self-worth


Mindset Secrets to Successfully Selling Premium Coaching Packages

In this week’s guest post Ling Wong uses her expertise and knowledge as she shares:

Mindset Secrets to Successfully Selling Premium Coaching Packages

By ling wong

"Mindset Secrets to Successfully Selling Premium Coaching Packages" by Ling Wong

A lot of business trainings tell us to sell coaching packages instead of single sessions, and raise our fees while we are at it so we can earn more, work less and have more energy to deliver our best services to our clients. Some of these trainings probably showed you how to design a program and price it.

Sounds good in theory, but… let me ask you – how much are your clients actually paying you? Do you consider the amount you are paid “premium”? (hmm, can you take just one or two new clients a month to pay the bills and more?)

Maybe you have a premium package sitting somewhere on your website, but you somehow have never been paid a “premium” fee; or you revert back to selling the “old” lower-cost packages when the rubber meets the road, i.e. during your sales conversation, because fears and doubts creep in and you chicken out.

If you (intellectually) know offering a premium package is better for your business, and you also have the knowledge to create the package – why aren’t you selling it? Where is the disconnect?

YOU, hold the answer. It’s all in your head.

Everything can sound good on paper, until it comes time to ask for the money.

There are a lot of fears, pre/misconceptions and judgments around “selling”, self-worth and value. Until you bust through these mindset hurdles, you will never feel completely comfortable during a sales conversation.

Your comfort level in asking to get paid is proportional to how much you ultimately get paid.

Preconception

Nobody likes being pushed into buying, and we may perceive people selling to be “bad” because some salesperson gave us bad experience. If you had bad experience with sales people, it is easy to equate selling as “dishonest,” and who wants to be perceived as such? Of course you don’t want to, so you hold back from selling.

Plus, there are many unfavorable images we associate with people doing selling – e.g. the used car salesman, the late-night infomercial dude, even that pushy MLM friend who won’t let you off the hook until you reluctantly sign up for stuff that you don’t want.

What if I tell you, selling = serving? What if you can serve your potential clients while you sell them your services? Educational marketing is a great example. You give people information and provide value to raise awareness about a problem. When they understand the problem they have actually has a solution and you, standing right there, provides that service – they will want to seek you out without you pushing your wares.

I sign a lot more clients after I changed my approach in my discovery sessions from constantly worrying about “what can I say or ask to get them to buy my stuff?” to “what questions can I ask to help this person see a solution to her challenges?” This change in attitude can give the energy behind sales conversations a major overhaul.

QuestionHow can you lead your potential clients into exploring working with you by serving them?

Fears

What kind of selling works? Genuine selling. The kind that you don’t hide behind scripts and templates. The kind that you put yourself forward and connect with your potential clients. But our fears are making us hide… instead of making the connection so critical to getting “yes” from potential clients.

The Fear of Not Being Good Enough can make you feel that you, being yourself, are not enough. It makes you feel there gotta be a script that holds the key to the perfect sales conversation. Maybe you fear that you don’t know enough so you keep babbling on about what you know and where you were trained… completely negating the potential client (who just wants to be heard and be given a damn solution!)

Don’t forget that little voice in your head that keeps saying “who are you to ask for that much money?”

The Fear of Not Being Worthy can cause you to confuse “self-worth” to what people are paying you for – i.e. our services that will give them results. When you don’t feel worthy of being paid, guess what… you don’t get paid!

The Fear of Lack can make you discount or settle for the client purchasing a smaller package even though you know she needs something more extensive because you don’t want to end up with nothing! By settling for less, at least you get the client to pay you something… (note how this makes you come from a place of lack, and not one of service)

The Fear of Being Vulnerable can get you to puff up as a protective mechanism, setting up a wall that prevents you from deeply connecting with your potential clients (people buy high-ticket items with emotions, you need to make that connection). Or, maybe you are afraid of being criticized so you hide from having conversations with potential clients or JV partners. If you hide, they can’t find you!

The Fear of Rejection can make you not ask for more money under the misconception that you will get more “no’s” if your price is higher. If you have this fear, the problem is not the price, the problem is you not having figured out how to communicate the value you deliver.

Question

Can you recognize when you fears kick in during your sales conversations?

Boundary and Codependency

In this article, I explored money boundary and codependency extensively. Here is the highlight:

  • If you are undercharging and not asking for a “premium price,” you may feel that you need to give everyone access to your service and you have the limiting belief or misconception that you can “help more people” by charging less. (You are trying to give everyone your stuff whether they want it or not – and this, is a violation of the other person’s boundary.)
  • If you are over-delivering (e.g. going overtime during your sessions, writing pages after pages of support emails, “throwing in” extras), essentially giving “premium” services without being compensated for it, you may be feeling responsible for your clients’ results even though they need to do the work to succeed. Because you feel responsible, you would bend over backwards – compromising your own boundaries in order to “help” that person with the misconception that somehow, you can do the work for your client (By the way, the client may or may not want to be helped, so in a way, you are violating that her personal choice.)
  • If you have been constantly discounting, you may be buying into the client’s money stories and somehow made felt responsible that your fee will turn into the cause of her distress so you discount to make yourself feel better. (By the way, you have no rights to decided for the other person what she can or cannot afford… it’s her priority and her decisions to make.)
  • If you have been giving away services for free – STOP! This is martyr mentality stemming from a fear of not being worthy (you are trying to prove to yourself that you are) and can turn into victimhood that kicks you off the driver’s seat altogether.

When your boundary is overstepped, it is you who allows that to happen.

QuestionIf it’s your boundary crime to commit, can you recognize your triggers and “rehearse” what you can do or say in those situations?

Self-Worth vs the Value of Your Program

I have a bone with the phrase “charge what you are worth” – I explained it in this post.

If you can separate your self-worth from the value you deliver through your program, then the question “how can my time be worth that much” will not even enter the equation.

Focus on the value your clients get out of your program or service package, not how much time you spend on the phone with them.

If they get a more out of your service than what they pay you, then offering them your package is doing them a service. The key, again, is to communicate effectively so they understand the value of your program, and the impact it has on their lives.

ExerciseWrite down how your work impacts your clients in the areas of health, career, finance, relationship and personal growth. Then put a monetary value (wherever possible) against each item. Now, add it all up and see for yourself how much value you deliver. Can you charge more?

***

Selling, and selling high-ticket items, is not scary. You can sell more with integrity by having the right mindset and perspective, overcoming your fears, strengthening your boundaries, and properly communicating the value of your offer.

About Ling Wong

Ling offers “Business Soulwork + Marketing Activation” to help coaches nail their Messages, claim their Superpowers and muster up the Guts to monetize their Truth so they can build a purposeful and profitable Personality-Driven business that is a full expression of their individuality and creativity.

Through her “left brain meets right brain” approach, Ling helps her clients tap into their intuition and ground those light bulb moments with practical strategies and marketing tactics to build a profitable and sustainable business.

Ready to Nail Your Message, Claim Your Superpowers and Monetize Your Truth for a Personality-Driven business? Get your FREE “Monetize Your Truth Mindset + Marketing Training” here.


Why do we need friends?

In today’s guest post Jan Read shares some thoughts around something dear to her heart.

"Why do we need friends?" A guest post by Jan Read

Why do we need friends?

By Jan Read

How many of you are aware that Sunday 4th August is National Friendship Day?

If our friends & friendships are important to us – why don’t we recognise this special day in the UK?

National Friendship Day is widely celebrated in other parts of the World – Singapore, Malaysia, South America & India – where friendship bracelets originated and are exchanged as a sign of friendship.

So I’m going to ask two questions to help you think about friendship this special weekend

  1. What is friendship and why do we need friends?
  2. How can friendship be incorporated into your coaching?

Why do we need friends? A guest post  By Jan Read, laughter photo

What is friendship?

The Oxford English Dictionary defines a friend as ‘A person with whom one has a bond of mutual affection, typically one exclusive of sexual or family relations’

Friendship is something we probably all take for granted and probably don’t realise how important it is?

The health benefits are well researched and the Mayo clinic lists these as:

  • Increasing your sense of belonging and purpose
  • Boosting your happiness
  • Reducing stress
  • Improving your self-worth
  • Helping you cope with traumas, such as divorce, serious illness, job loss or the death of a loved one
  • Encouraging you to change or avoid unhealthy lifestyle habits, such as excessive drink or lack of exercise

How many of these are issues that you are dealing with in your coaching work on a regular basis – could friendship be a solution?

Why do we need friends? A guest post  By Jan Read, linked hands photo

At various stages in our lives we need different kinds of friends for different reasons and we all have a variety of friends that can loosely be classified into three groups:

Best friends – who you would tell everything to

Social friends – who you would go somewhere or do something with

Acquaintances – Facebook friends/work friends

Is it better to have two or three close friends or a list of three hundred on a social networking site? Humans are generally regarded as ‘social’ animals and look for social interactions as part of their lifestyle. Some people are happy to share their time with just one or two people while others like the buzz of a group of friends around them.

We are all different and what matters is personal to each individual.

As a child there is an innocence & naivety to making friends – ‘Hello, what’s your name?’ – is usually enough in a playground to have a friend for an hour, a day or sometimes even a lifetime.

As we get older it becomes more difficult to make friends, our time is taken up with relationships, families and work and the definition of friendship takes on a new meaning.

With mobile phones, laptops and an ever increasing use of the Internet, we are also seeing new types of friendships evolving. With the advent of Facebook ‘friends’ and the popping up of past colleagues through Friends Re-united, LinkedIn etc, the scope of our friendships is widening and these social interactions shouldn’t be dismissed as not being ‘friendships’ too.

For many people a quick interaction through Facebook with someone they might only see once a year is a great way to keep in touch and be part of that person’s life.

Why do we need friends? A guest post  By Jan Read, word friends made from blocks photo

How can friendship be incorporated into your coaching?

Many clients will seek support from a coach when they are questioning how they can make changes to improve their life?

Finding new friends or developing existing friendships can be a solution to a variety of issues outlined below:

  • Life changing circumstances which may involve the loss of friends – leaving work, moving house to a different area, empty nesting, bereavement or divorce.
  • Loneliness is one of the major social problems facing the UK today. According to the Office for National Statistics, in 2012 it was estimated that 29% of all households consist of just one person. You can have a wide range of social friends but still be lonely if you live on your own.
  • A lack of self-confidence to join a club or go somewhere on your own when you’re used to having someone else go along with you.
  • ‘Toxic friends’ who may be causing significant problems but the thought of how to replace that friend may be just as overwhelming.
  • Unfulfilled dreams or ambitions – having a ‘Bucket List’ which becomes unachievable through the lack of having someone to go along with or share the experience.

Think more about how friendship could be brought into your coaching – it’s something we take for granted and yet to many people it could be the key to unlock the door into their future.

On National Friendship Day on Sunday please think of your friends and tell them how special they are to you. Arrange a get-together with a group of them or meet up with your special ‘bestie’ and give them a friendship token – let’s start to make National Friendship Day special.

About Jan Read

close up resizedMy own experience of wanting to find new friends came about following treatment for breast cancer 18 months ago. My individual life changing moment was when I realised that I was fed up of not being able to do the things I wanted – when I wanted because often I had no-one to go with.

I have a great group of friends and socialise often but not everyone likes my ‘weird’ taste in music or wants to climb a mountain, most have family commitments and aren’t always free when I am.

My solution was to set up a website which offers people the opportunity to find the friends they want. It doesn’t matter whether it’s to share an interest, a one-off trip or a regular outing somewhere – it’s important to find be able to find the friends be with.

www.lotsincommon.com is free to join and gives people the opportunity to link up with like minded people

Log on – Link up – Live life

Twitter: @LotsInCommon

Facebook: www.facebook.com/LotsInCommon

 


Selling Made Simple 1

Supercoach Michael Neill shares some thoughts on selling in this week’s guest post.

Selling Made Simple

by Michael Neill

Over the past couple of days, I’ve really enjoyed participating on a “Creating Clients” seminar given by Supercoach Academy faculty members Steve Chandler and Rich Litvin. We were challenged, cajoled, and at times even coddled through the process of facing up to and breaking through our fears about enrolling clients and selling our products and services in the world.

While there were a number of wonderful strategies shared throughout the weekend for inviting conversations and making powerful proposals, I became fascinated early on by a simple question that was being asked by the still, small voice in the back of my head:

What would selling be like if I didn’t know anything about how to do it and was completely comfortable with that fact?

The first thing I realized is that I would show up without much on my mind. I wouldn’t fill my head with affirmations about my self-worth or “visualize success”. If I had any intention at all, it would simply be to see what I could best do to assist, help, or serve the person in front of me.

Not having much on my mind would leave me very present. This quality of presence would ensure both high quality listening and a natural, unforced human connection.

I wouldn’t need to prepare any questions because anything I wanted to ask would arise instinctively out of my curiosity and interest in answering fundamental questions like “what would make the biggest positive difference in your life right now?”, “how can I serve you?”, and for myself, “do I want to?”

Because I’m comfortable not knowing what I don’t know, if you asked me anything that I hadn’t thought about, I would just think about it in the moment. If a satisfactory answer didn’t come, I would promise to get back to you when I had an answer and then keep my promise.

I wouldn’t have any fear about telling you the cost of my product or service because (as Steve repeatedly pointed out throughout the weekend) it would be no more significant than giving you my phone number so you could get in touch if you wanted to speak further. And if I hadn’t already decided what my fee was, I would make it up based on what would make me want to choose you as the next person to serve.

My lack of agenda would inoculate against the appearance of much “sales resistance”, and concepts like “overcoming objections” would become irrelevant because my job is to find a way to serve you, not to find a way to get you to do what I want. In fact, selling would never feel forced or manipulative because if I couldn’t find a way to serve you that I actually wanted to do, I would just move on to the next person.

If I wasn’t enjoying my sales and enrollment conversations, I would know that either I had slipped into thinking my job was to “make a sale”, or that perhaps I wasn’t terribly convinced that what I had to offer would actually be of service.

As the essayist Lawrence Platt writes:

“If you’re experiencing enrolling others in your possibility as a chore, it’s likely you haven’t yet completely distinguished your possibility. If you possibility is authentic, if it’s clear, if it’s genuine, then it’s inspiring to you. When it’s inspiring to you, then it’s inspiring to others. No effort is required for it to be enrolling. Inspiration grounded in possibility is naturally contagious: everyone gets it, everyone wants it. It literally enrolls others by itself.”

When we began enrolling Supercoach Academy three years ago, my first instruction to the enrollment team was that I would evaluate their effectiveness by how often I was thanked by potential students for allowing them the chance to speak with my team. I figured that if we found a way for people to feel grateful for being “sold to”, chances were we would not only wind up making sales, we’d also wind up building strong relationships for the future.

What made my reflections this weekend so powerful was the realization that “sales as service” isn’t just a clever ideology – it is the most natural and unforced way to sell, and as such will provoke the least internal resistance to the process.

In other words, when selling is really about you, not me, it’s really fun to do. Since I’m enjoying doing it, I’ll do more of it. As I do more and more of it, I’ll get better at it. And when I start getting noticeably better at it, chances are I’ll begin to enjoy it even more…

Have fun, learn heaps, and a belated Happy Mother’s Day to all!

With all my love,

Michael

About the author

Michael Neill is an internationally renowned success coach and the best-selling author of You Can Have What You Want, Feel Happy Now!, the Effortless Success audio program and Supercoach: 10 Secrets to Transform Anyone’s Life. He has spent the past 21 years as a coach, adviser, friend, mentor and creative spark plug to celebrities, CEO’s, royalty, and people who want to get more out of their lives. His books have been translated into 13 languages, and his public talks and seminars have been well received at the United Nations and around the world.

Copyright © 2012 Michael Neill. All Rights Reserved