Marketing is undoubtedly one of the hardest parts of being a business
owner and putting your service business out there in the world makes even the
best of entrepreneurs uneasy. You only want to focus on the creative side of
your service business BUT you know that sales are the bare bones of your
business without which there is no business. The idea of selling, showing up,
and offering your services to your audience feels plain HARD to most business
owners. Are you one of them? If you’re nodding ‘yes’, then this blog post is
just for you!
Marketing is a pretty vast and scary topic but it does not have to be so
if you break it down into manageable chunks and tackle each one step by step!
If you have read other blogs I have written in the past, you would know that I
am all about sharing quick + easy tips for service businesses to implement and
level up their brands. Here are 4 pre-requisites any service business
should have in place before you start marketing your offerings. Without these,
your marketing efforts would not really be effective let alone successful.
Ready for a strategic look at your marketing? Let’s do this!
DETAILED KNOWLEDGE OF YOUR
IDEAL CLIENTS
Who are your services and offerings for? Definitely not everybody! If you
said everybody, you need to start thinking deeper. This is one of the first
things I work on with my clients when branding for their service business - get
deep into finding every possible detail of their ideal clients who will benefit
the most from the services offered. These are the people you want to target
because they need exactly what you are selling and they are in the best
position to pay you (and not just pay but pay more!) for that + your expertise.
So not the question is - how do you find out more about these ideal clients?
Great question! And here’s how - by asking them! Super simple.
Identify some personality traits of your ideal clients starting with some
basic factors like age, gender, lifestyle choices, spending habits, etc (thanks
to social media, you can easily identify your ideal people through the things
they post! It’s a great starting point at least). Once you have a few people
who fit your ideal client profile, simply reach out to them and check if they
are okay to answer a few research questions. People are generally ready to help
as far as I have seen! The way I ask questions that help me get details about
their needs, problems (tip: include questions that would make them talk
about their problems!), mindset, and expectations - is through a survey. I
love using Typeform to create a quick
and easy survey that captures all the information for me in a visually pleasing
way. Even for my people, Typeform makes the survey process quite simple and
intuitive which helps them complete the task in no time (win-win!). Send this
survey to as many people as you can and that’s how you have the first piece of
the puzzle sorted in this game of marketing, my friend :)
CAREFULLY CREATED OFFER
Next, if you completed the information gathering step nicely, you should
have enough data to work off of. Remember you asked your ideal clients about
their problems and pain points? Now’s the time to use that data! Study their
answers and find patterns. If you’re studying a similar group of people who fit
your ideal client profile, then you WILL find patterns and overlapping problems
that your people are facing. This is the GOLD you’re looking for! Now that you
know what your people are going through, carefully create or structure your
offer/package/service around this so that you’re positioning your service business
to solve this exact problem. Feel free to get creative here. You can have one
offer/package that solves a group of problems or you can have multiple
offers/packages that solve different problems respectively. When you have these
nicely structured out, you will get a boost in your confidence when you get
into sales calls or in-person meetings because now you have exact solutions to
your ideal client’s problem/s. this is the second key piece in marketing your
service business successfully.
YOUR UNIQUE MAGIC!
Why should people choose you over anyone else who may be offering the
same solutions to their problems? The answer lies in your uniqueness. When branding
for creatives, this is a high-priority element that I uncover during the
brand strategy phase. No marketing effort is complete without a touch of your
unique magic that makes your offer stand out. This uniqueness in your niche can
be in the form of your process, your personality, or even the way you make your
audience feel - each tiny thing can become the factor that sets you apart. So
don’t focus too much on following the footsteps of your competitors. Get
creative and do things differently. Your uniqueness will shine through when you
market your services, attracting the right fit clients whom you don’t have to
chase and sell to!
PRICING YOUR CREATIVE SERVICES
This is where a lot of creatives go wrong so I would advise spending some
time pricing your offers respective to your packages and get well versed with
them. Having defined offers and prices will reduce the back and forth between
you and your ideal clients leading to much quicker conversions. You can always
tweak and adjust your pricing and make your packages more custom but setting a
base is the way to go. Now, pricing can depend on a number of factors like -
your niche, your competition, and your audience type. But since we are talking
about high-ticket services, the best way to price your services is ‘value-based
pricing’. Here you price your services based on the value your services bring
to your client and how much are they going to benefit from your work in the
long run. Let me explain with an example: Say you are a copywriter and you’re
hired to write the copy for your client’s sales page of their signature
program. This one-time service you provide will bring in upward of 6 figures in
revenue to this client which makes your sales copy so valuable to them! Now
think how much you deserve to make from this project? I’m guessing at least $2K
or more, whatever feels right to you. That is the mindset you need to adopt
when pricing your creative services. Having said that, pricing can be tricky so
know that nothing is set in stone. You can always change up, charge more, and
adjust pricing as you go. Everything is allowed in your creative world, after
all, you’re the boss for a reason!
How was that for you? If marketing scares you and you don’t really know
where to start, this would be a good starting point. Now’s the time to take
action and work on these steps till we get to part 2 of this 2 part blog series
on marketing your service business! Got questions or stuck somewhere? You’ve
got all the help! Comment below or reach out to me at hello@twelveandtwentyeight.com
or even better, let’s hang out on Instagram where we
can have fun conversations while working through your marketing questions! Talk
to you soon, friend :)