with a huge deficit of practical business and marketing skills they need to build a successful practice.
This ‘lie’ doesn’t work because often your ideal clients are unaware of your modality or they’re unaware that it could be the solution to their problem, because seemingly there are always several solutions. For example, someone with a bad back could go to a chiropractor, an osteopath, a massage therapist or an Alexander Technique teacher. Someone with anxiety could go to an NLP practitioner, a coach or a hypnotherapist. They may have heard of some of those modalities but may never have heard of yours at all.
It depends where people are on their buyer’s journey (something I go through in my course), but many potential clients are only in the ‘problem aware’ stage, they are aware of their symptoms and they may or may not have the correct label for it or diagnosis of it. From there they will search for solutions (if they’re ready to change), but if their label or diagnosis is incorrect, they could end up going for help with the wrong ‘solution’.
It’s your job to help them understand their issue, why it’s happening and what’s really going on, then explain and show them why your modality is the (or a possible) solution. You have to connect with them where they are and guide them towards you, otherwise they may never find you!
If you found this blog useful and you’d like more help to grow your business, do grab my FREE GUIDE below to help you get more clients!
Many thanks!
Get my Meaningful Marketing Content Ideas Generator FREE BRAINSTORMING WORKBOOK to help you create at least 25 pieces of content to help connect with, resonate and attract your ideal clients.
Just pop your details below and I'll send it to you forthwith! Or go here for more information.