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10 Website Mistakes That Might Be Impacting Sales

10 Website Mistakes That Might Be Impacting Sales

by | Nov 26, 2024 | Selling

 

 

“If you think math is hard, try web design.”
~ Trish Parr

You thought having a website would lead to sales but the truth is, it’s not. In this piece I share common website mistakes I see business owners making time and time again when it comes to selling their products and services online. Many of which are fairly easy to fix.

Normally, when meeting with new clients, I suggest that website won’t be one of our priorities. I think it’s all too easy to get bogged down by trying to get your website perfect, when it’s actually much more important to be out there having conversations with people and building relationships.

That said, there are instances where a website IS a problem that needs fixing and in today’s letter I want to share with you 10 mistakes I see many business owners making, that could be impacting your sales.

1. No clear problem that you solve (aka niche)

 

When we land on a service provider’s website, we’re usually looking for help with a specific problem or struggle we have. If we don’t see any copy that speaks to that problem, we’re unlikely to stick around or consider engaging in the services provided.

Let me put this into context for you. As a parent to a 4 year old who struggles with big emotions, I’ve researched parenting coaches and courses a ton. If upon landing on a website I don’t see anything that relates to my particular issue, I’ll probably leave pretty quickly.

On the other hand when I came across a parenting coach who talks a lot about “Deeply Feeling Kids” and offers specific resources and services for parents of children like that, I was all over it. I joined her list, I signed up to her membership and I bought her book. I just knew she was the parenting expert who could help me.

Many of the business owners I work with struggle to narrow down to just one problem and that’s fine. You can list out a number of problems you offer support with but you must be clear and specific about which problems your services best help with so that people know you can help them when they land on your website.

2. Broken links

I see this all the time. It’s not uncommon for me to be reviewing a new client’s website and find links that don’t work and important links to boot. Links to book a consult call or to connect, links that could and would potentially lead to a sale.

And I get it, I remember speaking to the largest audience of my business journey a few years ago and wondering why, after I got so many messages and great feedback, that my subscriber count didn’t seem to go up at all. Months later, I realised that my newsletter sign up link was broken!

So it happens AND it’s so important to check regularly that any links that people might click to buy from you, connect with you or stay in touch with you aren’t broken.

3. No clear CTA or sales page

I remember being surprised the first time I saw this and have since seen it several times. This is where people might have something like a services or coaching page that explains what they do but it doesn’t have any call to action (CTA) on it. So there is nothing to tell people what to do next if they are interested, nothing, for example that says, “buy now”, or “get in touch” or “book a call”. Leaving people to wonder or guess what they should do next.

Worse yet I’ve seen many people showcase their offerings with just a few lines of description. No sales page explaining who the service is for, what it might help with and what to expect. Just a brief description and on top of that no CTA.

Let me tell you now, most people won’t spend money on something that they don’t know enough about or that they have to go searching for a way to actually buy or pay. If you are selling a service to your customers, I would recommend you have a sales page with a clear call to action at the bottom of it.

4. Too many offerings

I typically work with multi-talented and highly trained individuals who work with a multitude of modalities and thus offer a wide range of services. The problem is people aren’t usually searching for a modality, what they want to know is whether or not you can help them to solve their specific problem.

If you have too many different services, each relating to a different modality, there’s a good chance that people will find and leave your website feeling confused. When we’re not sure which route to take, we typically don’t take any. So if you are offering people too many options to work with you, without clarity on why you would use one service over another, you will inevitably miss out on sales.

Usually when I’m working with a client in this situation, I’ll ask them 2 questions, which of your services do people rarely or never book? And which of your services do you NOT love delivering? If there are any services that fall into either category, I recommend they remove them from their website or at the very least from their top-level menu. This way when people land on your site they are presented with only your most popular services and those which you actually enjoy delivering.

Another recommendation I give is that when you have multiple services, do what you can to explain why a person would choose one over the other by making it clear who the service is for. Ethical Copywriter. Lauren Van Mullem does a great job of this on her services page.

5. No stepping stone — freebie or low cost offer

A good business model will offer buyers a journey from not knowing you to buying from you and from buying a low cost offer to purchasing a more premium offering. So, if for example, you are a coach who only offers high priced coaching packages, you are expecting customers to skip a necessary part of the journey — getting to know you better.

Giving people a free or low-cost way to get to know you better allows people to take steps along the journey to buying from you that don’t feel like a huge leap of faith.

My recommendation is that you have, prominently displayed, on your website a freebie (ideally a generous freebie) and/or a low cost (less than $50) product people can buy to better know how you operate. If you can wow people with your freebie or low cost offer, you’re much more likely to see those people come back for your higher priced products and services.

6. No way to “meet” you before they buy

If the services you offer include spending significant time with your clients, I believe it’s essential that you allow people the opportunity to “meet” you before they buy. I remember years ago wanting to hire a practitioner and the minimum spend was significant. What I really wanted to do was meet her so I could be sure she was the right practitioner for me but as this wasn’t an option, I decided against hiring her.

I can’t tell you how many times people have told me that they were 95% certain that they wanted to buy from me but the decision was made 100%, as soon as they spoke to me.

There are a few ways you can do this. You can offer a call (for me this is done on Zoom) on your sales page. You might have noticed that aside from low cost offers like my workshops, I rarely have a “buy now” button on my sales page. It’s much more likely to be an application form (which is followed by a call) or a link to book a call directly.

If you don’t want to offer calls to everyone who might be considering your individual offerings, then find another way for people to “meet” you before they buy. My colleague Lauren, offers craft and copy hour, where you can bring a craft to work on and any questions you have about copy to a group video call. Or another client who is an incredible book coach who offers free Q+A calls for people who are working on a book. Doing a group freebie like this allows you to meet several people at once.

7. No blog or an out of date one

This is, in my opinion, a biggie! Since getting serious about my blog circa 2019, I regularly have people finding me through Google searches, who then end up buying from me or enrolling on to one of my services. It’s important to note that this happens without me having spent a ton of time on SEO, rather just creating high value content that answers the questions that my ideal clients have and are searching for.

If you don’t yet post new and useful content on your website on a regular basis, I’d recommend starting there. People often think that the sales page is the most important copy on your website but people regularly tell me they are ready to sign up to 1:1 with me, because of all the content they’ve read on my blog and how sold they already are on my approach. Posting regular blogs allows me to share my most up to date thinking on business growth and share details about my approach, my best advice and my point of view.

8. No pictures of you

They say a picture tells a thousand words and never is this more true than on a website offering 1:1 or group services.

If people are going to spend money working with you (as opposed to just buying a product) then they will want to know what you look like. Having pictures of you on. at least. your homepage and about page works wonders for cultivating a sense of trust and safety for your website browsers and potential clients.

And for the record, it doesn’t have to be photos from a professional photoshoot, all the photos on my website were taken by friends or family and it shows!

9. An unclear message or lack of Point of View

This is probably one of the hardest to get right because it requires us to possess that clarity in the first place. If you do have clarity on your message or you do have a strong point of view about your work or industry, then do what you can to make sure your copy reflects that.

If you don’t yet possess that clarity, then my recommendation to clients is to explore your message and point of view through your content. People often think that in order to create meaningful content that they have to already be clear on their message or point of view but in my own personal experience, it wasn’t until I got consistent with content that my message became crystal clear.

10. Bad design

This is last on the list for a reason. I think many people get tripped up by this one, thinking that they’ll never be successful unless they spend 10K on fancy website design. That’s simply not true. These days with templates, it’s pretty easy to DIY a relatively good-looking website. Having said that, if your website is really out of date and badly organised or designed, it will inevitably have a detrimental impact on sales.

If in doubt go for minimalist, clean, with lots of white space. You’ll also want to avoid large chunks of text without paragraph breaks or subtitles to break it up. It’s human nature to give up when we see a large amount of text with no breaks in it so break down your copy into smaller chunks!

And that’s it, are you making any of the mistakes on this list? Can you fix them? I’d love to know, so if you feel called to share, hit reply and let me know.

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Once a week, in the form of an e-letter, I share the best of what I know about building a business with integrity for conscious business owners.

The intention behind these letters is to be a voice for integrity within your (undoubtedly) cluttered inbox. To be the one email you can count on to contain strategic and soulful advice for building a business without selling your soul.

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Is This Stopping You From Taking Action?

Is This Stopping You From Taking Action?

by | Oct 13, 2024 | Mindset, Uncategorized

“Being detached allows us to stay balanced and free from the anxieties that arise from success or failure.”
~ Pundarika Vidyanidhi Das

 

I want to talk to you about something that comes up in my client calls all the time. The struggle to take action on important business activities. In today’s letter, I’d like to share one reason that I think that might be.

Take a moment now to bring to mind something that you want to do in your business but that, for whatever reason, you struggle to take action on.

It could be getting your content marketing up and running, launching a new product or service, reaching out to someone who you know could be a great collaborator or any other thing that you know will move your business forward, but, for whatever reason, you’re stalling on.

Now ask yourself this?

 

What outcome are you attached to?

Is it that the content you write is well received and impactful? Is that your launch goes really well and you get a certain number of sign-ups? Is it that the person you reach out responds enthusiastically?

Now take that outcome and consider the fear behind it.

Is it that people won’t like your content or that they’ll criticize it? Is it that no one will buy your new offering and it will look like you don’t know what you’re doing? Is it that you won’t get a response from the person you reach out to and worse still, they’ll be annoyed that you did?

Can you relate? Do you have these sorts of thoughts running through your head? Perhaps you’re conscious of them or maybe this is the first time you’re giving them attention.

The key is that many of us become attached to a certain outcome and the fear of not getting the outcome we desire then gets in the way of taking action.

I get it, I used to do this all the time and I can still fall into this same trap but I want to share something that really helped me.

Years ago, when Joan and I left our home in Mexico (where we’d been housesitting for a year) and moved to Valencia, Spain, we were both excitedly working on our businesses. Joan had, since meeting me, really got into personal growth and was keen to start his own coaching business.

In typical Joan style, he dived right in and decided to run an in-person workshop on stress. He found a venue, found a partner to help him promote it and set a date. On the morning of his workshop, I couldn’t believe how calm he was. “Aren’t you worried that nobody will show up?” I asked him. Well aware that if it were my workshop, that would be my greatest fear.

“Not at all” he replied and went on to explain that his only goal was to become a person who had run a workshop on stress in Valencia. Essentially, to have gone through the process of finding a venue, getting all the equipment, marketing the event, creating his slides, delivering the workshop and gaining all the knowledge that doing so would bring. “I’ll do the workshop even if nobody shows up.” he said with a smile.

I’m not going to lie, I was stunned by this and being who I am, I wanted to understand how he could be so calm, when I might be a nervous wreck. The more I thought about it, the more I realised that my stress in similar situations came from my attachment to a certain outcome. I realised that whenever I wanted to try something new in my business, I wanted to be sure that I would succeed and my fear of failure was often enough to stop me even trying.

Since then (that was 9 years ago!), I’ve largely got over this habit of getting attached to outcome. I’m much better at spotting the desire for success and feeling the fear of failure and going for it anyway. Knowing that who I will be on the other side of just doing the thing will give me more knowledge, confidence and true feeling of accomplishment (regardless of the results).

When we start to do things for the sake of doing them, rather than as a means to an end, we get to enjoy them a whole lot more.

Let’s go back to my earlier examples.

What if, instead of attaching to the outcome of people like our content, we created content because we enjoyed the process of creating? What if, Instead of worrying about what people might say, we focused on expressing our ideas and point of view through content, knowing that over time our content marketing skills would improve?

What if, instead of obsessing over how many people might sign up to our new thing or not, we focused on the skills we’ll deepen as we lean into launching and selling our gifts. One of the things I always tell myself when I’m launching is that nobody knows if it fails. I don’t have to announce that I didn’t get any sign ups and my efforts will likely have got some people ready to buy next time.

What if, instead of not reaching out to people for fear of rejection, we told ourselves that rejection is an inevitable part of the journey. Some of the greatest success stories in life have come about after countless rejections. I’m currently starting the Harry Potter series with my son and so it feels apt to share how the first Harry Potter book was rejected by 12 different publishers before an obscure literary agent took it on.

The truth is, if we adopt an attitude of play, experimentation and exploration in our work, we enjoy it a whole lot more and actually achieve success all the much faster.

Another truth is that while we’re worried about what other people will think, they’re not actually watching us and waiting for us to trip or fail because they are too busy worrying about their own potential missteps.

And let’s just say for argument’s sake, that we do fail spectacularly. What’s the worst that can happen? If you publish that piece and no one comments or someone writes something rude? In a few days you’ll have forgotten all about it — trust me I’ve been there. Or if you try and launch a new offer and no one buys, who is even going to notice?

The worst that can happen in my opinion letting our hopes and fears about what might happen stop us from even trying. So please, ditch your attachment to outcome and consider what might be possible, if you just did the thing for the sake of doing the thing.

Care to share with me the one thing you’ve been procrastinating about moving forward with? I’d love to know so feel free to hit reply and let me know.

SIGN UP FOR MY SOULFUL STRATEGIES WEEKLY

 

Once a week, in the form of an e-letter, I share the best of what I know about building a business with integrity for conscious business owners.

The intention behind these letters is to be a voice for integrity within your (undoubtedly) cluttered inbox. To be the one email you can count on to contain strategic and soulful advice for building a business without selling your soul.

If you want to receive the Soulful Strategies Weekly, simply share with me your name and email address below and you’ll start recieving emails right away.

Five Things To Include In Your Next Launch

Five Things To Include In Your Next Launch

by | Oct 9, 2024 | Selling, Uncategorized

“The future depends on what you do today.”
~ Mahatma Gandhi

I want to share with you my 5 of my favourite launch activities, just in case you are planning a Fall/Autumn launch.

With launch season (as I call it) coming up, now is the time to be thinking about our launch plans if we are thinking of launching something in September or October. It can be tempting to leave it until the other side of summer but getting into planning mode now will make for much better launch results.

I teach a whole course on launching, which includes several activities I recommend you take when launching a new product or service but in this piece, I’m simply going to share with you my top 5 activities you can include in any launch to make it more successful.

Let’s dive in.

1. Conduct audience research

This one sometimes gets a few groans. Many people resist doing the research before getting too deep into launch mode because they either see it as a waste of time (because they believe they already know what people think) or they worry that the people will tell them things that they don’t want to act on.

The reality is that audience research is foundational to the success of any new offering. Conducting audience research in the form of calls early on in the launch process (aka the pre-launch phase), is a great way to do the following:

  • Test your idea to see if it’s really what people need and want. They might need something and not necessarily want it and therefore won’t pay for it.
  • Get the exact language your audience is using to describe their struggle or challenge. This is great for copy and sales pages.
  • Let your audience know what you are creating before you even begin asking for the sale.
  • Let’s your audience know you care about what they think and value their input into your creative process. This is great for building stronger relationships.

Check out the bottom of this piece for an example of how to invite people into research calls.

2. Use takeover graphics

When we’re in launch mode, it’s easy to think that we should be posting about our new offering all the time and yet as conscious business owners we don’t want to do that, because we don’t want to bombard our people.

My solution to this is to use takeover graphics on social media. What that means is changing the cover photo for my Facebook Business Page and Facebook groups that promote my offer with a link in the description to my sales page.

This is also possible on LinkedIn and for platforms that don’t use a cover photo, like Instagram, I simply change my bio so that it let’s people know I am launching something and links to the sales page. What this means is anyone visiting your channel can immediately see that you are launching something, without you needing to post that fact EVERY day!

See below for an example of my last takeover graphic on my Business Facebook Page.

3. Launch partners

This is one of my favourite launch strategies and probably the one that gets most overlooked. Whenever I start planning a launch, I think of a few colleagues, clients or mentors who I think might be willing to share about my new offer with their audience.

I then reach out to them, as early in the process as possible, to ask if they would be willing to support my launch by sharing details with their people. I do this early to give them time to plan it in and so that I can approach other people if they say no. I’m fortunate to have created some great relationships both with colleagues and former clients and in part I think this is because of my generosity in sharing about their offerings.

Having a small group of people supporting your launch can be the difference in a handful of people hearing about it and several hundred or even several thousand people.

4. 1:1 invitations

When we’re launching something new, it’s easy to become focused on our one to many marketing. Social media posts, newsletters etc. What I’ve found to be especially effective is actually taking the time to send personal and thoughtful 1:1 invitations to people who you would personally love to be involved (if it’s a live program, for example) or who you think might really benefit from your new offer.

We tend to think this will come across as pushy or salesy but when done with an attitude of service, with zero attachment to outcome it can actually feel like a compliment by the recipient.

Before I even get into launch mode, I like to think of 10 people would love to have in my workshop/program or who I think would benefit greatly from my new offering and if they haven’t bought as we get near to the end of the launch period, I might drop them a brief note to let them know that I’m offering something I think they’d be a great fit for. No pressure of course! I also never send any links and prefer to say something along the lines of: if you’d like to know more, let me know and I’ll send over details.

5. Final Call communications

I’ve been launching stuff online for a decade now and one thing I’ve learned is that people like to leave their buying decision until the last minute. I can’t tell you how many times, I’ve had a launch, only to get a flurry of sales on the first announcement and then nothing for the rest of the launch period and then another flurry of sales when I make the final call.

It can be tempting to think that if people have stopped buying/signing up that we’ve made all the sales that we’re going to make but sending a reminder to people that the deadline for purchase is approaching (if there is a deadline!) is often all it takes to have people make a decision. I would say that in most of my launches, an equal number of people sign up at the end as they do at the beginning.

Now gently reminding people is different to many of the FOMO inducing tactics we see online like countdown timers and messages like “last chance” and “don’t miss out!” Instead I prefer to send an email titled “Last call to sign up for xxxx” and I’ll also do some last call posts on social. That way hopefully those people who were considering buying but hadn’t yet decided get the opportunity to buy before the deadline passes.

And there you have it 5 of my favourite launch activities.

As I mentioned there are many other launch activities just like these that I cover in my 4 part training series but I hope that these 5 will at least give you some ideas to be getting on with. Hit the button below to access the sales page.

BUY LOVING LAUNCHES

That’s it for today, other than to let you know that you can comment and let me know if you have any questions about what I’ve shared in this piece.

 

Why I Favour Long Form Content Over Social Media

Why I Favour Long Form Content Over Social Media

by | Sep 25, 2024 | Content creation

“If you aren’t having fun creating content, you’re doing it wrong.”
~ Ann Handley

I think I’m probably in the minority as a business coach who doesn’t push my clients to spend time hustling on social media. Not because I don’t value social media, I certainly do but because I value something else more.

As someone who, as a little girl, wanted to be an award winning novelist when I grew up and who has a, not so small, obsession with books, using my love of words and writing to grow my business has been one of the most fulfilling parts of my business journey.

In fact I started my “business” journey as a personal development blogger and managed to build a solid and loyal audience before I ever sold a thing. Which meant when I finally did start selling my life coaching services, it wasn’t to crickets. It was to a group of people who had been following my journey since 2011 when I decided to ditch convention and change my entire life (for the better).

After transitioning to Business Coaching back in 2017, I needed to start my whole audience from scratch (minus a few people who followed me over from my life coaching business). I knew that content was going to be a key way to do this but the internet felt like a different place. In 2011, my personal development blog had grown quickly and organically, with little effort from me but starting a new blog in 2017 felt more daunting. The internet felt more crowded and noisy but despite that, after a stuttering start, I ploughed on. By 2019 I had a solid content marketing system in place and was publishing and repurposing content on a weekly basis.

Now, my content is one of the primary ways I connect with my audience. Nearly everyone who hires me or attends one of my workshops will tell me that they’ve read my content and it played a part in them wanting to work with me. I now have a bank of over 230 long form articles. It’s worth noting that by “long form” I typically mean 1000 words plus, which means well over 230,000 words written to date. One day I hope to turn some of those words into a book!

This bank of content has proved to be invaluable to me and is why I often encourage my clients to take a similar approach. Now if you are reading this and the thought of regularly writing 1000+ words fills you with dread, then this might not be the approach for you. But if you are a fellow wordsmith and love the idea of using your writing habit to grow your business, read on for 10 reasons I favour long form content over social media.

1. You can go deep and give more value

As someone who likes to go deep into things, going deep in my content suits me well and it has the added bonus of allowing me to give more value in my marketing. If you think about it, the amount of value you can provide in a short social media post is always going to be far less than in a longer, more in depth piece of content. And the more value a reader gets, the more likely they are to consider investing in your services.

2. You can better demonstrate your expertise

The more strategy, advice and insight I can share with my readers about the struggles they face in business, the better able I am to demonstrate my expertise. The impact of this is that it cultivates trust that I have the expertise and knowledge to support my audience to get where they are trying to get to.

3. It’s a great way to share your point of view

A lot of people think that the only place to share their point of view is in the copy on their website, but I’ve built a thriving business with old and outdated web copy on my website but with new, fresh content regularly going up on my blog.

It’s in my content that I really do share my point of view on business growth, I tell people what I really think, even (and especially) if it means going against the mainstream view.

Doing this allows my right-fit clients to buy into my approach and also repels those people who aren’t a fit. Which is great because I am definitely NOT the right business coach for everyone.

4. People take their time over it

Consider for a moment how you digest content. If you are anything like me, when on a platform like Instagram, I would guess that you spend much of your time scrolling. Why? Because that’s how the platform is designed. Social media platforms are not designed for going deep, they’re designed to keep you hooked on scrolling and if you have ever got into a downward scrolling spin, you’ll know exactly what I mean.

When we digest long form content, it’s usually on a blog or in a newsletter or on a platform like Medium or Substack, all of which are designed for deeper engagement with the content. A platform like Medium for example is actually designed to minimise distractions. I know when I open up Medium or read a blog on someone’s website, I’m going to take more time over it than I would if it were a reel or post on Instagram.

5. People find it when they are searching for it

When you write longer pieces of content in the form of a blog or article, there exists the possibility that people will find it while they search online for related information and advice. This means that when someone comes across your content, they are wanting to access content just like it, rather than simply seeing your content in a social media feed, regardless. of it’s relevance.

It goes without saying that if people have an issue that they are searching online for guidance on, that they are more likely to really engage with the content they find and even invest in services associated with that content to alleviate the problem they have.

That’s definitely been the case for my clients — I have had several clients apply for coaching because they’ve come across one of my articles and then gone on to read more of my blog posts or join my list. By contrast, I almost never have people hire me because they found me on social media.

6. You own the content

When you write for your own blog or newsletter, you control the content and the audience is your audience. No external provider can come and close your website down. When you put all of your content on social media, you can lose it overnight. if Meta, for example, decides to close down or freeze your account. I’ve seen it happen and as you can imagine, getting access to someone in an organisation like Meta to help restore your account is just about impossible.

I’ve also known people whose businesses were reliant on a flow of clients that was coming from social media and then the algorithm changed and suddenly their reach plummeted and their sales dried up. I’m not usually one for fear mongering but when you put all of your intellectual property on social media, I really do think you are taking a risk.

7. It suits my personality

As a highly sensitive introvert who doesn’t like spending too much time on social media, long form reading and writing is my preference. I think it’s fair to say that many of my clients are similar. If I prefer to read more high value and informative articles outside of social media, then I’m prepared to bet that many of my ideal clients feel the same.

Plus the idea of making reels and short pithy posts for social media just doesn’t inspire me. Having said that I am hoping to branch into video later this year!

8. I can do it less often

Most of the people I know who are killing it on Instagram (and I do know a few who are) are creating reels 2–3 times a week, that includes planning the reel, recording the reel, possibly editing or redoing the reel to get it right and then publishing the reel — 2 to 3 times a week. That feels exhausting to me.

With longer form content, like for a blog or newsletter, people don’t expect to receive fresh content every day or every few days, they expect to receive it every 1–2 weeks, which means as a content creator, I don’t have to work on content every day. I have Mondays blocked off for my content and I put out a new newsletter (which I later repurpose into articles and social media posts) every few weeks, which feels super manageable considering my busy schedule.

9. It’s easier to make a long piece of content short

The other reason I love long form content is because it’s far easier to take a longer piece of content and chop it down to shorter pieces than it is to start with a short piece made for social and then try to turn it into a longer piece.

All of my long form content ends up on social media, but it’s not created for social media. It starts life as a newsletter and then later gets repurposed into a Medium article, a blog, a text post on LinkedIn, a text post on Facebook and then maybe at some point it might make its way to a carousel post on Instagram. From one long form piece of writing, I can get many more other pieces out of it.

10. When you go deep in your content, you can repurpose it for bigger things

It’s not just easier to go from long form to shorter content, it’s also much easier to go from a longer form piece of content into something even bigger like a workshop. Many of the paid workshops I’ve run or free workshops I’ve done for other people’s audiences started life as a newsletter. Because I really explore ideas in depth in my writing, I often have the basis for a 60–90 minute workshop already done.

As I write, there are even more benefits to long form content popping into my head but this piece, at over 1700 words, is already probably long enough!

If you love writing and want to harness your creativity to grow your business, you might be interested in my brand new 7-week live group program, Content that Connects, starting on September 23rd. For all the details and to sign up, head to: www.carolineleon.com/content-that-connects/

Where My Clients Come From

Where My Clients Come From

by | Aug 21, 2024 | Client Creation

“All things being equal, people will do business with — and refer business to — those people they know, like and trust.”
~ Bob Burg

I want to share with you where my coaching clients come from in the hope that it gives you some insight on where to focus your attention to get more clients into your business.

It goes without saying that the number one question I get asked by my clients is how can I get more clients? Much of what I teach and the strategies I share are designed precisely to help conscious business to answer just that.

Lately, as I’ve been pondering this age old question, I’ve been thinking a lot about my business and the steady flow of new clients I enjoy and asking myself where do my clients come from? When I consider the various ways in which people come to me, I’m able to see the fruits of my earlier business building efforts.

My hope is that in sharing these details with you, you’ll get a sense of the work you need to do now, so that you too can have a steady source of new clients coming into your business, down the road.

How I know where my clients come from

It’s important to note that I’m able to make this analysis because I ask anyone who enquires about my coaching services how they found me. If you don’t currently do this, I highly recommend you find a way to do that. I ask the question in my 1:1 coaching application form but you could just as easily ask it in your client intake form.

My referral source categories

Before we dive into the numbers I want to share with you some details about the categories of my referral sources. My recording of this data goes back to late 2021 when I switched from using gift sessions to an application form as the CTA on my coaching sales page. My analysis covers 74 applications where a referral source was indicated. These roughly break down into the following categories.

Social media — this is pretty self-explanatory. For the record I’m on Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter although I’m most active on Facebook.

Google — this is where someone either googled a term like “Conscious Business Coach” and found my website or searched a topic like “Discovery calls alternative” and found one of my blog posts.

Client referral — this is where a current or former client has directly recommended me to someone.

Word of mouth — this is where someone has shared a piece of my content or talked about me in a group or shared a post about me — often I don’t know who this was or had no sight of the recommendation because I’m not in that group or I don’t know the person in question.

Colleague referral — this is where one of my colleagues has personally recommended me to someone.

Hubs — these are places that I share my teaching, knowledge or content where my ideal clients already hang out (like Tad Hargrave’s Marketing for Hippies Membership or The Focalizing Institute). There is some crossover between hubs and colleagues because for example a colleague like Tad Hargrave might personally recommend me to someone (which I count as a colleague referral) and then other people might discover me from the classes I’ve taught inside his membership program (which I would count as a hub). In essence both leads have come via Tad but for slightly different reasons, which I felt it was important to parse out.

Personal connection — This is when someone I know personally decided to hire me.

Before we dive into the numbers, I’d love you to consider which of these you think sends me the most leads and which send me the fewest. I’ll admit, I was surprised by the results the first time I did this analysis.

See below for an pie chart overview of the breakdown.

What the numbers tell me

So to present the information another way, let me list out my referral sources from top to bottom:

Colleagues send me 32.8% of all my coaching client applications.
Hubs account for 17.2% of my 1:1 applications.
Client referrals and word of mouth both account for 15.6% percent of referrals each. 31.2% in total.
Google searches accounts for 14.1% of applications.
Social Media accounts for 3.1%
And personal connections account for 1.6% (this was actually only 1 person overall).

What these numbers tell me.

People matter more than content

If I add up colleagues, client and other word of mouth referrals, this accounts for 64% of the applications I’ve had in over the few years. That means that the majority of people who decided to apply to work with me, did so because someone they trusted recommended me.

Given how much time I spend on content, that surprised me. I also wouldn’t have guessed that the majority of my client applications actually come from colleagues, some of whom do very similar work but no longer do 1:1 the way I do.

I don’t employ any particular strategies to bring this about but there are some things I do and have done, which might explain this number.

One thing that I’ve always done is to share generously about my colleague’s offers, even when they might compete with my own offerings. I do this because I want people to get access to the right resources for them, even if that means they spend their money elsewhere. I also only share products and services I truly believe in and many of my colleagues are doing amazing things in the world.

I also don’t subscribe to a scarcity mindset, I truly believe that there is enough clients for everyone and that my right-fit people will choose me because what I offer is the best fit for their needs, not because I was the only coach they knew about!

Something else I try to do is thank those colleagues and clients personally when they send people my way. If it’s a colleague who sends people regularly, I might send the occasional note to let them know that the person they recommended me to did in fact start working with me and that things are going great. If it’s a former client, I’ll reach out to say thanks and maybe even offer them a gift session as a way to say thank you and to be of support to them.

Another thing that I have done for as long as I can remember is create relationships through outreach and just simply being out in the world building and nurturing relationships. Several of the colleagues who send people my way, came as a result of a connection we made online or inside a program we were in together.

The big takeaway here is that I have invested heavily in BUILDING RELATIONSHIPS, not to gain anything, more often to be of service to others.

Content does matter

Even though personal recommendations are by far the most important source of clients for me, content does still matter, with Google searches, social media and teaching in hubs accounting for 34% of the applications that come in, my content still plays a huge part.

If we take google searches, I can tell you that around 3 or 4 articles are bringing in the majority of google leads. One in particular, has me ranking on the 1st page for the search term “discovery call alternative”, which is a piece I wrote about gift sessions way back when I had no idea about SEO or the fact that many, many coaches are looking for a more ethical approach to sales calls.

I also invested in an SEO program last year to make the most of all the content I have written but haven’t yet had the time to implement much of what I learned, so the success I’m having on Google is not coming from lots of SEO work but just my general commitment to creating content that serves my target audience and answers their most pressing questions.

Teaching in hubs has definitely been a great way for me to find new clients and a way that I really enjoy. Not only do I get to present my “content” to someone else’s audience, but they get also get to experience me in real time, which I’m sure has an impact.

Social media is having the least impact. Who knew!?! Well I did. I’ve known for sometime that people rarely say that they found me on social but I must admit, I do still find it a bit surprising that so FEW people do. Whilst I will continue to be active on social media, it does give me some comfort that my livelihood is not at the mercy of the algorithm and means that I can prioritise more enjoyable marketing activities than posting on social!

I should also note here that several people who gave a name of someone they heard about me from, also stated that they then joined my list and read my content for some time before reaching out to work with me.

So even though those personal referrals are so important, I’m confident that my content does a great job of helping people to get to know me better. I also believe that my content is one of the ways I’ve built trust with colleagues, who see what content I’m creating and come to understand my point of view and therefore feel better able to refer me.

The key takeaway here is to CREATE CONTENT THAT SERVES. Stop trying to create content that sells and instead create content that expresses your point of view and really answers the questions your potential clients are already googling.

Another takeaway here is the importance of DEMONSTRATING EXPERTISE. I think my content does a good job of this but when I teach in someone else’s group program or mastermind, I inevitably get more subscribers, sales and client applications. 

I think this is because I’m giving people a really good insight into how I work, what I stand for and the approach I take when it comes to business growth. Lots of people also give me the feedback that they like my down to earth nature, which I love hearing too!

A note on personal connections

You might be wondering why so few clients are coming from personal connections — well that’s because I live in a small town in Catalunya, Spain, where I barely speak the language and where a large proportion of the population are over 70.

That’s why all of my relationship building activities are happening online but if you live in a place where your ideal clients also live, don’t forget that building relationships via hubs and colleagues could work really well in your locality.

I’m curious to know what you make of these figures. Is there anything in here that surprises you? Is there anything you might do differently in your business as a result of reading about where my clients come from? Or do you have any questions for me? If you said yes to any of these questions, please let me know in the comments.

If you love writing and want to harness your creativity to grow your business, you might be interested in my brand new 7-week live group program, Content that Connects, starting on September 23rd. For all the details and to sign up, head to: www.carolineleon.com/content-that-connects/