THE ONE THING YOU NEED TO SIGN DREAM CLIENTS
Signing clients is often the biggest struggle for us as social media managers.
We get social media, we know how powerful it is and we know what works but for some reason, when it comes to our own business, we forget everything we know and sit in struggle for months.
Maybe you’ve just completed your training to become a social media manager but were never actually told HOW to get clients.
Maybe you’re self taught, can grow a huge following but no one actually wants to buy.
Maybe you attract new clients but they’re the cheap ones who want to pay peanuts for your services and micromanage everything you do.
Or maybe you have a great sales call, great communications and then they ghost you or tell you you’re too expensive.
Whatever obstacles you’re facing when it comes to signing dream clients, I guarantee this one thing is missing.
Before I’d officially launched my business as a social media manager, I’d received messages from multiple businesses asking me to manage their social media for them.
After spending hours agonising over what to charge, typing out a price, deleting it, typing out a lower price, deleting it, typing out an even lower price, I’d send off my proposal already telling myself the client wasn’t going to say yes.
And you know what happened?
I got a big fat NO.
I was told my prices were too high or I was ghosted completely.
At the time, I was offering my services for £299 per month per platform which, considering my experience and the results I’d achieved previously, I felt was a good deal.
A bloody brilliant deal actually.
However, the more times I heard the word no, the more my confidence in my abilities began to fade.
I dropped my prices lower and lower and still couldn’t sign anyone.
I soon realised the problem wasn’t my prices, the problem was ME.
I’d only interact with a potential client via email because I was SCARED to hop on a phone call with them.
The fear of saying the wrong thing or losing my train of thought mid sentence gave me such bad anxiety, I'd stick to crafting emails.
But only communicating via email means you can't build the same, solid relationship with a potential client.
When I worked through my visibility fears and the worry of jumping on a call with a potential client, my confidence began to increase.
I was achieving something, even if it was just having a phone call with a dream client.
With my new found confidence, I had a call with someone who’d found me through Twitter.
They wanted me to manage three platforms, handle their email marketing and write blog posts.
Feeling the butterflies fluttering in my stomach, I quoted them £1,000 (which to me, at the time was a HUGE amount) and they countered with €1,000 which worked out around £800 - my loss.
I agreed to the loss (because I had bills to pay) and we started working together.
Despite the increased reach, increased engagement and increased following of target audience within the first month, they were unhappy as they’d had no conversions.
I don’t need to explain to you, as a social media manager, that when you have a page full of purchased likes, a brand new brand and no previous strategy in place, the process takes time…
The client ghosted me.
They didn’t pay their invoice and ignored any emails or messages I sent to them.
Confidence, once again, knocked.
When a company found me through my Facebook page and emailed me asking me to work with them, I was delighted.
But also kinda terrified.
In their email, they’d explained they wanted me for 6 hours a week at a rate of $12 USD an hour.
By this point, I was about 8 months into my business and knew I was worth more than that.
I also knew that to get good results and to actually make a difference to their brand, I’d need longer than 6 hours a week.
When I responded, I explained I wanted to go all in for them, that 6 hours wasn’t enough time and that my hourly rate was $25 an hour but I loved their brand so would drop it to $20 ph.
They were excited, I was excited and they said a huge YES.
I felt confident, I’d stood up for myself and recognised my own worth.
A few months later, when I realised I was working all the hours but barely making enough to cover my living expenses, I knew I needed to reevaluate things.
Whilst I was working with dream clients, I wasn’t making the money I needed and thanks to the imposter syndrome that made me overdeliver, I’d added on extra services without charging any more money.
What started out as a good deal had slowly amounted to around £115 per platform.
I hired a coach to help me out and the first thing she made me do was take a day off.
Over the coming weeks, she encouraged me to work on my mindset every day.
At first, I was like “Are you joking? I’ve hired you to help with my business, not my mindset!” But as the weeks went by, as I noticed my self confidence increasing, I noticed a few shifts that were already impacting my business:
I was showing up more online without even thinking about it
I was inviting potential clients to hop on a call and the pre-chat nerves were no longer there
I was the one in charge of the calls and the fears of messing it up were gone
I finally noticed just how valuable myself and my services were
The biggest change? I increased my prices to £400 per platform per month and almost immediately, I signed a DREAM client.
Not one that micromanaged.
Not one that expected extra.
Not one that failed to pay on time.
Not one that I was scared to have a call with.
A dream client.
Have you figured out the ONE thing I needed from my stories?
It’s the ONE thing you need to sign your dream clients too.
CONFIDENCE.
If you have confidence in yourself you:
Show up consistently and give value
Invite potential clients to chat with you
Position yourself as an expert without even realising it
Charge your worth which means earning the money you actually NEED
Automatically attract dream clients just by being yourself
Take daily action that moves you forward in your business
Trust the nudges you have, your ideas, the strategy you create
Make time for yourself
Plan out exactly what you need to do to achieve your goals
Don’t make excuses for why something isn’t working
See the solution, not the problem
When you have confidence in yourself, in your services, in your business, signing dream clients becomes a habit, something you do without thinking.
A few of my favourite exercises to help you increase your confidence include:
Repeating positive affirmations
Journaling out your worries, writing as your future self, completing empowerment lists
Listen to audiobooks, read personal development books, watch Ted Talks and videos on YouTube
Positive self talk: Watch how you speak to yourself on a daily basis. Tell yourself how well you’re doing, focus on what you’ve achieved, not what you haven’t, practise being grateful for everything you have
Dress to impress instead of sitting around in your pjs all day feeling like a slob
I hope this was helpful for you and has shown you the missing puzzle piece you need to sign those dream clients you DESERVE.