To make money through your business, you have to sell! But selling your products and service shouldn’t feel like selling your soul, and being all sleazy whilst doing it! We have all witnessed other businesses owner talking online and you might of mental said to yourself “how does she talk that confidently about her offer?” Maybe you pick your phone up with the intention of recording a story but you have nothing to say and you month goes dry. Sound familiar? I’ve have felt this too…but not anymore. What if I told you that selling to your ideal audience could be more natural, and feel more like talking rather than pushy? I’ll be covering some best selling practise for solopreneurs, mindset tips and things to implement. So you can sell with easy, work with the right people and make money doing what makes you happy and pays the bills. Regardless what you offer here is my honest guide to selling online.
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Why selling is giving you the ICK!
Selling is really an act of service by customer and provider. When it’s done authentically, both you and the customer can actually enjoy the process, it’s true. But, at the moment you are going into selling with a fixed, fearful and unrealistic mindset.
Previous experiences
Before you started to sell, it’s likely you’ve been the customer and have already written the narrative in your head that selling is dirty. You may think this due to a previous experienced or witnessed a negative sales experience, either bought something because of a pushy sales person, fear mongering tactics or misleading marketing material. All these methods leads to buyers remorse. This is because the product never lives up to your expectation and or guilt tricked into it, leaving a nasty taste in your mouth about that business. This could be the reason why you when it comes the thought of selling you feel like the sleazy poppet master.
Limited belief
Another reason why selling gives you the ick is because you don’t believe what your offering is worth it, i’m sure it is by the way. Confidence is key, and can derail you when it comes to selling. Have you been in ore of other business owners naturally selling what they do as if was just a chat? This level of ease comes from an inner believe that there product is worth everything they are saying. There’s no nonsense, guilt or anxiety getting in the way of them talking about it. Sometimes confidence is misplace and we think we are just bad at selling. When really you aren’t confidence what your selling. You need to build a inner confidence around what you’re selling and why. Because people are far more likely to buy someone from some who is genuinely enthusiastic about what they are offering! You have to sort of really become your own hype woman to sell!
What it needs to do
But remember, the hardest time for you to sell to a potential customer is when they don’t know why your sell it and why they need it. Selling isn’t about promising a bunch of things that just sound good, it needs to actually easing your customers pain points. This is where it gets tricky if you’ve been selling your product and service to everyone it’s hard for you customers to really see the benefit specific to them. So stop selling to everyone and start selling to a specific group who will actually benefit from it.
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What To Do And Think Differently
When you go into selling your product or service, go in with an positive mindset. But not an unrealistic one. Because even the best sale person won’t be able to covert everyone person to buy that is a unrealistic expectation and unnecessary pressure. You need to treat your potential customers and clients like a person, not just a lead! By actually building a relationship first, taking an genuine interest on their problems and going that extra mile by offering some free advice. When it comes to selling online, you have to earn the right to sell to someone by building this foundational relationship. Because trust is something your customer has to feel before they are prepared to invest in your service or product.
The Transformation Sell
The other common mistake I see small business owners making is your too focus heavily on the facts and features. When really you need to be selling the outcome. By selling the transformation your customers will actually image this experience, which is far more effective. So instance if someone say to you buy this camera it has auto focus, manual mode, adjustable strap, flash, zoom etc. It’s like cool I think most camera’s have that but cool. But what if someone says to you goodbye to blurry pictures, become the inner professional photographer you’ve always wanted and never forget life moments. It’s so much more griping, you form this better version of yourself and what you could achieve if you had that product in your hands.
Word of warning
However, a word of warning because small brands get carried way and basically go to far with the transformation sell. Remember don’t offer your customers the world if you can’t fulfil that promise. The reason why selling has got a bad rep is because people do this too much! Misleading and falsifying facts is morally wrong don’t be tempted to do it, it will backfire. It’s like when your looking through a magazine and you see a mascara advertisement image and you can instantly tell that they A. heavily edited it and B. She probably wearing fakes! It makes you sort of angry, you don’t like being deceived or business trying to pull the wool over your eyes. So never do that to your audience!
Confidence building
I touched on this earlier but believing in what you do is a biggie and the only way you’ll build confidence. If you haven’t got much experience it’s worth lower your prices to gain some experience. See the results first hand, so you can see the customer/client transformation for yourself. Gain the positive feedback and really see how you’ve helped them. It’s hard when starting out to understand how to sell your product or service. But the more you believe in what you do actually works the easier it will feel.
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Things to implement when selling
When it come to selling to your audience you need to realise that they wont convert over night. Think of selling as a process, or a dance and only at the end of the song you’ll be able to ask for the date! How do you build a posItive rapport with your ideal audience? To build this we need to be their for them before they purchase. Your brand touch points need to be created in way that they are bring that person one step closer to buying from you. The first met could be an open ended offer. Something simple like a lead magnet – something that will help them connect with your brand and help them out, a win win! But this relationship over time will hopefully grow with other invitations and opportunities.
The importance of Trust
You also need to build trust, trust is a big decided in whether your audience will actually invest in you. That’s why you need to prove that the produce or service you provide is worth the investment. You can do this by helping them with smaller issues so they’ll start to build this association that you ease their problems. You fit the issues…you can help them! A great way to show your skills and knowledge is forming a community on Facebook where you can deliver free advice to real life situations. If your unsure how to build trust online go to episode 24 I provide you with more solutions on there.
Repetitive Sell
The other thing is in life we get interrupted. Your on the couch scrolling through instagram and the dog barks so you click off. That’s why you need to be repetitively promoting your brand online. You need to hear something about 8 to 10 times before you really know about it. So that mean you need to repeating yourself a lot, you need to be making it clear about what you do and where your audience can find you online!
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Start selling your product or service natural today!
You now have the knowledge to finally squish that sleazy sales feeling for good. It’s time you start believing in your offer! Sell more authentically by treating your customers like real people. Build a relationships on trust through free advice. Sell your offer only when you’ve earned the right too! You’ll shortly be working with and selling to the right people, making enough money to pay your bills doing what makes you happy! Feeling a little unsure how to build more trust with your ideal audience? Not to worry, tune into The BrandMade Podcast Ep. 24 and find out how you can build trust online without having to relying on testimonials.